path: root/77375-0.txt

*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77375 ***
                               * * * * *
                                MISSION
                                   TO
                               ASHANTEE.
                               * * * * *


[Illustration: A Map _shewing the_ _DISCOVERIES & IMPROVEMENTS_ _in the_
Geography _of_ WESTERN AFRICA _resulting from the_ _MISSION to ASHANTEE_
_by_ _T. E. Bowdich_ _Conductor_ 1817

_REPORTED COURSES_ of the NIGER to the NILE, GAMBAROO to CAUDEE,
OOGOOAWAI to the CONGO.

_London published as the Act directs by John Murray Albemarle Street
4th. Jany. 1819._

_J. Walker Sculpt._]


                                MISSION
                         FROM CAPE COAST CASTLE
                                   TO
                              =ASHANTEE,=
                                 WITH A
                  STATISTICAL ACCOUNT OF THAT KINGDOM,
                                  AND
                  GEOGRAPHICAL NOTICES OF OTHER PARTS
                                 OF THE
                          INTERIOR OF AFRICA.

                               * * * * *
                       BY T. EDWARD BOWDICH, ESQ.
                               CONDUCTOR.
                               * * * * *

“Quod si præ metu et formidine pedem referemus, ista omnia nobis adversa
                             futura sunt.”

                                LONDON:
                               * * * * *
                     JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE-STREET.
                                 1819.


              * * * * *
  London: printed by W. Bulmer and Co.
     Cleveland-Row, St. James’s.




                             INTRODUCTION.

                               * * * * *


A curiosity throughout Europe, proportionate to the ignorance of the
Interior of Africa, exacts the publication of the proceedings and
researches of every Exploratory Mission, from its Conductor, as a duty
to the Public: “mandat fieri sibi talia.”

The Public, in acknowledgment of the performance of the duty, reflecting
that it constrains literary efforts which the Author otherwise might
never have presumed to expose, should sympathise in his diffidence and
anxiety, and receive and review them as a task imposed, and not as a
spontaneous essay.

If this indulgence is due even to gentlemen who have had the most
enviable opportunities of qualifying themselves at the expense of a
liberal Government, it is surely secure to one who never enjoyed those
advantages; but, being suddenly called to the immediate conduct of a
Mission, originated by a public Board of very contracted means, when
estranged from all facilities, had no resource to aid his realization of
the scientific desiderata, beyond the acquirements common to most
private gentlemen.

The vessel in which I am making my passage to England having been
chartered to trade in the River Gaboon, which is immediately on the
Line, I diverted a tedious delay of seven weeks in so unhealthy a
situation, by visiting Naängo, a town about fifty miles from the mouth
of the River, where I collected Geographical Accounts of the Interior,
from several intelligent traders, and numerous slaves from different
countries. I have added this compilation, (as it may borrow some
interest from the adjacency of the Congo,) with a few notices of the
customs and productions of this ruder part of Africa.




                               CONTENTS.

                               * * * * *


                                PART I.

  CHAP. I.—The Objects and Departure of the Mission.               3

  CHAP. II—The Route and Reception of the Mission.                14

  CHAP. III.—Proceedings and Incidents until the Third            42
  Dispatch to Cape Coast Castle.

  CHAP. IV.—Proceedings and Incidents until the Signing of       101
  the Preliminaries to a General Treaty.

  CHAP. V.—Proceedings and Incidents until the Ratification      118
  of a General Treaty.

  CHAP. VI.—Proceedings and Incidents until the completion of    131
  the Mission and its return to Cape Coast Castle.

                               PART II.

  CHAP. I.—Geography.                                            161

  CHAP. II.—History.                                             228

  CHAP. III.—Constitution and Laws.                              252

  CHAP. IV.—Superstitions.                                       261

  CHAP. V.—Customs.                                              274

  CHAP. VI.—Architecture, Arts, and Manufactures.                304

  CHAP. VII.—Climate, Population, Revenue, City, Market, &c.     315

  CHAP. VIII.—Trade.                                             330

  CHAP. IX.—Language.                                            344

  CHAP. X.—Music.                                                361

  CHAP. XI.—Materia Medica and Diseases.                         370

  CHAP. XII.—Mr. Hutchison’s Diary.                              381

  CHAP. XIII.—Sketch of Gaboon, and its Interior.                422

  CHAP. XIV.—Suggestions for future Missions to the Interior     453
  of Africa.

                               APPENDIX.

  NO. I.—Extract from Meredith’s Account of the Gold Coast.      463

  NO. II.—Translations of an Arabic MS. Descriptive of Mr.       478
  Park’s Death.

  NO. III.—Arabic Routes.                                        482

  NO. IV. Dr. Leach’s Notice of Reptiles, Insects, &c.           493

  NO. V.—Thermometer Account.                                    497

  NO. VI.—Vocabularies.                                          504




                   DIRECTIONS FOR PLACING THE PLATES.


         Map                                    _to front the Title._

   1.    A Captain in his War-dress                   _to face p._ 32

         Arabic Circular                                          128

         Map from Dapper                                          211

   2.    The first Day of the Yam Custom                          275

   3.    The oldest House in Coomassie                            307

   4.    Quarters of the Chief of the Embassy                   _ib._

   5.    Odumata’s sleeping room                                  307

   6.    Inner square of Apokoo’s house                         _ib._

   7. }
      }  Piazzas of the palace                                    308
   8. }

   9.    Part of Adoom Street                                   _ib._

  10.    Exterior of the King’s bed room                        _ib._

         Ichnographical Sketch of Coomassie                       323

         Ashantee Music                                           365

         Empoöngwa Music                                          449

                               * * * * *

                                ERRATA.

  Map.—Affix the name Leeasa to the river flowing from the Niger by
  Boussa.

  Page 9.—After Frederick James, Esq. add, Member of Council, and
  Governor of Accra.

  Page 72.—For dated, read _dictated_.




                               GLOSSARY.


  Croom. A town or village.

  Caboceer. A chief or magistrate.

  Pynin. An elder or counsellor.

  Palaver. A dispute, debate, argument, or suit.

  Book or Note. A certificate of a monthly pension of the African
  Committee, paid in trade to the Fantee Kings and Chiefs in the
  neighbourhood of the British settlements, in consideration of their
  attachment, influence, and services; which Books or Notes were claimed
  by the King of Ashantee, as his by right of conquest.

  Stool. Throne, seat in council, inheritance.

  Custom. A festival, carnival, public ceremony, funeral rite.

  Panyar. To seize or kidnap.

  A Benda. Two ounces four ackies, or £9. currency.

  A Periguin. Two ounces eight ackies, or £10. currency.

  An Ackie. Five shillings currency.

  A Tokoo. Ten pence.

  A Dash. A present.

  Fetish. A charm, amulet, deity. Any supernatural power or influence.
  Any thing sacred.




                               * * * * *
                          MISSION TO ASHANTEE.
                                PART I.
                               * * * * *


                          MISSION TO ASHANTEE.
                               * * * * *

                               CHAPTER I.

                               * * * * *

              _The Objects, and Departure of the Mission._


Bosman and Barbot mention the Ashantees as first heard of by Europeans
about the year 1700; the latter calls it Assiantee or Inta, and writes,
that it is west of Mandingo, and joins Akim on the east; he asserts its
pre-eminence in wealth and power. Issert, a physician in the Danish
service, who meditated a visit to Ashantee, writes, “this mighty king
has a piece of gold, as a charm, more than four men can carry; and
innumerable slaves are constantly at work for him in the mountains, each
of whom must collect or produce two ounces of gold per diem. The Akims
formerly dug much gold, but they are now forbidden by the King of
Ashantee, to whom they are tributary, as well as the Aquamboos,
previously a very formidable nation.” Mr. Dalzel heard of the Ashantees
at Dahomey, as very powerful, but imagined them, the Intas, and the
Tapahs, to be one and the same nation. Mr. Lucas, when in Mesurata, was
informed that Assentai was the capital of the powerful kingdom of
Tonouwah. In Mr. Murray’s enlarged edition of Dr. Leyden’s discoveries
in Africa, we find, “the northern border of Akim extends to Tonouwah,
denominated also Inta, Assientè, or Assentai, from its capital city of
that name, which stands about eighteen days journey from the Gold
Coast.”

In 1807 an Ashantee army reached the Coast for the first time. I would
refer the reader to the extract in the Appendix, from Mr. Meredith’s
account of the Gold Coast, as the particulars are introductory as well
as interesting; and also serve to correct the misstatement in the work
last quoted, that in 1808 the King of Ashantee destroyed the English
fort of Annamaboe; originating, probably, from the storm of the Dutch
fort at Cormantine, at that time.

The Ashantees invaded Fantee again in 1811, and the third time in 1816.
These invasions inflicted the greatest miseries on the Fantees. Few were
slain in battle, for they rarely dared to encounter the invaders; but
the butcheries in cold blood were incredible, and thousands were dragged
into the interior to be sacrificed to the superstitions of the
conquerors. Famines, unmitigated by labour, succeeded the wide waste of
the Fantee territory, the wretched remnant of the population abandoning
itself to despair; and the prolonged blockade of Cape Coast Castle in
the last invasion, engendered so much distress and hazard, that the
Government having averted imminent danger by advancing a large sum of
gold on account of the Fantees, earnestly desired the Committee to
authorise and enable them to venture an Embassy, to deprecate these
repeated calamities, to conciliate so powerful a monarch, and to
propitiate an extension of commerce. By the store ship which arrived in
1817, the African Committee forwarded liberal and suitable presents, and
associated scientific with the political objects of the Mission, in
their instructions, which I submit in explanation.

“In order to enable you to redeem the promise to the King of Ashantee
(and as we are sanguine in our hopes of the good that may result from
it), we send you sundry articles as presents for him, to which you may
add such others from the public stores as you may deem desirable,
provided they will not materially increase the expense. The Committee
are extremely anxious (and in this respect the wishes of all classes of
people in this country go with them) that no exertions should be spared
to become better acquainted with the Interior of Africa; and we consider
the existing state of things to be most favourable for undertaking an
exploratory Mission into the dominions of the King of Ashantee. If,
therefore, nothing shall have transpired in the interim of this dispatch
being received by you, to make the measure objectionable, we wish you to
obtain permission from the King to send an Embassy to his capital: if
granted, you will select three Gentlemen (one of them from the medical
department[1]) for that service; and let them be accompanied by a
respectable escort, you giving them the fullest instructions for their
government. In particular, it will be necessary for them to observe, and
report upon, the nature of the country; its soil and products; the
names, and distances, and the latitude and longitude of the principal
places; and its most remarkable natural objects: the appearance,
distinguishing characters, and manners of the natives; their religion,
laws, customs, and forms of government, as far as they can be
ascertained; and by whom each place is governed. When at Ashantee, they
should endeavour to obtain the fullest information of the countries
beyond, in each direction; particularly whether any high mountains,
lakes, or large rivers are known; and the width, depth, course, and
direction of the latter; and whether the water, as well of the lakes as
the rivers, is salt or fresh: and how far, and under what circumstances,
white men may travel with safety, especially in a northerly direction.
They should collect the most accurate information possible of the
extent, population, and resources of the Ashantee dominions, and should
report fully their opinion of the inhabitants, and of the progress they
may have made in the arts of civilized life. They should be directed
also, to procure and bring away (with the consent of the chiefs) any
specimens of vegetable and mineral productions they may be able: and to
ascertain where and how the natives collect the gold, and the extent to
which the trade in that article, and in ivory, might be carried on. It
would, we conceive, be a most important advantage, if the King of
Ashantee, and some of his chiefs, could be prevailed upon to send one or
more of their children to the Cape, to be educated at the expense of the
Committee (to be attended by their own servants, if required), under the
guarantee of the Governor and Council for their personal safety, and
that they should be sent back when required.

“Another great object would be, to prevail upon the King to form, and
keep open, a path not less than six feet wide, from his capital, as far
as his territories extend towards Cape Coast, you engaging on the part
of the Committee, to continue it from that point to Cape Coast, which we
presume may be done at a very small expense, by means of monthly
allowances to the chiefs of such villages as be in that line; upon
condition that they shall not allow the path to be overgrown with
underwood, or otherwise obstructed.

“It may perhaps be found, that high mountains, or a large river, may be
not many days journey beyond Ashantee; in which case, if the Gentlemen
composing the Embassy feel themselves secure in the attempt, they may
probably be disposed to proceed so far. In such event, we authorize you
to pay their drafts for any moderate sums which they may find it
necessary to expend, as well as for the general objects of the Mission.

“Besides the escort of which we have spoken, we think it necessary, or
at least extremely important, that the Embassy should be accompanied by
natives of character and consequence, conversant with the Ashantee
language, in whom you have perfect confidence, selected, one from each
of the towns of Cape Coast, Accra, and Apollonia, to whom you may make
reasonable allowances for their time and trouble.

“We have said that you should obtain the permission of the King of
Ashantee to send the Embassy: we have doubts of the expediency of
requiring hostages; but, we presume you will concur with us in thinking,
it will be necessary, before it leaves Cape Coast, that a man of
consequence should be specially sent down by the King, to serve as a
guide and protector; and who, on his journey to Cape Coast, may arrange
with the messenger whom you may send to the King, respecting the places
at which the Embassy may stop to refresh, and give directions to open
the paths that may be overgrown.

“The Gentlemen whom you may select, will of course be well advised by
you not to interfere with any customs of the natives, however absurd; or
in any way to give them offence. And they cannot too strongly impress
upon the minds of the King and people of Ashantee, that the only objects
his Britannic Majesty has in view, are, to extend the trade with that
country; to prevent all interruption to their free communication with
the waterside; and to instruct their children in reading, writing, &c.
from which, as may be easily pointed out, the greatest advantages must
arise to the Ashantees.

“From what has been said, you, Gentlemen, will perceive, that in
selecting the Embassy, it is important that one of the persons composing
it should be able to determine the latitude and longitude of places, and
that both shall be seasoned to the climate; of ability, physical and
mental; of cool tempers, and moderate habits; and possessed of fortitude
and perseverance; and that in the selection of their escort also, regard
be had to the qualifications of the parties in those respects. Among
them there should be a bricklayer, carpenter, blacksmith, gunsmith, and
cooper, with proper tools; if these persons can be spared for the
purpose. We wish also they should take with them a number of
_certificates regarding Major Peddie_, and his companions, to be
circulated as distinctly as possible in the Interior; for though the
period may be past when they might have been useful to those travellers,
it is yet possible that they may be of use in making generally known the
object of Government in sending white men to explore that country.”

The suggestion of hostages was wholly impracticable, for there was not
even time for a communication with the King. A variety of circumstances
conspired to urge the immediate dispatch of the Mission; our interests,
to say the least, imperiously demanded its early interference; and had
we waited for a formal permission from the King to relieve the
difficulties of the enterprise, the rainy season would have been too far
advanced, and the critical moment have escaped us. The Governor thought
it more advisable to dispatch the Mission without an escort, and two
native soldiers only were added to the bearers of the baggage. The
perusal of the Governor’s instructions will be satisfactory to the
reader:


                                   _Cape Coast Castle, April 19th_, 1817

    FREDERICK JAMES, ESQ. Member of Council, and Governor of Accra.

   SIR,

IN accepting your voluntary offer of conducting the Embassy to the King
of Ashantee, I have every reason to believe, that from your long
experience in this country, and your knowledge of the manners and habits
of the natives, it will terminate in a manner highly creditable to
yourself, and eventually prove of the greatest importance to the
commercial interest of Great Britain, which is the more immediate object
of the Mission; however, as many subjects of scientific research may be
associated with it, they are particularly recommended to your attention.
For this purpose Mr. Bowdich will accompany you; and I have no doubt he
will be found perfectly qualified to make the necessary observations, in
which you will afford him every facility and assistance. He is provided
with instruments for determining the latitude and longitude of places.
Mr. Hutchison, writer, and Mr. Tedlie, assistant surgeon, will also be
attached to the expedition.

The Ashantees, who are appointed your guides, have been selected by the
Ashantee Captain who is now here. They will, I hope, aid and assist you
in every thing that lays in their power.

In addition to the Committee’s instructions, a copy of which you have
herewith, you will attend to the following:

On the subject of your journey, I have nothing to observe further, than,
that I hope you will take every opportunity of travelling when there
will be the least exposure to the sun, as the officers who accompany you
have been but a short time in the country, and every precaution will be
necessary for the preservation of their health.

As soon as may be convenient after your arrival at the Ashantee capital,
you will of course see the King, and deliver him the various presents in
the name of the African Company, to be received by him as pledges of the
harmony and friendship which is ever to subsist between them; and also
of his good will towards the natives residing under the protection of
their different forts. You will not fail to impress upon his mind, the
great power, wealth, and consequence of the British nation, and how much
it is the interest of himself and his subjects, to promote and
perpetuate their present free intercourse with the water side. In the
course of your interview many circumstances will doubtless occur, which
will suggest various other matters proper to be mentioned to the King,
all which I shall leave entirely to your own discretion.

You will acquaint the King, that in order to secure a correct
communication between him and myself, I request his permission to allow
an officer to reside constantly at Commassey, who will defray all his
own expenses, and for whom you will build a house without loss of time.
A carpenter, bricklayer, and cooper are sent with you, and you will
leave them with Mr. Hutchison, who will remain as Resident. On your
departure you will give him full instructions in writing for his future
government, a copy of which you will deliver me upon your return.

You will keep an exact diary of every circumstance possessing the least
interest, a copy of which you will transmit me by every opportunity.

In the course of your stay in the Ashantee country, you will embrace
every occasion of becoming acquainted with the politics of that nation,
of ascertaining its extent and boundaries, the power of the King over
the lives and property of his subjects, the probable force he could
bring into the field, the number of his allies, the sources and amount
of his revenues. Whether he is tributary to any other power, and what
nations in his neighbourhood are tributary to him? The amount of
tribute, and in what articles paid? The rule of succession to the
throne? What are the punishments for crimes of all descriptions? Who are
the persons of most consequence next to the King? The names of their
offices, and the extent of their power: by whom, or how paid? What are
the most prominent features in the character, manners, and habits of the
people, &c. &c. &c.?

Are any human sacrifices made? Upon what occasions, and to what extent?
How are prisoners of war now disposed of?

Of what nation are the Moors that frequent the Ashantee country, and for
what purpose do they go there?

Ascertain the current medium of exchange, whether gold, or cowries; also
the usual prices at which the Ashantees sell the goods they purchase
from the Europeans on the sea coast; and the extent of their commercial
relations with the Interior.

You will enquire whether any European travellers have ever been seen or
heard of in any of the countries to the northward; and what became of
them? Whether any thing be known of the river Niger, or Joliba, as it is
called by the natives? This information you will probably obtain from
the Moors.

Ascertain the position of the Doncoe country, and the city of Kong; also
the mountains of that name. Refer to Park’s Travels, and acquire as much
information as possible of the regions lying between Ashantee and the
last places he visited. In short, leave nothing undone that may add to
our present imperfect geographical knowledge of the Interior.

You will receive herewith copies of certificates relative to Major
Pedde’s expedition, which you will distribute amongst any persons you
find travelling into the Interior from Ashantee.

It would be of the first importance to have a road cut directly down to
Cape Coast; and this you will urge to the King in the strongest manner.
Your observations will, of course, enable you to point out the proper
directions.

I inclose a sketch of a treaty, and it would be highly desirable if you
could procure its ratification by the King. He might perhaps make some
objection at first, but may be persuaded at length, by your address, and
reasoning. If he wished any trifling alteration made, you might use your
discretion in this respect.

You will acquaint the King, it is my wish that in future he receive his
company’s pay at this Castle, and not at Accra, as formerly. Should he
say any thing of an increase to his present allowance, you may give him
hopes that it will be granted to a reasonable extent, provided the
objects of this Mission be fulfilled, and after twelve months experience
shall have proved the sincerity of his friendship to the British
Government, and to the natives resident under its protection at the
various forts on the Coast.

From the jealous disposition of the natives of Africa, it is highly
probable, that in the prosecution of your enquiries, you will be subject
to many unfavourable suspicions. These you will take all possible care
to remove, by the most candid explanations on every point that may be
required.

You will particularly explain to the King, the ill treatment the people
of Cape Coast have experienced from those of Elmina, which has added
very much to the distresses they have for some time suffered from the
extreme scarcity of provisions; and there is reason to believe, that
this unjust persecution has been induced, from their presuming on their
connection with the Ashantees. Being perfectly aware that it has been
done without the concurrence of the King; I have no doubt but he will,
by a proper representation of the affair from you, exert his influence,
and prevent what is at present to be apprehended, and what the Elminas
are endeavouring to provoke—a war between the two people.

In all cases not provided for in these Instructions, you have of course
a discretionary power, which I am convinced you will make use of with
deliberation and prudence, and with becoming zeal for the service upon
which you are employed.

Wishing you a prosperous journey and a safe return,

                              I am, Sir, your most obedient Servant,

                                                        JOHN HOPE SMITH.


[Footnote 1: We recommend his being well supplied with dressings, &c.
for wounds, and bruises, so that he may be able to assist any natives
whom he may meet with requiring his aid: services of this sort give
Negroes an exalted idea of white men, and are always gratefully
remembered.]




                              CHAPTER II.

                               * * * * *

               _The Route, and Reception of the Mission._


The Mission left Cape Coast Castle on the morning of the 22d of April,
with the intention of quitting the water side at Moree, three miles and
a half to the eastward; but on reaching it, we were told that the path
thence to Payntree’s croom, always bad, was then impassable from the
rains; and that we must proceed to Annamaboe before we struck into the
bush for the Interior.

The reluctance of the carriers, who had been pressed into the service by
the authorities of the town, became thus early almost insuperable; the
consideration of pay and subsistence, and the reflection, that the
dearth inflicted by the invasions the Mission was to deprecate, allowed
them but a bare existence at home, were entirely lost in their aversion
to the undertaking, which was equally influenced by jealousy and
indolence: eleven deserted the first day; and the slender authority of
the King and caboceers of Annamaboe, delayed the procuring of others to
replace them until the next evening. One party was then started,
attended by a soldier and a messenger, as they persisted in laying down
their loads, even in the town; and many of the Annamaboes who had been
procured, after lifting their packages, which were of moderate weight,
walked off again, with the most insolent indifference. The devices by
which these people displayed their ill will were peculiarly their own,
and none could be more ingeniously tormenting. At four o’clock on
Thursday morning we started the remainder of the packages, and followed
them at half past six. Proceeding about two miles in a N.N.W. direction,
we descended a steep hill, a quarter of a mile in length, and entered a
beautiful valley, profusely covered with pines, aloes, and lilies; and
richly varied with palm, banana, plantain, and guava trees: the view was
refreshed by gentle risings crowned with cotton trees of a stupendous
size. I never saw soil so rich, or vegetation so luxuriant.

The first croom we reached was Quama’s, about three miles and a half
from Annamaboe; it presented but a few hovels; and we passed through
three others, Simquoi, Taphoo, and Nasmam, just as wretched and
insignificant, before we reached Booka, romantically situated amidst the
luxuriant foliage of a high hill, terminating the valley. Abra is about
three miles eastward of this croom: it has been entirely deserted since
the last invasion, the Ashantee army under Appia Nanu having made it
their head quarters. It formerly exceeded Annamaboe, but the little that
now remains is in ruin, the inhabitants having retired to the small
crooms of their caboceer, or Captain Quaggheree.

Passing through Tachradi, which scarcely existed but in name, we
ascended a gentle rising, with a small croom, called Acroofroom, on the
left hand. The astonishment of its miserable inhabitants engaging our
attention, the extensive area of the summit burst upon us with the more
effect. It was environed by small groves; and clumps of cotton trees
rose so happily in frequent spots, as to afford all the scenery of a
romantic little park; the broken rays of the sun stealing through the
small trees in the distance, to make the deep shade of the foreground
more imposing. The path then became more hilly, and the landscape fuller
of wood: our descents and risings frequently through long vistas, so
richly gilded with the sun on the summits, that, impressed with the
description of Issert, we naturally yielded to the expectation, in
ascending each eminence, that it would afford us the delightful prospect
of an open country; but we were disappointed, and passing through
Dunnasee and Assoquah, both small crooms, the latter situated on a long
level, about three miles and a half from Acroofroom, we shortly after
arrived at Payntree’s.

On the higher hills the soil was generally gravel, with large stones; on
the lesser, white flint and whinstone abounded: the levels presented few
stones, and the earth was black, strong, and rich, producing grass from
four to ten feet high. The country was very thinly inhabited, and more
sparingly cultivated, the cassada frequent, but producing little from
the want of cultivation.

I made Payntree’s croom barely fifteen miles from Annamaboe; judging
from time, it was guessed to be eighteen or twenty; but the impediments
which the path almost incessantly presented to a hammock, the
inequalities of the ground, and many delays which insensibly consumed
the time, conspired to make such a calculation of distance very
fallacious. The plan I adopted throughout, though laborious, entitled me
to more confidence; and the observations confirmed the pretension. Mr.
Tedlie, who was always just ahead of myself, took the angles of the path
by his compass, which I pencilled as he uttered them, with their several
lengths, allowing four yards and a half for every six paces. It is
allowed too by the natives to be an easy four hours walk. Several hours
elapsed before all the carriers came up; most of those who had been
started by us the preceding day, slept in the bush, and one more had
deserted.

The prevailing courses and their proportions were N.¼; N.bW.⅛; N.N.W.⅛;
N.N.E.⅛; the rest of the distance being made up of small lengths, in
every point of the compass, from S.W. to S.E.; the variation 17¾° W. The
latitude of Payntree, by two altitudes of the sun, was 5° 20′ 30″ N.;
the longitude, by the course and distance, as afterwards corrected, 1°
47′ W.

We received the compliments of Payntree and several caboceers, under a
large tree, and were then conducted to a neat and comfortable dwelling,
which had been prepared for us: a small square area afforded a shed for
cooking in on one side, and a sleeping room in each of the others, open
in front, but well thatched, and very clean: from this we passed to our
sitting room, the floor of which was elevated about two feet from the
ground.

The croom was prettily situated on a level, encircled by very fine
trees, and consisted of a very broad and well cleaned street of small
huts, framed of bamboo, and neatly thatched. Just beyond the north end
of the croom, there was a stream running to the N.N.E and more than a
mile of marshy ground was distinguished by the deeper shade and
luxuriance of the foliage. We observed a great number of small birds,
which were even more beautiful from their delicate symmetry, than their
brilliant plumage; they were generally green, with black wings, and
their nests hanging from the trees.

The Ashantee captain, who expected to continue there some months, on the
king’s business, sent us a sheep, pleading the scarcity, and his being a
stranger, as apologies for so small a present. Old Payntree was
attentive and obliging; he dashed us some fowls, yams, and palm wine. We
remained there the next day, to allow our people to procure four days
subsistence, as they would not be able to meet with provision on the
path during that period.

I walked with Mr. Tedlie along a very neat path well fenced, and divided
by _stiles_, to a corn plantation of at least twenty acres, and well
cultivated. Payntree’s farm house was situated here, and afforded
superior conveniences; a fowl house, a pigeon house, and a large granary
raised on a strong stage. As we returned we paid him a visit, and were
refreshed with some excellent palm wine: his dwelling was a square of
four apartments, which were entered from an outer one, where a number of
drums were kept; the angles were occupied by the slaves, and his own
room, which had a small inner chamber, was decked with muskets,
blunderbusses, cartouch belts fantastically ornamented, and various
insignia. The order, cleanliness, and comfort, surprised us; the sun had
just set, and a cheerful fire on a clean hearth supported the evening
meal. The old man was seated in his state chair, diverting himself with
his children and younger wives, the elder one was looking on from the
opposite apartment with happy indifference; it was the first scene of
domestic comfort I had witnessed among the natives. There was a small
plantation or garden neatly fenced in, near the house, for the supply of
the family.

On Saturday the 26th we left Payntree’s croom, and proceeded through two
romantic little valleys, with a few huts in each: the variety of trees
increased with the number, and ornamented the hills with almost every
tint and character of foliage: the path was frequently covered with
water. Just before we reached Cottacoomacasa, a most beautiful landscape
opened, the fore-ground darkly shaded with large cotton trees, and the
distance composed of several picturesque little hills; their fanciful
outlines, and the beautiful variety of fresh and sombre tint of the
small groves which encircled them, forcibly reminded me of the
celebrated ride by Grongar hill, from Carmarthen to Llandilo.

Cottacoomacasa is about six miles and a quarter from Payntree’s croom,
and consisted but of a few miserable huts and sheds, which scarcely
afforded shelter, and were close and filthy. I took the angles of a
cotton tree near us, and the height proved to be 139 feet; generally
speaking, those we had passed were, to appearance, much higher. The
bearers had all settled themselves here, and not contented with a long
rest, refused for some time to proceed until the next day; several were
intoxicated with the rum from some ankers they had designedly broken. We
started again however about half past three, and almost immediately
entered a large forest impervious to the sun; the risings were frequent
but gentle; the path, crooked and overgrown, presented such constant
obstacles to a hammock, that Mr. Hutchison, Mr. Tedlie, and myself, were
glad to dismount, and found it was much more comfortable as well as more
expeditious to walk; the only inconvenience was the troops of large
black ants, which were too thick to be avoided, and stung us sadly. We
passed two little streams running E.N.E. About six miles from
Cottacoomacasa we found all the baggage, the people making their fires,
and settling themselves for the night; it was almost dark; Quamina, our
Ashantee guide, had gone on without us, and Mr. James we knew must be
far behind; we therefore determined to halt for the night, and our
hammocks were slung to the trees. The distance marched this day was
twelve miles. The longitude of Cottacoomacasa was one mile E. of that of
Payntree by account, that of our resting place 1° 46′ 30″ W. and the
lat. 5° 28′ N.

The next morning we continued our march through the same dark solitude,
and passing three small streams running E. we reached Mansue soon after
ten o’clock. We had scarcely seated ourselves under a tattered shed,
which could not defend us from the burning sun, when we were encircled
by the cooking fires of the party, and nothing but violence could remove
them to a proper distance.

Mansue had been the great Fantee market for slaves from the Interior,
and its former consequence was evident from the extent of its site, over
which a few sheds only were now scattered.

We proceeded again at one o’clock, and passing through a small river,
Assooneara, running eastward, we came to a second, called Okee, running
in the same direction to the Amissa, which falls into the sea between
Annamaboe and Tantum. We passed five or six swamps, one nearly half a
mile long; in these the soil was a dark clay, but otherwise gravelly. We
halted in the woods at a spot where our guide Quamina was busied in
cutting down the underwood to accommodate himself and his women; the
bearers, resolute in their perverseness, had gone on with our provisions
and clothes. The ground of our resting place was very damp, and swarmed
with reptiles and insects; we had great difficulty in keeping up our
fires, which we were the more anxious to do after a visit from a
panther: an animal which, the natives say, resembles a small pig, and
inhabits the trees, continued a shrill screeching through the night; and
occasionally a wild hog bounced by, snorting through the forest, as if
closely pursued. This day’s distance was eight miles, and the course
N.¼N. b. E.⅙. Lat. and long. by account 5° 34′ N. and 1° 48′ W.
Thermometer in shade 6 A.M. 74.

We started the next morning at seven o’clock, and after three miles and
a half crossed a small river called Gaia, and sometimes Aniabirrim, from
a croom of that name being formerly in its neighbourhood; it was ten
yards wide and two feet deep, and ran to the E. just across the path,
but afterwards N.N.E. to the Amissa. Here Mr. Hutchison waited for Mr.
James to come up, whilst Mr. Tedlie and myself walked on to overtake the
people. The doom and iron-wood trees were frequent; the path was a
labyrinth of the most capricious windings, the roots of the cotton trees
obstructing it continually, and our progress was generally by stepping
and jumping up and down, rather than walking; the stems or caudices of
these trees projected from the trunks like flying buttresses, their
height frequently 20 feet. Immense trunks of fallen trees presented
constant barriers to our progress, and increased our fatigues from the
labour of scaling them: we were also frequently obliged to wait the
cutting away of the underwood before we could proceed, even on foot. The
large trees were covered with parasites and convolvuli, and the climbing
plants, like small cables, ascending the trunks to some height, abruptly
shot downwards, crossed to the opposite trees, and threaded each other
in such a perplexity of twists and turnings, that it soon became
impossible to trace them in the general entanglement. We passed through
two small streams running S. and several swamps, richly covered with
palm trees. Parrots and crown birds were numerous. At the end of ten
miles we came to a small river called Quatoa, four yards wide, also
running eastward to the Amissa; and immediately after to a few sheds
bearing the same name, where we found the last party of the bearers all
lying down, and a soldier ineffectually endeavouring to rouse them: we
started them with difficulty. A mile and a half thence we met with the
Okee again, running over its rocky bed in a transparent stream, which
reflected the richest foliage; its course S.W.½W., the breadth nine
yards, and we stepped across it from rock to rock. We soon afterwards
walked through the Antoonso, a smaller river running W.S.W., which
probably crossed the path to the eastward in one of the small streams
near Cottacoomacasa, as every report confirmed its also running to the
Amissa; it was very near Fousou, where we had scarcely arrived, before
the Fantees, such was their perverseness, insisted upon going on, the
Cape Coast messengers either had no influence or would not exert it; we
soon stopped them with the assistance of Quamina, our Ashantee guide,
Mr. James not coming up until late in the evening. Fousou was formerly a
large town, but had been destroyed by the Ashantee invasion of 1807; it
presented but a few sheds, in one of which we observed the Ashantee
traders to deposit yams and plantains to subsist them on their return;
so severe was the scarcity in the Fantee country: we could purchase
nothing, and were admitted to the best hovel with reluctance. This day’s
distance was 14 miles. The courses N.½, N.N.W.¼, N.bW.⅛. The latitude of
Fousou by observation, was 5° 43′ 20″ N. and the longitude by account 1°
52′ W.

The next morning, the 29th of April, we marched seven miles to
Ancomassa, a name given to half a dozen sheds; the path was still of the
same rugged nature, and the gloom unvaried. A strong fragrance was
emitted from the decaying plants and trees of the mimosa kind, whilst
others in the same incipient state of putrefaction were very offensive.
We passed through two small rivers, Bettensin and Soubin, six yards
wide, and shallow; they both ran eastward to the Owa, of which I could
not learn more than that it emptied itself into the Boosempra.

We proceeded at four o’clock, and had not gone two miles on our gloomy
route before it became dark. The path was level, but very swampy, and
generally covered with water. The fire-flies spangled the herbage in
every direction, and from the strength of their light, alternately
excited the apprehension of wild beasts, and the hope that we approached
the resting place our guide, whom we never saw after starting, had told
us of in the morning. The greatest fear of the people was of the spirits
of the woods, (whom Mr. Park’s interpreter, Johnson, propitiated by a
sacrifice between Jing and Gangaddi) and the discordant yells in which
they rivalled each other to keep up their courage, mingled with the
howls and screeches from the forest, imposed a degree of horror on this
dismal scene, which associated it with the imaginations of Dante. Three
or four times we suddenly emerged from the most awful gloom into
extensive areas, on which the stars shed a brilliancy of light gradually
softened into the deep shade which encompassed them; they were the sites
of large and populous crooms destroyed in the Ashantee invasions. About
nine o’clock we discovered a few miserable sheds, which the noise of the
bearers, who had long arrived, convinced us to be Accomfodey. We had
passed two small rivers, the Aprinisee and Annuia, both running to the
Boosempra. This day’s distance was 11 miles, and the courses N.⅓,
N.bW.⅕. The lat. and long. by account 5° 49′ N. and 1° 55′ W.
Thermometer 11 a.m. 80.

We marched early the next morning. The scenery of the forest, excepting
on the banks of the small rivers, was very naked of foliage, and only
presented a harsh and ragged confusion of stems and branches intricately
blended. We passed a small river soon after leaving Accomfodey, bearing
the same name and running eastward; and shortly after another, six yards
wide and two feet deep (the Berrakoo), running N.E. to the Boosempra.
The path was sometimes trackless, and appeared to have been little used
since the invasion of 1807; several human skulls were scattered through
this dark solitude, the relics of the butchery. We halted about two
o’clock by Mr. James’s direction, and passed the night in the forest.
This day’s distance was eight miles, the prevailing courses N.¼, N.bW.⅛,
N.N.W.⅛, N.bE.⅛. The latitude and longitude by account 5° 53′ N. 1° 55′
W. Thermometer 2 p.m. 88½, 7 p.m. 82½.

The next morning we passed some sheds, on the sites of the crooms
Dansamsou and Meakirring. At the end of five miles and a quarter, the
herbage to the right disclosed the cheerful reflections of the sun from
the water; and we descended through a small vista of the forest, to the
banks of the Boosempra or Chamah river. Nothing could be more beautiful
than its scenery: the bank on the south side was steep, and admitted but
a narrow path; that on the north sloping; on which a small Fetish house,
under the shade of a cachou tree, fixed the eye; whence it wandered over
a rich variety of tint and foliage, in which light and shade were most
happily blended: the small rocks stole through the herbage of the banks,
and now and then ruffled the water: the doom trees towering in the
shrubbery, waved to the most gentle air a rich foliage of dark green,
mocking the finest touch of the pencil; the tamarind and smaller mimosas
heightening its effect by their livelier tint, and the more piquant
delicacy of their leaf: the cotton trees overtopped the whole,
enwreathed in convolvuli, and several elegant little trees, unknown to
me, rose in the background, intermixed with palms, and made the coup
d’oeil enchanting. The bright rays of the sun were sobered by the rich
reflections of the water; and there was a mild beauty in the landscape,
uncongenial to barbarism, which imposed the expectation of elegance and
refinement. I attempted a sketch, but it was far beyond my rude pencil;
the expression of the scene could only have been traced in the profile
of every tree; and it seemed to defy any touches, but those of a Claude
or a Wilson, to depict the life of its beauty. I took two angles from a
base on the south side, which gave the width of the river, forty three
yards; the depth was 7 feet, and the course N.W.½W. with a very strong
current. A small river called Nimeä, ran into it, close to our right as
we landed: we crossed in the hollow trunk of a tree, thirty feet long,
the ends plastered up with sticks and swish.

Mansue was said to have been the last town of the Fantee territory; but
we had no opportunity for comparison until we passed the river, the
country thitherto presenting all the gloom of depopulation, and the
forest fast recovering the sites of the large towns destroyed in the
Ashantee invasions. The inhabitants of the few wretched hovels, remotely
scattered, seemed as if they had fled to them as outcasts from society;
they were lost even to curiosity, and manners were brutal and sullen.[2]
We could purchase nothing for our subsistence.

The scene brightened from our crossing the Boosempra; the path improved,
and Prasoo, the first town, only three quarters of a mile from the
river, presented a wide and clean street of tolerably regular houses;
the inhabitants clean and cheerful, left their various occupations to
gratify their curiosity, and saluted us in a friendly and respectful
manner: indeed the Assins may be considered, collectively, a more
mannerly and orderly people than the Ashantees. Kickiwherree, one mile
and a half distant, was a larger town, not so regular, but presenting
the same neat appearance, improved by the white-washing of many of the
houses. We halted here under the ganian[3] tree, used, generally
speaking, for recreation only, palavers being talked in the open fronts
of the houses. We were conducted to a comfortable dwelling, affording us
four very clean rooms, about 12 feet by 7, in which there were shelves
containing many articles of superior domestic comfort; a curtain or
skreen of bamboo let down in the open front, and the floors raised about
a foot and half from the ground, were washed daily with an earth of the
neighbourhood, which coloured them Etruscan red. The iron stone
abounded. Kickiwherree was 7 miles from the previous resting place, and
the prevailing courses N.¼ N.b.W.⅐. The latitude by observation was 5°
56′ 40″ N; the longitude by account 1° 57′ W. Thermometer 8 a.m. 77; 1
p.m. 91.

My observations had not been so frequent as I wished; the nature of the
country, and the season of the year were both very unfavourable to them.
I worked the double altitudes, invariably by Dr. Pemberton’s rule in
Keith’s trigonometry, which requires no assumed latitude, and is in all
cases accurate.

Mr. James having determined to rest the next day at Kickiwherree, we did
not proceed until Saturday the 3rd of May. We passed through a small
river close to the town, called the Ading, six yards wide and two feet
deep; and soon after a second, the Animiasoo, nine yards wide, and three
feet deep, both running to the Boosempra; close to the latter was a
large croom of the same name, the seat of Cheboo’s government. Pagga and
Atobiasee were also large crooms near each other, and within four miles
of Kickiwherree. At Atobiasee was a small river called Prensa, five
yards wide, and two feet deep, which ran E.S.E. to the Boosempra: two
miles thence we came to Becquama, a very old croom, with a river nine
yards wide, called Prapong, running E. by S. to the Boosempra; and at
the end of nine miles we halted at Asharaman, a small croom on an
eminence, where the Assins under Apootey and Cheboo, first engaged the
Ashantees in 1807. There was a small plot of corn near this croom, the
first we had seen since we left Payntree, though every croom was
surrounded by a tract of cultivated land, or plantation of plantains.
The path continued through forest. Distance 8 miles. Courses N.¼.
Latitude by observation, 5° 59′ 20″. Longitude by course and distance 1°
57′ 40″ W. Thermometer 6 a.m. 76, p.m. 89.

The next day we passed through Ansa, a large croom, where Amoo had
governed; north-west of which, at a little distance, was Aboiboo, the
residence of his enemy Apootey. A small river near Ansa, called
Parakoomee, eleven yards wide, and three feet deep, ran south to a
larger, called Ofim or Foom, which rises six days northward of
Coomassie, and falls into the Boosempra some miles westward of our
crossing. The path was very swampy, and we did not reach Akrofroom until
three o’clock: this was by far the largest croom we had seen. The heavy
rains during the night floated us in our lodgings, and, as Quamina
reported, rendered the path to Moisee impassable for the next day;
consequently we did not proceed until Tuesday the 6th. Distance 12
miles. Courses N.⅕, N.N.W.¼. Latitude by observation, 6° 5′ 40″. Long: C
and D 2° 2′. W. The path still through forest, presented frequent
acclivities, and the iron stone, and a soft grey rock abounded; the soil
was sometimes gravelly, but generally of a red coloured clay used in the
native pottery. We passed the Parakoomee again twice, and at the end of
11 miles halted at Moisee,


  “Cingebant silvæ; quem collibus undique curvis,”


the last Assin town, at the foot of three high hills covered with wood,
bearing W.N.W., N., and N.N.E.; the barriers of the Ashantee kingdom.
Course N.⅕, N.W.b.N.⅐, N.b.E.⅛. Latitude by observation 6° 8′ 50″ N.
Longitude C and D 2° 4′ 20″ W. The thermometer was broken on the 4th.

We passed the northern boundary the next morning; the ascent was a mile
and a half in length, and very rocky; a small river called the Bohmen
ran S.W. to the Jim, which falls into the Ofim: the water of the Bohmen
is said to instil eloquence, and numerous Ashantees repair annually to
drink of it: it flowed in a very clear stream, over a bed of gravel, and
was three feet deep, and eight yards broad. The expectation of an open
country was again disappointed; I bore several eminent points, in the
hope of being able to do so again at some distance, and of thus, with
the intermediate course, checking the distance computed by paces; but
the forest soon shut them out entirely. The first Ashantee croom was
Quesha; and we soon after passed through Fohmannee, which had been a
very considerable town. We stopped there awhile at the request of a
venerable old man, who regaled us with some palm wine and fruit: his
manners were very pleasing, and made it more painful to us to hear that
his life was forfeited to some superstitious observances, and that he
only waited the result of a petition to the king to commiserate his
infirmities so far as to allow him to be executed at his own croom, and
to be spared the fatigue of a journey to the capital: he conversed
cheerfully with us, congratulated himself on seeing white men before he
died, and spread his cloth over the log with an emotion of dignity
rather than shame: his head arrived at Coomassie the day after we had.
On ascending the hill, the soil became a dark brown clay, and very
productive. We passed the first large plantation of corn we had seen
since we left Payntree, and halted at Doompassee. Distance 6 miles.
Courses N.⅓, N.N.W.⅕, N.W.⅙. Latitude by observation, 6° 11′ 30″.

Doompassee had been a very large croom, but the caboceer having
intrigued with one of Sai Cudjoe’s wives, who had permission to visit
her family in this place, the greater part of it was destroyed in
consequence, and the caboceer decapitated: the woman possessing
irresistible art in practising upon the numerous admirers of her beauty,
the king spared her life, and employed her thenceforth to inveigle those
distant caboceers, whose lives or properties were desirable to him. It
was the most industrious town on the path; cloths, beads, and pottery
were manufacturing in all directions, and the blacksmiths’ forges were
always at work. The intelligence of the beginning of the King’s fetish
week, and Mr. James’s attack of fever, delayed us at Doompassee, and a
messenger was dispatched in the interim to announce our approach. During
our stay, I observed an eclipse of Jupiter’s first satellite, which gave
the longitude 2° 6′ W.

We did not leave Doompassee until the 14th of May; after two miles,
passing a small stream running N.W. we ascended a high hill, on which a
large croom, called Tiabosoo, was situated. I looked into a pit here six
feet deep; the first stratum was vegetable mould, the second gravel, the
third, a kind of potter’s clay, and the remaining of brittle stone of a
reddish brown, resembling that they call cabouc in the East Indies. The
next croom was Sanquanta, where the path took an easterly direction, and
about seven miles from Doompassee we passed Datiasoo, where large
quantities of pottery were manufacturing, exclusively: it was not more
than a mile distant from Dadawasee, where we found a messenger from the
king, expressing his regret that we had come up in the rainy season, as
he had heard it was a very unhealthy one for white men, and appointing
us to enter the capital on the Monday following; he sent us a present of
a sheep, forty yams, and two ounces of gold for our table; he had also
given six ackies to our messenger, who returned at the same time. The
path had been cleared by the king’s order, the plantations became more
frequent and extensive, and numerous paths branching off from that we
travelled, shewed that the country was thickly inhabited, and the
intercourse of the various parts direct and necessary for an interchange
of manufacture and produce: the crooms hitherto had appeared insulated.
The Acassey or blue dye plant grew profusely. Distance seven miles.
Courses N.¼, N.bW.⅐, N.N.W.⅐, N.N.E.⅙. Latitude by observation 6° 16′
20″ N. long: C and D 2° 7′ 30″ W.

The next day, leaving Dadawasee, close to which was another large croom
called Modjawee, we descended a very steep hill, and passed the Dankaran
or Mankaran, a small river, in the rainy season eleven yards wide and
four feet deep, running to the Birrim: not far from this river was
Sahnfoo, and a short distance from that croom, a smaller river called
Yansee, running N.N.W. We then passed through Korraman, near which was
the small river Dansabow, running westward, and three other large
crooms, Aquinasee (having a neatly fenced burial ground,) Amafou, and
Agabimah; crossing another small river called Soubirree, near the
latter, we reached Assiminia, distant eight miles from Dadawasee. The
path was frequently eight feet wide, and kept as neatly as that of a
garden in the environs of the crooms, which now disclosed themselves
very prettily at some distance. Courses N.⅕, N.bE.⅙, N.N.E.⅙. Latitude
by observation 6° 22′, longitude C and D 2° 7′ 50″ W.

There was a violent tornado in the night, during almost the whole of
which the rain continued in torrents, increasing the small streams near
the town from ancle to three feet deep. Almost all the inhabitants were
employed in weaving the staple manufacture of Assiminia, which was
formerly of much greater extent. Mr. James rested here the whole of the
next day, and on Saturday we proceeded through Boposoo (on a very high
hill), Agemum, Yoko, and Abountum; near which we crossed the Biaqua,
running west to the Jim, and about seven yards wide and two feet deep;
between this and Sarrasou, where we halted, were two large crooms,
Pootooaga and Fiasou.

The path was continually well cleared: each croom presented one wide
central street, with the ganian or cachou trees at the extremities. The
soil ceased to be sandy, and became a reddish earth: we observed some
quartz, but silex prevailed. Distance 11 miles. Courses N.¼, N.N.E.⅕.
Lat. by observation, 6° 30′ 20″. Long. C. and D. 2° 6′ 30″.

The river Dah runs close to Sarrasou, rising at Sekooree near Dwabin,
and falling into the Ofim at Measee in the Warsaw path; it is generally
about sixteen yards wide, and four feet deep. There was an ingenious
fishing weir in this river; two rows of very strong wicker work were
fixed across it, supported against the rapidity of the stream by large
stakes, driven into the ground obliquely on each side of them, and
connected above and below by the trunks of two large trees. The funnel-
shaped baskets, thickly inserted at the bottom, were of split cane, and
about twelve feet long. There are large plantations of corn around
Sarrasou, which is a great nursery for pigs. We left it on Monday
morning, the 19th, and passing through a small croom, Oyoko, stopped at
another, Agogoo, about four miles distant, to dress ourselves in full
uniform. The soil from Sarrasou was a rich black mould, and there were
continued plantations of corn, yams, ground nuts, terraboys, and
encruma: the yams and ground nuts were planted with much regularity in
triangular beds, with small drains around each, and carefully cleared
from weeds.

Two miles from Agogoo, we crossed the marsh which insulates Coomassie;
the breadth at that part forty yards, and the depth three feet. Being
within a mile of the capital, our approach was announced to the king,
who desired us by his messengers to rest at a little croom, called
Patiasoo, until he had finished washing, when captains would be deputed
to conduct us to his presence. Distance 6½ miles. Courses N.⅙, N.N.W.⅙.

We entered Coomassie at two o’clock, passing under a fetish, or
sacrifice of a dead sheep, wrapped up in red silk, and suspended between
two lofty poles. Upwards of 5000 people, the greater part warriors, met
us with awful bursts of martial music, discordant only in its mixture;
for horns, drums, rattles, and gong-gongs were all exerted with a zeal
bordering on phrenzy, to subdue us by the first impression. The smoke
which encircled us from the incessant discharges of musquetry, confined
our glimpses to the foreground; and we were halted whilst the captains
performed their Pyrrhic dance, in the centre of a circle formed by their
warriors; where a confusion of flags, English, Dutch, and Danish, were
waved and flourished in all directions; the bearers plunging and
springing from side to side, with a passion of enthusiasm only equalled
by the captains, who followed them, discharging their shining
blunderbusses so close, that the flags now and then were in a blaze; and
emerging from the smoke with all the gesture and distortion of maniacs.
Their followers kept up the firing around us in the rear. The dress of
the captains (see drawing, No. I.) was a war cap, with gilded rams horns
projecting in front, the sides extended beyond all proportion by immense
plumes of eagles feathers, and fastened under the chin with bands of
cowries. Their vest was of red cloth, covered with fetishes and
saphies[4] in gold and silver; and embroidered cases of almost every
colour, which flapped against their bodies as they moved, intermixed
with small brass bells, the horns and tails of animals, shells, and
knives; long leopards tails hung down their backs, over a small bow
covered with fetishes. They wore loose cotton trowsers, with immense
boots of a dull red leather, coming half way up the thigh, and fastened
by small chains to their cartouch or waist belt; these were also
ornamented with bells, horses tails, strings of amulets, and innumerable
shreds of leather; a small quiver of poisoned arrows hung from their
right wrist, and they held a long iron chain between their teeth, with a
scrap of Moorish writing affixed to the end of it. A small spear was in
their left hands, covered with red cloth and silk tassels; their black
countenances heightened the effect of this attire, and completed a
figure scarcely human.

[Illustration: _Drawn by T. E. Bowdich Esqr._

_No. 1._

CAPTAIN in his WAR DRESS.]

This exhibition continued about half an hour, when we were allowed to
proceed, encircled by the warriors, whose numbers, with the crowds of
people, made our movement as gradual as if it had taken place in
Cheapside; the several streets branching off to the right, presented
long vistas crammed with people, and those on the left hand being on an
acclivity, innumerable rows of heads rose one above another: the large
open porches of the houses, like the fronts of stages in small theatres,
were filled with the better sort of females and children, all impatient
to behold white men for the first time; their exclamations were drowned
in the firing and music, but their gestures were in character with the
scene. When we reached the palace, about half a mile from the place
where we entered, we were again halted, and an open file was made,
through which the bearers were passed, to deposit the presents and
baggage in the house assigned to us. Here we were gratified by observing
several of the caboceers pass by with their trains, the novel splendour
of which astonished us. The bands, principally composed of horns and
flutes, trained to play in concert, seemed to soothe our hearing into
its natural tone again by their wild melodies; whilst the immense
umbrellas, made to sink and rise from the jerkings of the bearers, and
the large fans waving around, refreshed us with small currents of air,
under a burning sun, clouds of dust, and a density of atmosphere almost
suffocating. We were then squeezed, at the same funeral pace, up a long
street, to an open-fronted house, where we were desired by a royal
messenger to wait a further invitation from the king. Here our attention
was forced from the astonishment of the crowd to a most inhuman
spectacle, which was paraded before us for some minutes; it was a man
whom they were tormenting previous to sacrifice; his hands were pinioned
behind him, a knife was passed through his cheeks, to which his lips
were noosed like the figure of 8; one ear was cut off and carried before
him, the other hung to his head by a small bit of skin; there were
several gashes in his back, and a knife was thrust under each shoulder
blade; he was led with a cord passed through his nose, by men disfigured
with immense caps of shaggy black skins, and drums beat before him; the
feeling this horrid barbarity excited must be imagined. We were soon
released by permission to proceed to the king, and passed through a very
broad street, about a quarter of a mile long, to the market place.

Our observations en passant had taught us to conceive a spectacle far
exceeding our original expectations; but they had not prepared us for
the extent and display of the scene which here burst upon us: an area of
nearly a mile in circumference was crowded with magnificence and
novelty. The king, his tributaries, and captains, were resplendent in
the distance, surrounded by attendants of every description, fronted by
a mass of warriors which seemed to make our approach impervious. The sun
was reflected, with a glare scarcely more supportable than the heat,
from the massy gold ornaments, which glistened in every direction. More
than a hundred bands burst at once on our arrival, with the peculiar
airs of their several chiefs; the horns flourished their defiances, with
the beating of innumerable drums and metal instruments, and then yielded
for a while to the soft breathings of their long flutes, which were
truly harmonious; and a pleasing instrument, like a bagpipe without the
drone, was happily blended. At least a hundred large umbrellas, or
canopies, which could shelter thirty persons, were sprung up and down by
the bearers with brilliant effect, being made of scarlet, yellow, and
the most shewy cloths and silks, and crowned on the top with crescents,
pelicans, elephants, barrels, and arms and swords of gold; they were of
various shapes, but mostly dome; and the valances (in some of which
small looking glasses were inserted) fantastically scalloped and
fringed; from the fronts of some, the proboscis and small teeth of
elephants projected, and a few were roofed with leopard skins, and
crowned with various animals naturally stuffed. The state hammocks, like
long cradles, were raised in the rear, the poles on the heads of the
bearers; the cushions and pillows were covered with crimson taffeta, and
the richest cloths hung over the sides. Innumerable small umbrellas, of
various coloured stripes, were crowded in the intervals, whilst several
large trees heightened the glare, by contrasting the sober colouring of
nature.


  “Discolor unde auri per ramos aura refulsit.”


The king’s messengers, with gold breast plates, made way for us, and we
commenced our round, preceded by the canes and the English flag. We
stopped to take the hand of every caboceer, which, as their houshold
suites occupied several spaces in advance, delayed us long enough to
distinguish some of the ornaments in the general blaze of splendour and
ostentation.

The caboceers, as did their superior captains and attendants, wore
Ashantee cloths, of extravagant price from the costly foreign silks
which had been unravelled to weave them in all the varieties of colour,
as well as pattern; they were of an incredible size and weight, and
thrown over the shoulder exactly like the Roman toga; a small silk
fillet generally encircled their temples, and massy gold necklaces,
intricately wrought; suspended Moorish charms, dearly purchased, and
enclosed in small square cases of gold, silver, and curious embroidery.
Some wore necklaces reaching to the navel entirely of aggry beads; a
band of gold and beads encircled the knee, from which several strings of
the same depended; small circles of gold like guineas, rings, and casts
of animals, were strung round their ancles; their sandals were of green,
red, and delicate white leather; manillas, and rude lumps of rock gold,
hung from their left wrists, which were so heavily laden as to be
supported on the head of one of their handsomest boys. Gold and silver
pipes, and canes dazzled the eye in every direction. Wolves and rams
heads as large as life, cast in gold, were suspended from their gold
handled swords, which were held around them in great numbers; the blades
were shaped like round bills, and rusted in blood; the sheaths were of
leopard skin, or the shell of a fish like shagreen. The large drums
supported on the head of one man, and beaten by two others, were braced
around with the thigh bones of their enemies, and ornamented with their
skulls. The kettle drums resting on the ground, were scraped with wet
fingers, and covered with leopard skin. The wrists of the drummers were
hung with bells and curiously shaped pieces of iron, which gingled
loudly as they were beating. The smaller drums were suspended from the
neck by scarves of red cloth; the horns (the teeth of young elephants)
were ornamented at the mouth-piece with gold, and the jaw bones of human
victims. The war caps of eagles feathers nodded in the rear, and large
fans, of the wing feathers of the ostrich, played around the
dignitaries; immediately behind their chairs (which were of a black
wood, almost covered by inlays of ivory and gold embossment) stood their
handsomest youths, with corslets of leopard’s skin covered with gold
cockle shells, and stuck full of small knives, sheathed in gold and
silver, and the handles of blue agate; cartouch boxes of elephant’s hide
hung below, ornamented in the same manner; a large gold handled sword
was fixed behind the left shoulder, and silk scarves and horses tails
(generally white) streamed from the arms and waist cloth: their long
Danish muskets had broad rims of gold at small distances, and the stocks
were ornamented with shells. Finely grown girls stood behind the chairs
of some, with silver basins. Their stools (of the most laborious carved
work, and generally with two large bells attached to them) were
conspicuously placed on the heads of favourites; and crowds of small
boys were seated around, flourishing elephants tails curiously mounted.
The warriors sat on the ground close to these, and so thickly as not to
admit of our passing without treading on their feet, to which they were
perfectly indifferent; their caps were of the skin of the pangolin and
leopard, the tails hanging down behind; their cartouch belts (composed
of small gourds which hold the charges, and covered with leopard or
pig’s skin) were embossed with red shells, and small brass bells thickly
hung to them; on their hips and shoulders was a cluster of knives; iron
chains and collars dignified the most daring, who were prouder of them
than of gold; their muskets had rests affixed of leopard’s skin, and the
locks a covering of the same; the sides of their faces were curiously
painted in long white streaks, and their arms also striped, having the
appearance of armour.

We were suddenly surprised by the sight of Moors, who afforded the first
general diversity of dress; there were seventeen superiors, arrayed in
large cloaks of white satin, richly trimmed with spangled embroidery,
their shirts and trowsers were of silk, and a very large turban of white
muslin was studded with a border of different coloured stones: their
attendants wore red caps and turbans, and long white shirts, which hung
over their trowsers; those of the inferiors were of dark blue cloth:
they slowly raised their eyes from the ground as we passed, and with a
most malignant scowl.

The prolonged flourishes of the horns, a deafening tumult of drums, and
the fuller concert of the intervals, announced that we were approaching
the king: we were already passing the principal officers of his
houshold; the chamberlain, the gold horn blower, the captain of the
messengers, the captain for royal executions, the captain of the market,
the keeper of the royal burial ground, and the master of the bands, sat
surrounded by a retinue and splendor which bespoke the dignity and
importance of their offices. The cook had a number of small services
covered with leopard’s skin held behind him, and a large quantity of
massy silver plate was displayed before him, punch bowls, waiters,
coffee pots, tankards, and a very large vessel with heavy handles and
clawed feet, which seemed to have been made to hold incense; I observed
a Portuguese inscription on one piece, and they seemed generally of that
manufacture. The executioner, a man of an immense size, wore a massy
gold hatchet on his breast; and the execution stool was held before him,
clotted in blood, and partly covered with a cawl of fat. The king’s four
linguists were encircled by a splendor inferior to none, and their
peculiar insignia, gold canes, were elevated in all directions, tied in
bundles like fasces. The keeper of the treasury, added to his own
magnificence by the ostentatious display of his service; the blow pan,
boxes, scales and weights, were of solid gold.

A delay of some minutes whilst we severally approached to receive the
king’s hand, afforded us a thorough view of him; his deportment first
excited my attention; native dignity in princes we are pleased to call
barbarous was a curious spectacle: his manners were majestic, yet
courteous; and he did not allow his surprise to beguile him for a moment
of the composure of the monarch; he appeared to be about thirty-eight
years of age, inclined to corpulence, and of a benevolent countenance;
he wore a fillet of aggry beads round his temples, a necklace of gold
cockspur shells strung by their largest ends, and over his right
shoulder a red silk cord, suspending three saphies cased in gold; his
bracelets were the richest mixtures of beads and gold, and his fingers
covered with rings; his cloth was of a dark green silk; a pointed diadem
was elegantly painted in white on his forehead; also a pattern
resembling an epaulette on each shoulder, and an ornament like a full
blown rose, one leaf rising above another until it covered his whole
breast; his knee-bands were of aggry beads, and his ancle strings of
gold ornaments of the most delicate workmanship, small drums, sankos,
stools, swords, guns, and birds, clustered together; his sandals, of a
soft white leather, were embossed across the instep band with small gold
and silver cases of saphies; he was seated in a low chair, richly
ornamented with gold; he wore a pair of gold castanets on his finger and
thumb, which he clapped to enforce silence. The belts of the guards
behind his chair, were cased in gold, and covered with small jaw bones
of the same metal; the elephants tails, waving like a small cloud before
him, were spangled with gold, and large plumes of feathers were
flourished amid them. His eunuch presided over these attendants, wearing
only one massy piece of gold about his neck: the royal stool, entirely
cased in gold, was displayed under a splendid umbrella, with drums,
sankos, horns, and various musical instruments, cased in gold, about the
thickness of cartridge paper: large circles of gold hung by scarlet
cloth from the swords of state, the sheaths as well as the handles of
which were also cased; hatchets of the same were intermixed with them:
the breasts of the Ocrahs, and various attendants, were adorned with
large stars, stools, crescents, and gossamer wings of solid gold.

We pursued our course through this blazing circle, which afforded to the
last a variety exceeding description and memory; so many splendid
novelties diverting the fatigue, heat, and pressure we were labouring
under; we were almost exhausted, however, by the time we reached the
end; when, instead of being conducted to our residence, we were desired
to seat ourselves under a tree at some distance, to receive the
compliments of the whole in our turn.

The swell of their bands gradually strengthened on our ears, the peals
of the warlike instruments bursting upon the short, but sweet responses
of the flutes; the gaudy canopies seemed to dance in the distant view,
and floated broadly as they were springing up and down in the
foreground; flags and banners waved in the interval, and the chiefs were
eminent in their crimson hammocks, amidst crowds of musquetry. They
dismounted as they arrived within thirty yards of us; their principal
captains preceded them with the gold handled swords, a body of soldiers
followed with their arms reversed, then their bands and gold canes,
pipes, and elephants tails. The chief, with a small body guard under his
umbrella, was generally supported around the waist by the hands of his
favourite slave, whilst captains holla’d, close in his ear, his warlike
deeds and (strong) names, which were reiterated with the voices of
Stentors by those before and behind; the larger party of warriors
brought up the rear. Old captains of secondary rank were carried on the
shoulders of a strong slave; but a more interesting sight was presented
in the minors, or young caboceers, many not more than five or six years
of age, who overweighed by ornaments, were carried in the same manner,
(under their canopies), encircled by all the pomp and parade of their
predecessors. Amongst others, the grandson of Cheboo was pointed out,
whom the king had generously placed on the stool of his perfidious
enemy. A band of Fetish men, or priests, wheeled round and round as they
passed with surprising velocity. Manner was as various as ornament; some
danced by with irresistible buffoonery, some with a gesture and carriage
of defiance; one distinguished caboceer performed the war dance before
us for some minutes, with a large spear, which grazed us at every bound
he made; but the greater number passed us with order and dignity, some
slipping one sandal, some both, some turning round after having taken
each of us by the hand; the attendants of others knelt before them,
throwing dust upon their heads; and the Moors, apparently, vouchsafed us
a blessing. The king’s messengers who were posted near us, with their
long hair hanging in twists like a thrum mop, used little ceremony in
hurrying by this transient procession; yet it was nearly 8 o’clock
before the king approached.

It was a beautiful star light night, and the torches which preceded him
displayed the splendor of his regalia with a chastened lustre, and made
the human trophies of the soldiers more awfully imposing. The skulls of
three Banda caboceers, who had been his most obstinate enemies, adorned
the largest drum: the vessels in which the boys dipped their torches
were of gold. He stopped to enquire our names a second time, and to wish
us good night; his address was mild and deliberate: he was followed by
his aunts, sisters, and others of his family, with rows of fine gold
chains around their necks. Numerous chiefs succeeded; and it was long
before we were at liberty to retire. We agreed in estimating the number
of warriors at 30,000.

We were conducted to a range of spacious, but ruinous buildings, which
had belonged to the son of one of the former kings, and who had recently
destroyed himself at a very advanced age, unable to endure the severity
of disgrace: their forlorn and dreary aspect bespoke the fortune of
their master, and they required much repair to defend us from the wind
and rain, which frequently ushered in the nights.


[Footnote 2: Every account I received afterwards, confirmed the boundary
of the Fantee and Assin territories to be between Mansue and Fousou;
also that Ancomassa, Accomfodey, Dansamsou, Meakirring, &c. &c. had all
been large Assin crooms, destroyed with many others in their
neighbourhood, in the Ashantee invasion of 1807.]

[Footnote 3: This is the same tree as the banian or India fig.]

[Footnote 4: Scraps of Moorish writing, as charms against evil.]




                              CHAPTER III.

                               * * * * *

   _Proceedings and Incidents until the Third Dispatch to Cape Coast
                                Castle._


                                            _Coomassie, May 22nd_, 1817.

            TO THE GOVERNOR AND COUNCIL, CAPE COAST CASTLE.

   GENTLEMEN,

THE important objects of the Mission, and the safety and prosperity of
the Settlements, have this day demanded our public dissent from our
superior officer, Mr. James; to prove the act tutelary to these objects,
can be our only justification.

The Mission has engrossed our thoughts and exertions from the moment we
were honoured by the appointments; we have felt that the credit of the
Committee, the character of the service, and the good of our country
were associated in the enterprise; and that we were personally
responsible for these important objects, to the extent of our industry,
fortitude, and ability. Our reflections naturally associated obstacles
commensurate with the importance of the objects affected; and to
overcome the former in a manner auspicious to the latter, we conceived
to be the duty expected from us, as composing a Mission originated to
remove a portion of the formidable barriers to the interior of Africa.
We anticipated prejudice, intrigue, and difficulty, as inevitable; as
obstacles to invigorate and not to sicken our exertions.

At Dadasey, on Wednesday the 14th instant, we received a present from
the King, of two ounces of gold, a sheep, and thirty yams, with a second
appointment to enter his capital the succeeding Monday. When within a
short distance, the messenger who announced us, returned, to desire us
to wait at a croom until the King had washed. We were permitted to enter
soon after two o’clock, and the King received us with the most
encouraging courtesy, and the most flattering distinction. We paid our
respects in turn, (passing along a surprising extent of line) to the
principal caboceers, many of remote, and several of Moorish territories;
and all of these encircled by retinues astonishing to us from their
numbers, order, and decorations. We were then requested to remove to a
distant tree to receive their salutes; which procession, though simply
transient, continued until past eight o’clock. It was indescribably
imposing from the variety, magnificence, and etiquette: its faint
outline in Mr. Bowdich’s report, will impart our impression of the power
and influence of the monarch we are sent to conciliate. The King as he
passed, repeated his former condescensions.

The next morning (Tuesday) the King sent to us to come and speak our
palaver in the market place, that all the people might hear it: we found
him encircled by the most splendid insignia, and surrounded by his
caboceers: we were received graciously. Mr. James, through his linguist,
declared to the King’s, (who are alone allowed to speak to him in
public) that the objects of the Mission were friendship and commerce;
impressed the consequence of our nation, and the good feelings of the
Committee and Governor towards the King, as would be testified by our
presents; he submitted the wish of a Residency, and of a direct path.
The King enquired if we were to settle the Commenda palaver; the reply
was, no! He rejoined, “that he wished the Governor of Cape Coast to
settle all palavers for him with the people of the forts, and that he
had thought we came to make all things right, and so to make friends
with the Ashantees.” The King had previously observed, as literally
rendered, that “the forts belonged to him,” meaning (as the context, and
the whole of his sentiments and conduct have confirmed) nothing
humiliating to our dignity and independence; but simply, that the
advantages derived by the Fantee nations from the forts, should now be
his. He desired the officer to be pointed out to him who was to be the
Resident; and then enquired if that was all our palaver, he was told
yes: he said he would give us his answer the next day.

Soon after we returned to our house, the King’s linguist delivered this
message. “The King knows very well the King of England has sent him
presents; if you wish to be friends with him you must bring these
presents to his own house, and shew them to him and his friends, and not
give them before all the people.” This, in our judgment was a policy, to
prevent any favourable bias of the body of caboceers and people
anticipating the King’s and his councils satisfaction of our motives and
professions.

We attended: all the curiosity the packages excited could not incline
the King to regard them, until he had desired distinctly to understand
who had sent them, the King of England, or the Governor. He was told,
the Company to whom the forts belonged under the King; the interpreter
seemed to render it the King individually; it was more intelligible, and
the agreeable impression it made was striking. The presents were
displayed. Nothing could surpass the King’s surprise and pleasure, but
his warm yet dignified avowal of his obligations. “Englishmen,” said he,
admiring the workmanship of the different articles, “know how to do
every thing proper,” turning to his favourites with a smile as
auspicious to our interests, as mortal to the intrigues of our rival.
Much of the glass was broken; Mr. James expressed his regret, and
offered to procure more; the King replied, “the path we had come was bad
and overgrown, that we had many people to look after;” and waved our
excuses with superior courtesy. He desired the linguists to say, “this
shewed him that the English were a great people, that they wished to be
friends with him, to be as one with the Ashantees; that this made him
much pleasure to see, (and to repeat again and again,) that he thanked
the King of England, the Governor at Cape Coast, and the officers who
brought the presents much, very much.” He made very liberal presents of
liquor to our people, and delivered the distinct presents to his four
principal caboceers in our sight.

We learned from Quashie, the Accra linguist, the favourable reports he
had collected through his intimacy with some of the principal men. All
the caboceers, he said, had thought we had come for bad, to spy the
country; the King thought so too a little, but much fetish was made, and
all shewed that we meant well, and now the King thought so; the mulatto
sent by General Daendels, directly after Mr. Hydecoper, and who arrived
just before us, had sent to the King for a pass to go back, and the King
told him, that he would give him this message, “that the King had
thought to do good to the Dutch, but now he sees their white mens faces,
he should do good to the English.” This mulatto man (who is not in the
service, but a free man of Elmina town) visited us afterwards, and his
complaints and sentiments confirmed these reports in our favour.

On Wednesday morning the King’s sisters (one the caboceer of the largest
Ashantee town near the frontier) paid us a visit of ceremony, and
retired to receive our’s in return; their manners were courteous and
dignified, and they were handed with a surprising politeness by the
captains in attendance.

Mr. James being indisposed, we went by invitation to see the chief
captain’s horse, when the King sent to us to say, he was walking that
way, and requested us to get our chairs and wait, that he might bid us
good morning. Directly he saw us he ordered the procession to alter its
course, and stopped to take us by the hand. The procession consisted of
about 2000 men, and was marked by all the suit and parade of royalty.
The caboceers that day in attendance appeared as warriors, being
divested of the rich silks of the preceding day; the executioner, the
master of the bands, and the cook, were in the train, with suits which
shewed the importance of their offices; the latter was preceded by a
massy service of plate. Mr. Bowdich’s report will be more particular.

The king sent his messenger this morning to repeat, that he thanked the
King of England and the Governor very much for yesterday.

The King was much pleased when Quashie, the Accra linguist (who is our
only intelligible medium,) attempted to describe the use of the sextant;
consequently, when Mr. Bowdich saw the King’s chief captain this
morning, he offered to shew it to the King, with the camera obscura and
telescope; the captain said it would please the King, and reported, that
the King was much pleased with us, that he liked to be friends with the
English, that he wished to make pleasure with us, and would send for us
by and by to do so. We have been particular in these lesser
circumstances, as they are the evidence of the King’s good feelings, and
of the fair prospect of the consummation of the Mission, superior to all
the prejudice and intrigue opposed to it.

We were sent for to the King’s house; he was only attended by his privy
counsellors; he expressed much delight at the camera obscura and
instruments. He said, “the Englishmen knew more than Dutchmen or
Danes—that black men knew nothing.” He then ordered our people to be
dismissed, said he would look at the telescope in a larger place, that
now he wished to talk with us. He again acknowledged the gratification
of Tuesday, and desired Mr. James to explain to him two notes which he
produced, written by the Governor in Chief at the request of Amooney,
King of Annamaboe, and Adokoo, Chief of the Braffoes, making over to
Saï, King of Ashantee, four ackies per month of their company’s pay, as
a pledge of their allegiance and the termination of hostilities. The
impression seemed instantly to have rooted itself in the King’s mind,
that this was the Governor’s individual act, or that he had instanced
it; his countenance changed, his counsellors became enraged, they were
all impatience, we all anxiety. “Tell the white men,” said the King,
“what they did yesterday made me much pleasure; I was glad we were to be
friends; but to day I see they come to put shame upon my face; this
breaks my heart too much. The English know, with my own powder, with my
own shot, I drove the Fantees under their forts, I spread my sword over
them, they were all killed, and their books from the fort are mine. I
can do as much for the English as the Fantees, they know this well, they
know I have only to send a captain to get all the heads of the Fantees.
These white men cheat me, they think to make ’Shantee fool; they pretend
to make friends with me, and they join with the Fantees to cheat me, to
put shame upon my face; this makes the blood come from my heart.” This
was reported by his linguist with a passion of gesture and utterance
scarcely inferior to the King’s; the irritation spread throughout the
circle, and swelled even to uproar.

Thus much was inevitable; it was one of our anticipated difficulties; it
was not a defeat, but a check; and here originates our charge against
Mr. James, whom we declare to have been deficient in presence of mind,
and not to have exerted those assurances and arguments which, with a
considerate zeal, might at least have tended to ameliorate the unjust
impression of the King, if not to have eradicated it. Mr. James said,
“the Governor of Cape Coast had done it, that he knew nothing about it,
that he was sent only to make the compliments to the King, that if the
King liked to send a messenger with him, _he was going back and would
tell the Governor all that the King said_.” This was all that was
advanced. Was this enough for such a Mission to effect? the King
repeated, “that he had expected we had _come_ to settle all palavers,
and to _stay_ and make friends with him; but we came to make a fool of
him.” The King asked him to tell him how much had been paid on these
notes since his demand—that he knew white men had large books which told
this. Mr. James said he had seen, but he could not recollect. Nothing
could exceed the King’s indignation. “White men,” he exclaimed, “know
how many months pass, how many years they live, and they know this, but
they wont tell me; could not the other white men tell me.” Mr. James
said, “we never looked in the books.”

We were not so indiscreet as to expect or wish Mr. James to commit
himself by _promising the satisfaction_ of the King’s wishes; but
dwelling on the expense and importance of the Mission, on the
expectations it had excited, and feeling the reason of the King’s
argument, that its object should be to settle all palavers if we wished
to be good friends, we conceived we but anticipated the feeling of the
Council and of the Committee, in our anxiety for Mr. James to offer to
communicate with the Governor by letter, and to wait his reply, with a
confidence that his good feeling towards the King, his instructions from
England, and his own disposition, would lead him to do every thing that
was right to please him.

Mr. James’s embarrassment had not only hurried him to extricate himself
as an individual at the expense of his own dignity and intellect, but,
which was worse, he had thrown the whole onus of this invidious
transaction on the shoulders of the Governor in chief, against whom the
King’s prejudice would be fatal to all, and whose interest in his honour
was most flattering to the King, most auspicious to us, and the hopes of
the Mission; not only the future prosperity, but the present security of
the Settlements hung upon this, and the dagger was at this moment
suspended from a cobweb. Mr. Bowdich urged this in the ear of Mr. James,
urged the danger of leaving the King thus provoked, the fatal sacrifice
of every object of the Mission, the discredit of the service, the
disgrace of ourselves; Mr. James replied, “he knew the Governor’s
private sentiments best.” The Moors of authority seized the moment, and
zealously fanned the flame which encircled us; for the King looking in
vain for those testimonies of British feeling which presence of mind
would have imposed, exclaimed, as he turned his ear from the Moors, “I
know the English come to spy the country; they come to cheat me; they
want war, they want war.” Mr. James said “No! we want trade.” The King
impatiently continued, “They join the Fantees to put shame upon my face;
I will send a captain to-morrow to take these books, and bring me the
heads of all the Fantees under the forts; the white men know I can do
this, I have only to speak to my captains. The Dutch Governor does not
cheat me; he does not shame me before the Fantees; he sends me the whole
4 oz. a month. The Danes do not shame me, and the English 4 ackies a
month is nothing to me; I can send a captain for all; they wish war.” He
drew his beard into his mouth, bit it, and rushing abruptly from his
seat exclaimed, “Shantee foo! Shantee foo! ah! ah!” then shaking his
finger at us with the most angry aspect, would have burst from us with
the exclamation, “If a black man had brought me this message, I would
have had his head cut off before me.” Mr. James was silent.

Gentlemen! imagine this awful moment, think what a fatal wound menaced
the British interests; the most memorable exertion of the Committee, the
pledge to the Government of their energies, of the zeal and capabilities
of their officers, this important and expensive Mission falling to the
ground, the sacrifice to supineness; the Settlements endangered instead
of benefited, ourselves disgraced as officers and men, our key to the
Interior shivered in the lock, and the territories of a great and
comparatively tractable prince shut against us for ever. Could we be
expected to look with indifference on these sacrifices, to risk nothing
to avert them; to be auxiliary to the triumph of the intrigues and
duplicity of our rival, which you know to have been exerted even to our
destruction? Not a moment was to be lost; Mr. Bowdich stood before the
King, and begged to be heard; his attention was arrested, the clamours
of the council gradually abated: there was no interpreter but the one
Mr. James brought from his own fort, and no alternative but to charge
him promptly in the Governor’s name, before reflection could associate
the wishes of his master, to speak truly. Mr. Bowdich continued standing
before the King, and declared, “that the Governor wished to gain his
friendship more than he could think that we were sent, not only to
compliment him, but to write what he had to say to the Governor, and to
wait to tell his answer to the King, and to do all he ordered; to settle
all palavers, and to make Ashantees and English as one before we went
back. That the Governor of Accra was sick, and in pain, and naturally
wished to go back soon, but that himself, and the other two officers
would stay with the King, until they made him sure that the Governor was
a good friend to him. That we would rather get anger, and lose every
thing ourselves, than let the King think the Governor sent us to put
shame on him; that we would trust our lives to the King, until we had
received the Governor’s letter, to make him think so; and to tell us to
do all that was right, to make the Ashantees and English as one; and
this would shew the King we did not come to spy the country, but to do
good.” Mr. Bowdich then assured Mr. James that no outrage on his dignity
was meditated; that we should continue to treat him as our superior
officer, but that we felt the present act imperative, as our duty to the
Service and our Country.

Conviction flashed across the countenance of the interpreter, and he
must have done Mr. Bowdich’s speech justice, for the cheerful aspect of
the morning was resumed in every countenance. The applause was general;
the King (who had again seated himself) held out his hand to Mr.
Bowdich, and said, “he spoke well; what he spoke was good; he liked his
palaver much.” The King’s chief linguist came forward and repeated his
commendations with the most profound bows; every look was favourable;
every where there was a hand extended. The King then instructed his
linguist to report to Mr. Bowdich, personally, his arguments respecting
the books. “That he had subdued the Fantees at the expense of much
powder and shot; and that, in consequence, all their notes were his:
that he had only to send a Captain to bring all their heads, that he did
not want to do no good, and keep the books; he would do more for the
forts than the Fantees could; that the Dutch Governor did not cheat him,
but gave the four oz. a month. That he wished to be friends with the
English; but that the 4 ackies a month put shame upon his face.” To this
Mr. Bowdich replied, that he could only say he knew the Governor would
do what was right; that he could not say more until he heard from him;
but that he would write every word the King said; and he was sure the
King would see that the Governor would do what was right. We shook hands
and retired.

All the Fantees being detained by the King, Mr. Bowdich and Mr.
Hutchison went in the evening to the chief captain to request a
messenger from the King to Cape Coast; about two hours afterwards he
reported the King’s reply almost literally as follows: “The King wishes
you good night; this is his palaver and yours, you must not speak it to
any one else, the white men come to cheat him. The King recollects the
face of the white man who spoke to him to day, he likes him much, he
wishes he would talk the palaver; the King likes the other white men who
stood up with him very much; he thinks the Governor of Accra wishes to
put all the wrong on the Governor at Cape Coast, and not to tell any
thing. The King thinks that not right, and he sees you do not like that.
You must not speak this palaver again; ’tis the King’s palaver, and
yours; the King’s captain will speak right to the King what you say, and
you shall have a messenger.”

We again affirm positively, that Mr. James made no offer to communicate
with the Governor, but spoke only of his return, which we know he was
meditating at the expense of the treaty, and every object of the
Mission.

Referring to our detail previous to the serious business of to day, you
will find every circumstance to have been encouraging, and in our
opinion, auspicious to the consummation of the Mission. Yet at that
moment, unclouded as it was, we know Mr. James, by his own confession,
to have written to head quarters with a gloom which existed only in his
own imagination; this letter did not go from the detention of the Fantee
bearers. We believe firmly, that had there been no interference on our
part at the critical moment, Mr. James would have returned forthwith to
Cape Coast, without effecting one object of the Mission, and that the
future good of the Settlements would not only have been sacrificed, but
their present security endangered.[5]

Mr. James may write that Mr. Bowdich rose with great warmth: this we
deny, and affirm that he displayed no more than a temperate zeal,
considerate in its declarations, and respectful even in its dissent from
Mr. James. The attention of the King was arrested by the novelty of a
white man addressing him in the oratorical manner of his own country,
but it was not until the linguist had conveyed the arguments, that the
King held out his hand and the applause was general. Mere observations
whispered in the ear of the linguists had lost all effect, and would not
have answered the crisis.

Mr. James has talked, and perhaps written much of the King’s suspicion,
but we must contend that much of this is misnamed, and is no more than
that deliberate policy which is a pledge of the durability of the
confidence it precedes. Certainly there has been suspicion, but not more
than must have been expected, not more than was commensurate with the
important novelty which challenged it. It has been confessed here, that
our political rival has exerted all his address to vitiate our objects
in the eyes of the King, to convince him our ostensible views were
pretences; our real ones dangerous and unjust; that we sought
sovereignty, not commerce. The Moorish chiefs and dignitaries by whom
the King is surrounded, whose influence is powerful, not only from their
rank but their repute, naturally urged these arguments against
unbelievers and competitors in trade, and their extensive intercourse
has unfortunately possessed them of facts to the point of our ambition.
Let these considerations be weighed, let our account of the King’s
general deportment be again referred to; let us impress, that he has
never once adverted to our destruction of his troops before Annamaboe,
or of the critical situation of the fort; that he has evinced a
disposition to a sound understanding, by veiling every irritating
retrospect, by acknowledging every conciliatory circumstance.

We do not presume to enter our opinions into the important question of
the King’s demand of the whole of these two notes; we have advanced
nothing but our assurance that the Governor will do what is right, and
we have pledged our lives to convince the King of this; the importance
of the Mission would have claimed a more valuable pledge.

Whilst we impress the surprising power and influence of the King, we
must do him the justice to acknowledge the convincing manner in which he
urged the injuries and forbearance which preceded the Fantee war; his
willingness to do every thing for the forts, and the conduct of the
Dutch Governor in giving him the whole of the four ounces, were
impressively and ingeniously associated.

To wear away suspicion, Mr. Bowdich has ceased his enquiries and
observations for a time. The resources for intelligence of the Interior
are infinite. Timbuctoo has been visited by most of the sojourners, and
a mass of valuable information may be gathered with caution.[6] The
eclipses of Jupiter’s satellites will be regularly observed by Mr.
Bowdich, and the mean longitude reported; the want of a good watch
imposes considerable trouble.

We have reflected on what we have done, and if we are so unfortunate as
to be visited by your and the Committee’s displeasure, we shall console
ourselves in our reluctant change of pursuit, by the satisfaction of our
own minds of the honourable zeal of our motives.

We most respectfully solicit our recall, as we cannot implicate our
character and our responsibility with Mr. James’s judgment and
perseverance in prosecuting the Mission, of the consummation of which we
cannot agree to despond. We could not reconcile ourselves to the
sacrifice of one of its important objects to our personal apprehensions
(supported as we are by authority and circumstances) whilst the
recollection of the illustrious energies of an enterprising traveller,
forlorn and destitute, appeals to our spirit, and impresses the
expectations of our country. We are, &c.

                                         (Signed)

                                                      T. EDWARD BOWDICH.

                                                      W. HUTCHISON.

                                                      HENRY TEDLIE.

                               * * * * *


                                              _Coomassie, May 24_, 1817.

            TO THE GOVERNOR AND COUNCIL, CAPE COAST CASTLE.

   GENTLEMEN,

THE act our former letter has avowed, and we would presume (after the
most deliberate reflection) to add justified, has made it our duty to
communicate (independently of Mr. James) the circumstances of the
interval we may await your pleasure.

If this duty had not been imposed on us by the act in question, the
imminent fatality engendered in the debate of to day, and quickened by
the ardor of the captains, would have demanded from our private as well
as our public feelings, the most energetic representations (as auxiliary
to those of Mr. James,) in impressing the calamities and the sacrifices
which menace the Settlements and the Mission, to secure your serious
deliberation, as the only preventive we can look to with confidence.

Yesterday we were conducted some way without the town to an assembly of
the Moorish caboceers and dignitaries, who exert every device against
us. A chapter was read from the Koran, and we were ordered to swear by
that book that we had no rogues palaver, and that we had put no poison
in the King’s liquor. We severally refused to swear on the Koran, but
offered to do so on our own prayer books. The King’s linguist mediated,
and asked us if we would only strike that book three times, and then
declare as much, because the Moors said, that book would kill us if we
lied. We did this, and were about two hours afterwards ordered to sit
without our house and receive the following present from the King:

One bullock, 2 pigs, 8 oz. of gold, for Mr. James.

One sheep, 2 oz. 4 ackies of gold, for each of us.

To each of the numerous Fantee messengers, 10 ackies of gold.

To our cooks, a large assortment of pots and country vessels, 100 large
billets of wood, 100 yams, 100 bunches of plantains, four of sugar cane,
four (24 gallon) pots of palm oil, three jars of palm wine.

To the soldiers, 10 ackies of gold.

To the Accra linguist, 10 ackies of gold.

On Saturday we were summoned to the King, and waited as usual a
considerable time in one of the outer courts of the palace, which is an
immense building of a variety of oblong courts and regular squares, the
former with arcades along the one side, some of round arches
symmetrically turned, having a skeleton of bamboo; the entablatures
exuberantly adorned with bold fan and trellis work of Egyptian
character. They have a suit of rooms over them, with small windows of
wooden lattice, of intricate but regular carved work, and some have
frames cased with thin gold. The squares have a large apartment on each
side, open in front, with two supporting pillars, which break the view
and give it all the appearance of the proscenium or front of the stage
of the older Italian theatres. They are lofty and regular, and the
cornices of a very bold cane work in alto relievo. A drop curtain of
curiously plaited cane is suspended in front, and in each we observed
chairs and stools embossed with gold, and beds of silk, with scattered
regalia. The most ornamented part of the palace is the residence of the
women. We have passed through it once; the fronts of the apartments were
closed (except two open door ways) by pannels of curious open carving,
conveying a striking resemblance at first sight to an early Gothic
screen; one was entirely closed and had two curious doors of a low arch,
and strengthened or battened with wood-work, carved in high relief and
painted red. Doors chancing to open as we passed, surprised us with a
glimpse of large apartments in corners we could not have thought of, the
most secret appeared the most adorned. In our daily course through the
palace there is always a delay of some minutes, before the door of each
of the several distinct squares is unlocked; within the inmost square is
the council chamber.

To day, after the delay of nearly an hour (which seems an indispensible
ceremony) in the outer court, (where different dignitaries were passing
to and fro with their insignia and retinues,) we were conducted to a
large yard, where the King, encircled by a varied profusion of insignia,
even more sumptuous than that we had seen before, sat at the end of two
long files of counsellors, caboceers, and captains; they were seated
under their umbrellas, composed of scarlet and yellow cloth, silks,
shawls, cottons, and every glaring variety, with carved and golden
pelicans, panthers, baboons, barrels, crescents, &c. on the top; the
shape generally a dome. Distinct and pompous retinues were placed
around, with gold canes, spangled elephants tails to brush off the
flies, gold headed swords, and embossed muskets, and many splendid
novelties too numerous but for a particular report, which will not be
neglected. Each had the dignitaries of his own province or establishment
to his right and left; and it was truly “Concilium in Concilio.” When we
recollected the insignificant, though neat appearance of the few
Ashantee towns we had passed through on the southern frontier, and even
the extent and superior character of the capital, this magnificence
seemed the effect of enchantment.

We have intruded this sketch to impress the power and resources of the
monarch we are to conciliate, and to anticipate in some degree the delay
of Mr. Bowdich’s report, the transcription of which must yield to the
present momentous communication.

The King having decided a cause then in course, by which one of his
captains was condemned to death for cowardice, ordered the question of
the Annamaboe and Braffoe notes to be resumed. The several Fantee
messengers were heard, the King of Annamaboe’s, Amooney’s, and
Payntree’s (the interior caboceer) having joined us in the path. They
appeared all equivocation and embarrassment, as Quashie’s
interpretations confirmed; they were incompetent to answer the King’s
linguists, and unable to use the few uninterrupted intervals which were
allowed them to any purpose: it seems they would not acknowledge what
the full amount of these notes was. Mr. James was asked, he said “white
men’s heads were not like black men’s, and he could not recollect; but
he thought 4 oz. and 2 oz.” He did not offer to learn from the Governor.
Several impassioned harangues were made by the King’s linguists and
counsellors: the King said, “he had 4 oz. from Elmina, and 2 oz. from
English Accra; was it not putting shame upon him to send him 4 ackies
from Cape Coast?” The Cape Coast messenger (Quashie Tom had absented
himself) spoke again with great trepidation; the King could not conceal
his emotions; his counsellors became clamorous; in an instant there was
a flourish of all the horns; all the captains rose and seized their gold
headed swords from their attendants; the head general snatched Mr.
Tedlie’s from his scabbard; numerous canopies crowded one upon the other
in the background, as if some considerable personages had arrived; there
was nothing but commotion, wrath, and impatience. The captains, old and
young, rushed before the King, and exclaimed, as Quashie reported, (who
seems to have been afraid to tell us all, and was restrained by Quamina)
“King, this shames you too much; you must let us go to night and kill
all the Fantees, and burn all the towns under the forts.” They then
presented themselves successively with their bands of music and
retinues, and bowing before the King, received his foot upon their
heads; each then directed his sword to the King (who held up the two
first fingers of his right hand) and swore by the King’s head, that they
would go with the army that night, and bring him the books, and the
heads of all the Fantees. Each captain made the oath impressive in his
own peculiar manner; some seriously, some by ridicule, at our expense,
and that of the Fantees, pointing at our heads and ears, and
endeavouring to intimidate us by the most insolent action and gesture as
they held out their swords. The old general (Apokoo) who swore the last,
after he had done so in the most expressive manner, threw Mr. Tedlie’s
sword to him, over the heads of the people with contemptuous defiance.
The number was so great, that we thought this awful ceremony would never
finish.

The King left the council a short time. In the interval, Quamina Bwa
(our guide) told Accra Quashie to beg Mr. James to speak to the King
when he came back, and try and appease him. Mr. James did so, but
without the zeal, presence of mind, or argument the crisis demanded; it
was not adequate even to ameliorate the King’s impression of the
Governor and the English; it was no more than he said at first. The King
took not the least notice of it, but declared angrily, that “if he did
not see white men’s faces he would cut off the heads of every Fantee
messenger on the spot.” Some sheep and gold were then brought forward
and presented to the Captains, and the King rose abruptly from his
chair. In this anxious moment we reflected that the mulatto of General
Daendels had a long audience of the King just before we were received;
no resource was to be left untried, that was manly and appropriate. Mr.
Bowdich stepped before the King, and declared through the linguist,
“that he wished to speak what he knew would make the King think that the
Governor would do him right, and was his good friend.” The King said he
would hear him speak in the house; we retired amidst the insults and
menaces of the assembly.

About two hours after, we were summoned, and, as is the etiquette, kept
some time in waiting; in this interval, Mr. James said that our
situation being very critical, it was a pity any difference should be
observed, and that he thought it much better to be reconciled. Mr.
Bowdich replied, that he could not think it possible our sentiments to
be delivered to the King could differ at such a moment; that if they did
we should assimilate ours to his as much as possible; but feeling the
necessity for the greatest energy, for every address and argument for
the conviction of the King, we must, for the public good, continue our
assumption of the privilege of strengthening his declarations by our own
until our recall, that we should be tender of his dignity, but that it
being a difference on a point of public duty, we could not compound it,
but would take the consequences. We were received; the King’s aspect was
stern; he prefaced that “he did not wish to make war with the English;
but that the 4 ackies a month shamed him too much; that the captains
said to him, King! they cheat you, they put shame on you; we will go to
night and bring you the heads of all the Fantees; that he was forced to
say to them, I beg your pardon, but as I see the white men’s faces, I
beg you to stay till to-morrow, when they can write to the Governor, and
they will tell me themselves what he says; then if he does not send me
Amooney’s and the Braffoes books, you shall go and kill all; that he had
been obliged afterwards to dash them sheep and gold to make them stay
until the white men got the Governor’s letter.” Mr. James assured the
King “that the King of England and the Governor wished to be friends
with him, to do all that was right; and he thought in his own mind that
the Governor would give up the books.” The King took no notice, and
continued serious: the moment called for the most energetic appeal to
his reason, for every imposing argument and circumstance. There was a
long pause; Mr. Bowdich rose, and charged Mr. James’s linguist to
interpret truly. We took the precaution of making notes of this speech,
feeling we should be particular where we pledge our honour, and
volunteer our affidavit; it was as follows.

“We swore yesterday as the King wished, to day we wish to swear as we
should before our own King.” The King held up the two first fingers of
his right hand as he did to the captains. “We swear” (presenting our
swords and kissing the hilt, as the most imposing form that occurred to
us) “by our God, and by our King, and we know the Governor of Accra will
do the same, that we mean no bad to the King, that the King of England
and the Company ordered the Governor to send us to make the Ashantees
and English as one, that we are sure the Governor will do the King
right, and that when we write him all the King says, we will write also
that we think the King’s palaver good. We were sent to make the English
and Ashantees as one, because our’s is the greatest white, your’s the
greatest black nation, and when two great nations are friends, it makes
good. I came out in the ship that was sent to tell the Governor this,
and when he heard it, he said it gave him very much pleasure. The King
of England and the Company thought the Governor should send to the King,
to send some of his great men to Cape Coast, that we might be safe; but
the Governor said, no! there was no occasion, and wrote to the King and
the Company that he could trust all his officers in Ashantee, because
the King’s honour made them safe, so we came without sending, because we
knew the King was our true friend.

“The Governor wished always to do the King right, but the Fantees never
would tell him what was right, so he wrote to the King of England to
send him some presents, that he might send his own officers to the King,
and hear properly from the King’s own mouth what was right, because the
Fantees never would tell him what was true, or what the King said. When
the Governor reads what we shall write him, then he will know the truth
for the first time. We shall stay to make the Ashantees and English one,
and we pledge our lives to the King, that we speak a proper palaver, and
when we speak true before God and the King we cannot fear.”

There were repeated and general applauses as each sentence was
interpreted; the King smiled, and desired his linguist to say to Mr.
Bowdich as Quashie interpreted, “The King likes you, you speak a proper
good palaver, you speak like a man, the King wishes to be a friend to
white men; he thinks white men next to God.” Here the King raised his
hands to heaven, and then covering his face, Quashie continued to
interpret. “The King thanks God and his own fetish, that they have sent
him white men to talk proper like this to him, and when you three white
men go back to Cape Coast, and the Governor has bad put into his head,
and think you did wrong, then if you want any thing to eat, send a
messenger to him and he will send you plenty, for the King thinks you do
right to God and him, and to your King, and to the Governor, and that
you will get much honour when you go back; so the King thanks you, and
says you speak well.” The King then asked Mr. James if he would swear on
his sword like us, as we said; Mr. James did so. The King made an
observation which it seems we cannot convey to you in its full force, or
nearer than, that he liked the three white men because they always stood
up to speak, and pushed forward to get what they wanted. Many auxiliary
observations were afterwards offered casually by each of us, to confirm
his change of sentiment. The Fantee linguists attempted to intimidate
the linguist Quashie of Accra, but ineffectually; this man is invaluable
from his influence and intelligence, he is our only safe medium, and
interprets to the King anxiously and impressively.

The King appeared much pleased, and made us a long speech. “The King
says the Fantees are all rogues, the Governor knows that very well; the
King thinks they always put bad palaver in the Governor’s head, he
always tells his captains so; he is sure you come to do him right. The
King wishes all good for the English; he swears by God and by the
fetish, that if the English could know how the Fantees serve him, and
all the bad they do, they would say his palaver was good. The King
speaks true.” He then gave us an outline of the Fantee war, which must
have convinced even the most prejudiced, of his injuries and
forbearance, and their injustice and cruelty.

The King says, “if the English trust to him, he will take more care of
the forts than the Fantees can, he will do them great good, he does not
want to do nothing. He will send the English his trade; he will send
them good gold like what he wears himself, (shewing his armlets,) not
bad gold like he knows the Fantees make, his people don’t know how to do
that, the Fantees do it in their own houses before they give it to white
men. If at any time the English in the forts are in want of any thing to
eat, and send to him, he will send them every thing. To morrow is
Sunday, but the next day is Monday, then he will give you a proper
messenger.”

We cannot do justice to the King’s sentiments either in detail or in
expression; they were incredibly liberal, and would have ennobled the
most civilized monarch; they seemed to break the spell which has shut
the Interior. He begged us to drink with him, and Mr. James agreed in
the toast of “May the Ashantees and English always be one;” it pleased
him, and he begged us to touch his glass with ours. He then turned
suddenly to the Fantee messengers (who were trembling in the rear) and
said, “you made me very angry with you, and I am very angry with you,
but never mind, come and drink some of my liquor.”

Our critical situation demands the delivery of our sentiments on the
subject of these notes; we do so with diffidence and respect. The
services of the Braffoes, who hold the one, are merely nominal, their
enmity nugatory from their political situation; the issuing of a fresh
note to Amooney will be but a small addition to the expenditure, and
even the expense of renewing them both cannot be weighed with the
prevention of another Fantee war, of the destruction of a whole people,
and the ruin of our Settlements in their defence, with the defeat of the
intrigue and devices of our rival, and the acquisition of the confidence
of a powerful and liberal monarch, whose influence may perfect the views
of the British Government on the Interior. We hail the circumstances as
auspicious, even in the present serious moment.

Mr. James confesses that he desponds of consummating the objects of the
Mission; we do not; we would be responsible for all of them, but we
diffidently await your decision. We must claim this momentary calm of
the King to ourselves, because it only affords us the credit, or rather
the justification of having done our duty, which we are resolute in
repeating Mr. James has not. What has been said through Mr. Bowdich is
here reported faithfully; we have not committed the Governor or
ourselves.

Gentlemen, our situation is critical; if your answer determines the King
on war, we are his prisoners; if, as we cannot doubt, the valour of our
countrymen again retards his progress by defences as memorable as that
of Annamaboe, we may be the victims of an irritated soldiery, though we
feel it would be with the reluctance of a generous prince, who is not
independent, but, unfortunately, controlled by a military despotism,
which deposed his brother and invested him.

But, Gentlemen, if in your better knowledge and reflection, you cannot
consistently with your honour and your trust, meet the King’s demand,
the history of our country has fortified our minds with the illustrious
example of a Vansittart, and his colleagues, who were situated as we
are, when the dawn of British intercourse in India was scarcely more
advanced than its dawn in Africa now; and their last request to their
Council is our present conclusion to you—“Do not put our lives in
competition with the honour and interests of our country.”

                                            We are, &c. &c.

                                           (Signed)   T. EDWARD BOWDICH.

                                                      W. HUTCHISON.

                                                      HENRY TEDLIE.


                                            _Coomassie, May 28th_, 1817.

                      TO THE GOVERNOR AND COUNCIL.

   GENTLEMEN,

ON Sunday the King visited us at our quarters, and expressed much
gratification with the trifles we presented him individually, and our
solicitude in explaining some plates of botanical and natural history,
which he sends for frequently.

On Monday we had a public audience before the Captains, (whose ill-will
has been acknowledged,) when two messengers were ordered to accompany
one of ours to Cape Coast, with the letters to the Governor, and were
impressively sworn; they received their instructions in a speech from
the linguist of nearly two hours; it seemed to be intended to conciliate
the Captains at the same time.

In the afternoon the King sent for us again, and said he wished to
dictate a letter to the Governor. Mr. James wrote the sense of the
King’s expressions, but was obliged to leave off from indisposition. The
King would not trust it out of his hands. Yesterday evening it was
concluded, when the King proposed to make his mark, and insisted on
repeating it in the direction. We have taken the pains to preserve this
curious letter verbatim, which from its length, and our constant
interruption, we are compelled to reserve with many curious particulars
for the General Report.

We are anxiously waiting a summons to hand our dispatches to the
messenger. Nine days are allowed for the journey to Cape Coast, and nine
for the return. The whole time has been gradually extended, by intreaty
of the Fantee messengers, from eighteen to thirty days.

Mr. Hutchison is ill with a bilious attack, and several of the people
with a fever and dysentery. The heat is very powerful here, but Mr.
Bowdich and Mr. Tedlie continue in excellent health.

We would recommend the sending up a common green silk umbrella, and a
Company’s dirk, as presents to the King’s favourite nephew.

Our confinement to the house is rather irksome; we are not allowed to
walk in the town without Captains accompanying us.

12 o’clock. The King sent to say Mr. Bowdich must come to the palace,
and mount the chief captain’s horse, and shew him how Englishmen ride.
Mr. Bowdich went, and by the King’s desire gallopped up and down the
opposite hill. The King expressed great anxiety when the horse was made
to play his tricks; and when Mr. Bowdich persevered, and made him gallop
back and alighted, the King sent him word that “he rode like a proper
man, that he stayed on the horse well, and made him do proper.”

4 o’clock. The King sent for us at two, to make some additions to the
letter, and to seal it in his presence. A long prayer was uttered by a
Moor after the sealing of the letter, and we were called back to be
again impressed with the example and justice of the Dutch as regards the
books. Mr. Hutchison’s illness prevented his attendance to day. The
messengers are to go to night.

May 29th, 3 p.m. The messengers and the Fantee bearers, have been
delayed in consequence of the death of a person of rank, and their
assistance in the custom. I am now assured that they will leave
Coomassie at 4 o’clock.

In reply to the request we urged to Mr. James, that he would dismiss our
hammock men, as they had been of so little service to us in coming up,
and were a considerable expense; he impressed that it would be contrary
to your instructions.

Only one message from the King to day, and that a private one to Mr.
Bowdich, with permission for him to ride: he went all round the town,
which he considers to be about three miles in circumference: the King
afterwards sent him word, that to-morrow he must ride on a cloth only,
as he had heard the English did.

                                        We are, &c. &c.

                                               (Signed)   T. E. BOWDICH.

                                                          H. TEDLIE.

P.S. Mr. James had a severe relapse of fever last night, and was very
ill this morning; at 10 o’clock a.m. he had the cold bath, and some
febrifuge medicine. Mr. Hutchison is rather better, the soldiers also,
but the hammock men continue much the same.

                               * * * * *

SAÏ TOOTOO QUAMINA, _King of Ashantee and its Dependencies, to_ JOHN
HOPE SMITH, _Esquire, Governor in Chief of the British Settlements on
the Gold Coast of Africa._

THE King sends his compliments to the Governor, he thanks the King of
England and him very much for the presents sent to him, he thinks them
very handsome. The King’s sisters and all his friends have seen them,
and think them very handsome, and thank him. The King thanks his God and
his fetish that he made the Governor send the white men’s faces for him
to see, like he does now; he likes the English very much, and the
Governor all the same as his brother.

The King of England has made war against all the other white people a
long time, and killed all the people all about, and taken all the towns,
French, Dutch, and Danish, all the towns, all about. The King of
Ashantee has made war against all the people of the water side, and all
the black men all about, and taken all their towns.

When the King of England takes a French town, he says, “come, all this
is mine, bring all your books, and give me all your pay,” and if they
don’t do it, does the Governor think the King of England likes it?[7] So
the King has beat the Fantees now two times, and taken all their towns,
and they send and say to him, you are a great King, we want to serve
you; but he says, Hah! you want to serve me, then bring all your books,
what you get from the forts, and then they send him four ackies, this
vexes him too much.

The first time he made war against the Fantees, two great men in Assin
quarrelled, so half the people came to Ashantee, half went to Fantee.
The King said, what is the reason of this, so he sent his gold swords
and canes to know why they did so, and the Fantees killed his messengers
and took all their gold.[8] After they fought with the Elminas and
Accras, the Fantees sent word to the King they would serve him; the King
sent word to the Assins, if it is true that the Fantees want to serve
me, let me hear; after that they sent to say yes! they tired of
fighting, and wanted to serve him, he said, well, give me some gold,
what you get from the books, and then you shall hear what palaver I have
got in my head, and we can be friends; then he sent some messengers, and
after they waited more than two years, the Fantees sent word back, no!
we don’t want to serve the King, but only to make the path open and get
good trade: this vexed the King too much.

Then the Fantees sent to a strong man, Cudjoe Coomah, and said, “come,
let us put our heads together against the King;” after that, when the
King heard this, he sent one, not a great man, but his own slave, and
said, well you will do, go kill all the people, all the Aquapims, and
Akims, and all; and so he killed all, and after he killed all he came
and told him.

When he sent against Akim, the people in Akim sent word, that they told
their head men not to vex the King, but they would not mind them, so he
killed the head people, and the others begged his pardon.

When the King went to fight with the Fantees they sent this saucy
word—we will kill you and your people, and stand on you; then they did
not kill one Ashantee captain, but the King killed all the Fantee
captains and people. They do not stand on him.

That time, after the King fought, all the Fantees sent word, well we
will serve you, but you must not send more harm to hurt us, we don’t
want to fight more, but to make good friends with you. Then the King
said, what caboceer lives at Cape Coast and Annamaboe, what books they
get from the forts, let them send all, and then we can be friends. And
the King sent word too, if my messengers go to Cape Coast fort, and if
they bring pots of gold, and casks of goods, then I can’t take that,
_but I must have the books_.

After that the King sent word to the Governor of Cape Coast and the
Governor of Annamaboe, well! you know I have killed all the Fantees, and
I must have Adocoo’s and Amooney’s books, and I can make friends with
you, good brother and good heart; but now they send four ackies, that is
what makes the King’s heart break out when he looks on the book and
thinks of four ackies, and his captains swear that the Fantees are
rogues and want to cheat him. When the white men see the Fantees do
this, and the English officers bring him this four ackies, it makes him
get up very angry, but he has no palaver with white men.

All Fantee is his, all the black mans country is his; he hears that
white men bring all the things that come here; he wonders they do not
fight with the Fantees, for he knows they cheat them. Now he sees white
men, and he thanks God and his fetish for it.

When the English made Apollonia fort he fought with the Aowins, the
masters of that country, and killed them; then he said to the caboceer,
I have killed all your people, your book is mine; the caboceer said,
true! so long as you take my town, the book belongs to you.

He went to Dankara and fought, and killed the people, then he said; give
me the book you get from Elmina, so they did, and now Elmina belongs to
him.[9]

The English fort at Accra gave a book to an Akim caboceer, called
Aboigin Adjumawcon. The King killed him and took the book. The Dutch
fort gave a book to another Akim caboceer, Curry Curry Apam. The Danish
fort gave a book to another Akim caboceer, Arrawa Akim; the King killed
all and took their books.

This King, Saï, is young on the stool, but he keeps always in his head
what old men say, for it is good, and his great men and linguists tell
it him every morning. The King of England makes three great men, and
sends one to Cape Coast, one to Annamaboe, and one to Accra; Cape Coast
is the same as England. The King gets two ounces from Accra every moon,
and the English wish to give him only four ackies for the big fort at
Cape Coast, and the same for Annamboe; do white men think this proper?

When the King killed the Dankara caboceer and got two ounces from
Elmina, the Dutch Governor said, this is a proper King, we shall not
play with him, and made the book four ounces. The King has killed all
the people, and all the forts are his; he sent his captains to see white
men, now he sees them, and thanks God and his fetish. If the path was
good when the captains went, the King would have gone under the forts
and seen all the white men. The Ashantees take good gold to Cape Coast,
but the Fantees mix it; he sent some of his captains like slaves to see,
and they saw it; ten handkerchiefs are cut to eight, water is put to
rum, and charcoal to powder, even for the King; they cheat him, but he
thinks the white men give all those things proper to the Fantees.

The King knows the King of England is his good friend, for he has sent
him handsome dashes; he knows his officers are his good friends, for
they come to see him. The King wishes the Governor to send to Elmina to
see what is paid him there, and to write the King of England how much,
as the English say their nation passes the Dutch; he will see by the
books given him by both forts. If the King of England does not like
that, he may send him himself what he pleases, and then Saï can take it.

He thanks the King and Governor for sending four white men to see him.
The old King wished to see some of them, but the Fantees stop it. He is
but a young man and sees them, and so again he thanks God and his
fetish.

Dictated in the presence of,

    T. EDWARD BOWDICH,

    WILLIAM HUTCHISON,

    HENRY TEDLIE.

                               * * * * *

May 30. Apokoo sent us a present of 30 ackies of gold and some fruits.

June 1. The King sent to desire Mr. Tedlie to bring his instruments and
medicines, and explain their uses to him; he was shrewdly inquisitive,
and presented Mr. Tedlie with 6 ackies of gold in approbation of his
intelligence.

June 4. The King paid us a visit at our quarters, and expressed himself
highly gratified with some botanical engravings: he said white men tried
to know so much they would spoil their heads by and by. We were allowed
to take a walk in the town to day, in charge of two captains. We had
scarcely passed the palace when two men were decapitated for cowardice:
three others had been executed during the night.

June 5. Bakkee, to whom our house formerly belonged, had been sent the
second in command of the army with which Appia Danqua invaded Fantee the
second time, in pursuit of the Akim and Aquapim revolters. Wearied of
the procrastination and labours of the campaign, he inconsiderately
observed to a public messenger, that, as the King had declared when he
invaded Fantee in person, that he would have the head of every Fantee
caboceer, and yet returned with a part only; so he could not be expected
to forego the enjoyment of the riches and luxuries of his home, until
every revolter was killed. On his return to the capital without leave,
he was charged with this, and not denying it, was stripped of all his
property, and hung himself. Aboidwee our present house master was raised
to Bakkee’s stool, or seat in council, to which 1700 retainers are
attached.

June 9. The King sent us two sheep and a large quantity of fruit; his
nephew also sent us a sheep.

June 11. We were invited to attend the King’s levee, on the Adaï custom,
and were presented with a flask of rum and a fat sheep. This walk was a
great relief, for the longest court in our quarters was not more than 14
feet.

June 12. The King sent us a large Hio sheep to look at; it measured 4½
feet from the head to the insertion of the tail, which was two feet
long, its height was three feet, and it was covered with coarse shaggy
hair.

June 13. The King sent for us late at night; he assured us he wished to
think well of the English; and that if Cape Coast was not so far off, he
should send messengers daily to wish the Governor good morning, but the
Crambos (Moors) and his great men thought we came to do bad, and spy the
country; so he sent for us when it was dark, that they might not know
it. He had only two persons with him. Mr. James was too ill to attend.

17. The King sent a present to our quarters of

     2 ounces of gold to the officers.

    20 ackies to our people.

    10 ackies to our linguists.

     1 hog, 1 sheep, and a profusion of plantains and oranges.

This was his reproof of a disgraceful attempt to borrow money of him for
our subsistence; of which Mr. Hutchison, Mr. Tedlie, and myself, had
publicly disclaimed our knowledge and sanction. Nothing could be more
injurious to our dignity.

18th. Mr. Tedlie having ventured to walk a few yards without the town,
was arrested by a captain, with about 100 followers, who detained him in
his house whilst a message was sent to the King, who desiring Mr. Tedlie
to be brought before him, enquired if he had his small box (compass) in
his pocket, and finding he had not, affected to reprove the captain
severely, for supposing either of us could wish to run away, whilst the
King was our friend. After this we seldom went out.

21st. Bundahenna, one of the King’s uncles, begged him for permission to
go and make custom for some relatives whom he had lost in the last
Fantee war, as he feared their spirits were beginning to trouble him.
The King subscribed four ounces of gold, two ankers of rum, one barrel
of powder, and four human victims for sacrifice, towards this custom. We
received a present of 11 ackies of gold from Quatchie Quofies household.

26th. We received a present from a captain called Oöossa Cudjo, of 10
ackies of gold, and another from Jessinting, of the same quantity, a
sheep and some plantains.

28th. The King sent us a large quantity of plantains and oranges.
Apokoo, one of the four greatest men in the kingdom, hearing his
mother’s sister was dead, killed a slave before his house, and proceeded
to her croom to sacrifice many more, and celebrate her funeral custom;
but, when he found, on opening her boxes, that the old woman from her
dislike of him, had thrown almost all her rock gold into the river, and
that he should only inherit a number of hungry slaves, he sacrificed but
one more victim, and made but a very mean custom.

29th. Attended the King’s levee, and were presented with a flask of rum,
and a fat sheep. The King sent us word that he would be glad to let us
walk out, but there were many bad people who would kill us if they
could. We were gratified by an invitation to visit Odumata, one of the
four aristocrats; he begged us to drink palm wine with him, and ordered
a large jar of it to be sent to our servants. He told us he was the
first captain who fought with the English at Annamaboe; and that if the
books were not sent, he would be the first to do so again; he asked us
if we would take him to England to see our King, and engage to bring him
back again; for, having sold an immense number of captives as slaves, he
expected some of them might recognise him, and call out to the King of
England to stop him, because he had sent them out of their own country.

July 2. A girl was beheaded for insolence to one of the King’s sons, and
a man for transgressing the law by picking up gold which he had dropped
in the public market place, where all that falls is allowed to
accumulate until the soil is washed on state emergencies.

3rd. This morning one of the King’s sons (about 10 years of age) shot
himself: his funeral custom was celebrated in the afternoon, and a smart
fire of musquetry was kept up until sun-set, amidst dancing, singing,
and revelry; two men and one girl were sacrificed, and their trunks and
heads were left in the market place till dark. The mother of this child,
a favourite wife of the King’s, having added crime to a continued
perversity of conduct, had been put to death; the boy was banished the
King’s presence from that time. This morning he had stolen into the
palace for the first time, and the King desiring him to be removed,
observing that he had, doubtless, as bad a head towards him as his
mother had shewn; he replied, that if he could not be allowed to come
and look at his father, he had better die; half an hour afterwards he
destroyed himself privately, by directing a blunderbuss into his mouth,
and discharging it with his foot. The keeper of the royal cemetry was
this day imprisoned. His wife was soon after charged by the council with
making fetish to turn the King’s head; she replied that it meant no more
than to make the King think better of her husband; but they insisted
that she invoked the Fetish to make the King mad, and she was executed.

5th. A loud shout from our people announced the return of the messengers
from Cape Coast Castle, after an absence of thirty-eight days.


[Footnote 5: “The government of the country is a military despotism, and
I have this day received private information, that it is already
settled, that if the refusal of the notes occasions a war, and any one
is hurt or killed by the forts, our lives will be the forfeit.” Mr.
James’s Dispatch.]

[Footnote 6: “In the present suspicious state of the King’s mind
respecting us, I fear it would be impolitic to make the enquiries you
ordered in your instructions. I think it will be more prudent to leave
them to time. Mr. H. if he remains, will be able, from time to time, to
obtain such information as they can give, without creating that
suspicion which would certainly arise from any questions put at the
present moment. I have kept Mr. H’s hammock men, as it is yet uncertain
whether he will remain.” Mr. James’s Dispatch.]

[Footnote 7: This is an extraordinary impression, that all the towns in
Europe are supported like those under the forts, holding notes from
their governments for annual stipends.]

[Footnote 8: Here the King’s linguist ceased, and by his desire
requested us to repeat all the King had said, he was much pleased with
our accuracy, and begged us to take some refreshment, (spirits and palm
wine were introduced in silver bowls) fearing he had kept us too long
without eating, and, would continue the letter to-morrow. He locked up
what had been written, and heard it read again the next day, before his
linguists continued.]

[Footnote 9: The King always spoke of the acts of all his ancestors as
his own.]




                              CHAPTER III.

                               * * * * *

   _Proceedings and Incidents until the Third Dispatch to Cape Coast
                                Castle._


                                     _Cape Coast Castle, June 21_, 1817.

   SIR,

MR. JAMES being ordered to return here as soon as possible, will deliver
you his instructions, and you will immediately on receipt of this
letter, take upon yourself the management of the Mission. I have every
reliance on your prudence and discretion, and still firmly hope that the
termination of the Embassy will be attended with success, and that the
sanguine expectations which we have entertained as to the result of it,
will not be disappointed.

The King has received a very erroneous impression of the affair of the
Fantee notes, which I regret to hear was the cause of a serious
disturbance: I am glad however to find that by your prompt mode of
conduct, you were in some measure able to repress the unfavourable bias
it seems to have occasioned, and I have no doubt that an explanation of
the circumstance will effectually remove any remaining prejudice. This
transaction was entirely between the Ashantee messengers and Fantees,
negociated, and determined on by them at Abrah, and afterwards ratified
here by their mutual consent. Hearing that messengers from the King were
at Abrah, I invited them down, wishing through their medium to
communicate with him concerning the conveyance of the presents I had
received from the Committee. After some delay they arrived, and on their
first interview made known their errand to the Fantees, and the manner
it had been arranged, applying at the same time for two notes to be made
out in favour of Zey, at four ackies each, which were to be deducted
from the notes of Amooney and Aduecoe; not being perfectly satisfied
from the representation of these people as to the justness of the claim,
I delayed complying until it was stated to be a pledge of good faith and
allegiance on the part of the Fantees, and a confirmation of the final
adjustment of all differences between the two parties, and as such they
were given them. The nature of the claim having been fully and
satisfactorily explained, I have no hesitation in complying with the
wishes of the King; and this I do the more readily, knowing that by the
extension of his authority, good order and subjection will be better
preserved.

This will, I hope, evince to the King my friendly intention towards him;
and you will impress upon his mind, that it is my earnest desire to
cultivate his friendship, the establishment of which will be mutually
beneficial; and in order that the union between us may be more closely
cemented, I am particularly desirous that Mr. Hutchison be permitted to
reside at Ashantee, which will be the means of preventing any
interruption to the good understanding which, before you leave, will, I
hope, be firmly settled.

I have no objection to you returning by way of Warsaw, but your
undertaking the journey on foot, I am apprehensive, you will find too
fatiguing. The hammock-men are engaged for the trip, therefore the only
additional expense will be their subsistence; I however leave it to you
to dismiss them or not.

The Accra linguist being so very useful, and the only man who will
interpret faithfully, you will retain him until you return.

I have sent you, by the King’s messenger, 40 oz. of gold to defray your
expenses; should any loan have been granted by the King, you will of
course repay him.

I send you a piece of muslin and 10 danes for presents to the Moors,
whose friendship it will be highly necessary to conciliate. I have also
at your request, sent a dirk and umbrella, intended for the King’s chief
captain and his favourite nephew.

Quamina, the Ashantee captain at Abrah, has refused to allow any letters
to pass that place which may be given in charge to Ashantee traders, on
the plea that by so doing he would incur the displeasure of the King;
who, he says, expects that especial messengers will be engaged here to
proceed with all letters to the capital. Not long ago a trader who had
received a letter, was detained by him at Abrah, and the letter
returned. The expense of employing messengers here on every occasion
would be material, which is quite unnecessary, as opportunities almost
daily occur for forwarding letters by the different traders going from
hence. I therefore hope your representation of this affair to the King,
will induce him to countermand his orders to Quamina, if any such have
been given him.

                                           I am, Sir,

                                      your most obedient Servant,

                                                        JOHN HOPE SMITH.

_To Thomas Edward Bowdich, Esq._

JOHN HOPE SMITH, _Esquire, Governor in Chief of the British Forts and
Settlements on the Gold Coast of Africa, to_ SAÏ TOOTOO QUAMINA, _King
of Ashantee._

   SIR,

I HAVE received your letter of the 26th ult. and am happy to find that
you are sincerely desirous of cultivating the friendship of the British
nation. Both inclination and duty urge me to reciprocate the sentiments
expressed by you, and I shall be anxious at all times to promote the
harmony and good understanding which, I hope, will now be established
between us respectively, and which cannot fail to be mutually
advantageous.

I regret to find there has been so much trouble about the Fantee notes,
and I am sorry you did not apply to me in the first instance, as the
affair should have been settled immediately to your satisfaction; but I
knew not of it, except from the Fantees having begged me to take four
ackies per month from each note, which they said they had agreed for
with your messengers at Abrah.

I observe by the many instances quoted in your letter, that the notes of
conquered countries have been transferred to your ancestors, therefore
it shall be the same on the present occasion. Herewith I send you two
notes, one for two oz. per month, formerly held by Amooney, also one
from the caboceer at Abrah for two oz, the latter was only 12 ackies per
month, and I have added 1 oz. 4 to it. These, and the notes you hold
from Accra, will make your Company’s pay six oz. per month, which shall
be regularly paid at the Castle.

I hope my ready compliance with your wishes will convince you of the
good will of the British nation, but I have every reason to believe that
attempts have been made to prejudice you against it, however your own
good understanding will readily suggest to you that the only motive is
jealousy in trade.

The conduct of the English you will always find very different; they
enter into fair competition with the other European residents here, but
they never, by clandestine means or false assertions, endeavour to
injure their character with the natives of this country.

I have learned with regret that the people of Elmina are using their
influence to induce you to make a palaver with the Commendas. They are a
mere handful of people, extremely poor and not worth your notice;
besides they are under my protection, therefore I hope you will not
think further of the affair, and I shall consider your compliance in
this instance, as the greatest possible proof of the sincerity of your
intentions towards the English.

I wish you health and happiness, and I hope you will reign many years,
enjoying the love of your subjects, and the respect of all the Europeans
resident in this country.

                                       I am, Sir,

                                           your faithful friend,

                                               (Signed)    J. H. SMITH.

_Cape Coast Castle, 20th June_, 1817.

P.S. The abolition of the slave trade was an act of the King and the
Parliament in England, in which the government in this country had no
concern.


                                              _Coomassie, July 9_, 1817.

        TO JOHN HOPE SMITH, ESQ. GOVERNOR IN CHIEF, &c. &c. &c.

   SIR,

THE messengers returned on Saturday the 5th instant.

To be confirmed by your approbation, in the opinion that my zeal for the
public good had not exceeded my duty, is a most flattering satisfaction.
The appointment you have conferred on me, is an acknowledgment so far
transcending my conduct, that it must stimulate every ability to exert
itself for the success of the Mission, to justify such an honourable
distinction.

The box containing the letters was opened in the King’s presence, but
being engaged in a custom on the death of a son, he deferred the reading
of your letter, retaining it with the notes. His acknowledgments of your
justice were associated with the declaration, that, although you had
sent him the notes, still, if I could not fortify him with the prices of
the various articles to be received in payment, you would have it in
your power (though he did not suspect you) to reduce the intrinsic of
the whole, to that of the moiety rejected. The proposition of the same
prices as those attached to the Accra note, was annihilated by the
argument, that Accra was a small fort, and not like Cape Coast or
_Elmina_. So much stress was laid on the instance of the latter, that I
felt called upon to declare, as the only striking conviction, that you
did not wish, in the payment of these notes, to treat the King like a
trader, and therefore would not allow the Elmina Governor to act more
liberally in prices than yourself: the conviction was entire and
instantaneous.

The next audience did not take place until Monday, Mr. James being
present. I did justice to the utmost of my ability to your impressive
letter; the effect was honourable to you, and encouraging to myself; the
King ordered me to take his hand, in his sensibility to the strong
appeal of the several paragraphs, and again at the conclusion, as a
pledge of his cordial satisfaction of the whole; his linguist followed
his example, (as did the whole council) when he laid his fore-finger on
his head and breast, as the invocation to Heaven for the vouchsafement
of your several good wishes, as I concluded with them. I was reluctantly
compelled to yield a minor object to a custom consecrated by their
constitution. The laws of the three first Kings (who were brothers, and
cotemporary leaders of the colony, whose conquests established the
Empire) are sacred; and it was a law of Saï Cudjo, the younger brother,
and the grandfather of the present King, which granted to particular
captains the honourable patent of receiving the pay of small forts,
distinctly, each being responsible for his separate duties to his
settlement. If this law were not inviolable, the King pleads, that it
would be an invidious act, and unjust to the merits of the Captain of
English Accra, (Asquah Amanquah) to remove the payment of the Accra note
to Cape Coast; but as the other appointments originate in him, he will
respect your wish, by constituting one captain to receive both the Abra
and Annamaboe notes at Cape Coast. He enquired if it was your wish that
no Ashantee trader should go to Accra? I replied no! you were only
desirous to induce as many as possible to come to Cape Coast.

The Cape Coast linguists, and our guide, Quamina Bwa, confirmed your
report of the conduct of Quamina Bootaqua, the captain now at Payntree,
in the negociation of the notes; it excited the greatest surprise and
indignation; his interception of letters was disclaimed, and will be
done away with. I submitted to the King, on retiring, that in my next
audience, I should be desirous of declaring the purport of the official
instructions transferred to me (which had not been yet avowed) with
other credentials, explanatory and impressive of the good wishes and
intentions of the Government, the Committee, and yourself. I was
favoured with my first separate audience at 8 o’clock this morning. I
first impressed from the dispatches of the Committee, every motive and
sentiment that was convicting or imposing; urging your waving the
hostages and escort, as the demonstration of your confidence in the
King’s honour and friendship; and insinuating that the establishment of
a school at Cape Coast, was solely in anticipation of the King’s
committing some of his children to your care for education, as the
foundation of the pre-eminence of Europeans. I then passed to your
instructions, rendering them in a manner as persuasive and auspicious as
possible; associating in favour of the Residency, the commanding motive
of facilitating political interests, with the imposing one of securing
justice to the Ashantee traders. Lastly, I introduced the Treaty, as a
pledge from the King to give force to your application to the Government
at home, for the increase of his pay; for, as he continued to dwell on
the grant of 4 ounces from Elmina, I availed myself of this liberty of
my instructions, to divert the impression, and to propitiate his
ratification of the Treaty. I considered the pretence of your being
obliged to address the British Government on the subject, as
preservative of the opportunity of judging of the sincerity of his
professions, and of the duration of the union.

I think I may pledge myself for three great pillars of our commercial
intercourse, by the accomplishment of the Residency, the Education, and
the Treaty.

I reconcile myself to fresh difficulties by the reflection that they are
inseparable from all great political views; and that without them, I
should be deprived of the satisfaction of proving myself, in a small
degree, worthy this confidence and distinction, by patience and
perseverance. A letter accompanies this, written in the King’s presence,
on the subject of the Commenda palaver, which wears so decided an
aspect, that whilst I pledge all my energy and address, and look with
hope to the aid of your suggestions, I must candidly confess, I do not
think it can be compounded in any thing like a reasonable way. I
appealed to the King’s magnanimity, and depicted the poverty of the
Commendas, but every appeal and every argument was ineffectual; their
aggravated offences admit of no amelioration of the King’s feelings. I
depreciated the plea of General Daendels’ repeated messages, by
submitting that they were addressed to the Town, and not to the Fort,
and I succeeded in retiring him from the negociation, as an interference
inconsistent with your dignity, and the present good understanding.

I did not discourage the King’s great anxiety for clothes of the English
costume, considering that his example would be more auspicious than any
thing else, to the introduction of these manufactures. I have
distributed the muslins, &c. as politically as possible, including with
the Moors of repute, the aristocracy, or four captains controuling the
King, his four linguists, his brother and successor, our housemaster,
and some other captains of superior influence. I made a point of
conciliating a Moor of influence, about to return through Sallagha or
Sarem (the capital of the Inta country, and the grand emporium of the
merchandize of the interior) to Houssa, feeling the policy of
communicating every favourable impression to the neighbouring kingdoms.
In my second interview I obtained permission from the King to dismiss
the remaining Fantees. It was one of the first considerations, for the
sake of our dignity, to avoid the humiliating circumstances and
impressions, which have ensued from the want of foresight, and the
consequent inability to meet the demands of our people. Their conduct
since has been so mutinous and insulting, with the exception of six,
that to preserve the impression of the firmness of an English officer, I
secured one who encouraged the others, by persisting in some insulting
indecencies, in contempt of my remonstrances, and ordered him to be
punished.

The others (with the above exception) having refused in a body,
aggravating their disobedience with the grossest insolence, to go with a
cane to Payntree, and bring the biscuit which had been deserted there; I
have disclaimed them, and left them to act for themselves, only securing
them the King’s permission to depart.

I shall request the King to furnish me with his own people, on the
conclusion of the business of the Embassy. Such an arrangement favours
œconomy, and impresses the confidence I affect.

The frequent presents had enabled me to present the Fantees with large
supplies of plantains and hogs; and on paying them their arrears, which
I did the same evening I received your gold, I gave them a bullock which
fell to my share in a division with Mr. James.

You will see by the balance of the annexed account, that (preserving our
dignity) every expense should be avoided that can be; and I assure you,
that in making the present arrangement for bearers for our baggage only,
I do not disregard your solicitude for our health. I shall order one
Cape Coast messenger to attend Mr. James, and also the bearers left
behind, being sufficiently recovered.

The statistical and scientific desiderata so impressively recommended to
my attention, are daily realising beyond my expectations. Mr. Tedlie has
had a severe attack of fever and dysentery, but is convalescent: Mr.
Hutchison and myself are in perfect health.

                                 I am, with respect, Sir,

                                        Your most obedient Servant,

                                                          T. E. BOWDICH.

SAÏ TOOTOO QUAMINA, _King of Ashantee and its Dependencies, to_ JOHN
HOPE SMITH, _Esquire, Governor in Chief of the British Settlements on
the Gold Coast of Africa._

THE Commenda palaver now rests with you and the King of Ashantee only,
the Dutch Governor has no more to do with it, so the King recals the
captain sent to him, and sends a proper messenger to treat with you
individually.

The conduct and messages of the Commendas have been so irritating and
insolent to the King, that nothing but believing you to be his good
friend, could induce him to treat at all with them, or do any thing but
kill them; but for your sake, he will settle the palaver, and you must
help him properly.

The King wants to begin the union without any palaver remaining, and as
this Commenda palaver is the only one, it must be settled, and if you do
this, he will take care the Elminas shall not do wrong to the Fantees,
but he will help you in all your palavers.

The Elminas are always sending him messages about the insulting conduct
and expressions of the Commendas towards him, and this is very vexatious
to him, so he wishes to put an end to it with your help.

Adoo Bradie, his favorite nephew, the son of the former King Saï
Quamina, is sent with a proper captain, Quantree, to help you settle the
palaver.

Two thousand ounces is the demand.

The origin of the palaver is, that after the King returned from his own
campaign against the Fantees, the Commendas went to the Elminas and
said, “well, you help’d the King, and now he is gone back we will fight
for it.”

Again, when a war was about to take place between the Cape Coast people
and the Elminas, the Commendas went to the latter and said, well, we
will help you if you will give us plenty of powder to fight for you:
they did so, and immediately the Commendas used it to seize 98 Elminas,
and sold them as slaves—this the King thinks you will say is very bad.

The Cape Coast people and the Fantees having joined against the Elminas,
they sent to tell the King, stating, when he demanded the reason, that
it was because they had not resisted him when he came down against the
Fantees; adding, that the Commendas, who were their natural allies
before, had now joined their enemies, and begging the King to revenge
this act of perfidy. The King much angered, immediately sent a captain
for the purpose of their destruction (Yaquokroko,) but the Dutch
governor sent to him, and then sent to the King to beg him to stop,
because the English and Dutch being one, it would put shame on his face.

Col. Torrane by giving up Cheeboo, induced the King to consider the Cape
Coast people as his friends, and they took fetish accordingly, but their
joining the Fantees afterwards to fight against Elmina for assisting the
King, has made him distrust them always since.

He considers his favourite nephew as the adopted son of Col. Torrane, to
whom he gave him, and the Colonel gave him English clothes, so he is all
the same as a Cape Coast Boy.

Col. Torrane being dead, he considers his nephew to stand in the same
relation to you, and that he is therefore the proper messenger to send
to you about this palaver.

You must write in your great book, that the King is your good friend,
that he likes you too much, that he thanks God very much, so that every
future Governor may read that in the Cape Coast Books.

                       The mark X of Saï Tootoo, King of Ashantee,

                                                      Per T. E. BOWDICH.

Present.

   WM. HUTCHISON.

   HENRY TEDLIE.

_Coomassie, July 9th_, 1817.


                                           _Coomassie, July 12th_, 1817.

          JOHN HOPE SMITH, ESQUIRE, GOVERNOR IN CHIEF, &c. &c.

   SIR,

I AM just returned from reading your letter to the King, and extracts
from that to myself, before the assembly of the captains: the effect was
satisfactory; and Quamina Bootaqua is ordered up to answer for his
conduct. The King enquired if the pay now due on the two notes would be
liquidated on application; I replied, immediately; he is anxious for it,
on account of the approaching yam custom.

                                              I am, &c.

                                           (Signed)   T. EDWARD BOWDICH.

                               * * * * *

I will not continue to copy the rude diary before submitted, it is only
a register of dull or disgusting circumstances, illnesses, human
sacrifices, and ceremonious visits. I would not anticipate the better
arrangement of my reports, or break the thread of the correspondence on
the political difficulties opposed to the Mission. I will abridge some
passages of my diary, merely to give an idea of the nature of our
conversations, and the biography of the leading men. Mr. Hutchison has
sent me copious extracts from his diary, as Resident, his leisure and
tranquillity having afforded him better opportunities of social
intercourse and domestic observation, than I had, or could afford time
to cultivate, without neglecting my reports. I shall adjoin these
extracts, expecting they will contribute to the rational entertainment
of the public, and to the credit of an active and intelligent officer.

A captain called Asofoo, sent us a present of seven ackies of gold, and
we also received twelve from Amanquateä, and three from our house
master. On the 9th of July the King sent us ten ackies of gold, and
repeated his satisfaction of the result of the late correspondence, and
daily presents of meat and fruits from various quarters, evinced the
better opinion of his chiefs.

I paid my first private visit to Baba the chief Moor, and took some
pens, paper, ink, and pencils with me as a present; the paper and
pencils were much esteemed, but he preferred his reed and vegetable ink.
He received me courteously, and was contemplating a curiously intricate
figure like a horoscope; the ms. was filled with them; he laid his
finger on it, and said, if you have any hard palaver, this can make me
settle it for you when no other person can; or if you have any dear
friend in England you wish to see, tell me the name, and this shall
bring him to you. I thanked him, observing, that when Englishmen knew
their palaver was right, they always left it to God, and that England
was too good a place for me to wish any one I regarded to leave it. His
disciples and pupils were writing on wooden boards, like those Mr. Park
describes. When a charm was applied for, one of the oldest wrote the
body of it, and gave it to Baba, who added a sort of cabalistical mark,
and gave it a mysterious fold; the credulous native snatched it eagerly
as it was held out to him, paid the gold, and hurried away to enclose it
in the richest case he could afford. I had a long conversation with
Baba, and he begged me to visit him frequently; he was much gratified
with the specimens of African Arabic at the end of Mr. Jackson’s work,
and read them fluently. I visited him the next day, when he sent hastily
for a Moor, who he told me was very learned, and just come from
Timbuctoo. This man expressing no surprise when he first saw me, Baba
explained it, by telling me, spontaneously, that this Moor had seen
three white men before, at Boussa. I eagerly enquired the particulars of
the novelty, and they were again repeated to Baba, and were thus
interpreted: “that some years ago, a vessel with masts, suddenly
appeared on the Quolla or Niger near Boussa, with three white men, and
some black. The natives encouraged by these strange men, took off
provisions for sale, were well paid and received presents besides: it
seems the vessel had anchored. The next day, perceiving the vessel going
on, the natives hurried after her, (the Moor protested from their
anxiety to save her from some sunken rocks, with which the Quolla
abounds) but the white men mistaking, and thinking they pursued for a
bad purpose, deterred them. The vessel soon after struck, the men jumped
into the water and tried to swim, but could not, for the current, and
were drowned. He thought some of their clothes were now at Wauwaw, but
he did not believe there were any books or papers.” This spontaneous
narrative, so artlessly told, made a powerful impression on my mind. I
saw the man frequently afterwards, his manners were very mild, and he
never asked me for the most trifling present. He drew me a chart before
he went away, and I dispatched some certificates for Major Peddie by
him, endorsed with Baba’s recommendations. I heard exactly the same
thing afterwards from another Moor, but he had not been an eye witness.
I begged Mr. Hutchison, when I left Coomassie, to note any other report
on the subject of Mr. Park’s death, and he afterwards sent me the ms. a
translation of which is in the appendix. I continued to call on Baba
three or four times a week; these visits afforded much information, for
at each I found strange Moors just arrived from different parts of the
interior, sojourning with him. They always affected to deplore the
ignorance of the Ashantees, and presumed it must be as irksome to me as
to them. Baba telling one that I could speak different languages, he
said that he would try me, and addressed me in several, all very uncouth
to my ear, and their names even unintelligible, except one, which he
called Hindee or Hindoo; neither had I heard of any of the great cities
he enumerated, until at last he pronounced Room (Rome) and said, if I
did not know that I was not a Christian. I never saw the Shereef Brahima
(to whom I was introduced about this time by a Jennë Moor) at Baba’s,
they did not appear to be on terms; I think the latter was envious of
the greater learning and intelligence of the former, who had been to
Mecca and Medina. One day I requested Baba to draw me a map of the
world, he did so, encircling one large continent with a sea, bounded by
a girdle of rocks. Old Odumata’s notion of geography was as strange; for
he mentioned one day, that when on the coast above Apollonia, he had an
idea of walking to England, for he was told he should reach Santonee
(Portugal) in 30 days, and that after that, the path was very good. He
greatly enjoyed our singeing the hair of a foppish attendant of his,
with a burning glass; the man’s amazement was inconceivable, Mr.
Hutchison was at some distance, and not suspected.

We were now permitted to walk four or five miles beyond the city, and
felt quite at home. We seldom went out in the morning, lest an occasion
for an audience should occur. Apokoo and several other daily visitors
diverted us with their anecdotes, and in the afternoon we made our round
of calls. Apokoo was always facetious, and looked with much anxiety for
our entry, as his greatest recreation; he was very desirous of learning
tennis and sparring, and daily made some essays, so comical, that
neither we nor his attendants could contain ourselves. Apokoo became
very communicative of Ashantee politics, and asked innumerable questions
about England; particularly, why the King of England did not send one of
his own sons to the King of Ashantee, with the presents, and why so
great a King sent such a small force to Africa. The Spanish campaign was
gone through, again and again, and never tired him. He gave us an
excellent dinner, as did Odumata repeatedly. Both were extravagantly
enraptured with the miniature of an English female, and called all their
wives to look at it.

Having been advised by a note from the Governor, of the arrival of an
Ashantee boy and girl at Cape Coast Castle, sent by the King without any
explanation, I desired an audience on the subject, and forwarded the
following letter, which also communicates the baseness of one of the
King’s messengers, just returned from the Coast, and other inauspicious
circumstances.

                               * * * * *


                                            _Coomassie, 10th Aug._ 1817.

          JOHN HOPE SMITH, ESQ. GOVERNOR IN CHIEF, &c. &c. &c.

   SIR,

THE King has explained to me that he sent the boy and girl you mention
to have arrived at Cape Coast, to become the property of the Committee
or Government, conceiving it to be obligatory on him, in justification
of his possession of the notes, to allow an Ashantee family to rear
itself under the Governor’s protection, for the service of the
Settlement, and as an acknowledgment of the duties he owes it. He begs
me to observe that he put the same plates of gold around their necks
which distinguish the royal attendants.

I had reason to believe, from a coolness and some invidious comparisons
on the part of the King, that the messenger lately arrived, Ocranameah,
who was so particularly recommended to your favour, had been unjust in
his report of the treatment he had experienced. I did not hesitate to
avow my impression to the King, having solicited an audience for the
purpose. The King confessed he had felt his private feelings hurt ever
since the return of that messenger, having received his assurance, that
you would scarcely admit him to your presence; that he received no
present or compliment from you, and was wholly neglected during his stay
at head quarters. I instantly pledged my honour to the King that
Ocranameah (who was present) was guilty of falsehood and ingratitude,
adding, that I was not prepared to confront him with the particulars of
the presents he received from you and the officers; though I was
positive, from private letters, as well as my own conviction, that you
had not slighted the opportunity of evincing your private friendship for
the King; and as I might possibly identify some trifle, I wished the
King to allow a search to be made. On the messenger’s box being sent for
and opened, two engravings appeared, to the surprise of the King, and
which I recognised; but as the messenger still persists in _your_ entire
neglect of him, and of his not having received any present or compliment
worth mentioning, I must trouble you for the particulars of his
treatment at Cape Coast Castle, for the entire conviction of the King.
The King expressed his suspicion (founded on reports) that many
Ashantees imposed on your generosity, by introducing themselves as
attached to him in various capacities; and hoped that you would only
listen in future to such as he recommended to your notice by letter,
which his three messengers above had been; the second (Ocranameah) the
more particularly, and that recollection had made him so sensible of the
neglect. You will regret, with myself, that this inauspicious
circumstance has been unavoidable.

The recent intelligence respecting the Buntooko war, has imposed serious
anxiety, in the place of the King’s former confidence. The revolt of
that people, as may be expected in all revolts from arbitrary controul,
has gradually induced the secessions of some other tributaries; and the
King feels called upon by these unexpected difficulties, to conduct the
war in person; not with his former expectation of witnessing their rapid
subjugation, but from his present conviction of the necessity for every
stimulus and energy. His precaution has dictated some popular acts,
ameliorating the condition of the lower order of his subjects. The
confidential ministers have been instructed to hint to me, that it would
be indiscreet in the King to expose even his temporary reverses in an
arduous war, by the residence of a British officer; and that he would
most probably defer that part of the mutual wish, until the contest was
terminated. I used the same medium to impress upon the King, that such a
feeling towards the delegate of a friendly power was misplaced; that you
had expedited his ex-parte views in the confidence of his consummation
of the reciprocal objects of the Mission, without which (as they had
been instituted for his benefit and aggrandisement) I could not think of
returning; since a protraction would be construed into a slight of the
friendly overtures of the British Government, which (from its dignity
and pre-eminence in Europe) could not be vouchsafed whenever they might
be solicited.

I anxiously await your communications on the Commenda palaver, to
further my exertions for the full accomplishment of the Mission. The
King and his Council labour under so much anxiety and business at the
present moment, that though we pay and receive visits of ceremony, it is
almost impossible to effect an audience, but on the receipt of
dispatches.

                                               I am, &c. &c.

                                                      T. EDWARD BOWDICH.

The most entertaining _delassement_ of our conversations with the
chiefs, was, to introduce the liberty of English females; whom we
represented, not only to possess the advantage of enjoying the sole
affection of a husband, but the more enviable privilege of choosing that
husband for herself. The effect was truly comic, the women sidled up to
wipe the dust from our shoes with their cloths, and at the end of every
sentence brushed off an insect, or picked a burr from our trowsers; the
husbands suppressing their dislike in a laugh, would put their hands
before our mouths, declaring they did not want to hear that palaver any
more, abruptly change the subject to war, and order the women to the
harem.

One of the King’s linguists was a very old man, called Quancum; he spoke
but seldom, yet the greatest deference was paid to his opinion; the King
appeared to consult him more than any other. I was so much interested by
this man’s deportment, that I enquired his history. He had been the
linguist of two former Kings, who paid frequent, and large sums of gold,
as damages for his intrigues; neither had age corrected his fault, until
very lately, though the present King used the most friendly
remonstrances; and urged, that from his paying large sums so frequently
for him on this account, his subjects thought, that he countenanced the
depravity. Quancum confessed to the King, that his ardour for women was
perpetuated by the sensual devices of one of his wives. Soon afterwards,
he was detected in an intrigue with the wife of a captain of great
consequence, and the King refused to interfere. The captain declaring
that the punishment of Quancum, and not gold, was his object, the King
permitted him to be despoiled of all his property, even to his bed. The
favourite wife was amongst the spoil, and the injured captain being much
smitten with her, assured her of an indulgence and preference, even
greater than that she had enjoyed with Quancum; she replied, she must
always hate him, and intreated to be sold. After much importunity the
captain agreed to do so, provided she would put him in possession of all
the presents Quancum had lavished on her; she produced them,
stipulating, that her son might retain a small sum of gold, which
Quancum had lately presented to him; this was agreed to, and she was
immediately sold to a distant caboceer; but her son followed her, and
buying her with his little property, presented her again to his father.
On this, the King gave Quancum a house, and some furniture, and takes
care to continue small supplies of gold daily, adequate to his and this
woman’s comfort; having exacted a solemn oath from him, that he would
devote himself to this one wife, and never try to recover any of the
others.

Mr. Tedlie’s interesting interview with the King, when he desired his
attendance to exhibit and explain his surgical instruments, and
medicines, is best described in his own words.

“The King sent for me this morning, saying he wished to see the
medicines, books, and instruments. I went immediately, and explained
through Quashie, the Accra linguist, the proper use and advantage of
each instrument: he was very particular in his enquiries, and asked if I
had performed the operations I described; I assured him that I had, and
as a proof, exhibited a piece of bone that I had taken out of an Indian
black man’s head in Ceylon, who had been wounded, and who lived. The
King held up his hand as a mark of approbation, and all his attendants
were astonished. I applied the instruments first on myself, then on the
linguists, afterwards on the King’s two captains, and lastly on the
King: nothing could exceed the King’s approbation. He then desired me to
shew him the medicines; he enquired the virtues and doses of each, what
time in the day they should be taken, and whether it was proper to eat
or drink after taking them? I told him: he asked if I would sell them? I
said no. I brought these medicines for the officers; I could not sell
them, but I would give him as much as I could, keeping in view that some
of the four officers might be sick; he said that I was right, but he
could not help coveting the greater part of the medicines; he viewed
them all over five or six times, and asked me to give him some of them.
I did give him as much innocent medicine as I could with propriety
afford; he thanked me “very much.” I then shewed him the botanical
books; he was astonished, held up his hand and exclaimed hah! at every
brilliant or high coloured plant which he saw. All his attendants were
closely arranged around: the two captains laid hold of a volume each,
and were admiring the flowers; when either of them ejaculated an
admiration, the King would seize it, and ask me what that tree was?
After I had told him the use of them, I said all these trees grow in
England; and the reason the English write all these in a book is, that
they may know which is a good tree, and which is bad. He expressed the
greatest astonishment at the flax (linum), oak “that we build our ships
with,” poppy “that makes a man sleep,” and the sensitive plant (mimosa),
which he pointed out and described himself. During this time he
whispered to one of his attendants, who went out, and returned in a
short time with a bit of cloth containing 9 ackies of gold; the King
presented it to me; I accepted it, and returned thanks. He then asked me
if I would come and see him at any time he sent for me; I assured him I
would do every thing to please him, consistent with my duty. He shook
hands with me and went into his house. He returned in a short time,
leading his sister by the hand, in a manner that would shame many beaux
in Europe, saying, “this is the white doctor I told you of; go, and take
his hand; you are sick, tell him your complaint, and he will do you
good:” the lady complied with his request. He then said “give me that
gold I gave you, the cloth is not clean; I want to put it in a clean
cloth for you.” He then put it in a piece of rich silk, and after he
returned the gold he said “I like you; I like all the English very much;
they are a proper people, and I wish to drink health with you.” He
retired to his own apartment, and returned with a flask of gin, and two
servants with a silver vase and water and glasses; he helped himself and
me, made a bow and said “Saï wishes you good health.” I returned the
bow, saying, I wish good health to the King, and hope he never will
require any of my medicine: when this was explained to him he held out
his glass to me, we touched and drank. He then took my hand, saying, “If
I send my sister to you will you talk with her?” I assured him I would
talk with and advise all the King’s friends whenever he wished. After I
gave all the medicine I could conveniently part with, he sent for a
small Dutch liqueur case; he desired 10 or 12 of his attendants, and his
eunuch, to keep in their heads what I said; and requested me to repeat
again the use and dose of each medicine I gave him, with the proper time
and method of using it. I did so. He placed his hand on his head saying
“Saï recollects what the white doctor says;” then placing the medicines
in the case himself said “that good for my head, that good for my belly,
that good for my stomach,” &c. One of the King’s sisters sent a message
that she wanted to come and see the white gentlemen; and shortly
afterwards arrived with her stool and retinue, being head caboceer of a
large town. After exchanging compliments, she complained that her left
hand pained her very much. I examined it, but must confess I could not
see any thing the matter with it; however I rubbed a little liniment on
her hand, which seemed to gratify her; she asked if I would come and see
her in the evening? I answered yes. Quamina, our Ashantee guide, came to
conduct me: he said I must dress, put on my sword and hat, as this woman
was a caboceer, and the King’s sister; he would carry my umbrella. When
I arrived I found the princess lying on a mat in one of the inner
apartments of the house she occupied; she ordered a stool for me; I
rubbed some more liniment on her hand; she wished me to stop and drink
palm wine; this I declined, alledging the English did not like palm wine
in the evening, because it is sour.”




                               CHAPTER V.

                               * * * * *

 _Proceedings and Incidents until the Signing of the Preliminaries to a
                            General Treaty._


[The Governor’s reply to my communication on the subject of the Commenda
              palaver, reached me on the 27th of August.]

                                   _Cape Coast Castle, August 11_, 1817.

                          T. E. BOWDICH, ESQ.

   SIR,

I ENTERTAINED a confident hope that no further mention would have been
made by the King concerning the Commendas, after the receipt of my
letter, and I am sorry that he should allow so insignificant a set of
people to protract in the least the settlement of our union. As it is my
particular wish to remove this impediment, I have used every endeavour
to bring the affair to a conclusion, and trust the King will not suffer
it to be invincible. The Commendas are also naturally anxious for its
termination, but their poverty is so great, that they have it not in
their power to comply with his demand. They have acknowledged their
fealty to the King, and have agreed to pay the sum of 120 oz. of gold,
of which, messengers are sent by his nephew to enquire whether he will
accept. This, with the sum they have been unavoidably obliged to promise
the principal persons deputed to negociate this business, will increase
the sum to at least 150 oz. The many proofs the King has had of my
friendly intentions towards him, and the consideration of the benefits
that will accrue to him from his alliance with the English, will, I
hope, induce him to concede to the terms offered by the Commendas. A
refusal must be considered as an avowal of his determined resolution not
to conciliate the affair, and as the indigent circumstances of these
people, make it utterly impossible for them to pay a larger sum, you
will, should he persist in exacting more, procure his permission to
leave the country, and return with the other officers as soon as you
can. To sacrifice the Mission, after the heavy expences which have been
incurred, and when we are induced to believe that every other object is
propitiated to our utmost expectations, should be avoided if possible;
but if he insists on a larger sum being levied from the Commendas than
has been offered, there remains no other alternative. The dignity of the
flag must be the superior consideration to all others.

The King has no need to doubt in the least the sincerity of the Cape
Coast people, they are his friends, and have every inclination to
continue so; and I am convinced his nephew will, on his return, confirm
this report to him.

I will make known to the Committee his request for a crown and clothes,
and I have no doubt but it will be complied with.

                                           I am, Sir,

                                      your most obedient Servant,

                                                        JOHN HOPE SMITH.


                                             _Coomassie, Aug. 29_, 1817.

          JOHN HOPE SMITH, ESQ. GOVERNOR IN CHIEF, &c. &c. &c.

   SIR,

I HAVE the satisfaction to enclose a copy of the Preliminaries to the
general Treaty, as signed this day by the King in Council, adjusting the
Commenda palaver, agreeably to your letter of the 11th, which did not
reach me till the 27th instant.

I proceed to acquaint you with the transactions of the interval.

The charge of a political Embassy, in a part of the world where respect
and security are founded upon the opinion imposed by our conduct,
exacted a spirit and dignity, which might have been abated in
insinuating a Mission through the country for scientific purposes, but
the inviolability of which was inseparable from the improvement and
safety of neighbouring settlements. Since my last dispatch, I have been
obligated to resist various encroachments, of which I shall mention two
or three to justify my treatment of them.

The death of Quamina Bwa, our Ashantee guide, in the early part of the
last week, creating an idle, but popular superstition that he had been
killed by the fetish for bringing white men to take the country; I was
applied to in the King’s name, to ameliorate this impression, by
contributing an ounce of gold towards the custom to be made by the King
for his repose. I refused on two grounds; first, that Quamina Bwa had
himself unjustly incensed the people against us, by panyaring[10] their
provisions in the King’s name, for our subsistence, and defrauding them
of the gold we gave him for the payment: secondly, that the rites of
customs were unnatural to our religion, which bound us, at least, not to
encourage them. Fifteen persons had been sacrificed the week before (in
a custom for the mother of a captain) with aggravated barbarity.

Several of the principal men having applied to me to send to Cape Coast
for silks, to be paid for on receipt at Coomassie (a very dangerous and
impolitic indulgence), I impressed, indignantly, that I was not sent as
a trader to make bargains with them, but as an officer to talk the
palavers with the King.

These circumstances, and a personal chastisement of some insults from
inferior captains, which was provoked after much patience, influenced ex
parte representations, which, though they may not have sickened the
King’s regard, induced hauteur and neglect. In proceeding to the King’s
house on public occasions, which I never did without the flag, canes,
and soldiers, we had been expected to make way for the greater retinues
of superior captains, who would rudely have enforced it; and after
soliciting audiences for two days, I was kept in waiting above an hour
in the outer courts of the palace. On the last occasion of the latter
treatment, knowing that it was affected, I returned to our quarters
until I received the King’s invitation; representing to him, that as an
officer dignified by an authority to make a treaty with him in the name
of the British Government, I could not submit to disrespectful treatment
at the Palace, nor allow the English flag to give place to any but
himself; that, if it merely affected myself as an individual, my esteem
for the King would induce me to compromise these points of etiquette
with his captains; but, according to the custom of England, I dared not;
for if I did, my sword would be taken from me on my return to Cape Coast
Castle. It produced the desired effect; the gong gong proclaimed in
every street that all captains must make way for the flag; and at the
monthly levee of the captains (the Adaï custom) the King’s linguists
were deputed to us first, with the customary present of a sheep and rum;
and presented us the first to pay our compliments to the King, being
followed by Amanquateä, Quatchie Quophi, Apokoo, and Odumata; the four
captains composing the Privy Council, or Aristocracy, which checks the
King. The first (whose power approximates to that of the Mayor of the
Palace under the early French dynasty) sent his linguist and gold swords
to compliment us on the ground. I determined to take advantage of this
impression, and of the comparative facility of intercourse, and demanded
an audience to discuss the treaty, a copy of which I enclose, and hope
my additions will be satisfactory. I have the King’s assurance that it
shall be formally executed in eight days; when all his tributaries will
be present for the yam custom, and when I hope to make the King of
Dwabin and its dependencies a party, whose power is equal to the King of
Ashantee’s.

To resume—the audience was granted; and I read the treaty before the
King and his Council, submitting it article by article, to their
consideration. It was debated the whole of that and the succeeding day.
I considered that if I could get the treaty discussed and executed in
this favourable interval, removing the Commenda palaver from the
situation of an obstacle, and reserving it as the first proof of the
King’s disposition to coincide with you in what was reasonable and just,
I might, on the receipt of dispatches, gain the better terms for that
people.

On Saturday the 22d instant, I was summoned to declare the articles of
the treaty before the assembly of captains, who were seated with their
attendants and warriors in the large yard of the palace, with all the
imposing pomp and military parade, which had before been collected to
subdue us, in the scene of the declaration of war. The King’s sisters,
with the females of his family, were seated, with their numerous
attendants, on an elevated floor behind. The deputies from the Fantee
towns in the interior, were placed within hearing, and the crowd was
almost impervious: the most ghastly trophies were mixed with this blaze
of ostentation. We were seated near the King immediately opposite to his
linguists.

In reading the treaty, I paused after every article, leaving it to be
formally repeated to the King through his linguists, and then sat down
whilst it was discussed by the assembly. It is not necessary to repeat
the various debates; and I will only notice that Amanquateä, through his
linguist, proposed the renewal of the Slave Trade as a sine qua non;[11]
this, however, as I had all along declared it to be impossible, was at
length over-ruled, but with considerable difficulty. It was also
proposed to attach a fine to the infraction of the treaty; but this I
resisted as derogatory to the dignity of the contracting parties; and
urged, that as the King and his dignitaries would consider his oath as
sacred, as you and the Government would mine, I considered no
_infraction_ of the treaty could take place; though it might possibly be
_offended_ by the conduct of his subjects, or of individuals under
British protection, which was provided for, and must be visited
accordingly by the authorities pledged to the treaty.

I had declared from the first, that it would be expected that the King
should swear in the form of his country to the fulfilment and
preservation of the treaty, and that his oath should be attested by his
principal captains, from my anxiety to fortify to the utmost, a measure
not only valuable to commerce but to humanity, in averting the renewal
of a war, recorded by indelible marks of carnage and devastation.

At the moment I expected the King to execute the treaty, a fresh design
was disclosed, in a long speech from the chief linguist, setting forth
the wrongs the King had just received from the people of Amissa, who had
scourged his messengers, and couched their insulting defiance in the
foulest language; yet, he said, the King did not want to invade the
Fantee country for the sake of one town, and therefore I must stay and
assist him to settle that palaver; he would then readily swear to the
treaty. I replied at length, declaring particularly that I could not,
and would not recognize the Amissa palaver; that the King vitiated the
compliments he had been pleased to pay me, in expecting me to be such a
fool as to involve you in the palaver of a people, over whom you neither
possessed nor desired authority; and that if I had not a right to think
better of the King, I should view such a proposal as evasive of the
treaty, and final to the hope of a thorough understanding.

The chief linguist rejoined, that I had declared in announcing the
treaty, that it was the wish of the British Government to put an end to
war, and for the King to have no occasion to trouble the Fantees;
whereas, if the people of Amissa were not persuaded to retract, the King
must send a captain to destroy them, which could be done at a word, and
this perhaps would make another war. I urged that the Fantee towns under
the British forts must be considered distinctly, and that those, and
those only, were viewed by the Government and the treaty; yet, for the
cause of humanity, I would request you, for the King, to advise the
people of Amissa better, through some medium, which I hoped might do
good, but if disregarded, you could not even repeat it: that was all I
could promise, and if that was not enough, our negociations were at an
end. No! that was not enough, I must stay and see the palaver settled.

We immediately rose, and I declared as impressively as I could, that as
the officer of the King of England, your orders only could be obeyed by
me, that I dared not remain or allow myself to be stopped, even if I
should be killed on the path, for my life was not my palaver, but the
King of England’s. As I bowed to retire, the linguist exclaimed, that
the King promised to see me again in an hour.

I used the interval for reflection, and resolved to act upon the
conclusion, that nothing but an undaunted resolution could check these
encroachments, which were to be attributed to the Government rather than
to the King.

The hour having fully expired, I sent a cane to Adoocee, the chief
linguist, to desire the audience; he sent me word that the King was
asleep, and no one dared to awake him. I then went to Odumata (who
resides within the palace) and repeated to him, that I was determined to
go, if the King did not keep his word and see me; he said I could not; I
rejoined, I would, and left him. I then went to Adoocee’s house,
declared the same, and received the same reply. I left a cane in waiting
at the palace, with orders to quit and return to me at 4 o’clock, (which
allowed altogether four hours instead of one) if he was not dispatched
with a message in the interval. No notice was taken; there was no
alternative to my making good what I had said. The views of the Mission
were at risk, but they would have been too dearly purchased by such
concessions, and I was sanguine, rather than apprehensive of the success
of the measure I adopted; without spirit and fortitude nothing was to be
done.

I ordered all the baggage out, planted the flag, and giving the
soldiers’ muskets to the officers, converted them and the artificers
into bearers, as well as our own servants, for I saw the previous
dismissal of my own people was considered a hold on me. I ordered the
linguists to declare to the party publickly, that I would flog any man
who attempted to leave the town in debt; I paid all they confessed, by
advances on their pay to the amount of 10 ackies: this gave the greatest
publicity to our movements.

The King’s uncle, Bundaenha, and another superior captain came in form
to entreat me to stay, whilst they affected to address the King. I saw
through this, and that I might presume on it; holding the watch in my
hand, I promised to wait half an hour, and no longer. They returned
within the time to conduct me to the King, but after being kept
unusually long in waiting, the answer to my remonstrance through the
linguists, was, that the King was very busy hearing a great palaver; I
saw they lingered still in their hope of my submission. I sent the two
canes to tell the King that mine was a great palaver, and ought to be
heard, not only from its importance, but because he had passed his word
that it should; that after a King disregarded his promise, it was
useless to wait any longer. Returning to our quarters, I ordered the
people to load the baggage.

At the moment of starting, a royal messenger ran up, to say the King was
waiting to see me. I dismissed him with the message, that I could not
stop, unless a person of consequence was sent to promise for the King.
The King’s uncle came, and assured me the King would receive me himself
at the entrance of the palace. We went, and were instantly ushered into
the presence of the King and his captains, who were debating by torch
light: the clamour and deportment of this assembly might have been
subduing, had it been novel. The uproar having abated, the King
demanded, through his linguist, why I had determined to leave so
suddenly, and whether he had not behaved well to me, adding to much
declamation, that he knew the King of England and the Governor wished to
please him, and would not countenance the act. I replied, that “I had
not only gone the full length of my instructions to please the King, but
exceeded them; and all that I had to fear was, that you would not
approve my remaining a moment after he had trifled with me. The King’s
behaviour to me, as an individual, I should always be proud to speak of,
but his respect of the Embassy was a very superior consideration. Every
thing he wished had been done, and now he tried to impose a palaver on
me, with which you had no more to do than with the Buntooko war. The
King had promised me to settle the point of the treaty, I waited the
discussion patiently, he pledged his word to see me that evening, he had
avoided it; I had said I would wait no longer if he did not keep his
word; no English officer dared to break his word, if he did, he lost his
sword.” Much declamation ensued, but the King’s conviction silenced the
assembly, and realized the triumph I expected. He said, what I told him
was true, that he was very sorry, but he had too much to think about; he
liked the Law (the Treaty) very well, but begged me to wait a little
longer till all his captains came. I received his promise to see me the
following day. The next morning the head linguist came in form to
acquaint me that some palavers had arrived in the night, which had made
it necessary for the King to go to Berramang (a croom about five miles
to the N.E. on the road to Sallagha, the capital of the Inta country)
but he had orders to furnish us with the King’s hammock-men, if we were
inclined to follow him the next day. We did so, and I enclose an extract
from my diary, with the circumstances of the day, as they do not affect
the point in question: on taking leave in the evening, the King promised
that I should hear from him the next day.

Apokoo, who had been left in charge of the town, visited me in form by
the King’s orders, with the criers and insignia, to assure me there
should be no more impediments to the treaty, and that the King would
return the next day. The evening was productive of another disturbance,
from my resistance of an indignity. The Cape Coast messenger arriving,
informed me that the dispatches and letters were retained by Adoo
Bradie’s messenger, who accompanied him. I sent the canes to Apokoo’s to
demand them, but ineffectually; I then went myself, and insisted on the
delivery; he said it could not be allowed until the King returned to the
capital. I protested so strongly against the act, that he sent for the
chief linguist (Adoocee) and after a palaver, they promised to send me
the letters on my return to the house: I left the canes in waiting. The
time allowed having expired without the receipt, I went again to
Apokoo’s, who referred me to Adoocee. I went to him, and he said he
dared not interfere in the business. The Cape Coast messengers refusing
to do so, we proceeded instantly to Adoo Bradie’s house, and finding the
messenger, demanded the letters, and obtained them. I had scarcely read
them, before Adoocee came with some captains, and about 100 persons,
(being then 9 o’clock) to demand my delivery of your letter to his
charge, until the King’s return. I indignantly refused, asserting my
authority, and criminating such a request as injurious to the rights of
the meanest subject of the King of England, and an insuperable affront
to you. He tried threats and entreaties alternately; the former I
treated with contempt, the latter I regretted I dared not yield to. The
palaver was prolonged till 10 o’clock at night. I determined not to lose
ground. The King did not arrive until the evening of the next day, I
sent three canes with my compliments on his return, and received his
with an appointment of an audience the next (this) morning.

We were sent for early, the affair of the letters was opposed to me. I
repeated my declarations to Adoocee, and added, that I should not think
of leaving a Resident, if such were the forms of the Ashantee Court. The
Ashantee messengers declared that you had ordered your letters to be
delivered to the King. I said that was impossible. The King was very
gentle, but such was the suspicion of the assembly, that they requested
me to swear on my sword, that I had not altered any part of your letter;
I did so, prefacing the act as such a suspicion merited. I then read
your letter, abating nothing of its spirit and firmness, and laying
stress upon your disposition to benefit the King, and the proofs you had
given. I concluded my illustrations with the declaration, that you did
not settle the King’s palaver from fear, but from friendship, as it
remained with him to prove. I submitted the preliminaries in form, for
rejection or acceptance. After an ardent debate among the captains, they
were executed and attested, and I lose no time in forwarding the copy. I
left a duplicate with the King, as I shall of the treaty.

The King intends to dispatch a messenger directly to empower Adoo Bradie
to receive the gold, and hopes you will recommend the people of Commenda
to restore any of the slaves in their possession belonging to Elmina,
although that is not his palaver.

The King desired me to communicate his best thanks for your handsome
treatment of his nephew, whose reports have been very flattering.

I urged my intercessions for Quamina Bootaqua, until the King vouchsafed
me his assurance that he would pardon him.

I have the satisfaction to inform you, that I have been able, privately,
so far to conciliate the Moors, as to have witnessed their forwardance
of the certificates[12] to the Interior, with their own letters of
recommendation indorsed.

I advocated the merits of the Castle linguist, De Graff, as you desired,
and successfully. I flatter myself this will anticipate the arrival of
the King’s, and the Cape Coast messengers.

                             I am, &c. &c.

                                                          T. E. BOWDICH.

_Preliminaries of a General Treaty, to be made and entered into by_
THOMAS EDWARD BOWDICH, _Esquire, for the Governor and Council of Cape
Coast Castle, and on the part of the British Government, with_ SAÏ
TOOTOO QUAMINA, _King of Ashantee and its Dependencies._

1st. The King accepts the offer of the people of Commenda, through the
Governor in Chief; namely, one hundred and twenty ounces of gold for
himself, and the customary fees to his embassadors, as a settlement in
full of all demands.

2nd. The people of Commenda shall acknowledge their fealty to the King,
and be entitled to all the benefits of his protection.

3d. The King shall authorize some responsible captain to receive the
gold, from the hands of the deputies of the people of Commenda, at Cape
Coast Castle.

4th. It is hereby agreed, that every palaver is now settled preparatory
to the General Treaty, which shall be executed forthwith.

 Signed and sealed this twenty-ninth day of August, in the year of our
             Lord one thousand eight hundred and seventeen.

                               The mark of SAÏ TOOTOO QUAMINA. X (L. S.)

                                                  T. E. BOWDICH. (L. S.)

In the presence of

  WILLIAM HUTCHISON.

  HENRY TEDLIE.

  ADOOCEE, Chief Linguist.

  APOKOO, Keeper of the Treasury.

  QUAMINA QUATCHIE,  }
                     } Linguists to the Mission.
  QUASHEE APAINTREE, }

_Extract from Diary._—Monday, 25th August, we started soon after seven
o’clock, and proceeding in a N.E. direction, crossed the marsh close to
the town, where it was about two feet deep and one hundred and fifty
yards broad. We travelled the path to Sallagha, through a beautiful
country, abounding in neat crooms (of which we passed through seven),
the sites spacious, and environed by extensive plantations. The path was
wide and so nearly direct, that the eye was always in advance through
beautiful vistas varied by gentle risings. The iron stone still
prevailed.

The King received us in the market place, and enquiring anxiously if we
had breakfasted, ordered refreshment. After some conversation we were
conducted to a house prepared for our reception, where a relish was
served (sufficient for an army) of soups, stews, plantains, yams, rice,
&c. (all excellently cooked) wine, spirits, oranges, and every fruit.
The messengers, soldiers, and servants were distinctly provided for.
Declining the offer of beds, we walked out in the town, and conversed
and played drafts with the Moors, who were reclining under trees; the
King joined us with cheerful affability, and seemed to have forgotten
his cares. About two o’clock dinner was announced. We had been taught to
prepare for a surprise, but it was exceeded. We were conducted to the
eastern side of the croom, to a door of green reeds, which excluded the
crowd, and admitted us through a short avenue to the King’s garden, an
area equal to one of the large squares in London. The breezes were
strong and constant. In the centre, four large umbrellas of new scarlet
cloth were fixed, under which was the King’s dining table (heigthened
for the occasion) and covered in the most imposing manner; his massy
plate was well disposed, and silver forks, knives, and spoons (Colonel
Torrane’s) were plentifully laid. The large silver waiter supported a
roasting pig in the centre; the other dishes on the table were roasted
ducks, fowls, stews, pease pudding, &c. &c. On the ground on one side of
the table were various soups, and every sort of vegetable; and elevated
parallel with the other side, were oranges, pines, and other fruits;
sugar-candy, Port and Madeira wine, spirits and Dutch cordials, with
glasses. Before we sat down the King met us, and said, that as we had
come out to see him, we must receive the following present from his
hands, 2 oz. 4 ackies of gold, one sheep and one large hog to the
officers, 10 ackies to the linguists, and 5 ackies to our servants.

We never saw a dinner more handsomely served, and never ate a better. On
our expressing our relish, the King sent for his cooks, and gave them
ten ackies. The King and a few of his captains sat at a distance, but he
visited us constantly, and seemed quite proud of the scene; he conversed
freely, and expressed much satisfaction at our toasts, “The King of
Ashantee, the King of England, the Governor, the King’s Captains, a
perpetual union (with a speech, which is the sine qua non) and the
handsome women of England and Ashantee.” After dinner the King made many
enquiries about England, and retired, as we did, that our servants might
clear the table, which he insisted on. When he returned, some of the
wine and Dutch cordials remaining, he gave them to our servants to take
with them, and ordered the table cloth to be thrown to them and all the
napkins. A cold pig, cold fowls (with six that had not been dressed)
were dispatched to Coomassie for our supper. We took leave about five
o’clock, the King accompanying us to the end of the croom, where he took
our hands, and wished us good night. We reached the capital again at
six, much gratified by our excursion and treatment.

Mr. Tedlie had brought Quamina Bwa (our guide) into a very advanced
state of convalescence; but he so eagerly betook himself from low diet
to palm oil soups, and stews of blood, that he soon relapsed, and a
gathering formed on his liver, aggravated not a little by the various
fetish draughts he swallowed. Seeing there was no other chance, Mr.
Tedlie, who is a very skilful operator, would have scarified the liver;
but although I had great reason to rely confidently on his judgment and
ability, I thought our situation too critical to run such a risk. A
Fantee boy having fractured his leg, and his dissolution appearing
inevitable, the parents, in great distress, applied to the surgeon of an
English outfort, who amputated the limb, and after much wearying
attendance, to the surprise of every one, restored the boy to health.
The family then brought him into the fort, and laying him down in the
hall, addressed the surgeon (who was in charge of the fort) thus; “As
Master cut off poor boy’s leg, and so spoil poor boy for work, we come
to ask Master how much he think to give poor boy to keep him.”

Quamina Bwa was fetished until the last moment, and died amidst the
howls of a legion of old hags, plastering the walls, door posts, and
every thing about him, with chopped egg and different messes. I forget
how many sheep he had sacrificed to the fetish by the advice of these
harpies. The King sent him a sheep and a periguin of gold, when he heard
he was ill. This man had settled the palaver with Mr. White, after the
blockade of Cape Coast, in 1815, the third invasion of the Ashantees,
and was universally odious, for his cruel extortions; these being
reported to the King, he was disgraced; and being very extravagant,
became much involved. Being at Payntree, he prevailed on Quamina
Bushmaquaw to allow him to conduct us, to retrieve his finances a
little. Excepting Adoocee, the King’s chief linguist, he was the most
plausible villain I ever met with.

The head of an Akim caboceer arrived in Coomassie about this time. The
King and the Ashantee government had proposed that every croom of Akim
should pay 20 periguins of gold as an atonement for their late revolt.
Ten periguins were advanced immediately by each, and the other moiety
was excused until after the harvest; but Aboidedroo caboceer of Manasoo
resolutely refused to pay a tokoo. The King’s messengers, however,
appealed to his people with so much address, that they rose upon their
caboceer, killed him, and sent his head to the King, with the 20
periguins required.


[Footnote 10: Seizing.]

[Footnote 11: Presents from two Spanish slave ships were received
through the Mulatto Brue on the 16th instant; they were general, but I
can only particularise the following:

  To the King, 3 pieces of cloth, 1 umbrella, and a hat.

  To the chief linguist, 1 piece, do.  2 flashes liquor.

  To the 4th do. (Otee) 1 do.          2 ditto, do.

  To Odumata, 2 do.                    2 ditto, do.

  To Quamina Bwa, agent for the purchase of the slaves, 2 pieces of
  cloth, 1 umbrella, and 1 Dane gun.

]

[Footnote 12: For a copy of these certificates vide the opposite
engraving.]




                              CHAPTER VI.

                               * * * * *

_Proceedings and Incidents until the Ratification of a General Treaty._


The report of an Ashantee having been flogged to death in Cape Coast
Castle, which was aggravated every hour to our prejudice, was explained
by the following letter:


                                   _Cape Coast Castle, August 17_, 1817.

                          T. E. BOWDICH, ESQ.

   SIR,

THE day before yesterday an Ashantee man was guilty of a most daring
insult to the fort. On passing the gate, he was desired by the sentinel
to take his cloth off his shoulders, but instead of complying, he turned
round and struck him. The offender was instantly secured, and I ordered
him to be put in irons. Last night about nine o’clock, the captain of
the guard came to me to say, that the sentry on duty had reported the
Ashantee to have hung himself. The place in which he was with others
confined, was immediately opened, and he was found in a room adjoining
to that in which the prisoners sleep, with his under cloth attached to a
beam not more than three feet high, and very tightly drawn round his
throat, part of his body was lying on the ground, and it must have been
by the most determined resolution that he succeeded in strangling
himself. The surgeon was present, but his efforts to recover him were
ineffectual. This is the second offence of a similar nature that has
occurred; the first person, I most assuredly should have punished, had
he not ran past the sentry and made his escape.

The King’s displeasure will no doubt be excited when he hears of such
acts of insolence, and I hope he will issue such orders to his people,
as will make them more circumspect in future.

                                            I am, Sir,

                                        your most obedient Servant,

                                                            J. H. SMITH.

                               * * * * *


                                         _Coomassie, 31st August_, 1817.

          JOHN HOPE SMITH, ESQ. GOVERNOR IN CHIEF, &c. &c. &c.

   SIR,

I RECEIVED your letter last evening respecting the suicide of the
Ashantee. I procured an audience this morning, and have just returned
from the palace, where I had the honour to address you a letter, in the
name of the King, on this, and other subjects.

The messenger sent up by Adoo Bradie, was the brother of the deceased,
and declared before the King upon oath, that he had been killed by the
officers. The master (our landlord) proposed a fine to the captains
assembled, but after the audience was gone through, the King retired to
council, which is the form, and returning, dictated the sentiments I had
the honour to communicate to you, and rebuked our house-master severely
for his proposition. Of course I impressed the insult to the fort, as
the superior consideration of your letter.

The insolence of the lower orders here became insufferable, they
proceeded even to pelting us with stones; after every effort on our part
to conciliate them by the exhibition of the telescope and other
novelties. As may be expected in a military government, they are beyond
the King’s control, out of the field. He declared however, that he would
behead any man I would point out to him, and begged me to punish them as
I thought proper: a summary chastisement of two inferior captains
repressed this spirit.

All the captains of consequence have become friendly and respectful;
Apokoo was deputed in form yesterday, in the name of the whole, to thank
me for my conduct in negociating with the King.

The Treaty will be brought forward to be executed in six days, before
the annual assembly of Kings, caboceers, and captains. All the Kings
tributaries and allies being compelled to attend him at the yam custom.

The King intends your linguist De Graff, to take fetish with his five
linguists, to be just to both the powers to be pledged to the treaty,
and is convinced of his probity.

                                I am, with respect, Sir,

                                       your most obedient Servant,

                                                      T. EDWARD BOWDICH.

                               * * * * *


                                            _Coomassie, 31st Aug._ 1817.

    SAÏ TOOTOO QUAMINA, _King of Ashantee, &c. to_ JOHN HOPE SMITH,
               _Esquire, Governor in Chief, &c. &c. &c._

   SIR,

THE King assures you, that, anticipating the permanent union of the
English and Ashantees, so far from allowing the death of one man to
retard it, he should take no notice if a thousand were flogged to death
by you, as reported here, well knowing the insolent disposition of the
lower order of Ashantees, which is as vexatious to him as to you. He is
satisfied however, that this man came to his death by his own hands.

The King wishes you to adjust the palaver between the Commendas and
Elminas, as soon as convenient to you; that all the people who serve him
may be united, relying entirely on your justice.

The King will thank you very much if you will make the people of Cape
Coast, Elmina, and Commenda “_all one together_.”

The little palaver between these people, is the only one remaining; and
therefore, though it is not his, he wishes you to settle it.

The King hereby, and by his messenger, empowers his nephew Adoo Bradie,
and the Captain Quantree, to receive the gold from the deputies of
Commenda in your presence.

You must settle the compliments and fees, which the Commendas send to
the King’s linguists and captains.

The King hopes you will advise the people of Amissa, through some
medium, to retract their insolent message to the King, that the whole of
the Fantee territory may be quiet.

The King has condescended personally to solicit Mr. Bowdich to protract
his stay fifteen days, and obliged all his captains to the same
condescension, so that you will consider it the King’s act from the wish
to send him down with an honourable escort, and other marks of his
favour.

The King wishes you health and happiness.

                                   The mark X of Saï Tootoo Quamina, &c.

    In the presence of

      WM. HUTCHISON.

      HENRY TEDLIE.

A few only of the many curious observations of our Ashantee friends
recur to me. One captain told us he had heard that the English were so
constantly in palavers, one with another, that their houses, which he
understood to be made of wood, the same as their ships, were always
fixed on wheels; so that when a man had quarrelled with his neighbour,
he moved to another part of the bush. Another insisted that monkies
(whom the Moors said sprung from the Israelites, who disobeyed Moses)
could talk as well as men; but they were not such fools; for if they
did, they knew men would make them work.—This is better than Pliny’s
account of monkies playing chess.

The King walked abroad in great state one day, an irresistible
caricature; he had on an old fashioned court suit of General Daendels’
of brown velveteen, richly embroidered with silver thistles, with an
English epaulette sewn on each shoulder, the coat coming close round the
knees, from which the flaps of the waistcoat were not very distant, a
cocked hat bound with gold lace, in shape just like that of a
coachman’s, white shoes, the long silver headed cane we presented to
him, mounted with a crown, as a walking staff, and a small dirk round
his waist.

The King presented one of our servants with six ackies of gold, for
making trowsers for his child, and mending him a pair of drawers, which
he thought it extravagant to put on under trowsers or small clothes, and
therefore wore them alone.

I fixed a rude leaping bar in the outer yard of our house, and trained
the horse to it, preparatory to getting him over the trunks of trees on
the path: this brought even greater levees than the camera obscura, or
the telescope. Sometimes a gazer would start from the eye piece of the
latter, to lay hold of the figure at the end, as he expected; and they
all insisted on both being taken to pieces in their presence, that they
might see what was inside. At length, being inexplicable, it was
pronounced fetish. A captain had told the King, that with the telescope
we saw, when at Doompassie, all that he was doing at Coomassie: and
happening, in a sudden and heavy rain, to gallop from Asafoo to our
house, with Mr. Tedlie on the horse behind me, holding the umbrella, it
was immediately reported to the King as our plan of travelling to Cape
Coast.

Our Accra linguist pointed out a man to me named Tando, whom he
recollected to have visited the Coast some years, in great pomp, never
going the shortest distance, but in his taffeta hammock, covered with a
gorgeous umbrella, and surrounded by flatterers, who even wiped the
ground before he trod on it. This man had now scarcely a cloth to cover
him. He had been retired from his embassy to Akim, in consequence of a
dispute with Attah, then the king of that country; for though Attah was
adjudged to be in fault, after the palaver was talked at Coomassie, the
Ashantee government thought it politic to displace Tando, though he had
become disagreeable to the other, only for his vigilance and fidelity.
After a long interval of the most luxurious life the capital could
afford, he was instructed to proceed to Elmina, to talk a palaver for
the King; but thinking it would be a coup d’éclat much more important
and agreeable, if he could settle the Warsaw palaver as well, he visited
the country on his return, and persuaded them to conciliate the King,
and avert their ruin, by carrying a considerable sum of gold to
Coomassie, and agreeing to pay twenty-four slaves for every Ashantee
subject killed or injured by one of Warsaw. Deputies returned with this
man for this purpose; but the King dismissed them contemptuously; and to
the disappointment and surprise of Tando, declared that no man must dare
to do good out of his own head, or perhaps he would find he did bad, as
Tando had done, in spoiling a palaver which he and his great men meant
to sleep a long time. Tando was immediately stripped of all his property
for his presumption, and from a noble became a beggar.

The Moors now became friendly, and sent us some very good coffee, and
choice pieces of meat.

                               * * * * *


                                           _Coomassie, Sept. 8th_, 1817.

          JOHN HOPE SMITH, ESQUIRE, GOVERNOR IN CHIEF, &c. &c.

   SIR,

I HAVE the satisfaction to inform you, that the treaty was signed and
sworn to yesterday, by the King of Ashantee, and this day, by the King
of Dwabin. The whole of the caboceers, captains, and tributaries having
arrived, the treaty was finally discussed on Saturday, and two of the
four members of the Aristocracy, with the two oldest captains (Ashantee
and Nabbra) were deputed to swear for that assembly, with the King,
whose oaths (being very rare) are solemnized by the presence of his
wives.

The King sent a handsome procession of flags, guns, and music, to
conduct us to the palace on the occasion; and meeting us in the outer
square, preceded us to the inmost, where about 300 females were seated,
in all the magnificence which a profusion of gold and silk could
furnish. The splendour of this coup d’oeil made our surprise almost
equal to theirs. We were seated with the King and the deputies, under
the large umbrellas in the centre, and I was desired to declare the
objects of the Embassy and the Treaty, to an old linguist, peculiar to
the women. The King displayed the presents to them; the flags were all
sewn together, and wrapped around him as a cloth.

I was afterwards desired to stand before the King, and swear on my sword
that I had declared the truth: I did so, with the other officers. The
next form dictated was, that I should seat myself, and receive the oaths
of the deputies, and lastly, of the King himself, for his brother the
King of England. They advanced in turn, extending their gold swords
close to my face, as they declared their oaths. I rose to receive the
King’s, all the women holding up two fingers, as their mark of
approbation when he received the sword, and one of his counsellors
kneeling beside him with a large stone on his head. The King swore very
deliberately, that his words might be fully impressed on me, invoking
God and the fetish to kill him; first, if he did not keep the law, if we
had sworn true; and secondly, if he did not revenge the Ashantees to the
full, if we had bad in our heads, and did not come for the purpose I
avowed. The assurances, and the menaces of the oaths of the captains
were equally forcible. The King sent an anker of rum to our people to
drink on the occasion, and paid each captain the customary fee, of a
periguin of gold on his oath.

The King having communicated my wish, by a formal message, to Boïtinnee
Quama, the King of Dwabin, who holds his temporary court on the north
side of the town, I seconded it, by sending the canes to request an
audience; at which I had again formally to declare the objects of the
Embassy and the Treaty, which, after a great deal of form and enquiry,
received his signature, with the attestations of his chief linguists,
Quama Saphoo, and Kobara Saphoo, who are his principal counsellors. His
court was equally crowded with the King of Ashantees, who sits on his
right hand when he visits Dwabin; a reciprocal etiquette.

By an addition to the 4th article of the treaty, I reconciled the point
of the Amissa palaver; and the securing you the opportunity of
mediation, (without attaching any thing like responsibility) I
considered to be not only a precaution due to humanity, but a prudent
and legitimate measure for the extension of our influence.

The value of this treaty is enhanced by the reflection, that the
justice, dignity, and spirit, of the British Government have been
preserved inviolate; and that it has been the result of the impression,
and not of the abatement of these characteristics.

We are flattered by your acknowledgment of our offer to accompany the
King to the Buntooko war, and feel the force of your reason in the
present view of the invasion of that country. The lake proving to be
southward instead of northward, and close to the Accra path, I did not
think it prudent to aggravate suspicion, for so secondary and well
defined an object, whilst every day exacted some exertion (beyond
vigilance) to wear away the difficulties opposed to the more important
views of the Mission.

I expect the King will permit me to take leave on Saturday next. To-
morrow Apokoo gives us a dinner in public.

                             I am, with respect, Sir,

                                        your most obedient Servant,

                                                          T. E. BOWDICH.

                               * * * * *

_Treaty made and entered into by_ THOMAS EDWARD BOWDICH, _Esquire, in
the name of the Governor and Council at Cape Coast Castle on the Gold
Coast of Africa, and on behalf of the British Government, with_ SAÏ
TOOTOO QUAMINA, _King of Ashantee and its Dependencies, and_ BOÏTINNEE
QUAMA, _King of Dwabin and its Dependencies._

1st. There shall be perpetual peace and harmony between the British
subjects in this country, and the subjects of the Kings of Ashantee and
Dwabin.

2nd. The same shall exist between the subjects of the Kings of Ashantee
and Dwabin, and all nations of Africa residing under the protection of
the Company’s Forts and Settlements on the Gold Coast, and, it is hereby
agreed, that there are no palavers now existing, and that neither party
has any claim upon the other.

3rd. The King of Ashantee guarantees the security of the people of Cape
Coast, from the hostilities threatened by the people of Elmina.

4th. In order to avert the horrors of war, it is agreed, that in any
case of aggression on the part of the natives under British protection,
the Kings shall complain thereof to the Governor in Chief to obtain
redress, and that they will in no instance resort to hostilities, even
against the other towns of the Fantee territory, without endeavouring as
much as possible to effect an amicable arrangement, affording the
Governor the opportunity of propitiating it, as far as he may with
discretion.

5th. The King of Ashantee agrees to permit a British officer to reside
constantly at his capital, for the purpose of instituting and preserving
a regular communication with the Governor in Chief at Cape Coast Castle.

6th. The Kings of Ashantee and Dwabin pledge themselves to countenance,
promote, and encourage the trade of their subjects with Cape Coast
Castle and its dependencies to the extent of their power.

7th. The Governors of the respective Forts shall at all times afford
every protection in their power to the persons and property of the
people of Ashantee and Dwabin, who may resort to the water side.

8th. The Governor in Chief reserves to himself the right of punishing
any subject of Ashantee or Dwabin guilty of secondary offences, but in
case of any crime of magnitude, he will send the offender to the Kings,
to be dealt with according to the laws of his country.

9th. The Kings agree to commit their children to the care of the
Governor in Chief, for education, at Cape Coast Castle, in the full
confidence of the good intentions of the British government, and of the
benefits to be derived therefrom.

10th. The Kings promise to direct diligent inquiries to be made
respecting the officers attached to the Mission of Major John Peddie,
and Captain Thomas Campbell; and to influence and oblige the
neighbouring kingdoms and their tributaries, to befriend them as the
subjects of the British government.

Signed and sealed at Coomassie, this seventh day of September, in the
year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and seventeen.

                                The mark of SAÏ TOOTOO QUAMINA X (L. S.)

                                The mark of BOÏTINNEE QUAMA X    (L. S.)

                                THOMAS EDWARD BOWDICH.           (L. S.)

   In the presence of

WILLIAM HUTCHISON, Resident.

HENRY TEDLIE, Assistant Surgeon.

 The mark of APOKOO X }
                      }
 ODUMATA X            } Deputed from the General Assembly of caboceers
                      } and captains to swear with the King.
 NABBRA X             }
                      }
 ASHANTEE X           }

 KABRA SAPHOO X   }
                  } Linguists to the King of Dwabin.
 QUAMINA SAPHOO X }

 QUASHEE APAINTREE X Accra Linguist.

 QUASHEE TOM X      }
                    } Cape Coast Linguists.
 QUAMINA QUATCHEE X }

                               * * * * *

[Illustration: This _is to make known that Major John Peddie, Capt.
Thos. Campbell, and Surgeon Willm. Cowdry, have been employed by the
British Government to proceed from Senegal into the interior of Africa,
to trace the course of the River Niger; and to obtain such information
respecting the Countries through which they pass, as may be useful in
the extension and improvement of Commerce which is the object of the
British Government in sending those persons to Africa; and that any
Person who may happen to meet with those Gentlemen, and shall be the
Bearer of a Letter to the Governor of CAPE COAST CASTLE on the Gold
Coast, from either of them, shall receive five Ounces of Gold, and be
liberally rewarded for any Service or Act of kindness which it may
appear by such Letter may have been rendered to either of them._

_Witness my hand at Coomasie the Capital of the Kingdom of Ashantee the
30th. day of July 1817_

_Wm. Hutchinson Resident_

_T. E. Bowdich Conductor of the Mission from Cape Coast Castle_]

We were present at the trial of Appia Nanu, who had accompanied his
brother Appia Danqua in the last invasion of Fantee, and was ordered by
the King, on his death, to take the command of the army, and prosecute
the campaign. In the irritation of the moment, he exclaimed, before the
royal messengers, that though the King did not prevent him from
succeeding to the stool, and the honours of his brother, he kept back
all the rock gold which belonged to the inheritance, and desired to wear
him out in the pursuit of the revolters, to prevent his claim and
enjoyment of the property of his family. From this time he was very
inactive, and became suspected of cowardice; however, having succeeded
in getting the head of one of the revolters, he returned to Coomassie;
where he was coolly received, but not accused until the 8th of July. The
witnesses were the messengers the King had sent to him, who had been
concealed in a distant part of the frontier ever since, that Appia Nanu,
believing the general report of their death, might be the more
confounded when they burst upon him at the moment of his denial of the
charge. He was deprived of his stool and the whole of his property, but
permitted to retire with three wives and ten slaves; the King hearing
the next day that he still loitered in the capital, exclaimed, that no
proper man would bear so much shame before all the people, rather than
leave his home, and ordered only one wife to be left to him, whereupon
Appia Nanu hung himself. The King considers, that none but the basest
spirits can endure life after severe disgrace.

The Moors celebrated the feast of Ramadan in this month: there was
nothing curious in this ceremony. Men and women were dressed in their
richest suits, and seated on large skins before their houses, for they
occupy one street exclusively. They rose occasionally in small troops,
made short circuits in different directions, saluted each other, and
then sat down again. In the evening, the superiors exchanged visits at
their houses; the one visited always accompanied the other some distance
along the street on his way, where they exchanged blessings, and parted.
The slaves who carried their small umbrella’s over their heads, seemed
thoroughly jaded by this incessant parading.

The King regretted in one of his visits about this time, that they were
not more frequent; he said, our conversation entertained him more than
any thing else, because it told him of so many things black men never
heard of, but when he wished to see us on that account, his great men
checked him, and said, it did not become him as a great King to want us,
but that he should only send his compliments, see us, and make us wait a
long time when he sent for us to the palace.




                              CHAPTER VII.

                               * * * * *

 _Proceedings and Incidents until the completion of the Mission and its
                     return to Cape Coast Castle._


On the 11th of September I received the Governor’s reply to my letter of
the 10th of August.


                                   _Cape Coast Castle, August 25_, 1817.

                          T. E. BOWDICH, ESQ.

   SIR,

I HAVE received your letter of the 10th instant. The boy and girl shall
be disposed of under the protection of the Government here, agreeable to
the King’s wishes.

The messenger (Ocranameah) has grossly misrepresented to the King, the
reception he met with at Cape Coast; he was treated with the greatest
civility during his stay, and on leaving, expressed himself gratified by
the attention which had been shewn him.

For the King’s satisfaction, I have subjoined a list of the articles I
made him a present of;[13] the three first which I gave him, on taking
leave, will, when produced, convince him how much he has been deceived,
and prove to him, that his recommendation of the messenger was not
unattended to.

The Buntooko war, I consider a mere pretext for getting rid of the
Resident; it cannot be the true motive: to oppose however, any
disinclination to the measure, either on the part of the King or his
principal men, would be entirely useless; the aversion to it has no
doubt originated in the latter, with whom, under the present order of
things, the Resident would be very unpopular; consequently unsafe. The
eager desire which the King has manifested for enquiring into every
trivial occurrence, is another cause of its being objectionable. The
residence of a British officer would afford him the opportunity, not
only of doing this, but of making demands which he might otherwise not
have thought of. These and other circumstances, which were entirely
unforeseen, have materially altered my opinion in regard to the
Residency, which is certainly not so desirable as I before considered
it. You will therefore, on your return, bring Mr. Hutchison with you.

I am not aware of any Ashantees having introduced themselves here, but
such as were duly authorised by the King; you will however inform him,
that none will be attended to unless they bear his cane.

As Mr. Hutchison is to return, it will be a most important point that
you bring down two of the King’s sons for education, and I am very
solicitous that you should accomplish this object if possible.

The Commenda palaver being terminated, there will be nothing to detain
you longer at Ashantee. Your returning by way of Warsaw will be
desirable, and I hope the King will not object to your so doing.

                                           I am, Sir,

                                      your most obedient Servant,

                                                        JOHN HOPE SMITH.


                                            _Coomassie, Sept. 16_, 1817.

          JOHN HOPE SMITH, ESQ. GOVERNOR IN CHIEF, &c. &c. &c.

   SIR,

I DID not receive your letter of the 25th of August, until the 11th
instant, four days after I had advised you of the execution of the
treaty. I considered it my duty to acquaint you of every variation in
the prospects of the Embassy, although, even when communicating the
discouraging circumstances of my letter of the 10th ult. I could not
abate my hopes, or allow doubt to sicken my exertions. I valued on the
reflection, that I had not been heard before the King in vindication of
the Residency; the motives of which I knew to have been grossly
misrepresented by our natural enemies the Moors, to whose arts the
suspicion of the natives have been suitably auxiliary. My confidence was
justified by the favourable impression the King and the Government
manifested, when the subject was publicly advocated; since which I have
never heard of an objection to it: it has indeed, become a favourite
measure with the superior captains, who, as far as may be judged from
the respect and deference with which they have treated us from that
time, seem not only to have been conciliated, but won by the recent
circumstances of the negotiation. The terms of the treaty, by exceeding
your expectations, will compensate for the accumulation of difficulties
which have been opposed to us. We are taught to believe that no law has
ever been enacted in this kingdom with equal solemnity, or an oath, so
serious, been before submitted to by the King, or imposed on the
captains. Had the treaty disappointed, instead of exceeded our
expectations, I must have viewed it as inviolable, and submitted myself
to your candour; which I would now, and justify myself by answering the
reasonable apprehensions which have recently affected your opinion of
the Residency, rather than by the plea that the treaty was executed
before I received them.

If I had been convinced that it was dislike, and not suspicion, which
actuated the opposition to the Residency, I should not only have
considered it imprudent, but derogatory, to have persevered in the view;
but, sensible that it was the latter, (from the evidence of the King’s
deportment, and the knowledge of the intrigue and calumny excited
against us,) I felt the greater anxiety for its accomplishment; since,
to have yielded to suspicion, without every labour to eradicate it,
would have been to have excluded ourselves from the kingdom hereafter.

If the King had been actuated, individually, by the desire of detecting
the frauds of his messengers, I should have viewed the measure as
pernicious; but the Government itself having anxiously recommended it,
for the sake of their own interest, (Fort pay, and purchases from the
treasury being always divided amongst the superior captains) I
considered it harmless; and not solely from the power of its advocates,
but also from the impotence of the royal messengers in state affairs,
being generally attendants on the King, and therefore jealously watched
by the other parts of the Government. This desire has only been
addressed to me in two instances, both of which I think justified it:
first, respecting the fort pay; it having been since proved, and
confessed, that, out of 62 oz. paid at Christiansburg Castle in 1816 and
17, the Ashantee Government has been defrauded of 23 oz. by the
messenger: and secondly, respecting the goods purchased by Ocranameah,
where the fraud could not escape notice. Such peculations have probably,
in the first case, given rise to doubts of our honour; and in the
latter, have certainly proved a prejudice to the trade. On the occasion
of Ocranameah’s baseness, I myself requested the King to allow me to
address you for the particulars of his treatment; and if you consider
the mischievous influence of the report, the fatality of the impression
that the King’s Embassy had been subjected to contempt, whilst we had
been treated with generosity and respect, you will admit that the
disproof was imperious on me: he has been disgraced, and owes his safety
to my intercession. Nothing but the most decisive conduct can arrest
villainy here. The reports of Adoo Bradie have been highly flattering.
The King will certainly have a better opportunity of making demands from
the residence of a British officer; neither can I lessen the probability
further than by my opinion, which though only indulgent of the people in
general, is certainly favourable of the honour of the King, and the
superior captains. The advantages and prospects of our preserving our
footing by a Residency, have been too fully suggested by your
experience, to require my dwelling on them.

I will proceed to acquaint you of the circumstances subsequent to my
receipt of your letter, one of which had nearly been serious. After the
settlement of the Commenda palaver, the King requested me to wait 10
days, which were afterwards extended to 15, as you were advised in his
letter of the 31st ult. This time expired on Saturday last, but the King
said then that we must not go until Monday. Accordingly, on that day, I
delivered Mr. Hutchison written instructions (a copy of which I enclose)
and sent several messages to the King to remind him of his promise. We
were not sent for until six o’clock in the evening, when the King said
he could not let me go then, nor before he had time to send me away
properly. This I considered to be the mere affectation of state; I
pleaded that your orders were binding, and that it was insulting to you,
as well as dangerous to me, to prevent my respect of them, now every
thing like business was settled. The King said he would only ask me to
stop until Wednesday. I replied, that if he would give me his hand, and
promise that I should go then, I would wait. No! he could not, but he
would promise me for the Monday following. I saw that yielding to this
would subject me to an indefinite delay. I told the King that I should
be obliged to go, though unwillingly, without his approbation, and that
not only my duty but his promise justified me. I had only to ask him if
he still wished me to leave Mr. Hutchison? All the reply I could get
was, that I might break the Law if I thought proper. I told them the Law
would never be broken by an English officer, but still, if they were
sorry that they had sworn to the Law, I would send for it and tear it in
pieces before them; we did not make laws from fear. No! they liked the
Law, and could not break it, but I might if I chose. I repeated my
willingness to stay till Wednesday; the promise could only be given for
the Monday: the King and the council retired abruptly. I followed them,
told them I was obliged to be determined, and begged the King to shew
his respect for you, and the friendship he had condescended to profess
for myself, by considering your orders; this was construed as
indecision; and Monday, or when the King has time, was the reply. I
thanked him formally for all his kindnesses, told him I must go, and
retired. It was necessary, at least, to make the attempt, although it
was then eight o’clock. I left all the luggage in the charge of Mr.
Hutchison, except two portmanteaus, the sextant, and the box containing
my papers. We had scarcely proceeded fifty yards before the gong-gongs
and drums were beat all around us, and we were attacked by a crowd of
swords and muskets, headed by our house master Aboïdwee, who in the
first rush seized the luggage and the flag. I felt myself compelled to
attempt to regain the flag; and the value of my papers, and the impolicy
of being intimidated by the outrage, were also considerations. I begged
the officers not to draw their swords till the last moment, and taking
the muskets, the butt ends of which cleared our way to the luggage, we
fastened on it, with the soldiers, artisans, and our servants, who
supported us vigorously. The Ashantees did not attempt to fire, but
attacked us only with their heavy swords and large stones. We kept our
ground nearly a quarter of an hour, though our belts and caps were torn
away, and we frequently fell. At this time, Mr. Tedlie (who had regained
his sword, which had been torn from his side) was stunned by a blow on
the head, and as all were much bruised, and some of the people cut, I
contented myself with the recovery of the flag, the sextant, and the
papers, and we retired slowly to the house, not expecting they would
follow us; but they did so, with a fury which led me to believe they
intended our destruction. We posted ourselves in the door-way, and I
immediately dispatched the canes by a back way to the King, to tell him
we had not yet drawn our swords, but we must do so unless he rescued us
immediately. The tumult did not allow expostulation, we had no
alternative but to defend ourselves, which the narrow passage favoured.
The captain, Aboïdwee, who was quite mad with fury and liquor, made a
cut at me as I held him from me, which would have been fatal but for the
presence of mind of one of the soldiers, through which it only grazed my
face. We were soon rescued by the presence of Adoocee, the chief
linguist, and Yokokroko, the King’s chamberlain, with their retinues.
Nothing could exceed their servility, they offered to swear the King was
not privy to the outrage, ordered Aboïdwee before them, and threatened
him with the loss of his head. I told them I knew the King’s controul,
and was not to be treated as a fool; he had forcibly detained us as
prisoners, and must take the consequences; I should say no more. They
continued their professions and entreaties upwards of an hour, and did
all they could by their menaces to Aboïdwee, and their deference to the
evidence of our people, to convince me of their discountenance of the
outrage. I divided the people into watches for the night.

By day light the next morning all our luggage was returned, I refused to
receive it. Yokokroko and Adoo Quamina then sent to say they waited
below until we had done breakfast; a long palaver succeeded, of the same
tenour as that of the preceding night. About 11 o’clock, the linguists,
Adoocee, Otee, and Quancum; Yokokroko, and a crowd of captains came from
the King with a present of 20 ackies, two flasks of liquor, and a large
hog. I asked them if they came to put more shame on my face, by bribing
me to settle the great palaver they had made the night before with the
King of England. They flattered and menaced by turns to make me take it,
and urged, that to refuse the King’s present was to declare war. I
persisted in refusing every thing short of an interview with the King.
The Cape Coast messengers, impelled by their apprehensions and their
avarice, had the temerity to declare at this moment, that you had sent
them as a check upon me, and that they knew I was not doing as you
wished in talking so to the King, and that you would make a palaver with
me for not waiting the King’s pleasure. It was necessary to annihilate
the impression of such language immediately. I deprived them of their
canes, and threatened to put them in irons. The King not long after sent
his eunuch and followers to conduct us to the palace, where he had
assembled the superior captains. We went in plain clothes, alleging that
we dared not wear our uniforms as prisoners. The King said, I must not
say that; he was my good friend, and would do me right; he did not think
I would have tried to go without his leave, and never meant his people
to fight with us, he would give me the heads of all those who led them
on, and beg me himself for the rest, as I begged him for Quamina
Bootaqua; he never begged any body before; he did not send the gold, as
I thought, he sent it to pay for any thing the people had spoiled, and
meant to do us right all the same; it would break his heart if the King
of England heard he had used his officers ill, and if I liked him, I
must settle the palaver easy.

Of course I would not hear of any heads being cut off, though they all
pressed it repeatedly, and doubtless would not have regarded sacrificing
a few inferior captains to varnish their allegation; yet, I must
declare, it is my firm opinion, and it is supported by the evidence of
our private friends, that the King and his principal men merely intended
Aboïdwee to stop us, by placing his numbers before us and pleading the
King’s orders, not dreaming of any outrage, or that the impetuosity of
this man, irritated by the loss of his retainer at Cape Coast,[14] would
hurry him to order his soldiers to assault us: he has not an atom of
influence; but the King selected him as a near relative of his own, to
succeed to Bakkee’s stool, to which 1700 men are attached: the King
repeatedly offered me his head. To resume, the King requested us to
drink with him, and then to shake hands, begged us to resume our
uniforms, and ordered his own people to attend us at our house. I
renewed the subject of our departure. The King said this was a bad week,
and he did not like us to go in it, he would thank me very much to stay
till Monday, and then he could get a proper present ready. Sunday too
was the Adaï custom, and then I must put Mr. Hutchison’s hand in
Adoocee’s, and Adoocee place it in his, and he would promise to take
proper care of him before all the captains. Odumata and Adoocee came
forward to give me their hands, as a pledge of their responsibility. I
said I could receive no one’s hand but the King’s on such an occasion,
but I ordered Quashie Apaintree to do so, and it was sworn to. The King
then said Adoocee had told him the Cape Coast messengers had tried to
put shame on my face—he was very angry with them—they ought to know God
made white man’s head better than black man’s, and they must come before
him, and put my foot on their heads. I told him, I could not let any one
do so, but I sent for their canes, and entrusted them to them again,
with a suitable reprimand. The King then begged me to receive his
present, which I did, giving the people the hog and liquor, they had
received another on the Friday before, which the King sent me, with 39
yams.

I have observed that the Government’s anxiety for the force of the
Treaty, and for the Residency, has heightened in proportion to the
indifference I have affected. I consider the affair of yesterday to have
perfected the impression of our spirit. I certainly would not think of
leaving any but an officer of the most considerate conduct as a
Resident, and, I believe, Mr. Hutchison, by tempering his spirit with
judgment, may safely realize the objects of the situation; if, however,
on my return, you consider I have left him in a precarious situation, I
volunteer my services to replace him, and deliberately to retire the
Residency.

It occurs to me, the Amissa palaver may possibly be the design of this
interval, if it should, you may rely on my remaining resolute on the
subject.

                                                  I am, &c.

                                         (Signed)     T. EDWARD BOWDICH.


                                                _Coomassie, Sept._ 1817.

          _To_ WILLIAM HUTCHISON, _Esquire, British Resident._

   SIR,

I AM directed by the Governor in Chief to leave you written instructions
for your future government.

The conviction of the honour and justice of our public negotiations,
having procured us a footing in opposition to the arts which have been
practised upon the suspicion of the natives, your conduct is looked to,
with confidence, to support it, by originating an opinion of our moral
character, equally auspicious to the benevolent views of the British
Government. The simplicity of our religion, tolerating the calumny of
the Moors, that we are destitute of any, you will have the satisfaction
of perfecting the confutation, by a regular retirement to its duties,
and by the practice of that benevolence and forbearance, equally
congenial to the policy prescribed to us.

It would be premature, as well as dangerous, to direct any other than
the tacit reproof of your own conduct and sentiments, to the cruelties
consecrated by the superstitions of the Ashantees; you must be content
to avoid the countenance of them by your presence, by adhering to the
plea of the repugnance of your religion. This conduct, associated with a
humanity always inclining you to induce mercy, whenever the offence, or
prudence, may admit of an interference, will propitiate your own wishes,
and the expectations of the Government.

The friendship and respect which the King, and the superior captains
have manifested, will not only be preserved, but strengthened, by a
dignified deportment, and a considerate use of the private intercourse
these feelings have established; and you will cultivate the frequent
opportunities of instilling into their minds, that education originated
the pre-eminence of Europeans; and that peace is most auspicious to the
greatness of a Nation, directing all its powers to commerce and the
arts, and thereby founding its superior comfort, prosperity, and
embellishment. The power and resources of your own country should be
quoted to illustrate this truth; and you will impress that it is the
experience of it, which has imposed the benevolent anxiety of the
British Government, to improve the condition of the people of Africa,
through the legitimate medium of commerce. This impression you will
extend, deliberately, to the visitors from other kingdoms, particularly
to those from the Sarem and Mallowa countries.

In encouraging the trade with the Coast, your measures must disprove any
view but that of a fair competition; and your vigilance of the British
interests must be distinct from any thing like jealousy, suspicion, or
intermeddling: you will act as the advocate of the views of Europe, but
not allow any interference to be imposed on you, without the sanction of
the Governor in Chief, whose letters will be, exclusively, attended to,
and to whom you will candidly communicate any circumstance or
reflection, affecting our new connection.

You will repress, rather than encourage the disposition of the King and
the Council, to detect imposition through your assistance, by confining
your justifications, as much as possible, to public transactions; for
although the Government is gratified by it, it may tend to make the
Residency unpopular.

I enclose you a copy of the Treaty, and particularly direct your
attention to the 4th article, which authorizes you to submit to every
thing like a mediation, separable from responsibility, to the discussion
of the Governor in Chief, for the sake of peace and humanity; but you
will do this, invariably, with diffidence; without betraying any
sanguine expectations.

You will be more sensible to insult than injury; and the most politic
conduct will be, to declare that the British Government exacts from all
its officers, on pain of disgrace, a firm repulse of the former; and
that they dare not admit the influence of their private feelings, as in
the latter case.

I leave you in possession of the esteem of the King, and the friendship
of the superior Captains, and with every thing favourable to the objects
of the Residency; but, should any caprice in the Government make you
invidious to any thing like a party, or diminish their respect, you will
immediately address the Governor in Chief, who will order your presence
at Head Quarters. Another important consideration will be your health;
also the character of the captain who may be left in charge of the
capital, should the King go himself to the Buntooko war. Your personal
safety is out of the question at present, but should the least doubt
arise in your own mind hereafter, you must consult the Governor’s
solicitude, rather than your own spirit.

You see the necessity of keeping in with the Moors; the flattering their
intelligence is most conducive to this, and also elicits valuable
information.

I shall afford you a perusal of the dispatch of the Committee, and the
instructions of the Governor in Chief, to perfect the present.

I have directed Mr. Tedlie to leave you a supply of medicines, and you
will take charge of the Resident’s flag.

                                            I am, Sir,

                                        your most obedient Servant,

                                         (Signed)     T. EDWARD BOWDICH.

Baba had a great number of Arabic manuscripts; I have preserved a leaf
finely illuminated. Apokoo astonished us by offering to lend us some
books to read; he shewed us two French volumes on geography, a Dutch
bible, a volume of the Spectator, and a Dissuasion from Popery, 1620. It
was gratifying to recollect that this chief, now become so much attached
to us, was the man mentioned in our early dispatches as snatching Mr.
Tedlie’s sword from him, on the declaration of war, to make his oath
against us the more inveterate. Telling the King one day that Mr.
Hutchison’s and Mr. Tedlie’s countries, Scotland and Ireland, were
formerly distinct from mine, he begged directly to hear specimens of the
different languages, and was reluctantly persuaded that it was the
policy of England to get rid of all national distinctions between her
subjects. Apokoo was very fond of scribbling, and with a smile
frequently begged to know what he had written. They could not comprehend
how any hieroglyphic that was not a picture, could express an object. My
name, said the King, is not like me. He was rather uneasy at my
sketching; the Moors, he hinted, had insinuated that I could place a
spell on the buildings I drew. I told him, without drawings, the people
in England could not be convinced that I had visited him; he appeared
satisfied, and begged to be drawn handsome.

There are only four direct descendants now living of the noble families
which accompanied the emigration of Saï Tootoo, the founder of the
Ashantee monarchy; none of them are wealthy, and Assaphi, who is one, is
a beggar, wandering in the bush, having been disgraced from the highest
favour, for the following fraud. An old linguist of the former King’s
(Saï Quamina) having died at a distant croom, the King, according to
custom, sent Assaphi with four periguins of gold, and a quantity of
expensive cloths and mats to bury him; Assaphi kept the gold, and
substituted inferior cloths of his own. The wife urged the great and
zealous services of her husband to Saï Quamina, and her indignation at
such a mean acknowledgment as the King had sent. Assaphi returned,
reported her gratitude, and that every thing had been handsomely done,
to the credit of the King. The wife privately dug up the cloths buried
with the corpse, and suspecting the fraud, secretly conveyed them to the
King, with a full account. The King sent for Assaphi and again enquiring
the particulars, with seeming indifference, suddenly required him to
swear to the truth, which he advanced to do, when the King said no! you
must not swear, and the woman was immediately discovered to him with all
the cloths. He then confessed the particulars, was stripped of every
thing, and is now the more despised for not killing himself; and the
King could not put him to death, as the direct descendant of one of Saï
Tootoo’s peers. Part of the King’s reproach to him was curious: “my
brother’s linguist did him great good, so when he and my brother, who
now live with God, make God recollect all, and tell him the shame you
put on him for me, in so burying him, God will kill me.”

A man and a woman were beheaded on the 17th of this month, for an
intrigue: the woman was very handsome, and the wife of a captain: on
their being suspected, both were ordered to drink doom, which choking
them, they were immediately executed. The King’s sister sent for Mr.
Tedlie to go and see her, he enquired into her complaint and recommended
some medicine, which she very thankfully agreed to take; he prepared
some for her, and went to give her the proper directions; upon which,
she handed the cup to her husband, who beginning to swallow it very
fast, Mr. Tedlie stopped him, and said he had only prepared sufficient
for one person; the lady replied, “let him drink this to day, and I can
have more to-morrow;” he told her that he had very little medicine, and
could not afford to give it to people that were in good health: she did
not appear pleased with this reasoning. A man of Assiminia, who had
received medicine and advice from Mr. Tedlie on our march up, sent him a
third present about this time, of fruit, vegetables, and wild deer, with
the account that he was quite well.

Apokoo enquired very anxiously, why the King of England had not sent one
of his sons with the presents to the King of Ashantee. He said he had
himself conquered five nations, during the present and the preceding
reign, and he named twenty one nations which now paid tribute to
Ashantee; but he added, there were three countries which would not; two
eastward, and one to the north-west; each of those eastward had defeated
the Ashantees; the one north-westward, on the King sending for tribute,
desired that he would come and take it, and afterwards entirely
destroyed an Ashantee army.

                               * * * * *


                                            _Akrofroom, Sept. 26_, 1817.

          JOHN HOPE SMITH, ESQ. GOVERNOR IN CHIEF, &c. &c. &c.

   SIR,

THE King only availed himself of our detention to introduce us to fresh
ceremonies, and to augment the testimonies of his friendship. The Amissa
palaver was not attempted, and nothing like design has disclosed itself.

On the Monday there was a general assembly of the caboceers and
captains, the King of Dwabin being present, with his linguists, also
several Dagwumba caboceers, and the Moorish dignitaries. The King
announced the execution of the Treaty by himself and the deputies, and
impressed, in a long speech through his linguists, that he would visit
the least offence against it with the greatest severity. I was then
requested to read it for the last time, and the King’s duplicate was
executed in a similar manner.

In the evening, the King gave us our last audience before all his
superior captains: a letter was dictated, which I shall present to you
on my arrival; and Adoocee, the chief linguist, was formally deputed to
receive Mr. Hutchison’s hand from me, and to place it in the King’s, who
received it with a solemn avowal of his responsibility for the charge.
The linguist then presented from the King,

To the Government, four boys for education.

To the British Museum, six specimens of the goldsmith’s work. (I had
interested the King, by my account of this national repository.)

To the Governor in Chief, one boy, one girl, to be brought up in his
service.

To Mr. Bowdich, one boy, one girl, and 2 oz. 6 ac. of gold.

  Mr. Tedlie, one boy, and 1 oz.     4 ac. of gold.

  Accra linguist, one cloth,         10 ditto.

  Cape Coast linguists, two cloths,  10 ditto.

  De Graaff’s messenger,             10 ditto.

  The officers servants,             10 ditto.

  The soldiers,                      10 ditto.

I afterwards received a Sarem cloth and some trifles as a further dash
from Apokoo; one sheep, &c. &c. from Baba the chief of the Moors; and 15
ackies of gold from the King’s linguists, with their acknowledgments of
my firmness during the negotiation.

The King having a palaver at present with the Warsaws, objected so
strongly to our returning through their territory, that after one or two
attempts to over-rule his apprehensions, I found it would be imprudent
to persevere in the wish, although the disappointment was great; the
King assured me the Warsaw path was two days longer, and that he will
not spare any labour on that of Assin directly after the war. I had
permission to go some miles on the Warsaw path, to convince myself of
its neglected condition.

The King’s favorite son (a child about five years old) whom he had
dressed in our uniform for the occasion, was so alarmed at the idea of
being given over to us, that the King’s feelings obliged him to promise
me that he would send the children after me; he is too jealous of the
advantages to allow those of his great men to participate, until his own
family are first distinguished by them.

The King supplied me with bearers, and pressed me to take six hammock
men in case of sickness; he would not hear of pay for any, and persisted
in appointing one of his captains to take care of us. He yielded the
point of an escort reluctantly, which I had combated from the
consideration of the expense of a present to such a number. The King
requested me on taking leave, to wait a short time until his captains
had distributed the powder to salute as on our departure, and it being
then dark, to proceed no further than a small croom just beyond the
marsh, where the people should join us in the morning. The King and his
captains were seated by torch light with all their insignia, without the
palace, and we quitted the capital, preceded by the King’s banners,
discharges of musketry, and every flattering distinction that could be
thought of.

The King has provided one of the best houses for Mr. Hutchison, very
superior to any we could have raised at so short a notice, and has
anticipated every thing to make him comfortable, and respected; nothing
could be more considerate or kind, than his speech to him on my taking
leave.

A messenger of the King of Dwabin’s accompanies me for a suit of our
uniform for the King’s wear, which I could not refuse.

                                              I am, &c. &c.

                                         (Signed)     T. EDWARD BOWDICH.


                                        _Coomassie, September 22_, 1817.

    SAÏ TOOTOO QUAMINA, _King of Ashantee, &c. to_ JOHN HOPE SMITH,
               _Esquire, Governor in Chief, &c. &c. &c._

   SIR,

WE are from this time forth good friends, and I shall send all the trade
I can to Cape Coast Castle, and I hope that you will by and by have
confidence in my word.

I beg you will send my best compliments to the King of England, and
accept them yourself, in proof of my satisfaction of the purposes of the
Embassy, and its happy termination.

You will call all the Fantee caboceers before you, and impress the
importance of the Treaty, and exact their respect of it, as I have from
all my great men and caboceers.

I hope you will always act towards me as a friend, and I shall always be
ready to protect and support the British interests.

I wish you health and happiness, and all my captains send their best
compliments to you.

                                     I am, Sir,

                                           your sincere friend,

                                       The mark X of Saï Tootoo Quamina.

   Present,

W. HUTCHISON.

HENRY TEDLIE.

I will thank you to impress on the King of England that I have sworn not
to renew the war with the Fantees, out of respect to him, and I shall
consider them as his people. I hope therefore he will, in turn, consider
if he cannot renew the Slave Trade, which will be good for me.

I hope the King of England will now let all foreign vessels come to the
coast to trade, and you must say that the path is now clear to do as
much English trade as your supplies will allow.

                               * * * * *

         The following letter was sent after me, to Doompassie.


                                       _Coomassie, 23d September_, 1817.

          JOHN HOPE SMITH, ESQ. GOVERNOR IN CHIEF, &c. &c. &c.

   SIR,

THE King of Ashantee desires me to request you will write to all the
Governors of English forts, on the African coast, to order the caboceers
of each town, to send a proper person to Cape Coast, and that you will
add one messenger yourself; that they may all proceed to Coomassie to
take the King’s fetish in his presence, that none may plead ignorance of
the Treaty concluded between his Majesty and the British nation.

The King wishes me to express, that he is fully satisfied with the
objects of the Mission, and that the Treaty may be read by me to all the
Fantee deputies you may send for that purpose.

                                                 I am, &c. &c.

                                              (Signed)     W. HUTCHISON.

                               * * * * *

My last private letters from Cape Coast Castle had imposed the most
painful anxiety; the two lives naturally beyond all others the dearest
to me, were imminently endangered by the seasoning illness of the
country; one yielded to it before I could arrive, yet, under all the
impatience of my affliction, I must confess, when I took the King’s hand
for the last time, when I reflected on the benevolence, the solicitude,
and the generosity I had experienced whilst my life was in his hands,
affected by the most untoward and irritating political circumstances, by
the aggravated suspicions of his chiefs, and by the poisonous jealousy
of the Moors, there was a painful gratification in the retrospect, which
blended the wish to linger another hour in listening to acknowledgments
of esteem and obligation, more affecting than flattering, and enhanced
by the consoling reflection, that they were the natural emotions of one
of those monarchs we are pleased to call barbarians. Night was coming
on, but as I had so positively declared before the King and his council,
on the former occasion, that nothing should deter me from keeping my
word in quitting Coomassie on this day, it would not do to delay even
until the morning. A strict observance of your word, is every thing in
the eye of a Negro. The King said, he would not beg me to stay, as I had
declared I dared not; he would only ask me to go no further than Ogogoo,
that night, and his people should join me early in the morning. Our exit
was a brilliant scene, from the reflection of the glittering ornaments
of the King and his captains by the torches; they were seated in a deep
and long line, without the palace, accompanied by their retinues; all
their bands burst forth together, as we saluted the King in passing, and
we were enveloped in the smoke of the musketry. The darkness of the
forest was an instantaneous and awful contrast, and the howlings and
screeches of the wild beasts, startled us as we groped our way, as if we
had never heard them before. The torches provided for our protection
against them were extinguished in crossing the marsh, which had swollen
to between four and five feet deep, and the descent to it from Coomassie
was rocky and abrupt. The linguists and soldiers lost themselves in the
forest, and did not arrive at Ogogoo until long after Mr. Tedlie and
myself. The inhabitants were asleep, but they rose cheerfully, cleared
the best house for us, and made fires. The next morning I received the
dash of gold from the King’s linguists, in a Mallowa bag, with a long
compliment; the conclusion of which was, that I must always be ready to
use the same spirit and address, in talking a palaver for the King of
Ashantee, as I had shewn in talking that of my own King. This testimony
of their good feeling and esteem, which they could not avow whilst we
were political antagonists, was grateful.

Marching through Sarrasoo, where we were liberally refreshed with palm
wine, we halted in the evening at Assiminia. We were received with great
hospitality by the principal man, who provided us with excellent
lodging, to his own inconvenience, and presented us with some fowls. The
path was almost a continued bog, for the rainy season had set in
violently. The next day we marched through Dadasey to Doompassie, and
occupied our former comfortable dwelling. One party spent the night in
the woods. Thursday morning, the 6th, we had a short but most fatiguing
march over the mountains dividing the frontiers, to Moisee, the first
Assin town. The difficulty of procuring provisions until the people
returned from the plantations, detained us in Moisee until four o’clock
in the evening. As the stage from Doompassie had been short, (although
fatiguing) I determined to proceed to Akrofroom, as we should gain a day
by it. The Ashantees remonstrated, knowing the swollen state of the
several small rivers, and the aggravated difficulties of the path from
the heavy rain; but I was so apprehensive of being detained, by their
pleading their superstitious observance of good and bad days for
travelling, that I was afraid of seeming to yield to them, lest it might
encourage the disposition. I recommended them to go back, and started
without them, but they were soon at my heels, declaring, they should
lose their heads if they quitted us. Mr. Tedlie, myself, a soldier, and
the Ashantee next in authority under the captain, outwalked the rest of
the party, and found ourselves out of their hearing when it grew dark.
We lost some time in trying to make torches to keep off the beasts, and
to direct us in the right track, for we were walking through a continued
bog, and had long before lost our shoes. A violent tornado ushered in
the night, we could not hear each other holla, and were soon separated;
luckily I found I had one person left with me (the Ashantee) who, after
I had groped him out, tying his cloth tight round his middle, gave me
the other end, and thus plunged along, pulling me after him, through
bogs and rivers, exactly like an owl tied to a duck in a pond. The
thunder, the darkness, and the howlings of the wild beasts were awful,
but the loud and continuing crash of a large tree, which fell very near
us during the storm, was even more so to my ear. The Ashantee had
dragged me along, or rather through, in this manner until I judged it to
be midnight, when, quite exhausted, with the remnants of my clothes
scarcely hanging together, I let go his cloth, and falling on the
ground, was asleep before I could call out to him. I was awoke by this
faithful guide, who had felt me out, and seated me on the trunk of a
tree, with my head resting on his shoulder; he gave me to understand I
must die if I sat there, and we pursued the duck and owl method once
more. In an hour we forded the last river, which had swollen
considerably above my chin, and spread to a great width. This last
labour I considered final, and my drowsiness became so fascinating, that
it seemed to beguile me of every painful thought and apprehension, and
the yielding to it was an exquisite, though momentary pleasure. I
presume I must have slept above an hour, lifted by this humane man from
the bank of the river to a drier corner of the forest, more impervious
to the torrents of rain; when, being awoke, I was surprised to see him
with a companion and a torch; he took me on his back, and in about three
quarters of an hour we reached Akrofroom. This man knew I carried about
me several ounces of gold, for the subsistence of the people, not
trusting to our luggage, which we could not reckon on in such a season
and journey. Exhausted and insensible, my life was in his hands, and
infested as the forest was with wild beasts, he might after such a
night, without suspicion, have reported me as destroyed by them; this
had occurred to me, and was an uneasy feeling as long as my torpor left
me any. It was about two o’clock in the morning, and the inhabitants of
Akrofroom were almost all asleep, for it was too rude a night for Negro
revelry; however, I was directly carried to a dry and clean apartment,
furnished with a brass pan full of water to wash in, some fruits and
palm wine, an excellent bed of mats and cushions, and an abundance of
country cloths to wrap around me, for I was all but naked. After I had
washed, I rolled myself up in the cloths, one after the other, until I
became a gigantic size, and by a profuse perspiration escaped any other
ill than a slight fever. A soldier came up about mid-day, and gave me
some hopes of seeing Mr. Tedlie again, who arrived soon afterwards,
having left his companions in a bog, waiting until he sent them
assistance from the town. Our gratification was mutual, for the only
trace he had had of me was by no means an encouraging one; my servant
meeting an Ashantee in the forest with fragments of my clothes, which he
persisted he had not taken from any person, but picked up on his way.
Mr. Tedlie (whose feet were cut and bruised much more than mine, and
whose wretched plight made him envy the African toga I had assumed)
after we had separated, and the storm had drowned our mutual hollaings,
the howlings of the wild beasts meeting his ears on all sides, had just
determined to roost in a tree for the night, when an Ashantee appeared
with a torch, and conducted him out of the track to the remains of a
shed, where four or five of the people had before strayed and settled
themselves. Another party arrived at Akrofroom about four o’clock, and
the last, with the Cape Coast linguist and the corporal, not until sun
set; they had lost the track altogether, and spent the whole day, as
well as the previous night, in the woods. We made an excellent duck
soup, our grace to which was, “what a luxury to poor Mungo Park;” the
name recalled sufferings which made us laugh at our own as mere
adventures.

On Saturday the 8th we marched to Asharamang. Here we found great
difficulties in getting provisions until the Ashantees came up, for
Quamina Bwa’s knavery had been ascribed to us; and here, panyaring all
we required, he had not given the inhabitants a tokoo of the gold. At
length we were well supplied and comfortably lodged. The next day we
marched through Kickiwherree to Prasoo, where we occupied a good house,
and an Ashantee captain proceeding on an embassy, dashed us a supply of
fowls and yams. We crossed the Boosempra early the next morning, and
thence began to leave the rains behind us. Persevering in making but one
journey of the distances which occupied us two and three days going up,
we pressed forward, passing by our former bivouacs in the woods,
scarcely distinguishable, until we reached the site of Accomfodey, for
only one hut now remained; the wretched inhabitants having deserted it
in terror of the Ashantees. The solitary Fantee who occupied it, had the
address to assure me, that I should find much better lodging at
Ancomassa, where we recollected to have left some comfortable huts going
up, and we resolved to try another stage, and were recompensed by
finding scarcely a wreck of the place, and some tattered sheds only
instead of the sound roof we had quitted. We proceeded early the next
morning, passed Foosou, which was entirely deserted, and marched until
we found ourselves at sun set on the banks of the Aniabirrim. The people
were all behind, and the Ashantees coming up about an hour afterwards,
informed us they had settled themselves for the night about two hours
walk distant. Unfortunately we had no flint, and after fasting all day,
we had the mortification of losing our supper merely for want of a fire;
the wood was all so wet that friction had no effect on it, we could find
no shelter, and a heavy rain set in as it grew dark; fatigue luckily
beguiled us of cold and hunger, and of our apprehensions of a visit from
the beasts, who were howling about the banks of their watering place. I
wrapped myself up in the Inta cloth Apokoo had given me, and wet as the
ground was, I never slept better. Hence the forest visibly declined in
height towards the coast. We pressed on by day light, found some
excellent guavas to allay our hunger, and reaching Mansue, made a good
soup of our fowls, peppers growing luxuriantly all around us. We waited
until we heard of the people behind us, and then proceeded; about five
in the evening I reached Cottacoomacasa, with the Dwabin messenger only.
The place was deserted, and a body of Ashantee traders had occupied the
remaining shed. I would not disturb them, but waiting until sun set for
Mr. Tedlie, I left him a supply of guavas, and proceeded to Payntree.
There was a charm in the name of that place, being but one journey from
the sea, superior to the recollection of the former night’s adventure.
It was a brilliant night, and the dark gloom and hollow echos of the
long vistas of the forest, formed a fine contrast to the extensive areas
(sites of large Fantee crooms destroyed by the Ashantees) into which we
frequently emerged. The wild music and cheerful revelry of the
inhabitants of Payntree stole upon my ear, and raised the tone of my
spirits in proportion as the sounds strengthened.

A loud and continued shout warned me that I was announced; torches and
music instantly encircled me, and I was conducted to old Payntree’s
residence, who had built himself a new house somewhat in the Ashantee
fashion. An excellent bed was prepared for me of an accumulation of mats
and country cloths, and a famous supper of soups, stews, fruit, and palm
wine. Quamina Bootaqua paid his respects, and old Payntree, Amooney King
of Annamaboe, and two or three other caboceers, unknown to me, made a
long adulatory speech, complimenting my ability, bewailing my hardships,
and magnifying their obligations. I was requested to seat myself on old
Payntree’s state stool, whilst they stood around me, and he begged me to
listen to an air composed by his band on the occasion of the embassy,
and its successful termination; “all would now be well, and Fantee
revive and flourish.” I sat up till midnight, vainly expecting Mr.
Tedlie and the soldiers; they awoke me by their arrival before sun rise;
they had passed the night in a sound hut, on the path, which from the
want of a torch had escaped my notice.

Hearing, as I expected, that there was a path from Payntree to Cape
Coast Castle, avoiding Annamaboe (whence the Mission had departed), I
determined to explore it, and Payntree furnished me with a guide. The
country was beautifully diversified with hill and dale, but the soil was
generally lighter and more gravelly than that between Annamaboe and
Payntree. We passed through several groves of guava trees, and all the
other tropical fruits abounded. Occasionally there were small
plantations of Guinea corn, where a few wretched Fantees still lurked in
the ruins of the crooms the Ashantees had destroyed. We passed through
eleven which had been considerable, and now presented but a few mud
houses scattered over extensive sites. Their names were Assequah,
Daöoramong, Amparoo, Taächoo, Coorikirraboo, Perridjoo, Abikarrampa,
Aquoitee, Miensa, and Amosima. The only water was near Amparoo; it was a
large pond nearly two miles in circumference, and sixty yards broad,
impregnated with vegetable matter. After travelling 15 miles, we climbed
some very steep and rocky hills, apparently of iron stone, and descended
into a flat country, continuing until a small rising about two miles
from Cape Coast Castle, (which I judged to be 20 miles from Payntree by
this interior path) opened the sea to our view; as delightful to our
sight, as land would have been after a prolonged and perilous voyage.
The shouts and greetings of the natives were a grateful introduction to
the more congenial congratulations of our countrymen.


[Footnote 13: One piece of silk. 10 handkerchiefs of Dane. 1 umbrella. 4
gallons of rum. 20 lbs. of pork. 1 basket of rice. Biscuit. 1 sheep.]

[Footnote 14: The man who hung himself.]




                               * * * * *
                          MISSION TO ASHANTEE.
                                PART II.
                               * * * * *


                               CHAPTER I.

                               * * * * *

                              _Geography._


The impression of the Natives that we came “to spy the country” was
sedulously strengthened by the Moors, who were actuated by alarm,
jealousy, and a spirit of intolerance unmitigated by a previous
intercourse with Europeans. I felt compelled, therefore, to suppress all
curiosity for a considerable time, lest the anxiety to detect us in
geographical enquiries, to make their calumny more imposing, might have
been gratified. Latterly, when better feelings had been induced through
patience and candour, as the Moorish charts and MSS. evidence, the
inaptitude rather than the reluctance of the natives, made the shortness
of our stay unaccommodating. I shall pass over a mass of memoranda
recorded on individual report, and only select such, wherein Moors and
natives, unknown to each other, have agreed; describing their travels in
their own way, without my questions anticipating or directing them.
These routes and observations were further confirmed by the evidence of
children, recently arrived as slaves from the various countries, whose
artless replies decided my credence. It may be remarked, that the
children of the African Negroes, early accustomed to travel with their
parents for their convenience or their assistance, and unoccupied by the
difficulties of incipient education, observe nature more attentively
than European children of the same age would; for they have nothing else
to think of, or to divert the fatigue of these reiterated trading
journies: their evidence, therefore, was a genuine and acceptable check
on the Moorish and Negro adults.

The difficulty of adjusting geography by investigation only, is not
diminished by the numerous small states, scarcely less frequent than
those of modern Italy, which we find to compose this part of Western
Africa.

Any thing like observations of the Sun’s place, during a journey, seemed
to be so uncommon to the Natives, and so secondary to the Moors, from
their confused accounts of the occasional changes, that, after expending
much time to no purpose, I was obliged to content myself with placing
the different kingdoms in the same direction as their several paths bore
from Coomassie, taking every precaution to be convinced that the paths
did not cross each other; and afterwards adjusting the positions by the
various auxiliary evidence which occurred in the general course of my
enquiries. I allow 15 miles for each days journey (which, from
observation and report, I have reason to think is the average) and two
thirds of the sum to be made good on the horizontal distance, as we
found this to be nearly the case in our journey from Annamaboe to
Coomassie; the distance travelled being 146 miles, Annamaboe laying in
5° 4′ N., and 1° 43′ W., and the latitude of Coomassie being 6° 34′ 50″
N.; and the longitude 2° 11′ W. by the mean of the observations of the
eclipses of Jupiter’s 1st and 2nd satellites.

I procured the numerals of the various countries whenever I could, to
assist future enquirers.

There are nine great paths leading from Coomassie, the Dwabin, Akim,
Assin, Warsaw, Sauee, Gaman, Soko, Daboia, and Sallagha.

Dwabin is not more than three quarters of a day’s journey eastward from
Coomassie, by the route No. 1.; in which I have retained only the larger
towns, omitting the villages; as I shall invariably. The river Dah is
crossed close to the westward of Dwabin, and said to be as wide as we
found it at Sarrasoo. Two journies beyond Dwabin is a small dependent
district called Mohoo. Several names, such as Meäsee, Marmpon,
Akrofroom, &c. will be found common to different states, as Larissa,
Argos, and Thebes were in antient Greece.

There is an eastern branch of the Akim path, entered immediately on
leaving Coomassie, to a country called Quaöo, northward of Akim, (of
which it seems formerly to have been a district) and adjoining the
Volta. Diabbee is its principal town, and the second Wantomoo, 8
journies from Coomassie by route No. 2. The latter is situated at the
foot of a mountain whence the Boosempra issues, with two smaller rivers,
the Soobirree and Sesee, running to the Kirradee. This district is
entered the 3d day from Coomassie.

There are two routes to Accra through Akim, the capital of which is
Bannasoo, 5 journies, and the northern frontier town Feëa, 3 journies
from Coomassie. The easternmost route to Accra is 15 journies; the other
is made 17 journies to pass near the lake Boosmaquee. This lake, 3
journies from Coomassie, was described as four miles long, and nearly
three broad; upwards of thirty small crooms were reckoned situated
around it, supported by fishing: the water was said to be unpleasant to
drink, and to give a reddish hue to the hair of the people who washed in
it. Fish were forwarded thence daily for the King’s table, by relays of
men. It was called the white mans fetish, there being a popular
superstition, nourished by the Moors, that Europeans were to join it
with the sea, to introduce vessels for the subjugation of the country.
Close to the lake is a mountain called Quashee Boposoo, sometimes seen
clearly from Coomassie, abounding in large black stones, described as
basaltes. By this route (No. 3.) to Accra, the Akim country is entered
the 4th day, the Boosempra is crossed on the 6th, by a tree laid over
it, and the Birrim, by a line and raft on the 12th; it is much wider
than the Boosempra is where we crossed it, and runs to that river,
falling into it just above our crossing. The Aquapim, a clear and
mountainous country, is entered on the 16th day. By the eastern route,
No. 4, the Akim country is entered the 4th day; a large hill called
Abirrawantoo is passed the 9th; thence the Birrim springs, crossing the
path twice before it runs to the Boosempra. Three days westward from
this mountain, is a second, called Papow, in which the Aïnshue or the
Winnebah river rises. A river called Dinshue rises also in this
neighbourhood, running to the Saccomo, which falls into the sea 8 miles
west of Accra. Isert, who visited Aquapim, called the capital Kommang,
but Akropong is so now. The distance from Coomassie to Accra may be
estimated at 230 miles, which bears about the same proportion to the
horizontal distance, as the path we travelled through Assin from
Annamaboe. Dr. Leyden was much imposed on in the extravagant account he
has given of the extent, power, and commerce of Akim,[15] which is
placed in the map accompanying his work, eastward of Dahomey, instead of
westward of the Volta. Dr. Isert was a Danish gentleman, who had the
good fortune to cure the former King of Ashantee’s sister of a lingering
disorder, after she had exhausted all the skill of the fetish women, and
came to Christiansburg Castle in despair. He afterwards expressed his
wish to visit the Ashantee kingdom; and being encouraged, he set out in
June 1786, and staying some days in Aquapim, was just about to enter
Akim, when he was recalled by the Governor. A dangerous illness,
heightened by his disappointment, soon afterwards disgusted him with the
country, and he left it for the West Indies. As Dr. Isert’s letters are
only known in German and Dutch,[16] and he was an industrious and
scientific observer, an extract from his description of the Aquapim
country will be acceptable. I am indebted for a Latin translation of
this and other passages, adduced on different subjects, to Dr. Reynhaut
of Elmina Castle.

“I began my journey early in the morning of the 17th of June, and after
walking two hours I arrived at a little village, picturesquely situated,
named Aschiama. Two hours behind this lies a chain of mountains, which
are composed of granitous stones; flints are but rarely found. The whole
prospect shews itself here in a very different manner to that observed
in sandy countries; the rocks are covered with lofty trees, which are
encompassed with small forests almost impervious. The soil, no longer
sandy, becomes argillaceous, and excellent for vegetation. Behind these
forests I arrived at a Negro village called Abodee, eight leagues from
Christiansburg: the inhabitants of this place are very tenacious of
native ceremony and etiquette. Thence I passed by an irregular path
through the following villages, Fiasso, Fientema, Futu, Mampon, Odaky,
Manno, and Manseng. An hour afterwards I reached a village named
Kommong, the residence of H.R.H. the Duke of Aquapim. Here the country
is charming, though forests are still to be found. Mountains, rocks, and
vallies vary each other in the most striking order; fresh water, so
rarely obtained in maritime countries, is found here of an excellent
quality. Near this village a stream constantly rushes from the summit of
a rock, and affords a fresh and crystalline water. Trees of a very large
circumference are also found; I calculated one of the biggest to be 45
feet round and 15 in diameter. These trees are not the same as those of
which Adanson speaks in his description of Senegal, (Adansonia digitata)
but are of a peculiar species; they much resemble a round tower, as they
do not bear either flowers or fruits. Here I found the Ammonium Grana
Paradisi, the Ammonium Zerumber, and a new genus in a perpendicular tree
ornamented by flowers, which resembled tulips, (Novum Genus Tetandriæ)
and of great elegance: also a new species of aloe, of which the
inhabitants make thread; a new species of citron with indented leaves,
and a multitude of unknown trees and shrubs. In the thickest forests
grows a species of Spanish cane, very straight and well proportioned,
and often attaining six feet in height; it is to be wished that it could
be made use of, treating it as the Chinese do, for if, when dry, an
equal degree of tenacity could be induced, it would prove superior in
quality. I observed, on the boughs of the trees, the Senna plant (which
is parasitic, and consists entirely of a flower), it was almost the
shape of a pine when open, and the inside is of a very deep red; the
Negroes use it in the syphilitic disorder, when first attacked. I took
it for the Aphuteia Hydrora of Thunberg, but on examination it differs
much, as it belongs to Icosandria. Palm trees are here very rare, except
the oliferous (Elois Guineensis) and the viniferous (an Phœnix) which
are cultivated in great numbers; also the true cocoa nut trees (Cocas
nucifera) and the false (an Borassus.) In a word, nature entirely
changes her form as soon as you reach the summit of the chain of
mountains, and I do not believe one twentieth part of the plants found
here are the same as those on the Coast. With regard to natural history,
I was less happy in making discoveries. The elephant, so abundantly
inhabiting the environs of Fidah, (Whydah) and other wild beasts, are
here very rare, which may be attributed to the scarcity of grass, the
growth of which is prevented by the almost impenetrable forests. Several
sorts of birds are here seen, principally paroquets, of which I knew six
species, Psittacus, Erythæus and Pullarius (Linn.) the others seem to be
new, and I also saw a great number of insects of new species. The
mineral kingdom would perhaps be richer if they had mines here. The
rocks are solely composed of rough stones like granite and grens, and
their species; dry quartz and slate stones are often found; on the other
hand I could not discover calcareous earth. The soil is varied, but
consists in general of a rich aluminous earth, traced in different
colours, and of a rich black earth with which sand is never mixed. The
atmosphere seemed more salubrious than on the sea coast, though
physicians generally deny this quality to exist near the forests which
grow in warm climates. I believe the elevated situation of the country
contributes much to it. The Europeans who inhabit the Coast in forts,
would do well to establish an hospital and a garden here. The Arum
Esculentum, the Banana (Musa sapientum) the Ananas (Bromelia Ananas) the
Carica Papaia and Citron all abound here.”

The Assin path is that described in the route from Annamaboe to
Coomassie, it branches off at Foosoo to Ensabra, two journies from
Winnebah, through Anissoo, Asoidroo (the head quarters of the King of
Ashantee in the invasion of 1807) and Atoäperrim, which means “to fire a
gun.” The principal town of Assin is Ansa, through which we passed,
Akrofroom, apparently larger, is called the second. A range of stony
hills is the boundary of Assin and Akim.

The path to Elmina, through the Warsaw country, makes so considerable an
angle to the westward, that the Ashantees invariably declared it
occupied more time to travel than the Assin; it is allowed to be ten
journies at Elmina, by route No. 5. The Dah is crossed the first day at
its town Adahsoo, and in the evening Becquoi (one of the five large
towns built by the Ashantees) is reached. The Dankara country is entered
the third day, the Tufel the fourth, the Warsaw the sixth, the Boosempra
is crossed the tenth day, the Ofim, which skirts this path to the
westward (having received the Dah at Meeäsee) falling into it. The
capital of the Dankara country is four journies westward of Coomassie,
and the frontier is entered the second by route No. 6: it is the most
productive of gold, but has been extravagantly over-rated in Bosman’s
report of its population. The river Seënnee, or, as the Portuguese have
called it, Ancobra, from its serpentine course, has been thought to rise
just beyond the north eastern frontier, but it will presently appear to
be a branch of the Tando of the Ashantees. In the Dutch copies of the
old Portuguese charts, Dankara is placed eastward of Ashantee. The
Warsaw country will be noticed more particularly, in considering the
maritime geography from Cape Coast Castle to the river Assinee.

The Warsaw path has two grand branches, one to Apollonia and one to
Aöwin, each thirteen journies; the former is in the small kingdom of
Amanăheä. The Aöwin country extends from Apollonia to the river Assinee,
five journies in length and three in breadth; it is governed by seven or
eight caboceers, like those of Warsaw, independent of each other: it can
furnish about 5000 soldiers. The numerals of Amanăheä and Aöwin will
appear in an essay on the Fantee language. Both countries are at the
mercy of the Ashantees, who extort gold from them frequently, though
they have not yet fixed the tributes.

Sauëe lies eight journies W.N.W. from Coomassie, and Moinsan fifteen. I
could not procure the routes, but Wom and Sannasee are two of the
largest towns which are passed through.

Buntookoo, the capital of the kingdom of Gaman, is 11 journies N.N.W. of
Coomassie by route No. 7. The river Ofim is crossed the second day, the
Tando the fifth, thence the country becomes open. Yammee, the frontier
town of Gaman, is reached the eighth day. The name of the King of Gaman
is Adinkara; the capital, though not so large, is allowed to be better
built than Coomassie, and the Moorish influence has been longer
established. It is incomparably the richest country in gold, and small
pits were described to me, like those Mr. Park saw at Shrondo. The
numerals are,

  One      Tah.

  Two      Noo.

  Three    Sah.

  Four     Nah.

  Five     Taw.

  Six      Torata.

  Seven    Toorifeenoo.

  Eight    Toorifeessa.

  Nine     Toorifeena.

  Ten      Noonoo.

The four principal Gaman towns, are Sarem, which some call the capital,
Bandakeeä, Bundoo, and Nasseä, five journies from Kong, and seven from
Buntookoo.

A powerful kingdom called Bahooree, which has hitherto successfully
resisted the Ashantees, was described to be westward, and expected to
afford refuge to the King of Gaman on the approaching invasion.

I had heard it reported that the Tando formed the Assinee river, about
35 miles westward of Cape Apollonia, but a very intelligent Ashantee
satisfied me this was a mistake, arising probably from Seënee being the
native name of the Ancobra, which is formed by one branch of the Tando;
a second running westward. The Tando is not near so large as the
Boosempra, and therefore very unlikely to form so large a river as the
Assinee; the western branch may possibly run into it. Mr. Meredith,
writing from report without sufficiently checking it, has made the Tando
and the Chamah or Boosempra the same; yet, p. 225, he adds, “the Volta
is more probably a branch of the Tando, a large river reported as
running to the eastward, and which the Ashantees are obliged to cross in
coming to the Coast;” he did not reflect that he thus laid down a river
running out of the sea. The Tando, we have seen, is five days northward
of Coomassie, it rises in some rocky hills called Toofeeä, near the
large town Aënkroo, between the Banda and Inta paths.

Soko (formerly a province of Gaman) is 11 journies from Coomassie; and
Banda, four beyond, and a little to the eastward; see route No. 8. The
first day, Tafoo is reached, a large aboriginal Inta town, for, as will
be seen in the historical report, the Ashantees emigrated, and subjected
several Inta districts now forming the northern part of their dominions,
and trenched considerably on that declining kingdom, now entirely at
their mercy. If Mr. Dalzel had reflected, it would have occurred to him,
that the Taffoe, Tafoe, or Tafu of Snelgrave (placed so absurdly in his
map, 60 miles west of the mouth of the Volta) and the In-ta[17] he heard
of at Dahomey, and confounded with Ashantee, were the same: for the In
in In-ta is scarcely audible, and only a slight nasal sound barely
amounting to n, as N-ta; foo is merely an adjunct equal to people or men
in our language, affixed in the present infancy of African language to
all names of countries, as if we always said the Scotchmen or Irishmen,
instead of the Scotch and Irish. The Ofim is crossed one day beyond
Tafoo at its croom Ofeesoo, the Tando four journies beyond at Tandosoo.
Takima is reached the eighth day, whence the Fantees are reported, by
tradition, to have emigrated, and there is yet but little difference in
the languages.

Sixteen journies N.N.E. of Coomassie is Boopee (which I have placed
accordingly in 8° 42′ N. and 1° 19′ W.) the frontier town of Inta,
hitherto confounded with Ashantee, than which it is more populous and
more civilized. The Moorish influence has been long established there,
and almost all its caboceers affect to profess that faith. The river
Adirri, which we shall presently identify with the Volta, is crossed
four hours southward of Boopee, and is described as about 120 yards
broad; it rises eight journies N.W. of Boopee, in a large mountain
called Kondoongooree, one of the mountains of Kong, which were
distinctly and invariably reported not to be a chain, but frequently and
individually scattered, from Kong eastward. Seven journies from
Coomassie, on the Inta route, is the smaller kingdom Coranza (probably
the Corisseno of the old maps) the people of which are of the same
origin as the Ashantees by tradition, but, as the King himself assured
me, of much more genius and aptitude. Three journies from Boopee is
Daboia, the second town of Inta. The first journey is to Minsiroo, where
lions are numerous; the second to Moronko, the inhabitants of which are
so fearful of being carried off as slaves by the Ashantee traders (who
travel in great numbers) that they have no doors to their houses, but
ascending by a ladder, which they immediately draw up, they enter
through the thatch. Close to Moronko is a river, about as large as the
Boosempra, called Adiffofoo. Pahmee, three journies south eastward of
Daboia, and Yabo which I cannot place so precisely, are the alternate
residences of the King of Inta. There is a constant commercial
intercourse between Inta and Dahomey, the frontiers being five journies
apart. The numerals of Inta are

  One      Koko.

  Two      Anyoe.

  Three    Assa.

  Four     Anna.

  Five     Annoo.

  Six      Assee.

  Seven    Assoonno.

  Eight    Adoobrooa.

  Nine     Digrakoono.

  Ten      Koodoo.

Sallagha, the grand market of the Inta kingdom, is 17 journies north-
eastward from Coomassie, by route No. 10. The first is to Marmpon, one
of the five large towns built by the Ashantees, and possessing palatine
privileges; the second, through five smaller towns to Aphwaguiassie, the
largest market in the Ashantee kingdom; the 9th day the rivers Kirradee
and Oboosoom are crossed, each about 60 yards wide, and flowing so near
together, as to appear one in the rainy season; a high mountain,
Aduarreekennee, is just beyond them, the boundary of Ashantee and
Booroom. The tenth day the river Sennee is forded, which afterwards
enlarges considerably, and runs into the Volta; it rises five journies
from Coomassie (by route No. 11) between the Boopee and Sallagha paths.
The Booroom country is quite open, and the Ashantees give the river the
figurative name of Birrinsoo, which means that its distance is so
deceiving, that you will cry before you reach it. The capital of Booroom
is Guia, a considerable town, noticed in the route to Odentee, a fetish
sanctuary of great repute, and said to be splendidly furnished. The
Ashantee language is spoken very commonly in Booroom, but the vernacular
numerals are

  One      Ekoo.

  Two      Enoo.

  Three    Essa.

  Four     Enna.

  Five     Annoo.

  Six      Esseä.

  Seven    Assoono.

  Eight    Aquiay.

  Nine     Akonno.

  Ten      Edoo.

The tenth day the Adirri or Volta is crossed, more than a mile wide, but
much interrupted by rocks, and described to be full of hippopotami
(which they call sea elephants,) and alligators. This river divides
Booroom from Inta, Sallagha being one day’s long march from it.
Calculating the 17 journies to Sallagha at 15 miles each, the course as
N.E. by E. and supposing two thirds to be made good on the horizontal
distance, according to our own experience, which gives 170 B. equal to
147 G. miles, Sallagha will lie in latitude 7° 56′ N., and longitude 9″
W. As a check upon this position, it will be necessary to follow the
Adirri or Volta as far as the natives navigate it from Adda, where it is
called the Flou (as the falls of the Senegal.) Isert’s report may be
interesting as an introduction.

“The people of Adda think it derogatory to cultivate land, and live by
fishing, and making salt, which they sell to the people of the Interior.
The Volta has no breakers, and therefore may be presumed to be deep.”
This is an extraordinary mistake; Dalzel says there are high breakers.
Colonel Starrenberg (of Engineers) at Elmina Castle, who went about 60
miles up the Volta, accompanied by a Danish officer and flag, and met
with no impediment so far, but turned back reluctantly in three or four
fathoms of water, observed to me, that he thought the channel between
the breakers about a mile wide. Dalzel mentions an American brig making
good her passage over the bar, on which there is about two fathoms
water; and a Danish schooner has done so since. “An arm goes from the
mouth to Quitta.” This must be the river running from Lagos into the
Volta, near the mouth, as will be shewn in considering the errors in the
maritime geography. “Six English miles from the mouth, it forms a lake
60 miles long and 48 broad, whence an arm extends to Pottriba, 3 miles
eastward of Quitta: in this lake are more than a hundred islands.”
Colonel Starrenberg thought the river widened about 9 British miles from
the mouth, but the number of small islands prevented even ocular
demonstration. So large a lake would certainly have been spoken of by
the natives to Europeans ere this; those whom I have questioned, have
gone up the river to the extreme navigable point, and crossed it in many
parts; and they all declare that at Ascharee, 2 days from Adda, it is
not two miles wide. I never could find either an Ashantee, or a
waterside native, who knew of the arm running to Pottriba, a name they
had not heard of; neither could Col. Starrenberg learn any thing of it;
no branch appeared as far as he went. Isert probably alluded, from
report, to the river Assuafroo, which runs from eastward into the Volta,
7 journies from Adda, as will appear in the natives account. “From May
to December the water is good to drink, being then higher than the sea;
in the other months it is not so, but produces more fish. The river
overflows in July, and August, and the neighbourhood of its banks is
excellent for the cultivation of rice.” Rice is abundantly cultivated in
the Inta kingdom. “Three miles from the sea is an island, called Bird
Island, full of pelicans of peculiar kinds. There is a fish in this
river called hardrass, which, when smoked, is exactly like European
salmon. There are also hippopotami and crocodiles: quantities of oysters
adhere to the mangroves, but when the river is fresh they are good for
nothing. There are a great number of singing birds, and a nightingale
equal to the Polish, which sings in May and December.” Col. Starrenberg
heard a nightingale, but saw only one hippopotamus. There is a kind of
cedar tree, (Avicenniæ nov. spec.) which shoots up many branches from
the ground, about as thick as a pipe, and bare of leaves: this tree is
so very salt in its nature, that in the morning a great quantity of
liquid salt is found on the leaves, chrystallizing in the course of the
day.[18] Amalfee is on an island, 48 miles from the mouth, the
inhabitants of which, and those on the banks of the river, of Agrafee,
Wefee, Tophirree, and Bettoo, call themselves river inhabitants. The
former are the brokers of slaves for the Creppee country, and receive a
vast number from one of its provinces called Acottim, 3 journies
eastward.”

Mr. Meredith could scarcely have enquired about the Creppee or Aquamboe
countries, to have placed them west of the Volta. The natives who carry
salt up the Volta, pull the 1st day, by Agrafee, Foomee, and Tefferee to
Amanfee, on the banks; the 2nd to Dofo on an island; the 3rd, by
Ascharee, on the western bank, to Adomë; the 4th by Assafoo to the
Aquamboe country; the 5th to Sowa; the 6th to Pessee; the 7th by
Appasoo, to Deyatoompon, where a large river flows into the Volta from
the eastward; to Doodee the 8th; to Tombo the 9th; to Akorosoo the 10th;
to Odentee the 11th. Here the river becomes too rocky to proceed
conveniently, and hence to Sallagha by land is 4 journies, through the
large towns Oboëkee, Akuntong, Enkungquakroo, and Apapassee, famous for
making cotton cloth. There is a small state northward, between Aquamboe
and Inta, called Anoöchoo, subject to Ashantee, bordering on which is
Guasoo, the southern district or province of Inta. The Creppee country
borders on Aquamboe eastward, and is independent.

I am not in possession of Colonel Starrenberg’s bearings, but the course
of the river may be pretty well ascertained from fixing the points of
Odentee, Quaöo, and Ascharee. Odentee is 6 journies southward of east
(by route No. 12) from Pattooda, in the Booroom country, and mentioned
in the route to Sallagha. Quaöo, the country where the Boosempra rises,
has already been mentioned as entered 8 journies from Coomassie.
Ascharee, 2 days and a half pull up the river, is reached in 1 day’s
walk from Ningo. The course of the Volta is consequently about W.N.W. to
Quaöo, N.E. by N. to Odentee, and N.W. by Sallagha, which course it
appears to continue to Boopee, if not to its source in the Kondoongooree
mountain. The 10 days pull from Adda to Odentee, and the 4 journies by
land thence to Sallagha, agree very well with the distance and position
of that place, as before calculated by the 17 days route from Coomassie.
The houses of Sallagha and other towns of Inta were mentioned as
peculiar from being round. Leo Africanus observed houses built in the
form of bells at Timbuctoo.

Seven days from Sallagha, N.E. according to the Moors, through the Inta
town of Zongoo, is Yahndi, the capital of Dagwumba, which I have placed,
calculating the course at N.E. by E., and allowing 18 miles for each
journey, as the country is said to be open, in 55′ E. and 8° 38′ N.: the
position is assisted by the common account of its being 8 journies from
Daboia, by route No. 13, and that two obscure, but direct paths to
Daboia and Yahndi, from Coomassie, occupy the first 19 days, and the
latter (described as laying between Daboia and Sallagha) 23 days. Sir
William Young, in his Report of the Geography and History of Northern
Africa, writes, “the Slatees of Old Calebar are said to carry on their
trade to Degombah _northward_,” which also supports my placing it more
to the eastward than it appears in Major Rennel’s map. Yngwa, a district
and large town of Dagwumba, is said to lie 8 days north-westward of
Yahndi, through Sakoigoo; its distance from Daboia, by report 6
journies, places it about N.N.W. Two journies from Daboia, towards
Yngwa, is the river Adiffofoo, about 60 yards wide, running eastward, 2
journies from which is Kooboro, a large Dagwumba town.

North-eastward of Yahndi is Tonomah, of which I do not recollect more
than the name, though I think it is a town and district of Dagwumba. The
kingdom of Tonowah, of which Assentai has been described as the capital
by the Shereef Imhammed,[19] must have been derived from this name,
being otherwise unknown. Three journies north-eastward of Yahndi is
Sokoquo or Ensoko, also a considerable town.

Yahndi is described to be beyond comparison larger than Coomassie, the
houses much better built and ornamented. The Ashantees who had visited
it, told me, they frequently lost themselves in the streets. The King,
Inăna Tanquăree, has been converted by the Moors, who have settled there
in great numbers. Mr. Lucas called it the Mahomedan kingdom of Degomba,
and it was represented to him as peculiarly wealthy and civilized. The
markets of Yahndi are described as animated scenes of commerce,
constantly crowded with merchants from almost all the countries of the
interior. Horses and cattle abound, and immense flocks are possessed
even by the poorer class. The numerals of Dagwumba and Yngwa differing,
I submit both.

          _Yngwa._    _Dagwumba._

  One      Lakoo        Yahndo

  Two      Ayee         Ayee

  Three    Attah        Attah

  Four     Anāhee       Nasee

  Five     Leerennoo    Ennoon

  Six      Ayoboo       Yohbee

  Seven    Ayapaï       Poiee

  Eight    Annee        Nehenoo

  Nine     Awai         Whyee

  Ten      Peä          Edoo.

Yahndi is named after the numeral one, from its pre-eminence. Sarem is
the name of a region, including Gaman, Inta, and Dagwumba, so called
from the open nature of those countries.

One day from Sallagha, towards Yahndi, and scarcely one journey westward
from the latter, is the river Laka, described to be as large and as
rapid as the Adirri or Volta, which it joins below Odentee, and may
therefore be safely concluded to be the Assuafroo; for the names of
rivers are very mutable in Africa, each country through which they pass
naturalising them to its own language, and thus increasing the
perplexities of a geography founded on investigation. I could not
procure any authorized account of the northward course of this river,
the best opportunities had escaped me when I heard of it.

Five journies N.E. from Yahndi is the smaller kingdom of Gamba, the
birth place of Baba the chief Moor at Coomassie, and the boundary of the
Ashantee authority, though its influence, through the much respected
medium of Dagwumba, would extend to the Niger. Seven journies northward
of Yngwa is the kingdom of Fobee: the river Koontoorooa is crossed four
days from it, being about half a mile broad, it has an eastern and
western branch, the former running to the Karhala, one day farther,
considerably wider, and the course south-eastward. One journey from the
river is a large mountain called Sarraka, the same distance from Fobee,
the capital of the kingdom. Lakoo, Lamma, Karhala, and Koomada are the
next largest towns. Five journies northward is an independent kingdom
called Chouoocha. The position of Fobee is checked by Goorooma, being 15
journies from it, (a kingdom to be noticed presently in the direct
northern route from Yahndi to Houssa,) and Kawerree only nine, doubtless
Cayree, a kingdom in the route of the Moors from Coomassie to Jinnie.
The numerals of Fobee are

  One      Koroom.

  Two      Nalay.

  Three    Poompevarra.

  Four     Leetaynalee.

  Five     Kakwassee.

  Six      Mannassa.

  Seven    Noottoosoo.

  Eight    Borafay.

  Nine     Pirrifay.

  Ten      Nanooa.

Five journies from Yngwa is Mosee, a more warlike but less visited
kingdom; it consists of many states, but the superior monarch is named
Billa, and the capital Kookoopella. I place this N.W., because, although
its traders pass through Yngwa, they do not cross the Karhala, or indeed
any river but what they can walk through. The numerals are

  One      Yimbo.

  Two      Ayeeboo.

  Three    Ataboo.

  Four     Annasee.

  Five     Annoo.

  Six      Ayobee.

  Seven    Owhi.

  Eight    Ennee.

  Nine     Aïhopoi.

  Ten      Peega.

A few days northward of Fobee, through Chamday and Kobafoo, is Calanna,
described as a very large city, rivalling Yahndi as a market, and
situated at the foot of a mountain abounding in iron stone, which they
manufacture for rude purposes in much the same manner as Mr. Park
witnessed at Jeningalla. Calanna is probably the Calanshee of Imhammed,
who told Mr. Lucas that it was a dependency of Tounouwah or Assentai,
situated mid-way between it and the coast, 18 journies from each. The
numerals are

  One      Kodoom.

  Two      Naboolla.

  Three    Naweedazoo.

  Four     Nabonaza.

  Five     Nabonoa.

  Six      Lodoo.

  Seven    Logwa.

  Eight    Littaïzoo.

  Nine     Nako.

  Ten      Yewoo.

Kumsallahoo I have not attempted to lay down, having no other guide for
placing it than the report that it is one moon’s journey from Dagwumba,
that its traders pass through Mosee, and cross only one river, the
Fachinga, and that not large. The numerals are

  One      Yumbo.

  Two      Yeeboo.

  Three    Tabo.

  Four     Nasee.

  Five     Annoo.

  Six      Yobo.

  Seven    Poihee.

  Eight    Nehee.

  Nine     Wahee.

  Ten      Pega.

We will now return to Coomassie and proceed northwards to Jinnie, or as
it was generally pronounced, Jennë. This route to Tombuctoo (or
Timbooctoo) is much less frequented by the Moors than that from
Dagwumba, through Houssa. They alledge that the people northward, are
neither so commercial, so civilized, or so wealthy as those north-
eastward. The first 12 journies are to Buntookoo, seven journies whence
is a river called by the natives Coombo, and by the Moors, Zamma; it is
described as half a mile broad, and running westward. I could not find
any Ashantee who had travelled beyond this river, which is the northern
limit of their authority. Five journies eastward of north from the
river, is Kong, the King of which is named Asequoo. A large mountain
called Toolileseena is near the capital, and a small river, Woora, four
journies from it. The kingdom is said to be by no means so wealthy or
powerful as that of Ashantee; the market is supplied from Houssa, the
country is populous, horses numerous, and elephants killed daily. The
people fight with spears, and bows and arrows. Seven journies from Kong
several mountains are passed, called Koonkoori. Mr. Park says, that
“Kong signifies mountain in the Mandingo language, which language is in
use from the frontier of Bambarra to the western sea.” The language of
Kong seems to be a corruption of the Bambarra or Mandingo: the numerals
are

  One      Kiddee.

  Two      Filla.

  Three    Sowa.

  Four     Nanoo.

  Five     Looroa.

  Six      Wora.

  Seven    Ooranfilla.

  Eight    Leeaygee.

  Nine     Konunto.

  Ten      Tah.

The Ashantees calling all the slaves whom they brought down to the water
side Dunkos, it had been, for many years, naturally concluded that there
was a large country of that name in their neighbourhood. Isert writes,
“the Dunkoers are a people behind Ashantee.” On enquiry, however, I
found to my surprise, that there is no country of that name, but that it
is merely an epithet, synonymous with the barbarian of the Greeks and
Romans, which they apply to all the people of the interior but
themselves, and implies an ignorant fellow. I first suspected this from
observing some Dunkos were cut in the face, and some not, and I
presently discovered their vernacular languages were various, and
unintelligible to each other. Generally speaking, the bush or country
people of Dagwumba have three light cuts on each cheek bone, and three
below, with one horizontal under the eye; those of Yahndi, three deep
continued cuts; the people of Mosee, three very deep and long, and one
under the eye; those of Bornoo are frequently cut in the forehead; of
Marrowa all over the body in fine, small, and intricate patterns. In
Fobee, Kumsallahoo, and Calanna, the lower orders have a hole bored
through the cartilage of the nose. These cuts are made during infancy,
to insinuate fetish liquids to invigorate and preserve the child.

Nine journies northward of Kong is Kaybee, the King of which, named
Mamooroo, killed the former monarch Dabbira. The country was said to be
very populous, the capital behind a mountain called Beseeree, the soil
chalky, and asses as numerous as horses. Three journies from the
frontier of Kaybee, over a large mountain called Seboopoo, and across a
large river, is Kayree, through which country it is very dangerous to
pass, the people laying in ambush in small parties to rob or kidnap
travellers, and subsisting by rapine. Five journies thence is Garoo
(probably Gago[20]) a very powerful kingdom, the King, Batoomo, lives at
Netaquolla. Twenty journies beyond is the kingdom of Doowarra, the
people of which are indifferent warriors, but superior agriculturists,
and plant extensively; the soil is red earth. A smaller kingdom called
Filladoo or Firrasoo, is in the neighbourhood. Five journies north of
Doowarra is the Niger, and on an island, about a mile from the southern
bank, is Jennë. The route from Kong to Jennë is the only one which has
not been checked by Negro evidence, but I had reason to think well of
the Moor who furnished it, who never contradicted himself, though
repeatedly cross questioned during the four months I was at Coomassie.
The places reported to Mr. Park on this route, it is true, are none of
them mentioned, but, probably, the people who were insuperably adverse
to his proceeding, were the least likely to satisfy his curiosity but by
imposing on him.[21] Mr. Park in his route from Sego to Bædoo, has a
town called Doowassoo, only four journies from Sego; but I was assured
repeatedly that Doowarra is a powerful kingdom. In the first Mission,
Mr. Park reported the kingdom of Gotto to be so close to the Niger, that
its chief, Moösee, embarked on it to attack Jinnie, and Major Rennell
has placed it accordingly: but, in the second, he writes, “one month’s
travel south of Bædoo,” (which he makes 30 journies southward of Sego)
“through the kingdom of Gotto, will bring the traveller to the country
of the Christians, who have their houses on the banks of the Ba Sea
Feena.” He says the Ba Nimma rises in the Kong mountains south of
Marraboo, but does not mention the kingdom of Kong in his route, which
is about one moon’s travel from the sea, as he has described Bædoo to
be. Now it is very unlikely, if Bædoo had been but 20 journies from
Coomassie, that we should not have heard of it; and it is next to
impossible, that if any kingdom called Gotto laid still nearer, (which
it must have done, to have been passed through from Bædoo to the sea)
that it should have been unknown. Indeed, if the kingdom of Bambarra
extended 28 days south of Sego, as appears by the route given to Mr.
Park, the Ashantees would not have spoken of it from mere report, but
would probably have become acquainted with it, either through war,
commerce, or negotiation. It is a little extraordinary that the kingdom
of Ashantee, reported as eminently powerful to Mr. Lucas even so far
distant as Mesurata, and which must be well known in the neighbourhood
of Jennë, from the number of Moors who visit it from that city, should
not even have been noticed to Mr. Park in this southern route from Silla
or Sego to the sea. Mr. Park writes of the Moors not being able to
subject Jinbala; I believe they insinuate themselves as residents every
where, but I could not hear of their having established themselves by
force, or of their composing even the greater part of a population any
where.[22]

Having reached the Niger it is time to observe, that it is only known to
the Moors by the name of Quolla, pronounced rather as Quorra by the
Negroes, who, from whatever countries they came, all spoke of this as
the largest river they knew; and it was the grand feature in all the
routes (whether from Houssa, Bornoo, or the intermediate countries) to
Ashantee. Mr. Horneman wrote that the Niger, in some parts of Houssa,
was called _Gaora_, which must sound very like Quorra. The Niger, after
leaving the lake Dibbir, was invariably described as dividing in two
large streams; the Quolla, the greater, pursuing its course south-
eastward until it joined the Bahr Abiad, and the other branch running
northward of east near Timbuctoo, and dividing again soon afterwards;
the smaller stream running northwards by Yahoodee, a place of great
trade,[23] and the larger turning directly eastward, and increasing
considerably, running to the lake Caudi or Cadi under the name of
Gambaroo.[24] The Moors call the branch running by Timbuctoo the
Jolliba, I presume figuratively, as a great water, for I was assured by
a native of Jennë, who had frequently visited Timbuctoo, that this
branch was called Zah-mer by the Negroes.[25]

The variety of the concurrent evidence respecting the Gambaroo,
certainly made an impression on my mind almost amounting to conviction.
De Lisle, in his map of Africa for the use of Louis XV, (the accuracy of
which in one point where our latest charts are in error, the Lagos
river, will be shewn towards the close of this Report) makes a branch
from the Niger running near Timbuctoo; and what is even more to the
point, writes “Gambarou ou Niger.” It was not till sometime after my
return from Ashantee, that I unexpectedly discovered this solitary
European record of such a name, and it will at least be allowed that so
respectable a character as De Lisle, would neither have laid down the
branch from the Niger (for it is as likely to be so in the absence of
explanation, as a river running into it) without some authority, nor
have invented the name Gambarou: and it will also be allowed, that he
must have heard of it as being a very large river, to have confounded it
with the Niger. De Lisle has preserved most of the names reported to me,
more closely than any other geographer.[26] In the judicious compendium
of Mr. Murray, I observe the following note. “It is but justice to
D’Anville to say, that in his map of central Africa, inserted in the
26th volume of the Academie des Inscriptions, he has represented a river
passing close to Timbuctoo, running S.W., and falling into the Niger.
This delineation has not been copied by others, but it is not the less
probable that that excellent geographer may have had positive
information on which to found it.” Now, I may presume, this is only
recorded in delineation, and not noticed by D’Anville in the text, or,
his authority would have appeared. I shall be indulged in such a
conjecture, when it is recollected I am writing where I cannot satisfy
myself, in a place destitute of literary facilities. If it is only to be
found in the delineation, it is of course, as likely to be a branch
running N.E. from the Niger, as a river running S.W. into it. Mr. Park
has described the Niger as dividing into two large branches after
leaving Dibbie, and their re-union has been admitted by considerate
investigators, to be a very improbable addition to that report.[27] Sidi
Hamet assigns no course to the great river which he described as about
an hour’s ride with a camel south of Timbuctoo, and distinguished from
the Niger, or, as he called it, Zolilib, by saying the latter was two
hours ride. Adams placed La-mar-Zarah, about three quarters of a mile
wide, two miles south of the town, without hesitation, but he only
_conceived_ that the course was S.W.[28] Leo, ambiguous as the context
may be, certainly writes that there is a _branch_ of the Niger passing
Timbuctoo, “Vicino a un ramo del Niger.” Mr. Beaufoy’s Moor says that
below Ghinea is the sea into which the river of Tombuctoo disembogues
itself; on which Major Rennell observes, “by the word sea, it is well
known the Arabs mean to express a lake also:” this river of Timbuctoo
is, doubtless, the branch of the Niger forming the Gambaroo, and the sea
below Ghinea, the lake Caude. In the Description de l’Afrique, traduite
du Flamand, D’O. Dapper, à Amsterdam, 1686, I find “Ce Royaume de Tombut
ou Tongbutu environ à quatre lieuës _d’un bras_ du Niger.” The account,
to be submitted presently, that this branch of the Niger passing
Timbuctoo is not crossed until the third day going from Timbuctoo to
Houssa, is not an argument against its identity with the Zarah of Adams,
or the river of Sidi Hamet, only two or three miles from the city;
because, giving a northerly course to the branch, and Houssa laying
north eastward 20 journies from Timbuctoo, as will be shewn presently,
the direction of the path would not require the river to be crossed
immediately, but, evidently, not till the second or third day.

De Barros, who considered the Senegal to be the Niger, wrote, that it
received various names,[29] and was called by the Caragoles
(Serawoollies) Collë; on which Mr. Murray reasonably observes, “this
name seems readily convertible into Joli-ba, the latter syllable being
merely an adjunct, meaning a river:” this I was also given to
understand. Now, if the name Joliba had not been reported on the
authority of Mr. Park, I might submit that Collë is more readily
convertible into Quolla, which approximating even more closely to Kulla,
seems to identify the Collë and Kulla under the common name of
Quolla.[30] Mr. Park in his memoir to Lord Camden, writes, “the river of
Dar Kulla, mentioned by Mr. Browne, is generally supposed to be the
Niger, or at least to have a communication with that river.” The name
and course of the Quolla suggested this to me before I observed the
above remark, which I did not until my return.[31] Other arguments will
presently appear for the identity of the Kulla and the Niger.[32]

The Gambaroo seems to me to identify the Gir of Ptolemy,[33] carried by
him into the centre of Africa, and which would appear as large as the
Niger by the expression, “maximi sunt Gir et Nigir.” The river of
Bornoo, hitherto assumed, is not adequate to the impression Ptolemy
conveys, and the names “Gir et Nigir,” seem to indicate a connection.
The Niger may be considered to terminate when the smaller stream is lost
in the Nile.

Concerning the source of the Niger, there was a difference of opinion
amongst the Moors, and not the least notion amongst the Negroes. Some
said that it rose in Bambooch, meaning, as I presume, Bambouk, and
others in Jabowa, where they described another large river to rise also,
running westward. Jabowa was said to be 40 journies from Sego, and
Bambooch 43.

From Jabowa the Niger was described to run to Fouta Gollabi, and in six
days thence to Fouta Towra; the Moors must certainly have meant Foota
Galla, and Footatora, for their pronunciation was more imperfect than
their knowledge of the native names westward, whither they rarely
travelled. I induced a Moor on each side the question, and of different
countries, to draw in my quarters, unknown to each other, what they
called a chart of the Quolla, for the sake of preserving the several
names in their own writing. They were only inferior to one Moor, from
whom I never had an opportunity of inducing a chart. Both parties met,
apparently, at Hasoo, as will be seen by submitting the names.[34]

               _Bambooch._                                     _Jabowa._

  _Journies._

      10       to Gadima, probably Gadoo, little more than 6
               journies from the capital of Bambook, according
               to Major Rennell.

      20       to Hasoo                                         Hasoowa.

       4       to Jaoora                                        Jaoona.

       2       to Jamoo                                         Gamsoö.

       5       to Mallaïa                                       Mallaïu.

       2       to Shégo                                         Sego.

Sego was correctly described according to Mr. Park, and the death of the
monarch he first knew spontaneously mentioned, with his warlike
disposition, and great power. Mr. Park observes that he found the
language of Bambarra a sort of corrupted Mandingo; this confirms the
numerals repeated to me as the Bambarra:

         _Bambarra._    _Mandingo._

  One      Killi          Killin.

  Two      Foolla         Foola.

  Three    Sabba          Sabba.

  Four     Nani           Nani.

  Five     Looroo         Looloo.

  Six      Wora           Woro.

  Seven    Worroola       Oronglo.

  Eight    Sagi           Sie.

  Nine     Konunto        Konunto.

  Ten      Ta             Tang.

From Sego to Sansanding was called one journey, from Sansanding to Jennë
three. Jennë was described as on an island of the Niger, the town
considerable, and fortified, and with large houses to pray in. I did not
understand that it was subject to Timbuctoo; it certainly has a distinct
monarch, who was called Malaï Smaera, and the head Moor, Malaï Bacharoo.
From Jennë through Dibbir, at the entrance of which is Sanina, to
Kabarra or Kabra, the port of Timbuctoo (half a day’s walk from it) is a
voyage of 20 days. By land, it was only 12 journies, through Mashena
(Masina) Farrimabbie, Jimballa (the Jinbala of Mr. Park, which they
persisted was not on an island of the Niger, but on the northern bank of
it) Taäkim, Assoofoo, Zeddaï, Douraï (probably the Downie in Major
Rennell’s map) Matarooch, and Makkasoorfoo, probably the Soorka’s, whom
Mr. Park mentioned as inhabiting the northern bank of the river between
Jinnie and Timbuctoo: he also writes that it is 12 journies by land from
Jinnie to Timbuctoo. The horizontal distance from Jennë to Jimballa, on
Major Rennell’s map is about 100 B. miles, and thence to Timbuctoo 90
more. Now 12 journies at 18 miles, give but a horizontal distance of 144
B. miles, wherefore, I should think the northern bank of the lake
Dibbir, is not so high as it has been hitherto drawn, and the path so
distant as not to be deflected by any curve of the lake. Timbuctoo was
described as a large city, but inferior to Houssa, and not comparable
with Bornoo. The Moorish influence was said to be powerful, but not
superior. A small river goes nearly round the town, overflowing in the
rains, and obliging the people of the suburbs to move to an eminence in
the centre of the town, where the King lives. This is, probably, the
smaller river described by Sidi Hamet as close to the town. Leo says,
when the Niger rises, the waters flow through certain canals to the
city. There were very few muskets to be seen; the King, a Moorish Negro
called Billabahada, had a few double barrelled guns, which were only
fired at customs, and gunpowder was almost as valuable as gold. The two
latter circumstances, besides the name of the river, were all that I
recognised in their reports confirming the description given by Adams,
which I conceive to be as inadequate as those collected by Mr. Jackson
are extravagant.[35] The three last Kings before Billa, were Osamana,
Dawoolloo, and Abass. Mr. Jackson says there was a King Woollo reigning
in 1800, and a Moor who had come from Timbuctoo to Coomassie ten years
ago, did not know King Woollo (Adams’s King) was dead, as he was
reigning at the time he left Timbuctoo. Abass probably had a short reign
like Saï Apokoo the second. This Moor also said that Woollo’s favourite
wife (called by Adams, Fatima) was named Fatooma Allizato. The editor of
Adams shews that the name of Fatima, affords in itself no proof that its
possessor was Moorish, or even a Mohammedan woman. I think it is
probably derived from a numeral, for it answers to five in the numerals
of Garangi (a country described to be northwards of Jennë) which are

  One      Kerriminna.

  Two      Ferriminna.

  Three    Sowaninna.

  Four     Firrima.

  Five     Fahtima.

  Six      Tata.

  Seven    Mannima.

  Eight    Pirima.

  Nine     Missirĭma.

  Ten      Guahee.

Numerals are frequently added to names in Ashantee.

Perhaps the old ms. which I purchased with difficulty from a Jennë Moor,
will recompense the translator by a fuller account, but I fear religion
only is the subject. It contains thirteen pages, with some marginal
notes in a different hand. I should have observed, that, generally
speaking, I found the Moors very cautious in their accounts, declining
to speak unless they were positive, and frequently referring doubtful
points to others whom they knew to be better acquainted with them. I did
not succeed in procuring the numerals of Timbuctoo, but the language is
different from that of Houssa, as the words opposed to those recollected
by Adams will shew:

          _Timbuctoo._    _Houssa._

  Man       Jungo          Motoo.

  Woman     Jumpsa         Motee.

  Camel     So             Rakoomee.

  Dog       Killab         Karree.

  Cow       Fallee         Saneä.

  House     Dah            Garree.

  Water     Boca           Looa.

  Tree      Carna          Leeseeä.

  Gold      Or             Jennarreä.

  A Moor    Seckar         Bibay.

From Timbuctoo[36] to Houssa is 20 journies; the three first through a
woody country, and over the branch of the Niger to Azibbie, the frontier
town. Houssa was said to be the largest city north or south of the
Quolla, except Bornoo; the Moorish influence to have been established
there beyond memory, and the King’s name Serragkee. Cabi is not the name
of the kingdom, but of a large dependent town and district on the Niger.
Mallowa, or Marrowa, as the Negroes pronounce it, (for they seemed
invariably to substitute _r_ for the _l_ of the Moors, as Quorra for
Quolla)[37] is the next extensive in its limits to Bornoo. It is, no
doubt, the kingdom of Mellè, misplaced by Leo, and reported to Cadamosto
in 1455, as 30 journies beyond Timbuctoo. Major Rennell observes, “we
should naturally look for it on the eastward of Timbuctoo,” and it has
only been placed south eastward, and south of the Niger, because Edrisi
has a city called Malel thereabouts, though he calls the name of the
kingdom of which it is the capital Lamlam, which Hartman would reconcile
by supposing it to be a transposition of Malel, certainly a forced
conjecture.[38] A large town called Mahalaba is the nearest I have found
to Malel, to be noticed on the route from Dagwumba to the Niger.[39] In
speaking of all fortified cities, the negroes of Mallowa invariably
prefixed Berinnë or Brinnë to the name, as an indication that they were
so; this was always the case in mentioning Houssa, Cabi, Cassina,
Katinna, &c. &c. I shall place the numerals of Cassina, as written by
Mr. Lucas after the Shereef Imhammed, to the right of those of Houssa or
Mallowa, from their close affinity, perhaps identity; for this language
is spoken far eastward, and the Shereef, as we shall presently see, was
rather inaccurate in his recollection of the numerals of Bornoo.

  One      Daia        Deiyah.

  Two      Beeyoo      Beeyou.

  Three    Okoo        Okoo.

  Four     Odoo        Foodoo.

  Five     Beä         Beat.

  Six      Seddah      Sheedah.

  Seven    Becquay     Bookai.

  Eight    Tacquass    Takoos.

  Nine     Tarra       Tarrah.

  Ten      Gwoma       Goumah.

Two large lakes were described close to the northward of Houssa, one
called Balahar Soudan, and the other Girrigi Marragasee. Calculating the
20 journies from Timbuctoo at 18 miles each, supposing two-thirds to be
made good on the horizontal distance (equal to 212 g. miles) and the
course N.E., I have placed Houssa, 18° 59′ N. and 3° 59′ E. This agrees
pretty well with the account of its being 17 journies from the Niger, or
Quolla, which give 306 B. miles, and the horizontal distance 176 g.
miles. Houssa has hitherto been laid down about 2 journies N. of the
Niger. I have an impression that the city of Houssa will be found to lay
about E.N.E. of Timbuctoo, of course nearer the Gambaroo, which runs
through its dominions, and thus account for the reports of its being
situated upon the Niger. Leo certainly meant Mallowa and the Gambaroo,
when he wrote, “Melli regio quæ extendit se ad flumen quoddam quod ex
Nilo (i.e. Nigro) effluit trecenta millia passuum,” adding, “regnum
opulentissimum, maximè artificum et mercatorum copia, frequentia templa,
sacerdotes et populus qui Nigritas omnes civilitate antecedunt;” which
they certainly appear to do: see a few of their articles for the British
Museum. May not the Maurali of Ptolemy be the Melli of Leo, and the
modern Mallowa or Marrowa? his large adjunct to the Niger to the south
indicates the two rivers. Major Rennell seems to have expected the
present discovery, when he writes (commenting on Mr. Park’s report that
Houssa was 30 journies by land from Tombuctoo, and 45 by water)
“Possibly it may be that Houssa is situated on a different river from
that which passes by Tombuctoo (the Joliba,) but which may be an adjunct
of it, and may run into it in the quarter of Tombuctoo.” In Dapper’s
translation of the Description De l’Afrique du Flamand, 1686, I find
“Cette contreé (Melli) s’etend environ cent lieuës _le long d’un bras_
du Niger.”

Tarrabaleese, 50 journies westward of north, was much spoken of from the
number of its market places. This must be Tripoli, the Arabic corruption
of which is Trabŏlis. The Moors gave me a route to Tunis or Toonis, but
I cannot recognise any name in Major Rennell’s map, (which I could not
procure until my return,) unless Sabbai be Sebba, and Mookanassa
Mourzouk, in Fezzan. There is also another route eastward which I cannot
trace. See Appendix.

From Kabarra the Quolla, continuing its course southward of east, passed
by Uzzalin, Googara,[40] Koolmanna, Gauw, Tokogirri, (perhaps the Tokrur
of Edrisi and Gatterer) Askeä, Zabirmë, and Cabi to Yaoora, which I
imagine to be the Youri of Major Rennell’s map.[41] De Lisle places a
kingdom, Yaouree, south of the Niger. It is a very celebrated ferry,
occurring in a variety of routes from the north of the Quolla to
Ashantee, spoken of always as westward of Cassina, and with little
variation as 25 journies from Timbuctoo. Now as the Moors called it one
day’s journey from Sego to Sansanding, and Mr. Park made it scarcely
more, I will assume this as the rule to calculate the distance from
Timbuctoo to Yaooree, and afterwards consider its place according to the
routes from Dagwumba, through it, to Cassina. Twenty five journies from
Timbuctoo would place Yaoora about 70 miles above the Berrisa in Major
Rennell’s map, but this makes the horizontal distance from Yaoora to
Dagwumba about 850 B. miles, and therefore too great for 42 journies,
the greatest number allowed in the routes from Dagwumba to Yaoora.

I would not presume to investigate after Major Rennell, it would be
absurd in me to expect to throw any new interest into the discussion,
but by making clear the accounts I collected; to do which I must decline
the course of the Niger from Cabi (Mr. Horneman writes it flows
southward from Haoussa) even to a junction with the Bahr Kulla. For,
placing Yaoora in 13° 30′ N. and 8° 30′ E. in conformity with its
distance from Timbuctoo and a declining course to the Kulla, the
horizontal distance to Yahndi, the capital of Dagwumba, will be 600 B.
miles: now 42 journies, the greatest number allowed by the travellers,
at 20 miles each, (rejecting one third, as heretofore, lost in the
windings of the path) give the horizontal distance at 560 B. miles. This
is certainly an additional argument to the similarity of the names
Quolla and Kulla, for the identity of these rivers; but not so strong a
one as that the routes both of Moors and Negroes, allow but 40 journies
from Dagwumba to the point of crossing the Niger for Houssa. The course
to this point was described by the Moors as a little to the eastward of
north: now 40 journies on a N.N.E. course, by the former rule, places
this ferry 15° 1′ N. and 3° 33′ E. agreeing very well with our previous
position of Houssa, and proving that the course of the Niger must
decline considerably, for more than two extra journies would otherwise
be required for the north eastward route from Dagwumba to Yaoora. Major
Rennell only writes that the course of the Niger is _probably_ to
Wangara. Mr. Ledyard, in his comparatively minute description of that
country, (which I shall notice in the route to Bornoo) says nothing of
its bordering on the Niger. Major Rennell, in the construction of the
geography of Mr. Horneman’s report, writes, “M. D’Anville also had an
idea, and so describes it in his map of Africa, 1749 (possibly from
actual information,) that the Niger declined to the south beyond Gana,
so that the termination of it in the lake Semegonda was 3½ degrees of
latitude to the south of Gana.” There is a kingdom called Kulla as well
as a river, and there is also a kingdom Quollaraba: raba being probably
no more than an adjunct equal to the prefix dar, and signifying a
kingdom. Mr. Dupuis, in his notes on Adams, says of an intelligent
Negro, “his account was chiefly curious from his description of a nation
which he called Gallo or _Quallo_, which conveyed to me an idea of a
people, more advanced in the arts, and wealthier than any that I had
previously heard of: within three days journey of the capital was a
large lake or river which communicated with the Wed Nile.” The commended
arguments of the Quarterly Review, (which I have never had the advantage
of reading,) must be in a great degree auxiliary, in arguing, to support
the Congo hypothesis, a course of the Niger equally declined with that
which I have followed for the identity of the Quolla and Kulla. The
junction of the Quolla with the Bahr Abiad, or Nil, as the Moors called
it, cannot be more descriptively expressed, according to every account I
received, than in the words of Mr. Horneman. “Some days past I spoke to
a man who had seen Mr. Brown in Darfoor, he gave me some information
respecting the countries he travelled through, and told me that the
communication of the Niger with the Nile was not to be doubted, but that
this communication before the rainy season was very little.”[42]

We will pursue the course of the Quolla from Yaoora (where I should
judge from description it must be about 3 miles wide) before we apply
the routes northward of it.[43] One journey eastward of Yaoora,
(sometimes called Yawooree by the Negroes,) it passed Nooffie, doubtless
the Nyffe of Mr. Horneman and others, and which De Lisle has written
Nouffy: 3 journies thence it passed Boussa, which Amadi Fatouma
reported, as it was to me also (see Diary) as the place of Mr. Park’s
death, but I could hear nothing of the rock and door. Boussa is not in
Major Rennell’s map, but I observed Bousa in the map of De Lisle before
alluded to; it is probably the Berrisa of Edrisi. Twelve journies thence
it passed Atagara, but, previously, Hoomee, and Rakkah.[44] Southward of
the latter, they described an inland country called Koofee, possibly
Kosie, a country I shall presently introduce, as visited by a mulatto,
behind Lagos. Thirty journies from Atagara, it flowed through the
kingdom of Quollaraba,[45] which thus falls precisely where Major
Rennell has laid down the kingdom of Kulla. Six journies thence it
passed Mafeegoodoo, and 13 journies beyond, the lake Cadee or Caudee.
This I should consider to be the Cauga of Edrisi, which Major Rennell
has identified with the Fittri of Mr. Brown, for into this the second
large branch of the Niger, or the river Gambaroo, is said to run; but it
is considerably too much to the southward for the Cauga in Major
Rennell’s map, being, according to the accounts of the Moors, only 3
journies northward of the Quolla: yet Edrisi writes “besides a river of
the name of Nile or Neel _passes by_ Kauga.” What inclines me to think
the Cauga may be more distant from Bornoo the capital, though not from
the frontier of that kingdom, (15 journies being the number reported to
me as well as to Mr. Brown) is, that the Negroes of that city were not
so well acquainted with this lake as the Moors. My sketch in the map, of
course, represents the sketches and descriptions of the natives. They
described the Cadee or Caudee as an immense water, like a small sea,
frequently overflowing the neighbouring country, and sometimes so
convulsed as to throw up large quantities of fish and other contents;
meaning, in short, a volcanic lake. The Moors called it also the Bahr el
Noä, having a tradition that the waters of the deluge retired to, and
were absorbed in it. A very high mountain was spoken of, at an equal
distance between the Caudee and the Quolla.[46] Twelve journies from
Caudee, the Quolla received the river Sharee from northward, which, I
imagine, if not the Misselad, may be a river deriving its name from the
Abu Shareb of Major Rennell’s map. The Quolla was said to pass to the
southward of Bagarrimee, (the Baghermee of Mr. Brown.) Kalafarradoo, (I
cannot find any name nearer to this than the Courourfa of De Lisle, and
Kororfa, said in Mr. Beaufoy’s MSS. to be W. of Begarmee). Foör (Darfur,
according to Mr. Brown, means the kingdom of Foör) and lastly to skirt
Waddaï, the Waddey of Mr. Horneman, who wrote that it was east of
Begharmee, and west of Darfoor; but, as it was reported to me east of
Darfoor, by every person, and as Mr. Brown did not hear of it to adjust
its position, I have placed it so.[47]

The junction with the Nile having taken place, as Mr. Horneman before
reported, south of Darfoor, they continued the course to a large country
called Soonar,[48] indisputably the kingdom of Sennaar. Hence to
Massar,[49] or Egypt, they did not always agree themselves in the
various names, nor can I recognise any on the map, unless their Shewa
Abenhassa be Bennassa, Minsoor, Misur, Gammeacha, Gammazie; Sooess,
Sohaig; Kaheea, Kahoul; Zaragoo, Nayazoogoo; and their Lamabalara, in
the country of Egypt, the Bahr be la ma of Mr. Horneman; of the latter
there can be no doubt.[50]

My friend, the Shereef Brahima had, as well as some others, been to
Mecca and Medina. I place great reliance on this man’s information
(invariably confirmed by the Negroes) from his caution and diffidence,
and my experience of his character; for he was ultimately a valuable
friend to the Mission: he was the only Moor who dared to refuse to be
present at human sacrifices. The MS. No. 2. is his writing, and
professedly the route from Dagwumba through Bornoo to Massar,[51] it
consists of six pages well written. This would have been a valuable man
to have engaged to travel through the interior, for he was capable of
making circumstantial minutes, and I think he might have been engaged to
do so by a moderate Fort pay. The Moors talk much of the King of
Santambool,[52] as a powerful monarch and formidable to the Christians.

It will excite surprise that I heard nothing of Wangara,[53] as was the
case with Mr. Brown, not even after I had, contrary to my general
custom, submitted the name: but I heard very much spontaneously of
Oongooroo. Mr. Horneman called Wangara, Ungura, and De Lisle, Ouangara,
we shall find it in the route from Yaoora to Bornoo or Barranoo. Bornoo
was described to me about north-east from Yaoora, which agrees very well
with Major Rennell’s position, established beyond all contradiction
short of an observation, but, the horizontal distance, (lowering the
place of Yaoora as I have done) thence to Bornoo would be upwards of
1000 B. miles, whereas they described it to be but 51 journies, which
allowing 20 miles to each, as the country was said to be much more
favourable to travelling, and the path more direct than that we came,
would give but an horizontal distance of 680 B. miles. Mr. Horneman
heard that Bornu was but 15 journies from Kassina; I was told 33 if
walked, 19 if rode. Major Rennell has made the distance about 30
journies, considering the 15 journies applicable to the western
boundaries of the empire, and not to the capital.

We will now return to Yahndi and proceed northwards to Houssa. Nineteen
journies from Yahndi is Matchaquawdie, six beyond is Goorooma, 10 thence
Dolooë, subject to Goorooma, and only five journies from the Quolla,
described as about two miles wide there. When Amadi Fatouma mentioned
that he passed Gourouma, I should suppose he meant this kingdom of
Goorooma, Dolooë, as subject to it, being probably included under that
name. I must impress, however, that this northern route from Dagwumba to
the Niger, being, with that from Kong to Jennë, the only ones
unauthenticated, otherwise than by cross examination, I do not report
them with the same confidence, which I do the others. Two journies from
the northern bank of the Quolla is Gamhadi, to which three large towns
belong, Dogondaghi, Toodonkassalee, and Toompasseä, and numerous
dependent crooms. There were three routes from Gamhadi, the first
northward to Houssa 15 journies, passing the large river Gambaroo the
ninth, between which and Houssa is a district called Zessa. The second
route is to Katinnee, a city and state of the Mallowa kingdom, one month
from the Quolla. On this route the Gambaroo is crossed the tenth day,
and Sowhoondë, Souoola, (perhaps Sala) Quattaraquassee, Doorooma, Soroo,
Zabbakou, Dinka, Doochingamza, and Dammisamia were mentioned as large
towns on the route. The third route was through the Fillanee country,
(doubtless the Fullan[54] of Ben Ali) which had been frequently at war
with Mallowa, to the kingdom of Kallaghee, 14 journies from the Quolla,
the Gambaroo being passed the tenth. The numerals of Kallaghee are

  One      Gadee.

  Two      Sillil.

  Three    Quan.

  Four     Foolloo.

  Five     Vydee.

  Six      Zoodoo.

  Seven    Etkassa.

  Eight    Shiddowka.

  Nine     Woollaä.

  Ten      Woma.

A country called Barrabadi was described eastward of Mallowa, between it
and Bornoo; its numerals corresponded with those of Bornoo.

We will now return again to Dagwumba, and follow the route thence, over
the Quolla, through Yaoora to Bornoo. Gamba we have already described as
five journies north eastward of Yahndi, thence two journies, over a high
mountain called Yerim, and across a river running southwards (which the
Moors called Mory, but which it would seem is the continuation of the
Karhala) is Gooroosie, four journies thence Zoogoo, probably the Zeggo
of Major Rennell’s map; 10 farther the kingdom of Barragoo. De Lisle has
placed his kingdom of Bourgou thereabouts. North-westward of Barragoo is
Koomba, the Kombah of Major Rennell’s map. The position of this kingdom
is pretty well ascertained, because those who came from it, described
Goorooma as its northern neighbour, and Barragoo to be the first kingdom
passed through in their journies to the coast below Whydah. Eight
journies from Barragoo is Toombeä, three beyond is Goodoobirree. A river
running to the Quolla (as it was said, but more probably from it) called
Leeäsa, flows close to the eastward of this path, and is crossed, going
from Goodoobirree southwards, to a large kingdom called Yariba by the
Moors, but Yarba more generally by the natives. Major Rennell has drawn
a river communicating with the Niger close to Youri, so has De Lisle.
This river Leeäsa is the only one I heard of, answering in the least
degree to that of Sidi Hamet, but Wassana was a name unknown. Aquallie
is the frontier town of Yariba, one journey from Goodoobirree, and one
from Bootee, second only to the capital, Katanga, four journies beyond
it. Yariba was described to be about 24 journies, through Hio, (its
immediate neighbour) from Arătakassee or Alătakassee, which we shall
hereafter recognise in Ardra: this determines its position pretty
well.[55] Dahomey was said to be tributary to Yariba, as well as to Hio,
which I have an impression is also tributary to Hio. From Hio to Dahomey
is seven journies. The military are despotic in Hio, they always
intercept the new King on his way to the palace, and demand his naming
some neighbouring country for their invasion and plunder, before they
confirm him. The King before the present, had named Dahomey, but after
three years neglect of the fulfilment, he ordered the army against a
northern neighbour. The army went, wasted and pillaged the country, but
when within a day’s march of the capital on their return, they sent
deputies to enjoin his abdication, as inevitable to a falsehood to them;
he was obstinate; they arrived and cut off his head. The numerals of Hio
are

  One      Innee.

  Two      Eygee.

  Three    Etta.

  Four     Ernee.

  Five     Aroon.

  Six      Effa.

  Seven    Eggay.

  Eight    Eggo.

  Nine     Essun.

  Ten      Eywaw.

The Hio man, who gave me the above numerals, spoke of the Apaccas as a
more powerful northern neighbour, but I never heard of them from any
other person.

Yariba must certainly be the Yarba of Imhammed, though he described it
as 18 or 20 journies from Gonjah towards the N.W., for he is likely to
have been incorrect in this, because we have proved him to be so, in
stating, that Ashantee was the capital of Tonouwah, which appears to be
a district or town of Dagwumba, the people of which kingdom are by no
means warlike as he represented them, nor have they any notion of taming
the elephant: he reported that Calanshee was a dependency of Ashantee,
whereas no Ashantee knows the name; that Gonjah was 46 journies from the
coast, when it is but 30. Major Rennell reasonably conceived the Yarba
of Imhammed to be the Yarra of De Lisle, at the back of Sierra Leone,
but as this country is not preserved in his own map, I presume it cannot
be of much consequence, politically or commercially, whereas Yariba,
indisputably eastward of Kong, is always announced to enquirers, both by
Moors and Negroes, as a very powerful, and much frequented kingdom.
Another argument is, that all the Moors I saw at Coomassie, were almost
ignorant of the countries westward, only speaking of those their
enquiries for the source of the Quolla had made known to them: indeed, I
did not see one who had travelled westward, or south westward of
Bambarra, but our Accra linguist told me that he had recognised a Moor
at the Rio Pongos, whom he had seen in Coomassie (when sent there on the
eve of the second Ashantee invasion) who told him that he had been two
months travelling from Kong, and crossed a very large river. Imhammed’s
Affow (if not Taffoo, or the Inta country) I conceive to be Afflou, a
town and district of the Krepee or Kerrapay country, and a short walk
from the sea by Quitta, westward of Yarba, as he says, but more than
eight journies. The Kerrapay country, which is extensive and
independent, will be described, in proceeding from Cape Coast Castle,
along the coast, eastward.

[Illustration: _London published as the Act directs by John Murray
Albemarle Street 4th. Jany. 1819._

_J. Walker Sculpt._]

To return to the route from Yahndi to Yaoora, three journies from
Goodoobirree towards the Quolla through Gillimakafoo, Garagaroogee, and
Paänghee, is the large city of Kaiama, and four beyond it, through
Mahalaba, (the nearest name to the Malel of Edrisi,) Marramoo, and
across the small river Wooroo, (running to the Quolla) is the city of
Wauwaw,[56] three journies from the Quolla. Ten journies from the
northern bank, through Yaoora, and skirting the eastern limits of
Zamfara, is Goobirree, so called by the Moors, and Goobur by the
Negroes.[57] Mr. Beaufoy learned that Gubur was to the south of Wangara,
and De Lisle writes it Goubour. Thence to Kassina, having crossed the
large river Gambaroo, is eight journies. Eighteen journies, calculated
at 18 miles each on a N.E. course, from the altered position of Yaoora,
would place Kassina in 15° 43′ N. and 10° 43′ E., instead of 16° N. and
11° 45′ E. Mr. Lucas learned that Kassina was five journies from the
Niger, or about 100 miles from that water, which it is likely to be from
the upper branch or the Gambaroo, which river skirting Kanoo, and
Oongooroo, (or Wangara,) before it descends to the lake Cadee, (though I
could not prove satisfactorily that it did so,) would account for
Edrisi’s placing Kano, and Wangara, on the Niger.[58] From Kassina to
Dawoorra is six journies: this must be the Daura of Mr. Horneman, though
in the drawing of the Marrabut it is placed north of Kano. From Dawoorra
to Kanoo is four journies. D’Anville placed it 90 miles to the N.E. of
Kassina, and in the drawing just alluded to, it is placed inland
northward of the Niger. The only authority for supporting Edrisi’s
position of it, is what Mr. Matra was told at Marocco. The Moor who
informed Mr. Beaufoy that boats went with the stream to Ghineä, (the
Gano or Kano of Major Rennell) placed Jinnie between it and Houssa, so
gross an inaccuracy as to justify our doubting him on the other point.
The Ginea of Leo more probably meant Jennë, and he seems to write of
that navigation as a distinct one from that to Melli eastward.[59] From
Kanoo, through the large towns Madagee and Adagia, to Oongooroo is nine
journies, but seven on a joma or camel, “Est iter octo dierum versus
orientem” (Edrisi.) From Oongooroo to Barranoo is 15 journies on foot
according to the Moors, nine on horseback according to the Negroes, by
route No. 12. Bornoo or Barranoo was spoken of as the first empire in
Africa,[60] the King’s name, according to the Moors, was Baba Alloo, but
the Negroes called him Massinnama.[61] Kassina, and the intermediate
countries on the route, were subject to him with many others. One
district belonging to Bornoo was named Panaroo, and the vassal King or
governor of it, Yandee Kooma. A small river, called Gaboöa[62] by the
Negroes, ran southwards near Bornoo, and six journies eastward from it,
close to Aweeac, a large one Zerrookoo Keroboobee. Mr. Horneman writes,
the Wad el Gazel is not a river, but a large and fertile valley. The
Negroes of Bornoo were well acquainted with Baghermee. Imhammed’s
recollection of the numerals of Bornoo must have been very imperfect,
for I have written them at least half a dozen times, both from Moorish
and Negro inhabitants, and my spelling agreed with that of another
person present. They are

                   _Imhammed’s._

  One      Leskar    Lakkah.

  Two      Ahndee    Endee.

  Three    Yaskar    Nieskoo.

  Four     Deegah    Dekoo.

  Five     Oöogoo    Okoo.

  Six      Araskoo   Araskoo.

  Seven    Tooloor   Naskoo.

  Eight    Woskoo    Tallóre.

  Nine     Likkar    L’ilkar.

  Ten      Meeägoo   Meikoo.

Ben Ali said the language of the common people of Bornoo had a strong
resemblance to that of the neighbouring Negroes. Mr. Lucas writes that
no less than 30 languages are spoken in these dominions. The following
are the numerals of Maïha, one month to the north-eastward, subject to
Bornoo, and the King’s name Smaï Doonama.

  One      Lagen.

  Two      Indë.

  Three    Eäska.

  Four     Daäger.

  Five     Ohoo.

  Six      Araska.

  Seven    Tooloor.

  Eight    Weska.

  Nine     Likar.

  Ten      Inagoon.

The Negroes called Kanem, Kandem; were well acquainted with Doomboo, and
spoke much of the kingdom of Asben.

We will now return to Cape Coast Castle, and seek the best descriptive
authorities, in aid of the observations which have been made by the
Commissioners and others, for the maritime geography from the river
Assinee to Lagos.

The latitude and longitude of Cape Coast (called by the natives Igwa,
and in the Affettoo district) according to Messrs. Ludlam and Dawes, the
Government Commissioners who surveyed the coast in 1810, is 5° 6′ N. and
1° 51′ W. Elmina, the native name of which is Addĭna, is about seven
miles to windward of Cape Coast. Twelve miles from Elmina is Commenda,
an English fort, the town is called by the natives Akatayki, the Dutch
fort was destroyed in the American war. Nine miles thence is Chama, or
Assĕma, at the mouth of the Boosempra. Six hours pull up the river, is
an island, where Attobra, one of the Warsaw caboceers, who supplies the
Dutch with canoes, is building a large house to retire to; four hours
above which is his croom. Colonel Starrenberg was pulled three days up
the river in a canoe; his progress was much impeded by rocks, and at
length arrested by a large cataract, which, being considered a powerful
fetish by the natives, the canoe-men dared not to approach. Nine miles
from Chama, where the Dutch have a fort called Sebastian, is Succondee,
the first town in the Ahanta country. The English fort was destroyed by
the French in the American war, but there is a settlement house. The
Dutch fort is called Orange. Four miles from Succondee is Taccorary, and
a Dutch fort. Nine miles beyond is Boutrie where the Dutch have a fort,
formerly belonging to the Brandenburgh Company. Three miles from Boutrie
is Dix-Cove, or Nfooma, and in the interval Boossooä, the capital of
Ahanta, which is divided into three districts, Amanfoo, Adoom, and Poho.
The first is about one journey (through Geämma) behind Boossooa, and one
from the river Ancobra, the caboceer is of the next consequence to the
King, whose power and means are extremely limited. The two latter
districts are not more than half a journey behind Taccorary. The small
river running into the sea at Boutrie, rises in the Adoom district,
which is said to abound in gold, but the pits have not been worked for
many years, from their fear of the Warsaws. Amanfee also abounds in very
fine gold, which is generally found in quartz, and is ground upon stones
arranged under large sheds for the purpose. In a respectable periodical
publication of the last year, I observe, the King of Ashantee called
King of Ahanta, Inta, or Ashantee; this is one of the many proofs of the
indiscriminate ideas of that monarch before the Mission. Eighteen miles
from Dix-Cove passing Achooma and Accoda, (where the Dutch have a fort,
and which is close to Cape Three Points) are the ruins of Hollandia,
formerly belonging to the Brandenburgh Company, and called Fort Royal
Fredericksburg. Sixteen miles farther is Axim, where the Dutch fort
Anthony, their Vice Presidency, is situated. The people of Axim speak a
dialect of the Ahanta. About two miles westward is the mouth of the
Ancobra, so called by the Portuguese from its windings, the native name
is Seënna. Col. Starrenberg, who went up the river as far as the ruins
of Elisa Carthago, the extreme navigable point, for any but a very small
canoe, says, he cannot form any accurate idea of the distance, but
supposes it was about 20 Dutch miles and the course N.E. Meredith says
50 English: he was very careless and incorrect in writing, “the French
built a fort on the right bank of this river, and at about 50 miles from
its mouth; where they had a great gold trade, that soon excited the
jealousy of the Dutch, who expelled them. The Dutch however did not long
enjoy this acquisition, for the chief got embroiled with the natives,
and betook himself to the desperate remedy of blowing up the fort.”
Elisa Carthago was built by the Dutch governor Ruighaven, who died, as
appears by his tomb stone at Elmina, before 1700. The French never had
any but a small factory, almost at the mouth of the river, and the Dutch
officer in charge of Elisa Carthago had enjoyed a good trade many years
before the cupidity of the natives reduced him to the act of despair,
related by Bosman, and still recorded by the natives, who narrated it to
Col. Starrenberg. The following is from the Latin translation of Dr.
Reynhaut: “The chief of Elisa Carthago being at variance with the
natives, who invested the fort, and finding he could not resist them any
longer” (for as the story goes, he had been reduced to fire pieces of
rock gold from the want of bullets) “feigned to treat with them, and
invited them for that purpose into the hall of the fort, under which he
had placed several barrels of gunpowder, and a small boy with a match,
ordering him to apply it directly he stamped his foot on the floor of
the hall above. This he did, after reproaching the natives with their
cupidity, and they were all blown up together. One of the servants of
the fort had just before contrived to effect his escape with most of the
papers.” In navigating from the mouth of the Ancobra or Seënna to Elisa
Carthago, the following towns, on the banks, are passed, Boasso, Tarbo,
Marmeresse, Ejujan, Tetchbrouw, Gura, Barnesoe, Uromanio, Afamkan, and
Aduwa. Gura is a small state, the people of which speak the same
language as those of Axim. From Aduwa there are three grand roads, one
to the Aowin country, one to the Dankara, and one to Asankarie, a
considerable town in Warsaw. From Aduwa to Dankara numerous small crooms
are passed through, and the first large one of the latter country is
Kenkoomabaraso, only three journies from Coomassie. The people of
Dankara come to Axim to trade. From Aduwa to Aowin the first
considerable town is Taqua. The Warsaw country is governed by four
caboceers, independent of each other, of whose relation and power, the
best idea I can give, is by comparing it with that of the tyrants Geron
and Theron, who ruled at the same time in Sicily. Intiffa, the richest
caboceer, and whose power extends the farthest, resides at Abbradie, one
short journey from Elmina. Cudjo Miensa (Miensa is the numeral three) is
his principal counsellor, and will succeed him. Nerbehin was formerly
the residence of Quashee Jacon, another independent caboceer, but of
Intiffa’s family; he was driven from thence by Esson Cudjo, who now
rules there: he fled to Samcow (situated about one day’s journey on the
frontier of Warsaw, behind Succondee) of which Musoe, a slave of his,
has raised himself to be the caboceer, and now protects his master until
Esson Cudjoe’s death. Attobra, another independent caboceer, lives at
Dabroādie, on the Boosempra. The greatest breadth of the Warsaw country
is supposed to be 60 B. miles, and the greatest length 100 or 120. About
28 miles from the Ancobra, begins the kingdom of Amanaheä, in which the
English fort Apollonia is situated: it extends about 100 miles along the
coast, but not more than 20 in-land. The various numerals of the coast
will be submitted in an essay on the Fantee language.

Barely four miles eastward of Cape Coast is Moree, and the Dutch fort
Nassau. Six miles from Moree is Annamaboe, the most complete
fortification in the country; five miles thence Cormantine, the first
fort possessed by the English, and built by them about the middle of the
seventeenth century. It was taken afterwards by the Dutch, and being
stormed, was almost destroyed by the Ashantee army, before it attacked
Annamaboe: the position is very commanding. Tantumquerry, a small
English fort, is about 18 miles from Cormantine, (crossing the small
river Amissa, an hour’s walk in-land from which is Mankasim, the capital
of the Braffoe district of Fantee) the natives call the town Tuam. Eight
miles from Tantum is the town of Apam, where is a Dutch fort and a small
river. Eight miles from Apam is Simpah or Winnebah. The people of Simpah
are Fantees, but their language is called Affoottoo. They are in the
district of Agoona. About nine miles from Simpah is the Dutch fort
Berracoe, the natives call the town Seniah. Attah of Akim laid a
contribution on this fort in March 1811. About 27 miles from Berracoe is
Accra, or Inkran, once subject to Aquamboo, which people, according to
Isert, formerly drove them to Popo. Meredith fully describes Accra and
the environs, but he does not mention that according to the natives the
Portuguese settled here first, (Isert writes in 1452) and exercising the
greatest cruelties and enormities, were extirpated by the Accras (their
town was then situated a little behind the present), who executed the
governor and his countrymen, on a spot whence they still take the earth
to rub a new born child, in commemoration of the event. Accra, according
to the observations of the Commissioners, is in 5° 20′ N. and 10′ W. Mr.
Meredith, after quoting this observation, placed it in his outline of
the coast in 58′ E. Between two and three miles from the English fort,
is Christiansburg Castle, the Danish head-quarters.

We will follow[63] Isert in his route from Accra to the Volta, as he
travelled it several times. “Two miles from Christiansburg is Labbodee,
where there was formerly a fort: this is the residence of the grand
fetish, and the Bishop. Two miles to Pessin, two to Temmen, where the
Dutch had a small fort, abandoned in 1781, two (leaving Nimboe a little
in the bush) to Ponee, a deserted Dutch fort, now a Dutch factory; two
miles thence (crossing a brakke streek or low land, up to the shoulders
in the rains, and 300 fathoms broad, sometimes called Ponee river) are
great and small Pram Pram, where the English have a small fort or
fortified factory. Two long miles thence is Friedensbourg fort at Ningo,
the people of which speak a different language called Adampee, (the name
given to their country,) a mixture of Ashantee, Kerrapee, and Accra; it
is a republic.” Behind Adampee is the Crobo mountain, the people of
which, though but a few hundreds, have hitherto baffled the Ashantees,
by leaving their croom at the bottom of the mountain, which is of great
height, rugged, accessible but by one narrow path, and with springs of
water on the top, whence they roll down upon their enemies, the large
stones and fragments of rock which abound. “From Adampee I went in one
day to Addah, 12 miles. Two and a half from Ningo is a croom called Laï,
the inhabitants of which have removed, some to Addah, some to Ningo: the
English had a factory here, long gone to ruin. One mile west of the
Volta, there was formerly a croom called Foutchi.” Reckoning four
English miles to one Danish or Dutch, Addah would be 96 miles from
Christiansburg, but Meredith makes it but 67, therefore we will take the
medium and call it 87. From the Volta to Cape St. Paul’s is five leagues
by sea, according to Dalzel, and 15 miles by land, according to Norris’s
map of Dahomey and its environs. Quitta, about 12 miles from it
(according to Norris) by the observation made in H.M.S. Argo in 1802, is
in 5° 45′ N. and 1° 29′ 30″ E. by chronometer. Accra lies, according to
the Commissioners, in 10′ W. Taking the medium between Isert and
Meredith, Christiansburg Castle, about three miles eastward of the
English fort, is 87 from Addah, but as that place is six miles from the
mouth of the Volta, we will call it 81: allowing one mile for the
breadth of the river and 18 miles for the difference of longitude
between it and Quitta, (according to Norris,) the distance from English
Accra to Quitta will be 103 B. miles, which being equal to 89
geographical miles, place Quitta in 1° 19′ E. instead of 1° 29′ 30″ as
by the observation of the Argo, and that supposing the whole distance to
be made good horizontally, which is impossible. Wherefore I should think
Isert, who had travelled it, was more likely to be correct in making the
distance from Christiansburg to Addah 96 miles, than Meredith in calling
it 67.

Norris’s observation, placing Cape St. Paul’s in 5° 52′ N., I conceive
to be incorrect, as that of the Argo must be preferred, which places
Quitta in 5° 42′ N., instead of 6° 2′ N., as in Norris’s map. This
should not have escaped Mr. Dalzel’s notice in the “New Sailing
Directions,” where both observations are cited in the same page, without
any remark on the inconsistency, for Quitta and not St. Paul’s, is thus
made the Cape or western limit of the Bight, the eastern side of which
is called the Bight of Benin, I regret, amongst other disadvantages,
that of not having the opportunity to consult the chart of Mr. Demayne
(the master of H.M.S. Amelia) which is said to be more accurate than any
other.[64]

Quitta is included in an independent state of Kerrapay, called Agwoona,
which extends thence along the coast to the Volta; the towns from that
river to Quitta are Attoko, Terrobee, Footee, Agwoona, Whiëe, and
Tegbay. Agwoona lays half a mile from the shore, and about 15 miles from
the Volta. The inhabitants of all the other towns are obliged by the law
to bury their dead in Agwoona, the capital; the caboceer of which is
supreme over the others, but not absolute. Between Quitta and Popo, lay
the Kerrapay towns Egbiffeemee, to which several of the Quittas have
retired, Edjenowah, Oöogloobooë, and Afflou or Afflahoo, a little way
from the beach. These towns are governed by caboceers, independent of
each other, as well as of Agwoona; and in the last a mixture of Adampë
and Kerrapay is spoken, accounted for by the emigration of a large body
of the former people. Another independent state of Kerrapay is
Tettaytokoo, 2 journies behind Popo; the King is said to be despotic,
and the capital composed of circular houses. There is also another
smaller interior state, governed by a caboceer called Quaminagah. Tadoo,
however, is allowed to be the largest kingdom of Kerrapay, 6 journies
behind Popo, (which the Fantees call Inshan, but the natives Taun or
Taum) described as a large town; and the Accra language is spoken there
as well as the Kerrapay, in consequence of the temporary emigration of
the former people in 1680. The Kerrapay numerals are

  One      Eddee.

  Two      Effee.

  Three    Eltong.

  Four     Ennay.

  Five     Altong.

  Six      Adday.

  Seven    Adrinnee.

  Eight    Ennee.

  Nine     Indee.

  Ten      Owoo.

The Negroes of this country are of a much more daring and desperate
character than their neighbours, and were always the most severely
treated in the slave ships. Mr. Meredith, who writes it Crepee, placed
it west of the Volta.

Whydah, according to an observation of the Argo, is 6° 14′ N. 2° 31′ E.
I do not recollect Dalzel to have mentioned that Anotto is produced in
the neighbourhood of Whydah. I am not certain whether it is by the Bixa
orellana; but the shrub at Whydah may be classed under Polyandria
Monogynia. Lambe made it 200 miles from Whydah beach to Abomey; Norris
112, Dalzel 96. By Mr. Norris’s own account of his journey, not more
than 20 hours were occupied in travelling, which at 4 miles an hour, the
greatest pace which I think the hammock men can average, would make the
distance 80 miles. An officer in this service went to Dahomey, without
hurrying, in 3 days; and considers a dispatch would reach it in 2: he
thinks it can scarcely be 70 miles; but calling it 80 as above, and
supposing 54, two thirds, to be the horizontal distance made good, equal
to almost 47 G. miles, Abomey would lay in 7° 12′ N. Yet Mr. Dalzel
writes it lays in about 7° 59′ N.: Whydah being in about 6° 25′ in the
map affixed to his history; this requires 108 B. miles to be made good
on the horizontal distance, whereas he calls that of the whole journey
but 96, and Mr. Norris, who drew the map, 112. The public were certainly
indebted to Mr. Dalzel for the History of Dahomey, but it was his duty,
as an intelligent and considerate man, to correct such an error as this;
and if the author of the preface had reflected, he would not have
written, “The map, is that of Mr. Norris, with a few additions, which
for the places on the coast, and the position of Abomey, is near enough
to the truth.” Mr. Dalzel should have corrected a greater error in this
map, the course of the Lagos river, for altering which I shall presently
quote his own authority in addition to others.

An officer in this service, who resided at Lagos three years, and is the
only European resident who has survived of those who have made the
attempt, enables me to correct the following errors. The Pelican bank is
much smaller than it appears on the charts; the Doo island (which lays
N.W. and not N. of Lagos town) where the natives go to make fetish, is
not more than one mile in circumference; and there is no river of that
name. The beach over which the Portuguese and French (who never cross
the bar, where there are 3 fathoms water) transport their goods to the
canoes, is not more than 100 yards wide, instead of one mile. In
Norris’s map prefixed to Dalzel’s History, the Lagos river is made to
cross the path to Dahomey near Torë. In the Sailing Directions for the
Coast of Africa, to which Mr. Dalzel was the chief contributor, and who
revised the work, we find, “River Lagos is the mouth not only of the
river of that name, which runs to the _eastward from Ardrah_,” &c. and
the river Mr. Norris crossed near Torë, which he calls pretty deep and
rapid, but with a bridge over it, is by the account of other gentlemen,
officers in this service, who have been to Dahomey, no more than a
marsh. The gentleman before mentioned to have resided three years in
Lagos, informs me the grand branch of that river flows from the
northward of the island, where the pretended river Doo is placed, he
found it so wide on entering it, that being in the middle, where there
are 10 fathoms water, he could scarcely see the land on either side. The
current is impetuous, and floating islands, and large masses of alluvial
matter come down with such force, in the rainy season, as to trip
vessels from their anchors in the English road. De Lisle makes the Lagos
river flowing from the N., and the French are allowed to be much better
acquainted with this part of the coast. That called the West river in
Norris’s map, is only a creek; and what he calls the Lagos river, and
draws running close to Bădaggry, Ardrah, and passing Torë, is the
Western river. Bădaggry is not more than 5 or 7 miles from the beach,
instead of 15, and the tide only ebbs and flows so far. Ardrah is from
25 to 30 miles from the beach, instead of 18; and the river is crossed
at about one-third of the distance from the sea: this is what we call
Porto Novo, for there is not more than beachmen’s huts on the shore
opposite the anchorage. The natives call Ardrah Aratakassee, or
Allatakassee, and the country Essaäm, or the great. The river continues
its course not more than 100 yards from the sea, at Whydah, and proceeds
equally close (indeed frequently the ridge between them is covered with
water) until passing Quitta, it falls into the Volta near the mouth.

The above mentioned gentleman proves the informant of Adams’s editor
incorrect, in stating that the Houssa traders were constantly to be met
with at Lagos, previous to the abolition of the slave trade, for it has
always been the policy of Kosie, a kingdom on the eastern bank of the
river, and about 60 miles inland from the mouth, to prevent all
intercourse between the traders of the interior, and those of Lagos, to
secure to themselves the exorbitant profits they made as the brokers or
medium. The Europeans who traded at Lagos, once meditated forcing a
passage up the river in armed boats, and a vessel of 18 guns was got
over the bar, and anchored close to Lagos town; but the project was
abandoned as too perilous. Sometime afterwards the King of Kosie desired
a European might visit him, to gratify his curiosity, and that of his
people; but no one being willing, a mulatto, named Peter Brown, was
dressed up and sent. This man, being now at Cape Coast, I have
questioned. Several armed men were sent to conduct him, and relays of
canoe men sufficient to continue brisk pulling; which they did from the
evening till the next day, before he left the river to proceed by land;
it was still very wide, and more than 4 fathoms deep; considerably, for
aught he knew, for the bamboo poles of that length, with which the
natives push the canoe forward, when they get close enough to the banks
to do so, would not touch the bottom in the middle. Relays of hammock
men then carried him at a brisk pace until evening, when he reached
Kosie, which he described as a town of great extent, and the buildings
to resemble those in the drawings of Coomassie. The King gave orders
that the crowd should not intrude themselves into his house, treated him
very handsomely, and dismissed him after three days. He only heard the
people of Kosie speak of two great nations, the Hios, and the Awissees.

The gentleman before mentioned has an impression, from all the enquiries
he recollects to have made, of the slaves of the interior, that the
merchants convey them by water the greater part of the way; and their
reports were strengthened by his having an opportunity of seeing canoes
brought from Kosie to Lagos, and purchased from the slave merchants of
the interior. They were very superior in size and convenience to those
of the coast, were covered in, with a distinct apartment for the trader
and his wives, and would hold a hundred slaves. I never heard any slaves
speak of being brought any part of the way by water, but I have not seen
any who were brought to Kosie or Lagos.

The Karhala is the only large river likely to communicate with, or to
form that of Lagos; possibly the Karhala might run to the large lake in
Hio, which Snelgrave says (from the information of the Portuguese
mulatto he found at Abomey) “is the fountain of several large rivers
which empty themselves into the Bay of Guinea.” The Lagos river may flow
from this lake, but this is mere conjecture. The gentleman to whom I am
indebted, places the Mahees north of Dahomey, instead of north-west as
in Norris’s map, which is allowed to be far from discriminate in the
interior parts, in the preface to Dalzel’s History, and this is also
more probable, because about nine years ago, the King of Hio entirely
conquered the Mahees, and upwards of 20,000 of them were brought for
sale to Lagos.

The Joös, inconsiderately reported to Adams’s editor as being, with the
Anagoos and Mahees, the principal nations on the journey to the Niger,
and nearer to the coast, avoiding Dahomey, are probably the Jaboos, who
are about 40 miles westward of Kosie, and not behind Cradoo, as in
Norris’s map. They are celebrated for the cloths of their name, of which
the Portuguese have shipped such large quantities. The Anagoos, or
Nagoos, are the north westward neighbours of Dahomey.

The extent of Fantee is corrected from the conjectural enlargement of it
by Mr. Meredith, and, with that of Ashantee, Akim, Assin, Warsaw,
Ahanta, &c. &c. is sufficiently distinct in the present map. A more
enlarged, and particular map of Fantee, &c. would not be interesting to
the public, but as it might be desirable to geographers, I shall keep it
in view as a duty, and, at some future time, endeavor to add to the
observations of latitude and longitude which have been already made on
the coast.

I may not conclude without acknowledging the guidance, and assistance,
which Major Rennell’s previous investigations have afforded me; without
impressing, that had not some sketches of the interior been collected by
the industry of the emissaries of the African Association, and
afterwards connected and formed into a general outline, blended with the
feeble lights of the ancients, my enquiries would neither have been
excited or directed; and this present small contribution to our slender
knowledge would have perished an embryo. When I reflect on the creative
researches of the genius of D’Anville, and the acumen and erudition of
Major Rennell, it is my greatest anxiety to make my deference in
investigation, as manifest as the public duty which exacted the
involuntary presumption; and I cannot conclude more appropriately, than
by addressing the latter in the expressive lines of Virgil:


  “Nec calamis solum æquiparas sed voce magistrum

   Fortunate—tu nunc eris alter ab illo.

   Nos tamen hæc quocunque modo tibi nostra vicissim

   Dicemus.”


[Footnote 15: “On the west of Aquamboe lies the powerful state of Akim,
sometimes denominated Akam, Achem, and Accany, which occupies almost all
the interior of the Gold Coast, and is supposed by the natives to extend
to Barbary. The Accanese are represented as carrying on an extensive
commerce with the interior kingdoms of Africa, particularly Tonouwah,
Gago, and Meczara, by which Mourzouk the capital of Fezzan seems to be
intended.”]

[Footnote 16: “Reize van Koppenhagen naar Guinea, &c. Door den Heer
Isert. Amsteldam, 1797. Naar het Hoog Duitsch.”]

[Footnote 17: This induced me to think that In-ta and Ta-pah, as well as
Assiantee might mean the same place, as we find of Mahee, Yahon,
&c.—Dalzel.]

[Footnote 18: “In the province of St. Jago, in Chili, there is a plant
of this class and order (Didynamiæ gymnosperma) supposed to be a species
of wild basil (Ocimum salinum), resembling the common basil so much as
to be hardly distinguished from it, except that the flower stem is round
and jointed, and its scent and taste not like the basil, but rather like
the sea flag, or some marine plant. It is an annual, shooting forth in
the spring, and continuing till the commencement of winter: every
morning it is covered with hard and shining saline globules, resembling
dew, which the countrymen shake off the leaves to serve them as common
salt, and in some respects is thought to be of a superior quality. Every
plant produces daily about half an ounce of this salt; but Molina, a
scientific naturalist, to whom we are indebted for this information,
says, that it is extremely difficult to account for this phenomenon, as
the situation where he found these plants was in the most fertile part
of the kingdom, and at a distance from the sea of more than seventy
miles. When we see some plants secrete flint, separate and distinct from
their fibres, as well as combined with their organic structure; and when
we also know that plants secrete alkali, in every situation, I cannot
perceive why Molina should consider the contiguity of the sea to be
essential to the production of a neutral salt in the Ocimum salinum.”
Linnæan System, London, 1816, vol. ii. p. 303.

Riley, whose narrative has recently appeared, saw in the desert, “A
dwarf thorn bush from two to five feet high with succulent leaves
strongly impregnated with salt.”]

[Footnote 19: In the Dutch copies of the old Portuguese charts, Xabunda
(perhaps Banda) is placed as the capital of Ashantee, and two or three
large Portuguese towns, one St. Lawrence, with several convents and
crosses between it and the Coast.]

[Footnote 20: Gago oppidum amplissimum nullis quoque cingitur muris,
distat a Tumbuto meridiem versus quadringentes fere passuum millibus,
inclinatusque fere ad Euroaustrum. Leo Af.]

[Footnote 21: “To what degree the natives of Silla would have
contradicted each other in their accounts of Tombuctoo, Park’s short
stay there could not have allowed him time to ascertain, even if his
knowledge of their language had enabled him to understand their accounts
as well as he did those of the slatees on the Gambia.

“Several instances of the contradictory testimony of the Negroes occur
in Park’s travels, Jennië, for instance, is stated in his first Mission
to be situated on the Niger, but on his second journey he renounces that
opinion, on the apparently good authority of an old Somonie (canoe man)
who had been seven times at Tombuctoo.” Adams’s Editor.]

[Footnote 22: Mr. Hutchison writes, that from Inta to Jennë is said to
be 41 journies. This Gentleman, the Resident at Coomassie, merely
accompanied the Mission to act in that capacity in case the object could
be accomplished, and was not instructed to report: the officer
conducting the Mission being responsible to the extent of his industry,
and the opportunities, for the various desiderata, excepting the
Botanical and Medical, which were expected from the Surgeon, Mr. Tedlie.
Mr. Hutchison’s time was much employed in making duplicates and copies
of the frequent and voluminous dispatches to head quarters. The Moors
disliking even a second European to be present at their geographical
communications, Mr. Hutchison, through his obliging disposition, which
accommodated itself to every thing auxiliary to the pursuits of the
Mission, rendered me a great service, and quieted the uneasiness of the
Moors by keeping watch, and diverting the various Ashantee visitors who
would have intruded, with great patience and address. There was no time
even for a communication of the data I had collected before the Mission
left Coomassie, for we may be said to have lived in public the latter
part of the four months, and Mr. Hutchison’s genius inclining more to
the cultivation of the Ashantee and Arabic languages, which I had no
doubt would yield to his great industry, I did not intrude less
congenial pursuits on his attention, (the desiderata having been amply
realized,) but merely requested he would let me know what any
intelligent Moor, arriving after my departure, might say of the
Interior, and, if possible, procure a chart from him, especially if he
was not a native of Houssa or Bornoo, which two of the Moors who had
drawn for me were. After I had finished my Geographical Report, Mr.
Hutchison sent, with some other interesting particulars, added as notes
with his initials, a chart drawn by a Jennë Moor just arrived,
confirming all I had collected in the most satisfactory manner. The
names of the countries from the source of the Niger to Egypt were
written in Arabic, with Mr. Hutchison’s expression of the pronunciation
in English opposite. I particularly recollect that his ear differed
somewhat from mine, which accounts for the trifling differences in our
spelling. I shewed Mr. Hutchison my charts as curiosities, but he took
no minutes of the names, uninteresting from his never having had an
opportunity of reading Major Rennell’s Dissertations, which would alone
make them so to any one. He gives a better proof of this, than my own
impression, by the following extract from his letter to me, accompanying
the chart: “The Bornoo you used to talk about, you will find the same as
the lake Chaudi, or Al Bahare Noohoo, or else you know a country I I do
not recollect hearing of;” but, in the postscript, he writes, “On
looking over my memoranda, I find Bornoo is the principal monarchy the
Arabs alone stand in awe of, and one of the four kingdoms best known on
the Quolla.” Mr. Hutchison _unconsciously_ confirming what I had
learned, is even more satisfactory than if I had left him any basis for
his enquiries; indeed, his own object, the acquirement of the language,
was too important to be interrupted unnecessarily. Before I attach any
quotation from this Gentleman’s letters, I must acknowledge the
assistance I had previously derived from his spirited zeal as an
officer, as well as that which has since resulted from his interest in
intellectual pursuits.]

[Footnote 23: The Moors particularly mentioned buying their writing
paper there. One told me that the Joliba ran to a river called Hotaiba
after it passed Yahoodee, which river ran towards Toonis. Several talked
of vessels coming to Yahoodee, navigated by white men, but whence I
could not learn, and Brahima had never visited it, though such reports
were familiar to him.]

[Footnote 24: The rivers Arauca and Capanaparo in Cumana form
bifurcations similar to those of the Niger. The Arauca divides itself
into two rivers, the northern one, the Arauquito, runs through the lake
Cabullarito into the Orinoco, and the southern retaining the name of
Arauca, also flows to the Orinoco. The Capanaparo falls into the Orinoco
in two streams, the northern retaining the original name, and the
southern acquiring that of Mina. See Humboldt’s map of the eastern part
of the province of Verina.]

[Footnote 25: See note, p. 189.]

[Footnote 26: “No one who compares the maps of De Lisle and D’Anville
with the materials then published, can doubt the excellent means of
information with which they must have been supplied both by government,
and by private individuals.” Murray.

We find a remarkable instance of De Lisle’s accuracy in Major Rennell’s
construction of the geography of Mr. Horneman’s expedition. “Mr.
Horneman was informed that there are 101 inhabited places in Fezzan.” It
is remarkable that this is precisely the number stated in M. Delisle’s
map of Africa, drawn in 1707; and, according to Mr. Beaufoy’s informant,
there are nearly 100.

I have since found an older authority for the name _Gambaroo_, and which
also shews that the name _Quolla_ and its connection with the Gambaroo,
have not been wholly unknown hitherto. It is in the L’Afrique de Marmol,
livre viii. chap. 3. “C’est une chose estrange que ce fleuve venant de
si loin, car Ptolomée le fait venir du lac _Quélonide_, et de celui de
Nuba, il n’entraine pas tant d’eaux par ce costé-là, et la marée ne
monte pas si avant, _que par l’autre bras que l’on appelle Gamber_.” One
may almost fancy Quolla and Quellonide to have been derived from the
Chalonides of Ptolemy.]

[Footnote 27: “The fact of a large lake like the Dibbie, discharging its
waters by two streams flowing from distant parts of the lake, and re-
uniting after a separate course of a hundred miles in length, has always
appeared to us extremely apocryphal, at least we believe that the
geography of the world does not afford a parallel case.” Adams’s
Editor.]

[Footnote 28: “According to these statements of the Moorish traders,
Adams would seem to have mistaken the course of the stream at Tombuctoo.
In fact, I do not recollect that he told me at Mogadore that it flowed
in a westerly direction: but, I think, I am correct in saying, that he
discovered some uncertainty in speaking upon this subject, (and almost
upon this subject alone) observing, in answer to my inquiries, that he
had not taken very particular notice, and that the river was steady,
without any appearance of a strong current.” Dupuis on Adams.

Adams’s name, La-mar-Zarah (for of course he did not attach _La_ mar to
indicate water, but pronounced La-mar-Zarah, as an integral name) seems
accounted for by his confounding or connecting the Arabic name of the
river, _Lahamar_, with the Negro name _Yça_ (for we find these names in
Marmol, tom. 3. liv. 8.) making _Lahamar-yça_, La-mar-Zarah.]

[Footnote 29: Les Sénégurs le nomment Sénédec, les Jalofes Dengueh, les
Turcorons qui sont plus au-dedans du pays Maye, les Saragoles qui sont
plus haut Colle, et en un contrée plus vers l’orient Zimbale: au royaume
de Tombut on le nomme Yça. Marmol, tom. 3, livre 8. The name Zimbale
must be derived from Jimballa, by which country the river passes; it
occurs in the route from Shégo to Timbuctoo. P. 194.]

[Footnote 30: Kulla, in the Mallowa, if not in the Kassina language,
means _child_; perhaps, allegory being the character of African
language, the southern river may be called Quolla or Kulla, from being a
_branch_ only of the great river which forms it and the Gambaroo.]

[Footnote 31: See the account of the large interior river known at
Gaboon, under the name of _Wole_ or _Wolela_.]

[Footnote 32: “There is one thing that disagrees with Mr. Park’s
account, they call the Niger Quolla at Jennë, Sansanding, &c. &c. and
describe the Jolliba as falling into the Quolla east of Timbuctoo.” W.
H.

The Moors invariably reported to me that it ran from it. Mr. H. might
perhaps have misunderstood the Jennë Moor, whose single authority cannot
be opposed to the concurrence of several.]

[Footnote 33: Illorum verò qui per interiorem Æthiopiam fluant, quique
fontes et ostia in continente habent maximi sunt Gir et Nigir. (Lib. 2.
E. 1. De maximis _fluminibus_.)]

[Footnote 34: The Jennë Moor does not appear to have been so
particularly acquainted with the source of the Niger. He has drawn two
hills, from one of which springs a large river he could not name,
running westward, the other is the source of the Quolla, and Mr.
Hutchison has written its name Bieteerilmiloo. Between this source and
Mala, the King of which he describes as a great monarch, he mentions no
towns or kingdoms. This Mala is the Malay of the Moorish charts I
procured, between the source and which five places or countries were
written. Mr. Hutchison writes the course thus, without time or distance,
Mala, Bambarra, Shego, Sansanding, Jena, Mashina, Dahleä (a small croom
on the lake Dibber,) Kabarra: he adds, cannibals are close to the
Joliba, and 30 journies from Timbuctoo, they eat their prisoners: the
dead of their own people are put in the Joliba, in wooden coffins.]

[Footnote 35: The following sentence in the description of Leo, conveys
an idea of the decline or decay of the city. “Cujus domus omnes in
tuguriola cretacea stramineis tectis _sunt mutatæ_.” Yet immediately
after we receive the contrary impression on reading “Visitur tamen
elegantissimum quoddam templum cujus murus ex lapidibus atque calce vivo
est fabricatus: deinde et palacium quoddam regium quodam Granato viro
artificissimo conditum. Frequentissimæ hic sunt artificum mercatorum
præcipuè autem telæ atque gossypii textorum officinæ; huc mercatores
Barbari pannum ex Europa adferunt.” In the Description de l’Afrique en
Flamand, published about a century and a half afterwards, the author
seems to be aware of the advanced decline or decay of Timbuctoo. “Les
maisons étoient autrefois fort sumptueuses, mais elles ne sont
maintenant que de bois enduites de terre grasse et couvertes de
paille.”]

[Footnote 36: “All the country from where the Joliba discharges itself
into the Quolla is subject to the Sultan Malisimiel. What makes the
Sultan of Timbuctoo so much talked of, is his being near the water side;
but his master, the Sultan of Malisimiel considers him merely as a
deputy or governor. The four greatest monarchs known on the banks of the
Quolla, are Baharnoo, Santambool, Malisimiel, and Malla.” W. H. Malla is
Mallowa.]

[Footnote 37: “The Chaymas substitute _r_ for _l_, a substitution that
arises from a defect of pronunciation, common in every zone. The
substitution of _r_ for _l_ characterizes, for example, the Bashmouric
dialect of the Coptic language. It is thus that the Caribbees of the
Oroonoko have been transformed into Galibi, in French Guiana, by
confounding _r_ with _l_, and softening the _c_. The Tamanach has made
choraro (solalo) of the Spanish word soldado.” Humboldt’s personal
narrative, book iii. chap. 9.]

[Footnote 38: The position of Mellè is further confirmed in Dapper “Le
Roi de _Tombut_ prend le nom d’Empereur de _Melli_.” This title seems to
have been transferred to the King of Houssa from the decline of
Timbuctoo, to which the aggrandisement of the former city is to be
attributed.]

[Footnote 39: The King residing in Houssa is the King of Malla; he has
seven tributary Kings. W. H.]

[Footnote 40: I did not hear of the Gotoijegee, Carmasse, or Gourmon of
Amadi Fatouma; it is clear that he was not very correct in names. I
never once heard Silla called Sellee, Dibbie, Sibbie, or Kabra,
Rakbarra.]

[Footnote 41: The Jennë Moor notices between Kabarra and Cabi, Gauw (a
great kingdom) Quoülla, Askeä, Zabirma. Ptolemy has a city called Geua
on the Gir.]

[Footnote 42: The Jennë Moor told Mr. Hutchison, “the Quolla was the
largest river in the world, and about 5 miles wide, having a very rocky
channel, the banks on both sides very high, and rugged: in many parts
canoes often take a day to cross, from the dangerous whirlpools, and
sudden squalls; at other places the stream runs with great rapidity. The
houses in its environs are either terraced or shingled, as thatch cannot
resist the frequent high winds.”]

[Footnote 43: The Jennë Moor has placed Gangë as an island in the Quolla
just below Bousa. This must be the Gongoo of Imhammed, and Ben Ali,
south of Cassina. Mr. Lucas writes “the width of the Niger is such, that
even at the island of Gongoo, where the ferrymen reside, the sound of
the loudest voice from the northern shore is scarcely heard.”]

[Footnote 44: The Jennë Moor traces the course from Yaoora, thus:
Boussa, Gangë, Wawa, Noofa, Quollaliffa, Atagara; the only difference
being the position of the latter place, possibly an error of mine, as
the name Atagara was not noticed in the charts I made the Moors draw,
but only in the more particular enumerations of the countries the Quolla
passed; the names of which I minuted from their utterance, and
afterwards attached their remarks as interpreted to me.]

[Footnote 45: The Jennë Moor calls this Quolla liffa. Mr. Hutchison, who
has a servant, a native of it, describes it as a very powerful kingdom,
as the Shereef Brahima described it to me, and as was the impression of
Mr. Dupuis. Mr. H. adds, on Negro and Moorish authority, “it is to the
King of Quallowliffa that the country in which Canna, Dall, and Yum Yum,
where cannibals are, is subject.” Mr. Horneman mentions Yem Yems
cannibals south of Kano 10 days; and the account is further confirmed in
my subsequent geographical sketch of the interior of Gaboon. Mr.
Horneman’s information that the Niger flowed towards the Egyptian Nile
through the land of the Heathens, which Mr. Park quoted as an argument
for the Congo hypothesis, doubtless referred to these cannibals.]

[Footnote 46: “At times the water of this lake is hot, and it boils and
bubbles with a great noise, often overflowing the surrounding country.
The bones of fish thrown up by the volcano are so numerous, that the
Arabs mix them in the swish of their houses. There are a great many
islets in the lake, which is so extensive, that they cannot see the end.
Between it and the Quolla rises a very high hill, from the top of which
is an extensive view; it is a day’s journey from the water on either
side. The Arabs eat black rice, corn, and sweet beans, called Tummer.”
W. H.]

[Footnote 47: The Jennë Moor has also placed it E. of Foor. Mr.
Hutchison writes the course, after him, from Atagara, thus:
“Maffagoodoo, Sharee, Lake Chadee, Phorr (beginning of Arabs) “Wadie.”
Mr. Horneman writes “A great part of the people of Wadey, together with
their King, are Arabs.”]

[Footnote 48: Mr. Hutchison has written it Sooänar.]

[Footnote 49: “Cairo is still called, in the figurative language of the
East, Misr, without an equal; Misr, the mistress of the world.”
Quarterly Review. Mr. Hutchison writes, that the Moors told him it was
so called after Misraim, who settled there.]

[Footnote 50: The following, in the left hand column, are the places or
countries as written by Mr. Hutchison, after the Jennë Moor, agreeing
with those the Moors reported to me.

  Shuewa                                     Shewa Abenassa.

  Swiss                                      Sooess.

  Zall                                       Zaloo.

  Machazoogee                                Machawazoo.

  Tabarbass, cultivation, volcano from
  the Quolla two days, two days to the top,  Tabarrabass.

  Askanderee                                 Askandaraia or Sakunderree.

The latter place is Alexandria. The Moors called the Mediterranean Sea
to me by two names, Baharlë Malee, and Sabbaha Bahoori. Mr. Hutchison
writes it Baramela or Bahermale, and adds, “Seven rivers from Africa
turn their course to it, but only two reach the shores, of which the
Nile is one. The rush of the waters of the Nile when they meet the sea,
is so great, that the waves are driven into the air with great force,
and retire like waves against a rock. The Red Sea, they say, assumes
various colours at different periods from seven streams pouring their
course into it, salt water and fresh, red, blue, yellow, &c.”]

[Footnote 51: “Half of the inhabitants of Massar are white, and half
black; they have a Fort and Governor.” W. H.]

[Footnote 52: Stambool is the Arabic pronunciation of the familiar or
vulgar name of Constantinople, the etymology of which is ιϛαμαι πολιν.]

[Footnote 53: Mr. Hutchison writes, “Wangara is the name of a region
comprehending Mosee Kong, and other neighbouring countries south of the
Niger (if not some to the north of it) but Oongooroo is the name of the
country laying between Cassina and Bornoo.)” Mr. Park has _Wangeera_ in
the route from Sego to the coast of Guinea.]

[Footnote 54: “The dress of the people of Fullan (a country to the west
of Kassina) resembles the cloth of which the plaids of the Scotch
Highlanders are made.” Ben Ali.]

[Footnote 55: Mr. Hutchison sends me this route, as given him by the
Jennë Moor, thus, (supposing me not to have heard of Yariba) “from
Goodaberry, over Lasa small water to Quolla, at Boussa; few hours walk
to Yaraba; 28 days from Dahomey:” he adds, “recollect that the King of
Dahomey is tributary to the King of Yaraba, who is the same in that
quarter, as the King of Ashantee is here.”]

[Footnote 56: The Jennë Moor gave this route thus: Wawa to Kiama, a
great kingdom, 3 days; close to the eastward a desert; 1 day
Garagroogee; 1 day Wala; 1 day Goodaberry.]

[Footnote 57: “Guber est à cent lieuës de Gago vers l’Orient, et en est
separé par un desert inhabitable à quatorze ou quinze lieuës du Niger.
Cette contrée est entre de hautes montagnes, et toute pleine de
villages; celui où le Prince tient sa Cour a quelque mille maisons.”
Dapper.]

[Footnote 58: I shall adjoin an outline of the great river in one of the
maps of Dapper’s Description de l’Afrique, traduit du Flamand, because
the book is very scarce, and I do not remember to have seen the Niger,
the Gir, or the Congo so laid down in any other.]

[Footnote 59: The removal of Cano from the banks of the Niger agreeable
with every report I received, is supported by Dapper. “A cent soixante
et dix lieuës d’Agadez et à deux cent du Niger on trouve ce royaume
(Guber), au milieu du quel est la ville de Cano fermée de murailles de
bois et de pierre, et qui a des maisons bâties de même.”]

[Footnote 60: “The Mahometans of Senaar number Bornoo amongst the four
most powerful monarchies of the world; the other three are Turkey,
Persia, and Abyssinia: the sovereign of Bornoo is more powerful than the
Emperor of Morocco.” Lucas.]

[Footnote 61: Ce royame, qu’on croit avoir été la demeure des
Garamantes, est une vaste Province au levant de Gangara, qui s’étend
vers l’Orient l’espace de cent soixante dix lieuës et est éloignée du
Niger de cinquante.]

[Footnote 62: Mr. Hutchison heard of another river near Bornoo called
Koomoodoo gaiguina: he could not hear of the Wad el Gazel.]

[Footnote 63: I observe, in a modern publication, Dr. Isert’s described
as a second visit to Africa, under the auspices of the Danish
government, encouraged by his reports to attempt colonization in
Aquapim, and that he died from anxiety and exertion. This was not the
case, it was his first and only visit, the Danes never attempted
colonization, and he embarked for the West Indies as I have before
stated. Having read the above, however, I wrote to Dr. Reynhaut, who
translated some passages from the Dutch into Latin for me, and the
following is an extract from his letter in reply. “Quod attinet Iserti
in Africam reditum, ibique ejus obitum, ficta hæc est fama. Verum est
juxta Quitam post victoriam in Augnaeos populos reportatam, Danos arcem
condidisse, cui nomen insigniverunt Prinzenstein; sed nullæ culturæ
incubuerunt, nec colonias struxerunt, nec minus falsum est umquam
Isertum in Africæ littoræ inferiora regis jussu rediisse, colonias
extruendi gratia, nam præter opus Botanicum quod Floræ Guinensis titulo
occurrit, nullum aliud de illo scriptum existit.”]

[Footnote 64: Since I have been at sea I have drawn the maritime part of
my map again, and laid down the Forts and other points according to the
observations quoted in Norrie, (4th edition, 1816,) which agree so very
nearly with those of the Commissioners in the two instances cited, that
I conclude he has been allowed to copy the whole series from their
papers, which I believe have never been published. Even in Dr. Mackay’s
valuable publication, Cape Coast Castle is laid 1° 23′ too much to the
eastward. I presume too that the observations made by H.M.S. Amelia, are
part of those quoted by Norrie, although the Argo’s observations of the
longitude of Quitta and Whydah are not confirmed. I observe a small
error which makes 1′ 28″ N. and 7′ 24″ E. the difference between
Kormantine and Annamaboe, the former is only 5 miles eastward of the
latter.]




                              CHAPTER II.

                               * * * * *

                               _History._


To speak of the death of a former king, the Ashantees imagine to affect
the life of the present equally with enquiring who would be his
successor; and superstition and policy strengthening this impression, it
is made capital by the law, to converse either of the one or the other.
The inability of the natives to compute time, and the comparatively
recent establishment of the Moors, may be pleaded as additional
apologies for the imperfect history I have collected.

According to a common tradition, which I never heard contradicted but
once, the Ashantees emigrated from a country nearer the water side, and
subjecting the western Intas, and two lesser powers, founded the present
kingdom. These people being comparatively advanced in several arts, the
Ashantees necessarily adopted a portion of their language with the
various novelties; which probably created the limited radical difference
between their language and that of the Fantees; for I could not find,
after taking the greatest pains, more than 200 words unknown to the
latter. The weights of the Inta country, in particular, were adopted
with their names, by the conquerors, without the least alteration.

The tradition, scanty in itself, is very cautiously adverted to, the
government politically undermining every monument which perpetuates
their intrusion, or records the distinct origins of their subjects: but,
from the little I could collect, it appeared to have been an emigration
of numerous enterprising or discontented families, to whom the parent
state afterwards became subject. I am inclined to think, (the account of
their coming from a country nearer the sea being too general for
conjecture to revolt from,) that they emigrated from the eastward of
south, where the territory admitted to be Ashantee proper is remote,
compared with its extent southward, or westward of south, and the former
consequence of Doompassie, and the towns eastward of it, support this:
yet, the very few natives who pretended to any opinion on the subject,
had an impression, that their ancestors emigrated from the neighbourhood
of a small river, Ainshue, behind Winnebah: a croom called Coomadie is
to be found there, but there is nothing else to countenance the report.

The Ashantee, Fantee, Warsaw, Akim, Assin, and Aquapim languages are
indisputably dialects of the same root; their identity is even more
striking than that of the dialects of the ancient Greek: now the Fantees
and Warsaws both cherish a tradition, which exists also in many Ahanta
families, that they were pressed from the interior to the water side by
the successful ambition of a remote power; whence it may be concluded,
that the Ashantee emigration we are now considering, was posterior to a
more important movement of the whole people, corresponding with that of
their neighbours. I will not dilate upon this secondary subject by
referring to internal evidence, there is nothing to recompense either
the investigation or the perusal.

One curious evidence however may be added of the former identity of the
Ashantee, Warsaw, Fantee, Akim, Assin, Aquamboe, and part of the Ahanta
nations; which is a tradition that the whole of these people were
originally comprehended in twelve tribes or families; the Aquonna,
Abrootoo, Abbradi, Essonna, Annŏna, Yoko, Intchwa, Abadie, Appiadie,
Tchweedam, Agoona, and Doomina; in which they class themselves still,
without any regard to national distinction. For instance, Ashantees,
Warsaws, Akims, Ahantas, or men of any of the nations before mentioned
will severally declare, that they belong to the Annŏna family; other
individuals of the different countries, that they are of the Tchweedam
family; and when this is announced on meeting, they salute each other as
brothers. The King of Ashantee is of the Annŏna family, so was our Accra
and one of the Fantee linguists; Amanquateä is of the Essonna family.
The Aquonna, Essonna, Intchwa, and Tchweedam, are the four patriarchal
families, and preside over the intermediate ones, which are considered
as the younger branches. I have taken some pains to acquire the
etymology of these words, but with imperfect success; it requires much
labour and patience, both to make a native comprehend, and to be
comprehended by him. Quonna is a buffalo, an animal forbade to be eaten
by that family. Abrootoo signifies a corn stalk, and Abbradi a plantain.
Annŏna is a parrot, but it is also said to be a characteristic of
forbearance and patience. Esso is a bush cat, forbidden food to that
family. Yoko is the red earth used to paint the lower parts of the
houses in the interior. Intchwa is a dog, much relished by native
epicures, and therefore a serious privation. Appiadie signifies a
servant race. Etchwee is a panther, frequently eaten in the interior,
and therefore not unnecessarily forbidden. Agoona signifies a place
where palm oil is collected. These are all the etymologies in which the
natives agree. Regarding these families as primæval institutions, I
leave the subject to the conjectures of others, merely submitting, that
the four patriarchal families, the Buffalo, the Bush Cat, the Panther,
and the Dog, appear to record the first race of men living on hunting;
the Dog family, probably, first training that animal to assist in the
chase. The introduction of planting and agriculture, seems marked in the
age of their immediate descendents, the Corn stalk and Plantain
branches. The origin and improvement of architecture in the Red earth;
and of commerce, probably, in the Palm oil: indeed, the natives have
included the Portuguese, the first foreign traders they knew, in that
family, alleging, that their long and more intimate intercourse with the
blacks, has made the present race a mixture of the African and
Portuguese. The Servant race reminds us of the curse of Canaan. This
resembles a Jewish institution, but the people of Accra alone practise
circumcision, and they speak a language, as will be shewn, radically
distinct, yet not to be assimilated to the Intā, to which nation they
are referred by the Fantees, merely because it is the nearest which
practises circumcision. Accra is a European corruption of the word
Inkran, which means an ant, and they say the name was either given or
assumed on account of their numbers; this must have been before their
wars with the Aquamboes.

When Adokoo, chief of the Braffoes, a Fantee nation, consulted the
venerable fetish men of the sanctuary, near Sooprooroo, on the Ashantee
war, they answered, that nothing could be more offensive to the fetish,
than the Fantees preventing the peaceable intercourse of their inland
neighbours with the water side, because they were formerly all one
family.

The conduct of the later emigration of the Ashantees is ascribed to Saï
Tootoo, who, assisted by other leading men of the party, and encouraged
by superstitious omens, founded Coomassie, and was presented with the
stool, or made King, from his superior qualifications. This account is
supported by the mixed nature of the government, founded on equality and
obligation, and the existence of a law, exempting the direct descendants
of any of Saï Tootoo’s peers and assistants, (in whom the Aristocracy
originated) from capital punishment.

The Dwabin monarchy is said to have been founded at the same time by
Boitinnë, who was of the same family as Saï Tootoo, being the sons of
sisters. Boitinnë and his party, took possession of Dwabin, the largest
of the aboriginal towns, (leaving Saï Tootoo to build Coomassie) whence
it seems his followers were the more powerful; indeed I have heard it
confessed by a few Ashantees, that Dwabin had formerly the pre-eminence,
though they have always been firm allies in war, and equal sharers in
spoil and conquest. This common interest, preserved uninterrupted more
than a century, by two rising powers, close to each other, with the view
of a more rapid aggrandisement, and their firm discretion in making many
serious disagreements subservient to the policy, is one of the few
circumstances worth considering in a history composed of wars and
successions. I do not think there is such an instance in our heptarchy,
nor do I recollect any other in history, but that of Chalcis and
Eretria.

Bakkee, who died, as I have related,[65] about a year ago, was the son
of Saï Apokoo, the second king, and an infant at the breast at the time
of his father’s death; he was a very old man when he incurred the
present King’s displeasure, which supports the report of the Moors, that
the kingdom has been founded about 110 years. Bosman and Barbot mention
the Ashantees, as just heard of by Europeans, about the year 1700, which
confirms this account. The anxiety of the Ashantee government for daily
records, immediately on the establishment of the Moors, who were only
visitors until the present reign, acknowledges the perplexities and
deficiencies of their early history too candidly, to leave any
encouragement to the researches of strangers. Records beyond half a
century are not to be found in the archives either of Cape Coast, or
Christiansburg Castles, so that the chronology can only be founded on
that of the Moors, and circumstances.

The Ashantee government concentred the mass of its original force, and
making the chiefs resident in Coomassie and the few large towns they
built in its neighbourhood, with titular dignities, conciliated those
whom they subdued by continuing them in their governments, and checked
them by exacting their frequent attendance at festivals, politically
instituted. Military command seems to have been the sole prerogative of
Saï Tootoo; his judicial and legislative power being controlled by the
chiefs or aristocracy much more than at present, who, as in the Teutonic
governments, directed the common business of the state, only consulting
a general assembly on extraordinary occasions.

Saï Tootoo defeated the Akims and Assins, subjected the Tufel country,
and subdued many small states in the neighbourhood. He also conquered
Dankara, the King of which, Intim Dakarey, was so considerable a trader
in slaves, that the Dutch Governor General paid him a monthly note from
his own purse, and assisted him with two or three small cannons, and a
few Europeans, on the eve of the Ashantee invasion: the former are now
placed as trophies in Coomassie, at the top of the street in which the
Mission was quartered. Booroom was subjugated soon after.

Saï Tootoo did not live to see all the streets of Coomassie completed,
for war being declared against Atoä, a district between Akim and Assin,
he invaded that country. The chief of the Atoas, unable to face such a
power, dexterously insinuated his small force through the forest, until
he reached the rear of the Ashantee army, which the King was following
leisurely with a guard of a few hundred men, all of whom were destroyed
by the Atoäs, who shot the King in his hammock. This happening near a
place called Cormantee, (razed to the ground in vengeance,) and on a
Saturday, the most solemn oath of the Ashantees, is “by Saturday and
Cormantee;” (“Mĭminda Cormantee;”) and no enterprise has since been
undertaken on that day of the week.

1720. Saï Apokoo, brother of Saï Tootoo, was next placed on the stool.
Had there been no brother, the sister’s son would have been the heir;
this extraordinary rule of succession, excluding all children but those
of a sister, is founded on the argument, that if the wives of the sons
are faithless, the blood of the family is entirely lost in the
offspring, but should the daughters deceive their husbands, it is still
preserved.

Saï Apokoo finished the building of Coomassie, and exchanged compliments
with the King of Dahomey, since which there has been no intercourse; the
latter, probably, as a despotic monarch, did not wish to give his people
any opportunity of contemplating the greater freedom of the Ashantee
government.

Saï is the family name of the present race of Kings, some of their
relatives bearing it as well. Innăna is also the cognomen of the Kings
of Dagwumba.

Apokoo invading the kingdom of Gaman, Abo, the King, fled to Kong,
whither the Ashantee army pursued him. The King of Kong politically
compelled Abo to meet his enemies on the frontier, least they might
disturb a neutral kingdom. Abo being defeated, purchased a peace by
presenting large sums of gold to the various chiefs, and consenting to
an annual tribute. Apokoo next subjected Takima, whence the Fantees are
said to have emigrated, and forced a second emigration of the people to
Gomawa, at the back of Winnebah. He dispossessed the Akims of the
English, Dutch, and Danish Accra notes.[66] The mortifying destruction
of European records, confines me to the report of the more intelligent
natives on the subject of these notes, who declare, that the people of
Accra being deprived of them by the fraud of the Akims, when they were
assisted by them against the Aquamboes, the Akims were in their turn
obliged to yield them to their conquerors the Ashantees.

Tribute being demanded from the neighbouring kingdom of Dagwumba, a war
ensued, and its troops were defeated. The King of Dagwumba, convinced
that his former reliance on a superior population was vain, from the
military genius of the Ashantees, and the commercial disposition of his
own people, dispirited from their want of fire arms,[67] prudently
invited a peace, before a more decisive defeat left him no dignity, and
his enemies no moderation for treating. As it was, they still respected
his resources, and were content to secure him as a tributary, rather
than exhaust their forces in his subjugation, in the infancy of their
kingdom. A triumph in policy was in the view of the King of Dagwumba,
equivalent to the small diminution of personal dignity; and at the
expense of an inconsiderable tribute, he established a commercial
intercourse, which, his markets being regularly supplied from the
interior, was both an advantage and a security to him, from the great
convenience to his warlike neighbours, whose superstition assenting to
his great reputation for making saphies, and for augury, would not only
augment his revenue, but insure him superior respect as a tributary.
Intā had previously become tributary.

I should have mentioned, that every subject state was placed under the
immediate care of some Ashantee chief, generally resident in the
capital, who seldom visited it but to receive the tribute from the
native ruler, for whose conduct he was in a reasonable degree
responsible. Thus Quatchi Quofie has now the care of Dankara, Odumata of
Soota, Apokoo of Aquamboe, Oöosa Quantabisa of Daboia, &c. &c. Their
policy, in short, not only in this particular, but in many others, seems
to have been closely similar to that of the Persians, as described by
Herodotus.

Boitinnë, the founder of Dwabin, died in this reign.

1741. Saï Apokoo was succeeded by his brother Saï Aquissi. I could not
learn any particular exploits of his, excepting that he preserved the
subjection of the states previously reduced. The King of Akim, in his
time, (the last who had the power of governing without consulting the
pynins or elders) desiring to go to war with his neighbours, was obliged
to obtain permission from the Ashantee government, which he did by the
promise of sending them half the spoil; but, gaining little or nothing,
he did not do so. He soon afterwards heard of Aquissi’s intention, to
demand his head; and knowing that King’s word was irrevocable, he
summoned his ministers, and desired to sacrifice his life for the quiet
of his people: his ministers insisted on sharing his fate; and a barrel
of powder being brought for each to sit on, they drank a large quantity
of rum, and blew themselves up with the fire from their pipes. Dr. Isert
also heard of this in Akim.

1753. Aquissi was succeeded by Saï Cudjo. The Aristocracy was retrenched
and conciliated by this monarch, who raised his favourite captains to
the vacant stools,[68] uniting three or four in one, and swearing that
their lives should be equally sacred, (see p. 4,) to anticipate any
doubts of his fidelity to the constitution.

Saï Cudjo defeating the Warsaws and Assins more decisively than his
predecessors, first compelled them to acknowledge their fealty to
Ashantee. He also subjected Aquamboe, and Aquapim, quelled several
revolts of other countries, and was esteemed a very great captain. The
grandfather of Amanquateä Atooa, conquered Sawee, killing the king
Boomancumma; and Bakkee, soon afterwards, subjugated Moinseä. In this
reign Quama, king of Dwabin, died.

1785. Saï Quamina succeeded his grandfather Saï Cudjo, at a very early
age. The Akims revolted soon after his accession, under Ofoosoo, their
most active ruler for many years: he engaged several smaller states in
alliance, and defeated the Ashantees repeatedly; at length the treachery
of his followers procured Quatchi Quofie, the Ashantee general, his
head; with which he returned to Coomassie, the country having again
submitted. The fame of Ofoosoo made Quatchi Quofie so vain of this
achievement, that he had a figure of him made, with which his umbrella
is still crowned, and before which he dances with every insulting
gesture and vaunt, when he arrives on the ground at the various
ceremonies. The present king has frequently been heard to say, that it
was a great pity this old man did not know better, for the Akim
caboceers generally attended his summons with alacrity and good will;
but the sight of the insulted effigy of their favourite leader,
disgusted them, and excited their revolt. These brave people have risen
from their dependence at least eight times.

The government finding a pretext to invade Banda, the King Odrasee
vigorously opposed the Ashantee army; but at length, seeing he must
inevitably fall into their hands, to prevent his head being found, which
circumstance he knew would sorely disquiet the enemy,[69] and solace his
own people, ordered, just before he killed himself, a woman to be
sacrificed, and the abdomen being ripped, his head to be sewn up within
it, and her body afterwards to be buried in the heap of the slain. It
was discovered by bribes, and is now on one of the King’s great drums.
Soota was also subjugated in this reign, occupying the army under
Odumata ten years, during which period he was not allowed to see
Coomassie. Odumata afterwards subdued Coranza, the larger part of his
army being Gaman auxiliaries.

Saï Quamina raised Apokoo to the stool of Assimadoo, to whom he had been
a servant, in exclusion of the family.

The Danish Governor-General, meditating the punishment of the Popos,
applied to Saï Quamina for 5000 Ashantee auxiliaries; the request was
granted, but while the troops were on their march down, the Governor
died, and his successor prudently paid 250 ounces of gold, (alleged to
have been advanced by the King for their subsistence on their march to
Christiansburg Castle) rather than involve himself in the expenses and
troubles of such an alliance.

1798. Saï Quamina had remained twelve months on a visit at Dwabin, deaf
to the remonstrances of various deputations urging his return, and
infatuated beyond recovery by the arts of his mistress, Gyawa, the
daughter of the King; when it was formally announced to him, that if he
was not present at the approaching Yam custom, he would be deprived of
the stool. It is said, that this woman refused to accompany him to
Coomassie, either dreading the resentment of his mother, a woman of
violent passions, and great ambition, or, which is more probable,
influenced by her father to mingle this repugnance with her
blandishments, to accelerate the ruin of Saï Quamina, which he was not
without hopes might lead to his own aggrandisement. The form of the
dethronement is interesting. Appia Danqua, whose power seems to have
been equal to that of mayor of the palace, repaired to the King’s mother
with the chief captains, and deliberately recounting the offences of her
son, commanded her to remonstrate with him, as the daughter of their old
king, and the parent to whom he owed his elevation. The mother, who no
doubt had assisted in the private council, affecting to bewail her own
misfortune and her son’s disgrace, confessed, with seeming reluctance,
that her remonstrances had already been despised, that the king had even
attempted her life, and begged them to raise her second son, Saï Apokoo,
to the stool the elder had forfeited. This was complied with, and they
sent Saï Quamina a few of his women and slaves, desiring him to retire
into the bush and build himself a croom, and on his death, which
happened soon after, as it was said, from the poignancy of his feelings,
they made the greatest custom for him which had ever been known. The
sable Cleopatra died soon after him. It was whispered, that those he had
formerly injured incessantly insulting him in his retirement, even to
abusing his wives before his face, he had a private interview with the
present King, communicated several schemes of conquests, invoked him to
distrust, and, if possible, to punish those who had forsaken him, and
implored death; which was inflicted (as the blood of the royal family
could not be shed, and as he could not be privately drowned in the
sacred river) by fixing his feet on the ground, bending his body
backwards with a prop in the small of his back, and suspending several
large teeth of ivory from a noose around his neck, which, hanging from
the prop, strangled him.

1799. Saï Apokoo did not live more than a few weeks after being elevated
to the stool, and was succeeded by his brother Saï Tootoo Quamina, the
present King, who must then have been about seventeen years of age. On
this occasion, the general assembly of the captains, jealous of the
aristocracy, and desirous of making a favourable impression on the young
King, insisted that the remaining members of it, should propitiate the
reign, by publicly disclaiming their exemption from capital punishment.

The invasion of the Fantee kingdom in 1807 was the first important
military act of the present reign, the circumstances and origin of
which, being pretty accurately described by Mr. Meredith, in the extract
in the Appendix, I need not repeat. Whilst the invasion was meditating,
Baba, now the chief of the Moors, presented himself to solicit an asylum
in Coomassie, having been driven from Gamba by the rapacity of the King,
his near relative; and professing solely to desire the recovery of a
large property with held from him, to make the King of Ashantee the heir
to it. The King promised he would oblige the King of Gamba to do him
justice, on his return from the Fantee war, if Baba and his companions
were fortunate in their prayers and charms for his success. The King of
Gamba did not think proper to resist the demand afterwards made through
the Ashantee government.

1807. Coonadua, the King’s mother, was left regent during his absence;
this woman was a second Messalina, and many young captains who refused
to intrigue with her, from fear or disgust, have been ultimately the
victims of her artifice and vengeance.

Yaboquorra, the King of Dwabin, died in this interval, and was succeeded
by his grandson, Boitinnë Quama, now about twenty years of age.

1811. Attah, caboceer or King of Akim, had followed the King to the
first Fantee war, and behaved well. Apokoo being sent on an expedition
against the Fantees of Winnebah and Berracoo, Attah received orders to
join him with his contingency; instead of which, he sent a message to
Apokoo, before he passed the Boosempra river, refusing to join him, and
advising him not to attempt to pass through his country. Apokoo reported
this immediately to the King, who, as is usual, sent to Attah to enquire
if he had said so. He confessed that he had, without hesitation, adding,
that the King treated him like a slave, in incessantly summoning him to
attend his wars, and besides, that he never could forget that Saï Cudjo
had cut off his grandfather’s head, and that he would fight with Apokoo
whenever he came. Soon afterwards, Quamina Guma, (the father of Becqua,
captain of Danish Accra,) and one of the King’s sons, returning to
Coomassie with a large quantity of gold collected to make custom for the
King’s mother, Attah intercepted, robbed, and murdered them and their
party, with the exception of one, whom he desired to tell the King that
this act would convince him he was in earnest, and determined to go to
war with him. Apokoo was immediately ordered to proceed against Attah,
who had engaged Quaw Saffătchee as a party in the revolt, who was weary
of the same laborious vassalage. When Apokoo entered the Akim country,
Attah was for attacking him immediately, and at sun rise, but Quaw
impressing his doubts of their succeeding against the superior warfare
of the Ashantees, begged him to stop until three o’clock, when the
Ashantees generally ate and slept, and when they might be better able to
retreat if worsted, as the enemy never pursued in the dusk. The attack
was a surprise, but the fight continued obstinate and undecided until
night, when Apokoo found he had lost so many men, that he immediately
dispatched a messenger to summon the Accras to his aid, as vassals to
the King. His messenger reached Accra the next day, and that people
joined him on the following, on which the enemy retreated precipitately;
Attah to windward, and Quaw to Adda. Apokoo followed the latter, who
having escaped him after a tedious watchfulness, Apokoo, believing the
Danish governor, Mr. Flindt, to have connived, made him his prisoner,
and kept him with the army, which soon afterwards encamped in Aquapim,
five months, during which time he was treated with kindness and respect,
but his ransom amounted to nearly £400. Apokoo was soon after ordered
back to Coomassie. He told me he brought the bell of Adda fort as a
trophy.

Appia Danqua had been sent, at the same time with Apokoo, with 6000 men
against the Fantee states which were disposed to the revolters. He
defeated them at Apam, and took Baffoo the Annamaboe caboceer prisoner,
but whilst his army was before Tantum, intelligence of the approach of
Attah, who had retreated from Apokoo, but whose name was as redoubtable
as his disposition was rapacious, subdued his firmness, and under the
plea of prudence, hurried him back to the interior.

[Sidenote: 1814.]

The path was afterwards shut for two years, through the vigilance, and
from the terror of Cudjo Cooma, who had been elected to the stool of
Akim, six months after the death of Attah, whose immediate successor
(Quawko Ashantee) tyrannized so cruelly during that period, that he was
commanded by the people to kill himself, and could only obtain the
indulgence of a week’s respite, which he spent in singing and dancing,
in fact in making his own custom Quaw Saffătchee had also leagued with
the Fantees who attacked the Accra town, but were repulsed. The King
suddenly determined to open the path to receive the arrears of pay due
from the Forts, and sent Amanqua Abiniowa with an army of 20,000 men,
charging him to offer no violence nor commit hostility, unless provoked
by attack, but to receive the submission of the Akims and Aquapims, and
merely to exact a fine to seal it. Appia Danqua was sent at the same
time with a smaller army to the back of Winnebah and Tantum, to
intercept the revolters if they fled to windward. Abiniowa proceeded to
Aguiasso, one day’s march from Aquapim, unmolested, when one of his
foraging parties was attacked by Cudjo Cooma and seven men killed. A
general engagement took place the next morning, and after six hours
fighting the Ashantees were victorious, and sent a jaw-bone and a slave
to each of the Accra towns. Amanqua then marched to Accra to receive the
King’s pay, and remained nearly twelve months in its neighbourhood. He
then returned to Aquapim, where, after some time, he received a message
from the King, with a large quantity of gold, advising him that he must
not see his face again unless he brought the heads of Cudjo and Quaw.
Amanqua did not immediately communicate this message to his captains,
but ordered them to deposit their equipage and property in Accra, and
then, making a large custom for three days, to propitiate the
enterprise, he took fetish with all his captains that they would never
return to Coomassie without the heads.

1816. Appia Danqua had died in Assin in the interim, and was succeeded
by his brother Appia Nanu, under whom Bakkee was the second in command.
The King hearing nothing of his progress, and his indolence being
reported to him, sent orders to Amanqua to join him, which he did at
Essecooma, reproaching him for his cowardice. Soon after this, the
skirmish at the salt pond near Cape Coast took place, the detachment was
principally of Assins, and commanded by Quasheemanqua. Yokokroko soon
afterwards joined the combined army, (which had marched to Abra,) with a
few hundred men destined to attack Commenda.

Not long after the palaver was settled at Cape Coast, and the army again
divided, Cudjo Cooma was killed by a party of Appia Nanu’s at Insoom or
Incoom near Essecooma; upon which, Appia, instead of marching to join
Amanqua as had been concerted, returned to Coomassie, where he was
coldly received, but not accused until the 12th of July last (see
Diary). Adoo Danqua, the brother of Quaw Saffătchee, came to the Accras
and concerted the delivering of him up, as he had tired him out with his
wanderings. The Ashantees agreed to prevail on the King to give him the
stool if he did. A few Accras and a few Ashantees accompanied him, and
when he came near where his brother was hid, one day’s journey from
Accra, he placed an ambush, and sitting down, expostulated with him, and
recommended him to kill himself; but Quaw would not, alleging that he
should eventually wear out the King’s patience in pursuing him; on this
Adoo rose, and a shot was immediately fired at Quaw, who was brought
down and rose again four times, exclaiming that his brother was his
murderer, who reflected the reproach on his own obstinacy. The body was
brought to Accra, and his head sent to Coomassie, and it is now a trophy
at Bantama or the back town. Amanqua then returned to Coomassie, and
arrived about six months before the Mission.

The Aowins, to anticipate the ambitious views of the Ashantee
government, lately sent an embassy with offers of service and tribute,
but the amount of the latter has not yet been decided.

The King had sent to demand the royal stool of Buntooko or Gaman which
was thickly plated and embossed with gold; it was given up by Adinkara,
the King, from fear; his sister, a woman of masculine spirit and talent,
and the soul of the government, being absent. On her return, she
reproached her brother severely, and ordered a solid gold stool to be
made to replace it. That being also demanded, as the right of the
superior, with a large gold ornament in the shape of an elephant, dug
out from some ruins, the sister, receiving the ambassadors, replied,
that the King should not have either, and added, impressing it with more
force than delicacy, that her brother and she must change sexes, for she
was most proper for a King, and would fight to the last rather than be
so constantly despoiled. The King of Ashantee sent word that she was fit
to be a king’s sister, and a strong woman, and he would give her twelve
months to prepare for war. Several embassies have been sent however to
negotiate; two during our stay, the latter, it was said, with an offer
of 400 Bendas, (£3200.) but the aristocracy were obstinate, and urged to
the King, that his other tributaries would laugh at him, if he did not
get the King of Gaman’s head. The small pox was raging in Buntooko.

It is clear, that the King of Ashantee contemplates the reduction of the
King of Dwabin from an independent ally to a tributary. We witnessed one
circumstance to the point. A messenger being sent to require gold of
Dwabin, the King of which is a very weak young man, a captain of the
royal family replied, that there was no war on foot to require gold, and
as it could only be for the individual benefit of Ashantee, the
government must be reminded that Dwabin had formerly exacted gold, and
was not now to be subjected to imposition, because the right had been
yielded from respect to the sister kingdom. This being reported to the
King, he suppressed his anger, and sent a gold headed sword, with other
marks of dignity and favour to this man, who, to his surprise, refused
them, alleging, that the honours he already possessed at home became him
better. The King still temporised. Some months after, at the full
assembly convened for the proclamation of the treaty with the British
Government, the mother of the King of Dwabin, who acts as regent, and
over whom Saï is known to have much influence, suddenly, and no doubt at
his instance, accused this captain of plotting to deprive her son of the
stool. The accusation was supported by others, who prayed the King to
judge the palaver. The King of Dwabin sat with the greatest
indifference. The accused made an animated appeal to the assembly, and
Saï affected to support him vehemently, and ordered the linguists to
give him chalk, or acquit him. The man thanking him very earnestly,
Adoosee was desired to tell him, that his ill-will to the King of
Ashantee had been reported in a very aggravated manner; but as it was no
longer believed, he was only required to take fetish, that he liked the
King, and would do him all the good he could; this done, the man
received several marks of favour and bounty.

Saï Tootoo is considered to take better care of the treasury than any of
his predecessors: he cautiously extends his prerogative, and takes every
opportunity of increasing the number of secondary captains, by
dignifying the young men brought up about his person, and still
retaining them in his immediate service.

Saï Acotoo, the King’s brother, and the heir to the stool, appeared to
me very inferior in ability; but the Ashantees say otherwise.

The King’s private character is amiable; the children of his brothers
share the fondness and indulgence which endear him to his own, and his
few moments of recreation are the liveliest of theirs. The circumstances
connected with the various instances which we witnessed of his
generosity to others, justify me in ascribing it to the benevolence of
his disposition. His admiration of ingenious rather than splendid
novelty, has frequently imposed the appearance of a covetousness,
scarcely culpable from his reverence for invention, and the amazement
its extent excited. To present him with the trifles which attracted his
notice when he visited us, offended him, he told us we must only answer
his questions, and let him examine them; to make dashes on the occasion
of a private visit, was to vitiate the motive of the condescension,
which could not be repeated unless we paid more respect to his dignity
and friendship. The King is certainly capricious, and his liberality of
mind is stained by prejudices against individuals which he confesses to
be unaccountable; and to several of the principal actors in his
brother’s deposition, (which, desirous to extend his prerogative, he
would tacitly censure,) he has been unjustly severe. His humanity is
frequently superior to his superstition and policy, he offended Quatchi
Quofie, one of the four, by limiting the human sacrifices at his
mother’s funeral, and resisted all the importunities, founded on
precedent, for the allowance of a greater number. He dismissed us twice
with apologies for not proceeding to business, confessing, the first
time, that he had been unusually irritated just after he sent for us,
and had not recovered his calmness; the latter, that some agreeable news
had induced him to drink more than fitted him to hear great palavers
like ours. In his judicial administration, a lie always aggravated the
punishment, and truth generally extenuated, and sometimes atoned of
itself for the offence: he invariably anticipated the temerity of
perjury, where convicting evidence was to be opposed to the accused. The
King’s manners are a happy mixture of dignity and affability, they
engage rather than encourage, and his general deportment is conciliating
though repressive. He speaks well, and more logically than most of his
council, who are diffuse, but his superior talent is marked in the
shrewd questions by which he fathoms a design or a narrative. He excels
in courtesy, is wisely inquisitive, and candid in his comparisons: war,
legislature, and mechanism, were his favourite topics in our private
conversations. The great, but natural fault of the King is his ambition;
I do not think it has ever proved superior to the pledge of his honour,
but it certainly has, and that frequently, to his sense of justice,
which is repressed rather than impaired by it. This sketch of his
character being narrowed to my own knowledge, will be assisted by the
following history of Agay, the second linguist.

Agay, when a boy, carried salt from Aquoomo to Coomassie for sale; he
was afterwards taken into the service of Aquootoo, caboceer of that
place, against whom the government had instituted a palaver, but
wrongfully. Agay accompanied the caboceer when he was sent for to
Coomassie for judgment. After the King’s messengers had spoken,
misrepresenting the case in preference to confessing the King to be in
the wrong, and the caboceer was confused, this boy suddenly rose, and
said, to use the words of the narrators, “King, you have people to wash
you, to feed you, to serve you, but you have no people to speak the
truth to you, and tell you when God does not like your palaver.” The
assembly cried out unanimously, that the boy might be hurried away and
his head taken off; but the King said, “No! let him finish;” and Agay is
said to have spoken three hours, and to have disclosed and argued the
palaver to the King’s conviction, and his master’s acquittal. He was
retained to attend the King, but treated with no particular distinction.
A serious palaver occurring between two principal men, it was debated
before the council, who were at a loss to decide, but inclined to the
man whom the King doubted; judgment was suspended. In the interim the
King sent Agay, privately, to the house of each, to hear their palavers
in turn, tête-à-tête; he did so, and when the King asked him who he
thought was right, he confirmed his impression. “Now,” said the King, “I
know you have a good head.” Agay was then made a Linguist, and presented
with a house, wives, slaves, and gold. Sometime afterwards, the King
confessing a prejudice against a wealthy captain, his linguists, always
inclined to support him, said, “If you wish to take his stool from him,
we will make the palaver;” but Agay sprung up, exclaiming, “No, King!
that is not good; that man never did you any wrong, you know all the
gold of your subjects is your’s at their death, but if you get all now,
strangers will go away and say, only the King has gold, and that will
not be good, but let them say the King has gold, all his captains have
gold, and all his people have gold, then your country will look
handsome, and the bush people fear you.” For this the King made him
second linguist, and much increased his property. When Amanqua had the
command of the army against Cudjo Cooma, the King asked him which
linguist he would take, he replied, Adoosee or Otee; the King said, no!
I will give you this boy, he has the best head for hard palavers.
Amanqua urged that he was too young, the King told him he was a fool to
say so. He then made Amanqua take fetish with him to report the merits
of Agay faithfully, who distinguished himself so much, that he is always
employed in difficult foreign palavers.

The manners of the higher orders of captains, always dignified, are
courteous and hospitable in private, though haughty and abrupt in
public. I believe them to be jealous rather than tenacious of their
honour, and their sophistry is as ingenious as their maxims are
prepossessing. They consider that war alone affords an exertion or
display of ability, and they esteem the ambition of their King as his
greatest virtue. They have no idea of the aggrandisement of a state by
civil policy alone. They are candid in acknowledging their defeats, and
just to the prowess of their enemies, but they possess little humanity,
and are very avaricious and oppressive. They listen to superstition with
the most childish credulity, but they only cultivate it for the
preservation of life and the indulgence of passion; beyond this, the
Moors could never advance their enquiries; they are neither curious nor
anxious about a future state, pretending to it from rank and achievement
rather than domestic virtue; and believing, if the latter were outraged,
the solemnities and sacrifices of their funeral customs would purchase
their repose. Indeed, licensed as they are by the zealous conflicts of
rival superstitions, (Moorish and Pagan,) their lives are moderate and
benevolent to what might be expected, and merit more than our excuses.

The lower order of people are ungrateful, insolent, and licentious. The
King repeatedly said, he believed them to be the worst people existing,
except the Fantees, and not comparable with many of their inland
neighbours. Perhaps we should agree with Voltaire, “Je crois qu’il faut
plutôt juger d’une puissante nation par ceux qui sont à la tête, que par
la populace.”[70]


[Footnote 65: See Diary.]

[Footnote 66: See the explanatory list of words and the early dispatches
in the First Part.]

[Footnote 67: Fire arms are unknown to such of the nations on the south
of the Niger as the Shereef has visited; and the reason which he assigns
for it is, that the Kings in the neighbourhood of the coast, persuaded
that if these powerful instruments of war should reach the possession of
the populous inland states, their own independence would be lost, have
strictly prohibited, and by the wisdom of their measures, have
effectually prevented this dangerous merchandise from passing beyond the
limits of their dominions. Lucas.]

[Footnote 68: “To succeed to the stool,” does not mean to the seat in
the council, but is the common expression for succeeding to a property
even in private life. The same stool, or seat descends through many
generations.]

[Footnote 69: On the death of the late King of Amanaheä, two competitors
for the stool appeared, one called Suikee or Suiquah; the other’s name I
am ignorant of. Both collected their slaves and adherents, and fought.
Suikee was obliged to fly, and hide himself in the bush; but the people
being dissatisfied with the conqueror, Suikee re-appeared against the
town. When his rival was reduced beyond all hope, he threw all his gold,
which filled several jars, into the lake; and then collecting his wives
and the different branches of his family, went with them into a remote
part of the bush, and cut all their throats, with the exception of one
son, whom he reserved to assist him in burying the bodies. He then made
this son swear on his fetish, to kill and bury him, and never to
discover where the bodies were laid: the son fulfilled the oath, and
returned to Apollonia, but I am not certain what became of him. After
Suikee had seated himself firmly on the stool, he by some means
discovered where the bodies were concealed; he caused them to be dug up,
and taken to Apollonia town; he then ranged them in a sitting posture,
in a row along the beach, with stakes to extend their arms, and support
their heads: this horrid spectacle was exhibited until even their bones
had perished. One of Suikee’s first acts after his accession, was to
consecrate his hiding place in the bush, making it death, or a heavy
fine, for any one to swear by Suikee’s bush, and not to keep the oath.]

[Footnote 70: The principal districts of Fantee, are, the Affettoo, the
Braffoo, and the Essecoomah; Cape Coast is in the former. The Dey of
Affettoo (a title probably introduced by the Portuguese) was formerly
supreme in Fantee, so far as summoning the other kings and caboceers at
pleasure, prescribing their political conduct, and being appealed to and
sentencing in all cases of life and death, wherever or by whomsoever the
crime may have been committed; witchcraft excepted. Upwards of a century
ago the small pox almost depopulated Affettoo, then the largest town and
capital of all Fantee, (it is about 10 miles inland from Cape Coast,)
and all the immediate heirs to the stool being cut off, the supremacy
was transferred to Mankasim. The present Dey, however, preserves a
spiritual authority over the other kings and caboceers, and is esteemed
as the superior fetish man; when they desire rain, for instance, they
apply to him to procure it, and they look to him solely for their
chronology, which he preserves by knotting strings. Mankasim then became
the capital and largest town of Fantee, but it was almost destroyed by
the Ashantees in their first invasion of 1807. Any Fantee caboceer who
did not attend the summons of the King of Mankasim, was suspended by
him, and afterwards displaced by the diet. Adoo, the last King of the
Braffoos, despoiling all his subjects of their most valuable property,
and countenancing the individuals of his family in the same assumption
and violation, without any regard to persons; they were all seized, on
his death, by a simultaneous rising of the people, and sold off the
coast as slaves, to get rid of the race. Adookoo, one of the leading
men, was then called to the care of the stool, with the title of
caboceer only, it being still considered as an interregnum, but he
exercised the same supremacy and privileges which the King had done, and
was acknowledged by the whole country. During his retreat and wanderings
in the bush, after several defeats by the Ashantees, the Fantee towns
have assumed many political and judicial rights before centered in
Mankasim; but Adookoo is now expected to summon them all, and re-
establish the ancient order of things, which they deem too sacred to
think of resisting. It was not the Braffoos, or the whole people of that
district, who had the privilege of living abroad at the public expense,
and who took whatever they pleased of the property of others, as Mr.
Meredith has stated; but the state officers of that district called
Brofoos, who acquired that name from the hide in which the tobacco is
rolled, being formed into a seat peculiar to them, never using a wooden
stool. They were the executors, and not the organs of the law, and
always sat to the right and left of Adookoo, but had no voice. The
number was twelve, and the dignity immemorially hereditary in as many
families. These men were allowed to take whatever they pleased at home
and abroad, but since Adookoo’s misfortunes, and inability to support
them, they have been content to beg for their tithes in the large towns,
and only exercise their rapacity in the small crooms of their own
district.]




                              CHAPTER III.

                               * * * * *

                        _Constitution and Laws._


The King, the Aristocracy, now reduced to four, and the Assembly of
Captains,[71] are the three estates of the Ashantee government.

The constitution requires or admits an interference of the Aristocracy
in all _foreign_ politics, extending even to a veto on the King’s
decision; but they watch rather than share the _domestic_
administration, generally influencing it by their opinion, but never
appearing to control it from authority; and their opinions on civil
questions, are submitted with a deference, directly in contrast to their
bold declarations on subjects of war or tribute, which amount to
injunction.

The Ashantees advocated this constitution by the argument, that the
interference of the Aristocracy in all foreign politics, makes the
nation more formidable to its enemies, who feel they cannot provoke with
impunity, where there are so many guardians of the military glory; who,
by insisting on a war, become responsible in a great degree for the
issue, and pledge an energy and exertion, in comparison with which, such
as could be excited by a despotic monarch, must be deemed disinterested.
They added, that an almost independent administration of the King, was
better calculated for the domestic government, because the decrees of a
monarch have naturally more force with the people, (over whom his power
is unlimited) and, further, that a civil power in the Aristocracy could
not be reconciled to the Assembly of Captains, to whom the former estate
was already sufficiently invidious for the health of the constitution.

In exercising his judicial authority, the King always retired in private
with the Aristocracy to hear their opinions, to encourage their candor
without diminishing his majesty in the eye of the people; and in using
his legislative prerogative, he was said always to give them a private
opportunity of defending the old law, rather than of objecting to the
new; though, from the same state policy, the latter was announced to the
Aristocracy as well as to the Assembly of Captains, before the people,
as the sudden and arbitrary pleasure of the King.

The general Assembly of the Caboceers and Captains, is summoned merely
to give publicity to the will of the King and Aristocracy, and to
provide for its observance; unless on state emergencies, or
unprecedented occasions, such as the Treaty with the British Government.
The following anecdote, related to me by many Ashantees, will illustrate
the freedom of their constitution.

A son of the King’s quarrelling with a son of Amanquateä’s, (one of the
four) told him, that in comparison with himself, he was the son of a
slave; this being reported to Amanquateä, he sent a party of his
soldiers, who pulled down the house of the King’s son and seized his
person. The King hearing of it sent to Amanquateä, and learning the
particulars, interceded for his son, and redeemed his head for 20
periguins of gold.

The most original feature of their law, that of succession, has been
mentioned in the History, with the argument on which it is founded: it
is universally binding; the course is, the brother, the sister’s son,
the son, the chief vassal or slave to the stool. In the Fantee country,
the principal slave succeeds to the exclusion of the son, who only
inherits his mother’s property, frequently considerable, and inherited
from her family independently of her husband: the daughters share a
small part of the fetish or ornamental gold, which is much alloyed with
silver.

The sisters of the King may marry or intrigue with whom they please,
provided he be an eminently strong or personable man; that the heirs of
the stool may be, at least, personably superior to the generality of
their countrymen.

The King is heir to the gold of every subject, from the highest to the
lowest; the fetish gold and the cloths are generally presented by him to
the successor to the stool, from which the slaves and other property of
the deceased are inseparable. The King contributes to the funeral custom
to validate his claim, and usually bestows ten periguins of the dust
gold on the successor, (if of a rich man,) who is in all cases liable
for the debts of the deceased, though the amount is generally made good
to him sooner or later, if he has influence with those about the King,
or recommends himself to his notice personally. This law is sometimes
anticipated, by a father presenting his children with large sums of gold
just before his death. Boiteëm, the father of Otee, one of the King’s
linguists, is known to have done so, but the son discovers his wealth
very deliberately.

The gold buried with members of the royal family, and afterwards
deposited with their bones in the fetish house at Bantama, is sacred;
and cannot be used, but to redeem the capital from the hands of an
enemy, or in extreme national distress; and even then, the King must
avoid the sight of it, if he would avoid the fatal vengeance of the
fetish or deity.

If a slave seeks refuge from an ally or tributary, he is restored; if
from an unconnected power, he is received as a free subject.

The tributary state which distinguishes itself in suppressing the revolt
of another, is rewarded by privileges at the expense of the offending
power: thus if a subject of the former kills a subject of the latter,
the price of a slave only can be recovered, instead of the fine
otherwise attached to the death of a freeman; and the damages for other
injuries are reduced in proportion.

If the subjects of any tributary do not like the decision of their
ruler, according to the laws of their own country, they may appeal to
the King, and claim decision by the law of Ashantee. The commission
allowed to the collectors of tribute or fine, is two periguins out of
ten.

The direct descendants of the noble families who assisted the enterprise
of Saï Tootoo, the founder of the kingdom, are not subject to capital
punishment, but can only be despoiled. There are now but four remaining,
Ananqui, Assafee, (see Diary,) and two others, all beggars.

We were present at the promulgation of the following law: “All persons
sent on the King’s business shall no longer seize provisions in any
country, whether tributary or otherwise, in his name; but requiring
food, shall offer a fair price for the first they meet with, if this is
refused, they shall then demand one meal, and one meal only, in the
King’s name, and proceed. This extends to all messengers sent by the
head captains, whose servants, as well as the King’s, have been long in
the habit of extorting goods from traders, and tobacco and provisions in
the market place, in the names of their masters, which they shall do no
longer without incurring the same penalty which is attached to the
former part of this law, 110 penguins.” The form of making this law,
was, the linguists with their insignia advanced and announced it to each
of the four members of the Aristocracy, then to the whole assembly;
afterwards Cudjo Appăni, the chief crier, proclaimed it to the people,
who shouted their thanks; his fee from the King was ten ackies, from the
people twenty. This attachment of the penalty to the law (the chief
merit of Zaleucus) manifests some advancement in polity, in securing the
accused against arbitrary judgment.[72]

The caboceers of Soota, Marmpon, Becqua, and Kokofoo, the four large
towns built by the Ashantees at the same time with Coomassie, have
several palatine privileges; they have an independent treasury, though
subject to the demands of the government and a judicial power, with the
reserve of an appeal to the King. They celebrate their own yam custom
after they have attended that at Coomassie, at which all dependents and
tributaries must be present, and which seems to have been instituted
like the Panathenæa of Theseus, to unite such various nations by a
common festival. These four caboceers, only, are allowed, with the King,
to stud their sandals with gold.

The blood of the son of a King, or of any of the royal family cannot be
shed; but when guilty of a crime of magnitude, they are drowned in the
river Dah, by a particular captain, named Cudjo Samfani.

If a man swears on the King’s head, that another must kill him, which is
understood to be invoking the King’s death if he does not, the other man
must do so, or forfeit the whole of his property, and generally his
life. This very frequently occurs, for the blacks in their ardor for
revenge, do not regard sacrificing their own lives to bring a palaver on
their murderer, which their families are sure to do.

To be convicted of cowardice is death.

A subject may clear any part of the bush for building a croom, or making
a plantation, without paying any thing to the King as lord of the soil;
but he must pay a small sum to the possessor of the nearest croom or
plantation, through which his path runs.

The government has no power to direct the traders to any particular
market, though it interdicts the commerce with any power which may have
offended it.

All the King’s linguists take fetish to be true to each other, and to
report faithfully.

If any subject picks up gold dropped in the market place, it is death,
being collected only by order of the government on emergencies; see
Revenue.

Theft of the King’s property, or intrigue with the female attendants of
the royal family, or habitual incontinence, is punished by emasculation;
but crim. con. with the wife of a man who has been so punished, is
death: being considered an aggravated contempt of law.

Interest of money is 33⅓ per cent. for every forty days, which is
accompanied after the first period by a dash of liquor. When the
patience of the creditor is exhausted, he seizes the debtor, or even any
of his family, as slaves, and they can only be redeemed by the payment.
This barbarous law was nearly the same in Athens.[73]

In almost all charges of treason, the life of the accuser is at risk as
well as that of the accused, and is forfeited on the acquittal of the
latter. I understood this, from the best authorities, to be
indispensible as a check on the palavers; envy, spleen, or covetousness
would otherwise accumulate.

The accuser is never discovered or confronted to the accused, nor the
evidence revealed, until the latter has fully replied to the charge, as
outlined by the King’s linguists.

Palavers are frequently allowed to sleep even for years, as in the
Fantee country, to make the damages sued for, the heavier: for instance,
if a man stole a hen twelve months before, the value of the broods and
eggs it would have produced, on a fair average, in the interval, would
be shrewdly calculated, and sued for.[74] State palavers are also
allowed to sleep for years, but that is to impose the confidence on the
accused that the principal witnesses are dead, and the impression is
artfully assisted by the policy of the council. The witnesses against
Appia Nanu, who had reported his haughty message to the King, had not
been seen for nearly twelve months before they burst before him on the
day of his trial, having been sent into the bush on the most distant
frontier.

No man is punished for killing his own slave, but he is for the murder
of his wife or child.[75] If he kills the slave of another, he must pay
the value. If a great man kills his equal in rank, he is generally
allowed to die by his own hands: the death of an inferior is generally
compensated by a fine to the family, equal to seven slaves.[76]

If a person brings a frivolous palaver against another, he must give an
entertainment to the family and friends of the acquitted.

If an aggry bead is broken in a scuffle, seven slaves are to be paid to
the owner.

Trifling thefts are generally punished by the exposure of the party in
various parts of the town, whilst the act is published; but more serious
thefts cannot be visited on the guilty by any but his family, who are
bound to compensate the accuser, and punish their relative or not as
they think fit; they may even put him or her to death, if the injury is
serious, or the crime repeated or habitual.

If a man cohabits with a woman without the house, or in the bush, they
are both the slaves of the first person who discovers them; but
redeemable by their families.

It is forbidden, as it was by Lycurgus, to praise the beauty of another
man’s wife, being intrigue by implication.

A captain generally gives a periguin to the family on taking a wife, a
poor man two ackies: the damages for intrigue in the former case are ten
periguins; in the latter, one ackie and a half, and a pot of palm wine.

If a woman involves herself in a palaver, she involves her family, but
not her husband.

None but a captain can sell his wife, and he, only, if her family are
unable to redeem her by the repayment of the marriage fee.

The property of the wife is distinct, and independent of the husband,
though the King is the heir to it.

None but a captain can put his wife to death for infidelity, and even
then he is expected to accept a liberal offer of gold from the family,
for her redemption. To intrigue with a wife of the King’s is death.

If the family of a woman are able and willing, on her report of her
dislike to her husband, or his ill-treatment of her, to tender him the
marriage fee, he must accept it, and the woman returns to her family,
but may not marry again.

If a husband is not heard of by his wife for three years, she may marry
again, and if the first husband returns, the claim of the second is the
better; but all the children of the after marriage are considered the
property of the first husband, and may be pawned by him.

Those accused of witchcraft, or having a devil, are tortured to death.

The good treatment of slaves is in some degree provided for, by the
liberty they have of dashing or transferring themselves to any freeman;
whom they enjoin to make them his property by invoking his death if he
does not; an imperative appeal.


[Footnote 71: It has been shewn in the history, that the Aristocracy was
originally formed of the peers and associates of Saï Tootoo the founder
of the monarchy, who owed his elevation not to his superior rank, but to
his superior endowments and address. The Aristocracy has been gradually
retrenched since Saï Cudjo pointed out the way.]

[Footnote 72: By the laws of Ahanta, which are peculiar, if any subject
or sojourner is in urgent want of provisions, he may seize the first he
meets with, paying the owner the prices which have been fixed by the
caboceers: this is similar to the law of Lycurgus. At the Contoom or
annual Harvest Custom, the Ahantas revise their laws, as Solon enjoined
the Athenians to do, annulling some and adding others.]

[Footnote 73: In Ahanta, all old debts must be paid within six weeks
from the commencement of the Contoom or Harvest Custom. The creditor can
panyar or seize not only the family, but the townsmen of the debtor.]

[Footnote 74: The Ahanta laws do not allow of these protracted palavers,
and only award the intrinsic value of the articles stolen or destroyed.
If a man robs a plantation of a yam, he must pay the owner a tokoo of
gold, and take two more. In Fantee the pettiest theft frequently entails
slavery.]

[Footnote 75: In the kingdom of Amanaheä or Apollonia, the tenth child
is always buried alive.]

[Footnote 76: A person accidentally killing another in Ahanta, pays 5
oz. of gold to the family, and defrays the burial customs. In the case
of murder, it is 20 oz. of gold and a slave; or, he and his family
become the slaves of the family of the deceased. If a man dashes himself
to the fetish on the head of another, the other must redeem him. If a
man kills himself on the head of another, the other must kill himself
also, or pay 20 oz. to the family: in Fantee the sum is indefinitely
great: this is frequently resorted to, when there is no other prospect
of revenge.

Adumissa, an extraordinarily beautiful red skinned woman of Cape Coast,
possessed numerous admirers, but rejected them all. One of them, in
despair, shot himself on her head close to her house. The family
demanding satisfaction; to save her relations from a ruinous palaver,
she resolved to shoot herself in expiation. She accordingly assembled
her friends and relatives from various parts of the country, and
sitting, richly dressed, killed herself in their presence with golden
bullets. After the body had been exposed in state, it was buried with a
profusion of cloths and gold. The beautiful Adumissa is still eulogised,
and her favourite patterned cloth bears her name amongst the natives.]




                              CHAPTER IV.

                               * * * * *

                            _Superstitions._


The Negro tradition of the book and the calabash, cited by St. Pierre,
is familiar to every native of these parts, and seems the source of
their religious opinions. Impressed that the blind avarice of their
forefathers inclined all the favour of the supreme God to white men,
they believe themselves to have been committed to the mediating care of
subordinate deities, necessarily as inferior to the primary, as they are
to Europeans.

As the Ashantee manner of relating this tradition differs a little from
that of the Fantee, I will repeat it, on the authority of Odumata and
other principal men. In the beginning of the world, God created three
white and three black men, with the same number of women; he resolved,
that they might not afterwards complain, to give them their choice of
good and evil. A large box or calabash was set on the ground, with a
piece of paper, sealed up, on one side of it. God gave the black men the
first choice, who took the box, expecting it contained every thing, but,
on opening it, there appeared only a piece of gold, a piece of iron, and
several other metals, of which they did not know the use. The white men
opening the paper, it told them every thing. God left the blacks in the
bush, but conducted the whites to the water side, (for this happened in
Africa) communicated with them every night, and taught them to build a
small ship which carried them to another country, whence they returned
after a long period, with various merchandise to barter with the blacks,
who might have been the superior people.

With this imaginary alienation from the God of the universe, not a shade
of despondency is associated; they consider that it diminishes their
comforts and their endowments on earth, but that futurity is a dull and
torpid state to the majority of mankind.

Their fetishes or subordinate deities, are supposed to inhabit
particular rivers, woods, and mountains, as the imaginary deities of the
Celts. They are venerated in proportion as their predictions (always
equivocal) chance to be realized. The present favourite fetish of
Ashantee is that of the river Tando. Cobee, a river in Dankara, and
Odentee on the Adirree, are two of the others.

The kings, caboceers, and the higher class, are believed to dwell with
the superior Deity after death, enjoying an eternal renewal of the state
and luxury they possessed on earth. It is with this impression, that
they kill a certain number of both sexes at the funeral customs, to
accompany the deceased, to announce his distinction, and to administer
to his pleasures.

The spirits of the inferior classes are believed to inhabit the houses
of the fetish, in a state of torpid indolence, which recompenses them
for the drudgery of their lives, and which is truly congenial to the
feelings of the Negro. Those of superior wisdom and experience, are said
to be endued with foresight after death, and to be appointed to observe
the lives, and advise the good of those mortals who acknowledge the
fetish; their state corresponding, in short, with that of the first race
of men after death, as described by Hesiod. Those whose enormities
nullify the mediation of the funeral custom, or, whom neglect or
circumstances might have deprived of it, are doomed, in the imagination
of others, to haunt the gloom of the forest, stealing occasionally to
their former abodes in rare but lingering visits. Those who have
neglected the custom, or funeral rites of their family, are thought to
be accursed and troubled by their spirits.

There are two orders of fetishmen. The first class dwell with the
fetish,[77] who has a small round house, built generally at a distance
from the town. They question the oracle respecting the future fortune of
a state or an individual, convey its advice, and enjoin the attention of
the _audible_ spirits of those, any member of their family would
question respecting property or domestic circumstances:


  “Auditur tumulo et vox reddita fertur ad aures.” Æn. vi.


The inferior class pursue their various occupations in society, assist
in customs and superstitious ceremonies, and are applied to as fortune
tellers or conjurors are in Europe; especially in cases of theft; when,
from a secret system of espionage, and a reluctance, frequently
amounting to a refusal to discover the culprit, or to do more than
replace the property whence it was taken, they are generally successful.
The magical ceremony consists in knotting, confusing, and dividing
behind the back, several strings and shreds of leather. They are also
frequently applied to by slippery wives, to work charms to keep their
husbands in ignorance of a projected intrigue, which they affect to do.

The primary dignity is hereditary in families, as the priesthood was in
Egypt, celibacy not being enjoined; their property is also hereditary,
and they possess other immunities. The latter order is frequently
augmented by those, who declare that the fetish has suddenly seized, or
come upon them, and who, after inflicting great severities on
themselves, in the manner of the convulsionists, are ultimately
acknowledged. The fetish women, generally preferred for medical aid, as
they possess a thorough knowledge of barks and herbs, deleterious and
sanative, closely resemble the second class of Druidesses as described,
I think by Mela: they seem licensed prostitutes, before and after
marriage.

The present state of these people referring them to a comparison with
the nations of ancient Europe,[78] the close resemblance of many points
of their superstition to relative particulars recorded of Greece and
Gaul, recalls the following reflection of an eminent writer. “The truth
is, there is hardly any thing more surprising in the history of mankind,
than the similitude, or rather identity, of the opinions, institutions,
and manners of all these orders of ancient priests, though they lived
under such different climates, and at so great a distance from one
another, without intercourse or communication. This amounts to a
demonstration, that all these opinions and institutions flowed
originally from one fountain.”

Half the offerings to the fetish, are pretended to be thrown into the
river, the other half belongs to the priests. The King’s offering is
generally ten ounces, and three or four slaves: that of a poor subject
about four ackies. Children are frequently vowed to the service of the
fetish before their birth. A slave flying to the temple, may dash or
devote himself to the fetish; but, by paying a fee of two ounces of gold
and four sheep, any person shuts the door of the fetish house against
all his run away slaves.[79]

Every family has a variety of domestic fetishes, furnished by the
priests, and answering to the Penates of the Romans; some are wooden
figures, others of arbitrary shapes and materials; they receive
offerings and libations at the yam custom, but are not brought out of
the house.[80]

In Ashantee there is not a common fetish day, as on the coast.[81]
Different families solemnize different days of the week, by wearing
white cloths, abstaining from palm wine and labour, as they do the day
of the week on which they were born, which is in fact their second
fetish day. The King’s family keep Tuesday as their fetish day.
Odumata’s, Friday. Saturday was the King’s birth day, when, as well as
on his fetish day, he always sat on a stool placed before his chair as a
foot stool would be. Some families never eat beef, others abstain from
pork. Fowls and beef are the fetish of the King’s family, and
consequently never eaten by it.

The Ashantees have their Fasti and Nefasti, or lucky and unlucky days,
as the Romans had.[82] The former consecrated by some good fortune, the
latter condemned from some national calamity, as Saturday, for instance,
from the defeat and death of Saï Tootoo. They are also otherwise marked
than by the week; for I was told, that our month of September contained
fewer bad days than any other, and was besides deemed auspicious to
travelling:


  Ipsa dies alios alio dedit ordine Luna

  Felices operum · · · ·

  · · · · nona fugæ melior. Geor. I.


I have known Ashantees thirty days coming with dispatches from Cape
Coast Castle to Coomassie, in August; and in September, to have arrived
in twelve.

If the successor to a stool, or any rich inheritance is a child, they
grind aggry beads into a powder, and rub him with it daily, after
washing, believing that it hastens his growth and maturity. When any one
denies a theft, an aggry bead is placed in a small vessel, with some
water, the person holding it puts his right foot against the right foot
of the accused, who invokes the power of the bead to kill him if he is
guilty, and then takes it into his mouth with a little of the water, the
rest being thrown on the ground, and crossed as he repeats the
invocation: their superstition is generally superior to their
resolution. I shall be expected to notice these aggry beads.

The natives invariably declare that the aggry beads are found in the
Dankara, Akim, Warsaw, Ahanta, and Fantee countries, the greater number
in the former, being the richer in gold; they say they are directed to
dig for them by a spiral vapour issuing from the ground, and that they
rarely lay near the surface; the finder is said to be sure of a series
of good fortune. The plain aggry beads are blue, yellow, green, or a
dull red, the variegated consist of every colour and shade. The Fantees
prefer the plain yellow bead, the Amanaheäns the blue and yellow, for
which they will give double the weight in gold; those of inferior beauty
frequently fetch a large price, from having been worn by some royal or
eminent character. Dr. Leyden, who writes, “the aigris is a stone of a
greenish blue colour, supposed to be a species of jasper, small
perforated pieces of which, valued at their weight in gold, are used for
money,” (which I never heard of,) rather describes the popo bead; though
that is semi-transparent, (of a bright blue,) resembling carnelian,
(which is frequently found in these countries) and said to be obtained
in the same manner as the aggry bead. Isert writes, “they are a sort of
coral, with inlaid work: the art of making beads is entirely lost, or
was never known in these parts: it is not improbable, that in the golden
age of Egypt, she had communication with the Gold Coast; indeed, it has
been thought, and perhaps not without some reason, that the Gold Coast
is the Ophir of Solomon.”

The variegated strata of the aggry beads are so firmly united, and so
imperceptibly blended, that the perfection seems superior to art: some
resemble mosaic work, the surfaces of others are covered with flowers
and regular patterns, so very minute, and the shades so delicately
softened one into the other, and into the ground of the bead, that
nothing but the finest touch of the pencil could equal them. The
agatized parts disclose flowers and patterns, deep in the body of the
bead, and thin shafts, of opaque colours, running from the centre to the
surface. The natives pretend that imitations are made in the country,
which they call boiled beads, alleging that they are broken aggry beads
ground into powder, and boiled together, and that they know them because
they are heavier; but this I find to be mere conjecture among
themselves, unsupported by any thing like observation or discovery. The
natives believe that by burying the aggry beads in sand they not only
grow but breed.[83]

To return to the superstitions of the Ashantees: when they drink, they
spill a little of the liquor on the ground as an offering to the fetish;
and on rising from their chairs or stools, their attendants instantly
lay them on their sides, to prevent the devil (whom they represent to be
white) from slipping into their master’s places.

But the most surprising superstition of the Ashantees, is their
confidence in the fetishes or saphies they purchase so extravagantly
from the Moors, believing firmly that they make them invulnerable and
invincible in war, paralyse the hand of the enemy, shiver their weapons,
divert the course of balls, render both sexes prolific, and avert all
evils but sickness, (which they can only assuage,) and natural death.
The King gave to the King of Dagwumba, for the fetish or war coat of
Apokoo, the value of thirty slaves; for Odumata’s, twenty; for Adoo
Quamina’s, thirteen; for Akimpon’s, twelve; for Akimponteä’s, nine; and
for those of greater captains in proportion. The generals being always
in the rear of the army are pretty sure to escape, a circumstance much
in favour of the Moors. The drawing of Adoo Quamina will convey the best
idea of this dress, which has been described before, in our entrée; it
is so weighty that old Odumata could scarcely move in his. Jannequin,
who visited Mandingo in 1637, describes exactly the same sort of dress
as worn by the chiefs of that country, and adds, “their bodies are so
encumbered with these defences, that they are often unable to mount on
horseback without assistance.” For a small fetish of about six lines,
sewn in a case of red cloth, which the King presented to our Accra
linguist, Baba charged and received six ackies. The man valued the gift
highly; he had expended two pieces of cloth and a quantity of rum in
fetish, at Accra, before he joined the Mission; but for which, he told
me, he was convinced the Ashantees would have managed to poison him:
yet, he was one of the most sensible natives I ever conversed with. A
sheet of paper would support an inferior Moor in Coomassie for a month.
Several of the Ashantee captains offered seriously to let us fire at
them; in short, their confidence in these fetishes is almost as
incredible, as the despondency and panic imposed on their southern and
western enemies by the recollection of them: they impel the Ashantees,
fearless and headlong, to the most daring enterprises, they dispirit
their adversaries, almost to the neglect of an interposition of fortune
in their favour. The Ashantees believe that the constant prayers of the
Moors, who have persuaded them that they converse with the Deity,
invigorate themselves, and gradually waste the spirit and strength of
their enemies. This faith is not less impulsive than that which achieved
the Arabian conquests.

Neither the Ashantees or their neighbours have any tradition of a
deluge, nor does Catcott, the only writer I recollect to have read on
its universality, report any Negro tradition, though he submits that of
the American tribes, with those of the other nations of the world. The
Moors told me, that the waters of the deluge retired to, and were
absorbed in the lake Caudi or Caughi, which they also called Bahar
Noohoo, or the sea of Noah.

Amongst other observations, I recollect the Moors to have said, that
Moses spoke like God, that Abraham was the friend of God, that Jesus was
a spirit of God, but that Mahomet was the best beloved of God. They
added, that there were four books written by the inspiration of God, at
different times. Moses wrote Tauratoo; David, Zaboura; Jesus, Lingheel;
and Mahomet, Al Koran. Lightning, they said, was occasioned by God
waving his hand to direct the courses of his angels. One Moor was a
great etymologist; he told me, that Mahomet rushing between two armies,
who were fighting, exclaimed to one party, “Toorek! Toorek!” (leave off!
leave off!) and that those people were thenceforward called Turks. I
questioned them concerning the origin of nations; they told me, that
Japhet was the most active in covering the nakedness of his father,
which Ham discovered, and thence the subjection of black men the
descendants of Ham, to Europeans the descendants of Japhet. Shem, from
whom they were themselves descended, they said, was neither so good or
so bad as his brothers, and therefore his children enjoyed a medium of
endowment and favour. They augured from the sacrifice of sheep, with
which the King supplied them abundantly, and, excepting those who had
made a pilgrimage to Mecca, (of which they told us wonderful tales) did
not hesitate mingling the superstitions of the natives with their own,
either for their profit or safety. They were tolerably expert in slight
of hand tricks.


[Footnote 77: At Nanampong (Nanan means a grand-father) near Mankasim,
in the Braffoo country, there is a deep dell, inhabited by a number of
aged fetish men, whom the Fantees believe to be immortal, and to have
lived there beyond all memory, in close converse with the fetish, and
ignorant of the world but by intuition. The spirits of the aged and wise
are believed to dwell amongst them, and their prophecies and advice are
revered as emanations from the fetish. Adookoo, the chief of the
Braffoos, used sometimes to consult them in person, but generally
through his head fetishman, and the Fantees now attribute the successes
of the Ashantees, and their own defeats and misfortunes, to the
disregard of what the oracle enjoined; for, whilst it was obeyed, they
say the country always prospered; and, indeed, from the instances which
have been reported to me, the responses appear to have directed a just
and prudent policy, highly conducive to the welfare of Fantee. This dell
is so impervious, and yet so capacious, that many hundred Fantees were
secreted there, during the Ashantee invasions, which these priests had
predicted. The house or temple of the principal fetish of the Ahanta
country, called Checquoo, is at Apremmadoo, about four miles up the
Takaradee river: upwards of fifty superior priests are resident there.]

[Footnote 78: “And here I cannot but remark, that those accounts, when
compared, shew how little manners and minds improve in Africa, and how
long, and how much society has been there at a stand:—Jobson saw, in
1620, exactly what Park saw in 1798.” Sir W. Young.]

[Footnote 79: A slave dashing or devoting himself to Checquoo, the great
fetish of Ahanta, is never redeemed; the impression of the superior
power of that fetish being so awful, that the proprietor of the slave,
would believe the death of all his family inevitable, were he to redeem
him from the sanctuary.]

[Footnote 80: The different states of the water side revere different
animals as fetish: the hyæna is esteemed so at Accra, the alligator at
Dix Cove and Annamaboe, and vultures universally; and with more apparent
reason, as they consume all the offal of the neighbourhood, and thus
contribute to its health and cleanliness. A black man killing a hyæna at
Accra, would incur a serious penalty. A European is obliged to pay a
case of neat rum and one piece of white baft, in which the head of the
animal is wrapped, and afterwards buried by the natives. Almost every
resident on the coast, can speak to the imitative powers of the hyæna,
which Pliny has been ridiculed for reporting. In a fresh water pond at
Dix Cove, there is an alligator, about twelve feet long, which always
appears on the bank, at the call of the fetish men, who then throw it a
white fowl. In a modern natural history, I read, “in this part of the
world (Africa) also, as well as at Siam, the crocodile makes an object
of savage pomp, near the palaces of their monarchs. Philips informs us,
that at Sabi, on the slave coast, there are two pools of water near the
royal palace, where crocodiles are bred as we breed carp in our ponds in
Europe.” I never heard of any royal palaces, or of Sabi (probably
Assaboo) on the Slave Coast; the alligator of Dix Cove may possibly be
alluded to.]

[Footnote 81: Tuesday is the common fetish day on the coast, when they
neither fish or work in their plantations.]

[Footnote 82:


  Ille et nefasto te posuit die. Hor. 12, 13.


Romani pariter quosdam atros et nefastos habuere, eo quod in iis clades
acceperant; · · ·]

[Footnote 83: The coloring matter of the blue beads has been proved, by
experiment, to be iron; that of the yellow, without doubt, is lead and
antimony, with a trifling quantity of copper, though not essential to
the production of the color. The generality of these beads appear to be
produced from clays colored in thin layers, afterwards twisted together
into a spiral form, and then cut across: also from different colored
clays raked together without blending. How the flowers and delicate
patterns, in the body and on the surface of the rarer beads, have been
produced, cannot be so well explained. Besides the suite deposited in
the British Museum, I had the pleasure of presenting one of the most
interesting kind to Baron Humboldt; and I have also sent one to Sir
Richard Hoare, as it seemed to correspond so closely with the bead which
he found in one of the barrows, and describes, as follows, in his
History of Wiltshire. The notion of the rare virtues of the Glain
Neidyr, as well as of the continued good fortune of the finder, accords
exactly with the African superstitions. “A large glass bead, of the same
imperfect petrefaction as the pully beads, and resembling also, in
matter, the little figures that are found with the mummies in Egypt, and
are to be seen in the British Museum. This very curious bead has two
circular lines of opaque sky blue and white, which seem to represent a
serpent entwined round a centre, which is perforated. This was certainly
one of the Glain Neidyr of the Britons, derived from glain, which is
pure and holy, and neidyr a snake. Under the word glain, Mr. Owen, in
his Welsh Dictionary, has given the following article: “The Glain
neidyr, transparent stones, or adder stones, were worn by the different
orders of the bards, each having its appropriate color. There is no
certainty that they were worn from superstition originally; perhaps that
was the circumstance which gave rise to it. Whatever might have been the
cause, the _notion of their rare virtues was universal_ in all places
where the Bardic religion was taught. It may still be questioned whether
they are the production of nature or art.” The beads which are the
present object of my attention, are thus noticed by Bishop Gibson in his
improved edition of Camden’s Britannia. “In most parts of Wales, and
throughout all Scotland, and in Cornwall, we find it a common opinion of
the vulgar, that about Midsummer eve (although in the time they do not
all agree,) it is usual for snakes to meet in companies; and that by
joining heads together, and hissing, a kind of bubble is formed like a
ring, about the head of one of them, which the rest, by continual
hissing blow on till it comes off at the tail; and then it immediately
hardens, and resembles a glass ring, _which whoever finds (as some old
women and children are persuaded) shall prosper in all their
undertakings_. The rings which they suppose to be thus generated are
called Gleinu Nadroedh, i.e. Gemmæ Anguinum, whereof I have seen at
several places about twenty or thirty. They are small glass annulets,
commonly about half as wide as our finger rings, but much thicker; of a
green color, usually, though some of them are blue, and others curiously
waved with blue, red, and white. I have also seen two or three earthen
rings of this kind, but glazed with blue, and adorned with transverse
streaks in furrows on the outside. There seems to be some connection
between the Glein Neidyr of the Britons, and the Ovum Anguinum mentioned
by Pliny,[a] as being held in veneration by the Druids of Gaul, and to
the formation of which he gives nearly the same origin. They were
probably worn as an insigne, or mark of distinction, and suspended
around the neck, as the perforation is not sufficiently large to admit
the finger.”

The bead engraved in Tumulus No. 9, resembles closely a coarse sort of
bead, still manufactured in Syria, brought over by Dr. Meryon. The glass
globes dug up in Lincolnshire, and presented by Sir Joseph Banks to the
British Museum, are very like a distinct sort of aggry bead, dug by the
natives even more rarely than the others, but not larger than a moderate
sized apple: they are more opaque than the other beads, and the ground
or body is generally black, speckled confusedly with red, white, and
yellow.

_Aggry_ is the generic, not the abstract name; ‘_awynnee_’ is _bead_,
but aggry is an exotic word no native can explain. When first I heard of
similar beads having been lately dug in India, I associated for an
instant the expectation that it might have been in the neighbourhood of
Agra, and thus have thrown some light on the name; but it appears they
were found in Malabar. I am indebted for the following account of this
interesting discovery to a gentleman lately returned from India. “The
bead you sent me is more like those I saw in India, than any I have seen
before; but it is thicker and shorter; neither does the material of
which it is formed exactly agree with those in India, which appear to be
of a red glass, very like red carnelian (such, however, are frequent
among the Aggry beads) with white lines of enamel, inlaid, as it were,
in the body of the bead. I gave these to a friend in India, who promised
to send them to the Asiatic Society in Calcutta. The circles of stone in
which these beads have been found, abound most in Malabar, in the
neighbourhood of Calicut; but I have seen them in other parts of India,
and I am of opinion that they might be traced throughout the whole of
the southern peninsula. They are formed of large masses of rough stones,
placed round in irregular circles, some of very large extent, some of
smaller: they appear so much like natural rocks, that most persons would
pass them unobserved. Several of these circles about three years since
were excavated, in the vicinity of Calicut, and in the centre of each of
them we found, at the depth of about five feet, a large earthen jar of
the same shape as those found in Wiltshire, as near as we could judge,
for it was broken to pieces: it was about four or five feet deep, its
mouth in general closed with a square piece of granite: the beads were
found at the bottom of these jars with some pieces of iron, apparently
parts of swords and spears. There was an iron javelin found in one of
these places, tolerably perfect: it was about five feet long, with a
large iron knob at one end of it. In the centre of one of the circles we
came to a flight of seven steps, which led to a cave excavated in the
rock; it measured 11 feet in diameter, and 7 feet in its highest part;
the entrance to it was a square opening of about 18 inches, which was
closed up by an immense block of granite. We found in this place a great
number of earthen pots of very curious shape; in one of these there were
the remains of bones, which appeared to have been but imperfectly
calcined; in several of the larger jars there were the husks of rice,
which dropped into dust immediately they were opened. We found here also
an iron tripod, and a very curious stone, somewhat similar to what the
Indians now use for grinding their curry powder on. The large stones
forming the circles were set upright and capped with still larger ones.
They are not of granite, but of the stone of the country in which they
are situated; they are of different sizes; I have seen some of them 10
or 12 feet high, and the large stone on the top from 10 to 12 feet in
diameter, or perhaps more. Coimbatore is a district situated between the
Coromandel and Malabar coasts; it is bounded on the east by the river
Cavery, on the banks of which the tumuli are in general situated. In
some, a few silver coins have been found, of a square figure, with
characters on them, which none of the most learned Bramins have been as
yet able to make out; it is in these also that remains of very large
swords, &c. have been found. The Roman coins to the number of upwards of
90 were all of gold, and Nero’s; each of them had a cut or slit in it.
They were not found in one of these barrows, but were discovered in a
garden by one of the natives when digging: they were in a small copper
pot. Pandu Kuri literally means Pandu’s caves or holes. Pandu is a very
celebrated personage in the Hindoo Mythology, and a great warrior; it is
common in India to ascribe to him all great works of antiquity; this
term therefore only shews that those places are very ancient, and that
the present inhabitants are quite ignorant of their origin.”]

[Footnote a: Præterea est ovorum genus in magna Galliarum fama, omissum
Græcis. Angues innumeri æstate convoluti, salivis faucium, corporumque
spumis artifici complexu glomerantur, anguinum appellantur. Druidæ
sibilis id dicunt in sublime jactari, sagoque oportere intercipi ne
tellurem attingat. Profugere raptorem equo. Serpentes enim insequi donec
arceant amnis alicujus interventu. Experimentum ejus esse si contra
aquas fluitet vel auro cinctum Insigne Druidis. Ad victorias litium ac
regum aditus maxime laudat. Plinii Hist. Natural. L. 29. c. 3.]




                               CHAPTER V.

                               * * * * *

                               _Customs._


The Yam Custom is annual, just at the maturity of that vegetable, which
is planted in December, and not eaten until the conclusion of the
custom, the early part of September. All the caboceers and captains, and
the majority of the tributaries, are enjoined to attend, none being
excused, but such as the Kings of Inta, and Dagwumba, (who send
deputations of their principal caboceers,) and those who have been
dispatched elsewhere on public business. If a chief or caboceer has
offended, or if his fidelity be suspected, he is seldom accused or
punished until the Yam Custom, which they attend frequently unconscious,
and always uncertain of what may be laid to their charge. The Yam Custom
is like the Saturnalia; neither theft, intrigue, or assault are
punishable during the continuance, but the grossest liberty prevails,
and each sex abandons itself to its passions.

On Friday the 5th of September, the number, splendor, and variety of
arrivals, thronging from the different paths, was as astonishing as
entertaining; but there was an alloy in the gratification, for the
principal caboceers sacrificed a slave at each quarter of the town, on
their entré.

In the afternoon of Saturday, the King received all the caboceers and
captains in the large area, where the Dankara canons are placed. The
scene was marked with all the splendor of our own entré, and many
additional novelties. The crush in the distance was awful and
distressing. All the heads of the kings and caboceers whose kingdoms had
been conquered, from Saï Tootoo to the present reign, with those of the
chiefs who had been executed for subsequent revolts, were displayed by
two parties of executioners, each upwards of a hundred, who passed in an
impassioned dance, some with the most irresistible grimace, some with
the most frightful gesture: they clashed their knives on the skulls, in
which sprigs of thyme were inserted, to keep the spirits from troubling
the King. I never felt so grateful for being born in a civilized
country. Firing and drinking palm wine were the only divertissemens to
the ceremony of the caboceers presenting themselves to the King; they
were announced, and passed all round the circle saluting every umbrella:
their bands preceded; we reckoned above forty drums in that of the King
of Dwabin. The effect of the splendor, the tumult, and the musquetry,
was afterwards heightened by torch light. We left the ground at 10
o’clock; the umbrellas were crowded even in the distant streets, the
town was covered like a large fair, the broken sounds of distant horns
and drums filled up the momentary pauses of the firing which encircled
us: the uproar continued until four in the morning, just before which
the King retired. I have attempted a drawing, (No. 2.) it is by no means
adequate, yet more so than description could be.

[Illustration: _Drawn by T. E. Bowdich Esqr._

_Engraved by R. Havell & Son._

THE FIRST DAY OF THE YAM CUSTOM.

_Published Decr. 2, 1818, by John Murray, Albemarle Street._]

On the left side of the drawing is a group of captains dancing and
firing, as described in our entré. Immediately above the encircling
soldiery, is a young caboceer under his umbrella, borne on the shoulders
of his chief slave; he salutes as he passes along, and is preceded and
surrounded by boys (with elephants tails, feathers, &c.) and his
captains, who, lifting their swords in the air, halloo out the deeds of
his fore-fathers; his stool is borne close to him, ornamented with a
large brass bell. Above is the fanciful standard of a chief, who is
preceded and followed by numerous attendants; he is supported round the
waist by a confidential slave, and one wrist is so heavily laden with
gold, that it is supported on the head of a small boy; with the other
hand he is saluting a seated caboceer, sawing the air by a motion from
the wrist. His umbrella is sprung up and down to increase the breeze,
and large grass fans are also playing; his handsomest slave girl
follows, bearing on her head a small red leather trunk, full of gold
ornaments, and rich cloths; behind are soldiers and drummers, who throw
their white-washed drums in the air, and catch them again, with much
agility and grimace, as they walk along. Boys are in the front, bearing
elephants tails, fly flappers, &c. and his captains with uplifted
swords, are hastening forward the musicians and soldiers. Amongst the
latter is the stool, so stained with blood that it is thought decent to
cover it with red silk. Behind the musicians is Odumata, coming round to
join the procession in his state hammock lined with red taffeta, and
smoking under his umbrella, at the top of which is a stuffed leopard. In
the area below is an unfortunate victim, tortured in the manner
described in the entré, and two of the King’s messengers clearing the
way for him. The King’s four linguists are seen next; two, Otee and
Quancum, are seated in conversation under an umbrella; the chief,
Adoosey, is swearing a royal messenger, (to fetch an absent caboceer,)
by putting a gold handled sword between his teeth, whilst Agay delivers
the charge, and exhorts him to be resolute. The criers, all deformed and
with monkey skin caps, are seated in the front. Under the next umbrella
is the royal stool, thickly cased in gold. Gold pipes, fans of ostrich
wing feathers, captains seated with gold swords, wolves heads and snakes
as large as life of the same metal, depending from the handles, girls
bearing silver bowls, body guards, &c. &c. are mingled together till we
come to the King, seated in a chair of ebony and gold, and dressed much
in the same way as described at the first interview. He is holding up
his two fingers to receive the oath of the captain to the right, who,
pointing to a distant country, vows to conquer it. On the right and left
of the state umbrella are the flags of Great Britain, Holland, and
Denmark. A group of painted figures are dancing up to the King, in the
most extravagant attitudes, beating time with their long knives on the
skulls stuck full of thyme. On the right of the King is the eunuch, who
superintends the group of small boys, the children of the nobility,
waving elephants tails, (spangled with gold,) feathers, &c.: behind him
is the above mentioned captain and other chiefs dressed as in the left
end of the drawing. Musicians, seated and standing, are playing on
instruments cased or plated with gold. The officers of the Mission are
next seen, their linguists in front, their soldiers, servants, and flag
behind, at the back of whom is placed the King’s state hammock, under
its own umbrella. Adjoining the officers is old Quatchie Quofie and his
followers; at the top of his umbrella is stuck a small black wooden
image, with a bunch of rusty hair on the head, intending to represent
the famous Akim caboceer who was killed by him; vain of the action, he
is seen according to his usual custom, dancing before and deriding his
fallen enemy, whilst his captains bawl out the deed, and halloo their
acclamations. The manner of drinking palm wine is exhibited in the next
group, a boy kneels beneath with a second bowl to catch the droppings,
(it being a great luxury to suffer the liquor to run over the beard,)
whilst the horns flourish, and the captains halloo the strong names. The
Moors are easily distinguished by their caps, and preposterous turbans.
One is blessing a Dagwumba caboceer, who is passing on horseback, (the
animal covered with fetishes and bells,) escorted by his men in tunics,
bearing lances, and his musicians with rude violins, distinct from the
sanko. The back of the whole assembly is lined with royal soldiers, and
the commoner ones are ranged in front, with here and there a captain and
a group of musicians, who, some with an old cocked hat, some with a
soldier’s jacket, &c. &c. afford a ludicrous appearance. This
description will be rendered more illustrative of the drawing, by
referring to that of our entré.

The next morning the King ordered a large quantity of rum to be poured
into brass pans, in various parts of the town; the crowd pressing
around, and drinking like hogs; freemen and slaves, women and children,
striking, kicking, and trampling each other under foot, pushed head
foremost into the pans, and spilling much more than they drank. In less
than an hour, excepting the principal men, not a sober person was to be
seen, parties of four reeling and rolling under the weight of another,
whom they affected to be carrying home; strings of women covered with
red paint, hand in hand, falling down like rows of cards; the commonest
mechanics and slaves furiously declaiming on state palavers; the most
discordant music, the most obscene songs, children of both sexes
prostrate in insensibility. All wore their handsomest cloths, which they
trailed after them to a great length, in a drunken emulation of
extravagance and dirtiness.[84]

Towards evening the populace grew sober again, the strange caboceers
displayed their equipages in every direction, and at five o’clock there
was a procession from the palace to the south end of the town and back;
the King and the dignitaries were carried in their hammocks, and passed
through a continued blaze of musketry: the crush was dreadful. The next
day (Monday) was occupied in state palavers, and on Tuesday the diet
broke up, and most of the caboceers took leave.

About a hundred persons, mostly culprits reserved, are generally
sacrificed, in different quarters of the town, at this custom. Several
slaves were also sacrificed at Bantama, over the large brass pan, their
blood mingling with the various vegetable and animal matter within,
(fresh and putrefied,) to complete the charm, and produce invincible
fetish. All the chiefs kill several slaves, that their blood may flow
into the hole from whence the new yam is taken. Those who cannot afford
to kill slaves, take the head of one already sacrificed and place it on
the hole.[85]

The royal gold ornaments are melted down every Yam Custom, and fashioned
into new patterns, as novel as possible. This is a piece of state policy
very imposing on the populace, and the tributary chiefs who pay but an
annual visit.

About ten days after the custom, the whole of the royal houshold eat new
yam for the first time, in the market place, the King attending. The
next day he and the captains set off for Sarrasoo before sun rise, to
perform their annual ablutions in the river Dah. Almost all the
inhabitants follow him, and the capital appears deserted; the succeeding
day the King washes in the marsh at the south-east end of the town, the
captains lining the streets leading to it on both sides. He is attended
by his suite, but he laves the water with his own hands over himself,
his chairs, stools, gold and silver plate, and the various articles of
furniture used especially by him. Several brass pans are covered with
white cloth, with various fetish under them. About twenty sheep are
dipped, (one sheep and one goat only are sacrificed at the time,) to be
killed in the palace in the afternoon, that their blood may be poured on
the stools and door posts. All the doors, windows, and arcades of the
palace, are plentifully besmeared with a mixture of eggs, and palm oil;
as also the stools of the different tribes and families. After the
ceremony of washing is over, the principal captains precede the King to
the palace, where, contrary to usual custom, none but those of the first
rank are allowed to enter, to see the procession pass. The King’s fetish
men walk first, with attendants holding basins of sacred water, which
they sprinkle plentifully over the chiefs with branches,[86] the more
superstitious running to have a little poured on their heads, and even
on their tongues. The King and his attendants all wear white cloths on
this occasion. Three white lambs are led before him, intended for
sacrifice at his bed chamber. All his wives follow, with a guard of
archers.

Another national custom is the Adaï, by the number of which the
Ashantees appear to reckon their year, which began, I could not
understand why, on the first of October. The common people pretend, or
believe, that the time for repeating the Adaï, is marked by the falling
of a fruit like a gourd, from a tree called Brebretim, and which
generally takes place in about twenty days from its first appearance,
all the birds and beasts in the neighbourhood crying out simultaneously.
They further pretend, that from the fruit of this tree spring various
kinds of vegetables. This account of the tree, known in Warsaw as well,
is peculiar to Ashantee. The customs are alternately called the great
and little Adaï, the former taking place always on a Sunday, the latter
on a Wednesday; and it appeared to me, from calculation, that there were
six weeks between each great Adaï, and six between each little one, so
that the custom was generally held every twenty-one days.

The large drum which stands at the entrance of the palace, adorned with
skulls and thigh bones, is struck with great force at sun set the
preceding day, as a signal; the whole of the establishment of the palace
shout, and their shout is echoed by the people throughout the town.
Music and firing generally beguile the night. The next morning the King
goes to the fetish house, (Himma,) opposite the palace, and offers
several sheep; the blood of this sacrifice is poured on the gold stool,
to which extraordinary virtues are ascribed, being considered the
palladium of the kingdom: the deposition of Saï Quamina was protracted
from his having it in his possession at Dwabin. The caboceers and
captains, many coming from towns two or three days distant, begin to
march to the large yard of the palace about sun rise, to secure their
places. We generally attended between nine and ten, when the King had
just seated himself. The first ceremony was penetrating to the King,
through the various state officers and attendants, to wish him good
morning, at which he slightly inclined his head. The chiefs as they
advanced to do so, were supported and followed by a few favourite
attendants, who flourished their swords in the air, the gold handles
upwards, and the band of each began to play as he left his seat. Young
caboceers of five and six years of age, stalked by with interesting
vanity. After this the King left his chair, which was turned upside
down, and retired a few minutes into the palace. All the horns
flourished as he made his exit and entrée; swords, feathers, elephants
tails, were waved rapidly, and the drums beaten with deafening effect.
After he was seated, the linguists, preceded by their gold canes and
insignia, presented a sheep, a flask of rum, (drank on the ground,) and
ten ackies of gold to each superior captain, and somewhat less to the
others. Another flourish proclaimed the dispensation of the King’s
bounty. Five or six men then rose; and chaunted his deeds and titles for
about ten minutes. I regret exceedingly that this chaunt was not noted,
it was so harmonious. I observed them put something between their teeth
before they began. The same tedious form of saluting the King was now
repeated to return thanks. Any new law was afterwards promulgated, which
occurred but twice during our stay, and the levee broke up on the King’s
leaving his chair. Not unfrequently the whole took place during heavy
rain. It was computed that the King dashed or presented forty pereguins
of gold (£400.) every Adaï custom.[87]

The decease of a person is announced by a discharge of musketry,
proportionate to his rank, or the wealth of his family. In an instant
you see a crowd of slaves burst from the house, and run towards the
bush, flattering themselves that the hindmost, or those surprised in the
house, will furnish the human victims for sacrifice, if they can but
secrete themselves until the custom is over. The body is then handsomely
drest in silk and gold, and laid out on the bed, the richest cloths
beside it.[88] One or two slaves are then sacrificed at the door of the
house. I shall describe the custom for Quatchie Quofie’s mother, which
we witnessed August the 2d.; it was by no means a great one, but it will
give the most correct idea of these splendid, but barbarous ceremonies.
The King, Quatchie Quofie, and Odumata each sacrificed a young girl
directly the deceased had breathed her last, that she might not want for
attendants until the greater sacrifice was made. The retainers,
adherents, and friends of the family then sent contributions of gold,
powder, rum, and cloth, to be expended at the custom; the King, as heir,
exceeding every quota but that of the nearest relative, who succeeded to
the stool and slaves. The King also sent a sum of gold, and some rich
cloths to be buried with the deceased, in the basket or coffin. I could
not learn the various sums of gold dust with sufficient accuracy to note
them, but the following were the quantities of powder presented on the
occasion:

  Quatchie Quofie                20 oz. (of gold) kegs.

  King                            4

  King’s brother                  2

  Amanquateä                      2

  Odumata                         2

  Apokoo                          1

  Otee                            1

  Yapensoo                        1

  Amanqua Abiniowa (the nephew)   2

  (Name illegible)                1

  Adoosey                         1

  Jessinting                      1

  Saphoo                          1

  Ooshoo                          1

  Inferior retainers              4
                                 --
                                 44 nearly 12 barrels.

The inferior retainers of Quatchie Quofie gave four ackies of gold, and
eight fathoms of cloth each. I was told these contributions were
unusually small, from the command of the King that the greatest economy
should be observed in every expenditure of powder, on account of the
approaching war.

We walked to Assafoo about twelve o’clock; the vultures were hovering
around two headless trunks, scarcely cold. Several troops of women, from
fifty to a hundred in each, were dancing by in movements resembling
skaiting, lauding and bewailing the deceased in the most dismal, yet not
discordant strains; audible, from the vast number, at a considerable
distance. Other troops carried the rich cloths and silks of the deceased
on their heads, in shining brass pans, twisted and stuffed into crosses,
cones, globes, and a fanciful variety of shapes only to be imagined, and
imposing at a small distance the appearance of rude deities. The faces,
arms, and breasts of these women were profusely daubed with red earth,
in horrid emulation of those who had succeeded in besmearing themselves
with the blood of the victims. The crowd was overbearing; horns, drums,
and muskets, yells, groans, and screeches invaded our hearing with as
many horrors as were crowded on our sight. Now and then a victim was
hurried by, generally dragged or run along at full speed; the uncouth
dress, and the exulting countenances of those who surrounded him,
likening them to as many fiends. I observed apathy, more frequently than
despair or emotion, in the looks of the victims. The chiefs and captains
were arriving in all directions, announced by the firing of muskets, and
the peculiar flourishes of their horns, many of which were by this time
familiar to us; they were then habited plainly as warriors, and were
soon lost to our sight in the crowd. As old Odumata passed in his
hammock, he bade us observe him well when he passed again: this prepared
us in a small degree. Presently the King’s arrival in the market place
was announced, the crowd rolled towards it impetuously, but the soldiery
hacked on all sides indiscriminately, and formed a passage for the
procession. Quatchie Quofie hurried by, plunging from side to side like
a Bacchanal, drunk with the adulation of his bellowing supporters; his
attitudes were responsive to the horror and barbarism of the exultations
which inspired them. The victims, with large knives driven through their
cheeks, eyed him with indifference; he them with a savage joy, bordering
on phrenzy: insults were aggravated on the one, flattery lavished on the
other. Our disgust was beguiled for an instant by surprise. The chiefs
who had just before passed us in their swarthy cloths, and the dark
gloomy habits of war, now followed Quatchie Quofie, glistening in all
the splendor of their fetish dresses; (see drawing, No. I.) the
sprightly variety of their movements ill accorded with the ceremony. Old
Odumata’s vest was covered with fetish, cased invariably in gold or
silver. A variety of extraordinary ornament and novel insignia, courted
and reflected the sun in every direction. It was like a splendid
pantomime after a Gothic tragedy.

We followed to the market place. The King, and the chiefs not
immediately connected with Quatchie Quofie, were seated under their
canopies, with the usual insignia and retinue, and lined about the half
of a circle, apparently half a mile in circumference; the soldiery
completed it, their respective chiefs situated amongst them. Thirteen
victims, surrounded by their executioners, whose black shaggy caps and
vests gave them the appearance of bears rather than men, were pressed
together by the crowd to the left of the King. The troops of women,
before described, paraded without the circle, vociferating the dirge.
Rum and palm wine were flowing copiously, horns and drums were exerted
even to frenzy. In an instant there was a burst of musketry near the
King, and it spread and continued incessantly, around the circle, for
upwards of an hour. The soldiers kept their stations, but the chiefs,
after firing, bounded once round the area with the gesture and
extravagance of madmen; their panting followers enveloping them in
flags, occasionally firing in all the attitudes of a scaramouch, and
incessantly bellowing the strong names of their exulting chief, whose
musket they snatched from his hands directly he had fired. An old hag,
described as the head fetish woman of the family, screamed and plunged
about in the midst of the fire as if in the greatest agonies. The
greater the chief the heavier the charge of powder he is allowed to
fire; the heaviest charge recollected, was that fired by the King on the
death of his sister, 18 ackies, or an ounce avoirdupoise. Their
blunderbusses and long guns were almost all braced closely with the
cordage of the country; they were generally supported by their
attendants whilst they fired, several did not appear to recover it for
nearly a minute; Odumata’s old frame seemed shaken almost to
dissolution. Many made a point of collecting near us, just within the
circle, and firing as close as possible to startle us; the frequent
bursting of their muskets made this rather alarming as well as
disagreeable. The firing abated, they drank freely from the bowls of
palm wine, religiously pouring a small quantity on the ground before
they raised them to their lips.[89]

The principal females of the family, many of them very handsome, and of
elegant figures, came forward to dance; dressed, generally, in yellow
silk, with a silver knife hung by a chain round their necks; one with a
gold, another with a silver horn; a few were dressed as fetish women; an
umbrella was held over the grand daughter as she danced. The Ashantees
dance incomparably better than the people of the water side, indeed
elegantly; the sexes do not dance separately, as in Fantee, but the man
encircles the woman with a piece of silk which he generally flirts in
his right hand, supports her round the waist, receives her elbows in the
palms of his hands, and a variety of figures approximating, with the
time and movement, very closely to the waltz.

A dash of sheep and rum was exchanged between the King and Quatchie
Quofie, and the drums announced the sacrifice of the victims. All the
chiefs first visited them in turn; I was not near enough to distinguish
wherefore. The executioners wrangled and struggled for the office, and
the indifference with which the first poor creature looked on, in the
torture he was from the knife passed through his cheeks, was remarkable:
the nearest executioner snatched the sword from the others, the right
hand of the victim was then lopped off, he was thrown down, and his head
was sawed rather than cut off; it was cruelly prolonged, I will not say
wilfully. Twelve more were dragged forward, but we forced our way
through the crowd, and retired to our quarters. Other sacrifices,
principally female, were made in the bush where the body was buried. It
is usual to “wet the grave” with the blood of a freeman of
respectability. All the retainers of the family being present, and the
heads of all the victims deposited in the bottom of the grave, several
are unsuspectingly called on in a hurry to assist in placing the coffin
or basket, and just as it rests on the heads or skulls, a slave from
behind stuns one of these freemen by a violent blow, followed by a deep
gash in the back part of the neck, and he is rolled in on the top of the
body, and the grave instantly filled up. A sort of carnival, varied by
firing, drinking, singing, and dancing, was kept up in Assafoo for
several days; the chiefs generally visiting it every evening, or sending
their linguists with a dash of palm wine or rum to Quatchie Quofie; and
I was given to understand, that, but for the approaching war and the
necessary economy of powder, there would have been eight great customs
instead of one, for this woman, one weekly, the King himself firing at
the last. The last day, all the females in any way connected with the
family (who are not allowed to eat for three days after the death,
though they may drink as much palm wine as they please,) paraded round
the town, singing a compliment and thanks to all those who had assisted
in making the custom.

On the death of a King, all the Customs which have been made for the
subjects who have died during his reign, must be simultaneously repeated
by the families, (the human sacrifices as well as the carousals and
pageantry) to amplify that for the monarch, which is also solemnised,
independently, but at the same time, in every excess of extravagance and
barbarity. The brothers, sons, and nephews of the King, affecting
temporary insanity, burst forth with their muskets, and fire
promiscously amongst the crowd; even a man of rank, if they meet him, is
their victim, nor is their murder of him or any other, on such an
occasion, visited or prevented; the scene can scarcely be imagined. Few
persons of rank dare to stir from their houses for the first two or
three days, but religiously drive forth all their vassals and slaves, as
the most acceptable composition of their own absence. The King’s Ocras,
who will be mentioned presently, are all murdered on his tomb, to the
number of a hundred or more, and women in abundance. I was assured by
several, that the custom for Saï Quamina, was repeated weekly for three
months, and that two hundred slaves were sacrificed, and 25 barrels of
powder fired, each time. But the custom for the King’s mother, the
regent of the kingdom during the invasion of Fantee, is most celebrated.
The King of himself devoted 3000 victims, (upwards of 2000 of whom were
Fantee prisoners) and 25 barrels of powder.[90] Dwabin, Kokoofoo,
Becqua, Soota, and Marmpong, furnished 100 victims, and 20 barrels of
powder, each, and most of the smaller towns 10 victims, and two barrels
of powder, each. The Kings, and Kings only, are buried in the cemetery
at Bantama, and the sacred gold buried with them; (see Laws;) their
bones are afterwards deposited in a building there, opposite to which is
the largest brass pan I ever saw, (for sacrifices,) being about five
feet in diameter, with four small lions on the edge. Here human
sacrifices are frequent and ordinary, to water the graves of the Kings.
The bodies of chiefs are frequently carried about with the army, to keep
them for interment at home, and eminent revolters or enemies also, to be
exposed in the capital. Boiteäm, (the father of Otee the fourth
linguist,) who accompanied the army of Abiniowa in his political
capacity, dying at Akrofroom in Aquapim, during the campaign, his body
was kept with the army two months before it arrived at Coomassie. I
could not get any information on their treatment of the corpse, beyond
their invariable reply that they smoked it well over a slow fire.

The laws of Ashantee allow the King 3333 wives, which number is
carefully kept up, to enable him to present women to those who
distinguish themselves, but never exceeded, being in their eyes a
mystical one. Many of these reside in a secluded part of the King’s
croom, or country residence, at Barramang; a greater number in a croom,
at the back of the palace, immediately in the marsh; and the remainder
in two streets of the capital. Many, probably, the King has never seen.
The streets as well as the croom, are inhabited by them exclusively, and
never approached but by the King’s messengers, or their female
relatives, who only communicate with them at the entrances, which are
closed at each end with bamboo doors, where there is always a guard. If
the King _consaws_ or marries an infant at the breast, which is not
unfrequent, she is thenceforth confined to the house, and rigorously
secluded from the sight of any but the female part of her family. The
King has seldom more than six wives resident with him in the palace. On
the occasion of signing the treaty, as explained in the public letter,
about 300 were assembled, and none but the King’s Chamberlain, and the
deputies of the parts of the government, were allowed to be present:
they were addressed through their own linguist, a very decrepid old man;
many of them were very handsome, and their figures exquisite. When they
go out, which is seldom, they are encircled and preceded by troops of
small boys with thongs or whips of elephants hide, who lash every one
severely who does not quit their path for another, or jump into the bush
with his hands before his eyes; and sometimes the offenders are heavily
fined besides. The scrambling their approach occasioned, in the more
public parts of the city, was very diverting; captains, caboceers,
slaves, and children tumbling one over another. I was told what it cost
the King daily to support them, but it has escaped me; they are said to
live as daintily as himself. None but the chief eunuch, an immense
creature, is allowed to bear a message to the King when in the seraglio
of the palace.

It has been mentioned before, that the King’s sisters are not only
countenanced in intrigue, with any handsome subject, but they are
allowed to choose any eminently so, (however inferior otherwise,) as a
husband; who is presently advised by the King of his good fortune; thus
they consider they provide for a personal superiority in their monarchs.
But if the royal bride dies before the husband, unless his rank be
originally elevated, he is expected to kill himself on the occasion, and
also if the only male child dies: if he hesitates, he is peremptorily
reminded that as either are his superiors, to whom he is to be
considered as a slave, so he must attend them wherever they go; and when
a male child is born, the father does it homage and acknowledges his
vassalage in the most abject manner.

The Ocra’s are distinguished by a large circle of gold suspended from
the neck; many of them are favourite slaves, many, commoners who have
distinguished themselves, and who are glad to stake their lives on the
King’s, to be kept free from palavers and supported by his bounty, which
they are entirely; some few are relatives and men of rank. All of the
two former classes, excepting only the two or three individuals known to
have been entrusted with the King’s state secrets, are sacrificed on his
tomb. The royal messengers, and others of the suite have been described
in the processions; they are sometimes fed in the palace, but they have
a free seat at the table of every subject.

The King has a troop of small boys, who carry the fetish bows and
arrows, and are licensed plunderers; they are so sly and nimble, that it
is very diverting to watch them in the market place, which they infest
every morning. Whatever they can carry off is fair game, and cannot be
required or recovered; but the loser, if he can catch them before they
arrive at the palace, may beat them as severely as he pleases, short of
mortal injury; however, they bear it as obdurately as young Spartans.
Sometimes one party trips up a person with a load of provisions, whilst
another scrambles them up: the anxious alarm of the market people,
sitting with sticks in their hands, and the comic archness of these boys
threading the crowd in all directions, is indescribable. Some of the
earliest European travellers in Abyssinia met with a similar troop of
royal plunderers, and I believe suffered from them; our property was
always respected by them, but they used to entertain themselves with
mimicking our common expressions and our actions, which they did
inimitably: whilst sketching, they buzzed about me like musquitoes. The
Ashantees are without exception the most surprising mimics I have ever
heard. I have known a captain, called Adoo Quamina, repeat a sentence
after I had finished it, of at least a dozen words, which he knew
nothing about, and had not heard before. The King has a sort of buffoon,
whose movements were as irresistibly comic as those of Grimaldi.

The King appeared to have nearly a hundred negroes of different colors,
through the shades of red and pink to white; they were collected for
state, but were generally disgusting objects, diseased and emaciated;
they always seemed as if going to shed their skins, and their eyes
blinked in the light, as if it was not their element.

About twenty pots of white soup, and twenty pots of black (made with
palm nuts) are cooked daily at the palace, (besides those for the
consumption of the household,) for visitors of consequence, and a
periguin of gold is given daily to Yokokroko, the chamberlain, for palm
wine. This would have appeared too large a sum, had I not witnessed the
vast consumption and waste of it; for the vigour of an Ashantee being
estimated by the measure of the draught he can drink off; nearly half is
generally spilt over his beard, which it is his greatest pride and
luxury to draw through his fingers when wet. The King was very proud of
the superior length of his beard. A large quantity of palm wine is
dashed to the retinues of all the captains attending in the course of
the day; much is expended in the almost daily ceremony of drinking it in
state in the market place; and our party was always well provided for in
the course of the evening. The palm wine at the palace was seldom good,
but a zest was excited by the exquisite polish of the plate in which it
was served. Apokoo, Odumata, and others, sent us some daily that was
excellent.

It is to be observed that the King’s weights are one third heavier than
the current weights of the country; and all the gold expended in
provision being weighed out in the former, and laid out in the latter,
the difference enriches the chamberlain, cook, and chief domestic
officers of the palace, as it is thought derogatory to a King avowedly
to pay his subjects for their services. In the same manner the linguists
derive the greater part of their incomes, (their influence being
occasionally purchased,) for all the dashes or presents of gold the King
makes in the year, are weighed out by the royal weights, and re-weighed
by them in the current ones. The law allows a debtor to recover of a
reluctant or tardy creditor, in the King’s weights, besides the
interest, (noticed in the laws,) if he is esteemed enough by Apokoo the
treasurer, to be trusted with them; or rather, if he can afford to bribe
him, or engages to share the profit with him.

After a subject is executed for crime, the body and head are carried out
of town by some of the King’s slaves, appointed for that purpose, and
thrown where the wild beasts may devour them; but if the deceased be of
any consequence, some of his friends conceal themselves near where they
know the body will be carried, and purchase it, and the right of burial,
of these domestics, generally for eight ackies. There are a number of
fine large sheep, decorated with bells and other ornaments, about the
palace. If any person gets into an ordinary palaver, and wishes the
King’s interference in his favor, he goes to the captain who has the
charge of these sheep, pays him 20 ackies for one, and sends or takes it
to the King, as a dash, who commits it again to the care of the captain.

When the King sends an ambassador, he enriches the splendor of his suite
and attire as much as possible; sometimes provides it entirely; but it
is all surrendered on the return, (except the additional wives) and
forms a sort of public state wardrobe. The King’s system of espionage is
much spoken of (for its address and infallibility) by Apokoo and others,
who abet it. A shrewd but mean boy is attached to, or follows the
embassy, (sometimes with a trader,) in the commonest capacity and
meanest attire; and he is instructed to collect every report as he
passes, and to watch the motions of the embassy as closely as possible.
As the extortions of these deputies are always loudly and publicly
complained of by the injured inhabitants of the dependent or tributary
crooms they pass through, (perhaps being aware they will reach the
King’s ears,) the particulars are easily acquired. The messengers who
were sent with our first dispatches to Cape Coast, excusing the length
of the time, (forty days) by alleging that it was found necessary to
collect a session of the Fantee caboceers at Paintree; the King replied,
“You tell me a lie; you fined a captain there four ounces for breaking
an Ashantee law, and you waited to procure and expend the gold, not
intending it should be known.” The men instantly confessed, and were put
in irons; one was the brother of Yokokroko, who paid six ounces for his
release, after several days.

When the King spits, the boys with the elephants tails sedulously wipe
it up, or cover it with sand; when he sneezes, every person present
touches, or lays the two first fingers across the forehead and breast,
as the Moors did when they pronounced a blessing, and the Ashantees,
invariably, to propitiate one. These troops of boys who carry the
elephants tails, are the sons of men of rank and confidence; for
whenever the King dignifies a deserving subject, with what may be termed
nobility, he exchanges some of his own sons or nephews, (from eight to
fourteen years of age,) for those of the individual, who maintains them,
and for whom they perform the same offices, as his own and others do for
the King. Thus the present King (the short reign of his brother Saï
Apokoo being unanticipated) carried an elephants tail before Apokoo,
whose kindness and indulgence to the child secured the preference of the
monarch.

It is a frequent practice of the King’s, to consign sums of gold to the
care of rising captains, without requiring them from them for two or
three years, at the end of which time he expects the captain not only to
restore the principal, but to prove that he has acquired sufficient of
his own, from the use of it, to support the greater dignity the King
would confer on him. If he has not, his talent is thought too mean for
further elevation. Should he have no good traders amongst his
dependents, (for if he has there is no difficulty) usury and worse
resources are countenanced, and thought more creditable than a failure,
ascribed to want of talent rather than to a regard of principle.

The fees to the King’s household on a captain being raised to a stool,
are generally eight ounces. I saw two instances of the King paying them
himself; the individuals, very suddenly elevated for extraordinary
courage, being too poor to do so. They were immediately dispatched to
collect tributes, the per centage on which, (see Laws,) and the
douceurs, which may be judged of by the amount provided for them in the
settlement of the Commenda palaver, would possess them of a good sum to
begin with.

The interference of Amanquateä, Quatchie Quofie, Odumata, and Apokoo, is
purchased at a most extravagant rate by offenders, whether foreigners or
subjects; it is irresistible with the King; Apokoo is generally
preferred; minor influence is purchased in proportion. No subject can
sit in public with a cushion on his stool, unless it has been presented
to him by the King, or one of the four, who, as well as all the other
superior captains, receive a periguin of gold for every oath the King
exacts of them.

During the minority, or the earlier part of the reign of a monarch, the
linguists and oldest counsellors visit him betimes every morning, and
repeat, in turn, all the great deeds of his ancestors. The greatest
deference seemed to be paid to aged experience or wisdom.

Apokoo is the keeper of the royal treasury, and has the care of all the
tributes, which are deposited, separately, in a large apartment of the
palace, of which he only has the key. Numerous and various as the sums
are, he disposes of them by a local association which is said to be
infallible with him, for the Moorish secretary, (who resided some time
at Hio,) only records the greater political events. Apokoo holds a sort
of exchequer court at his own house daily, (when he is attended by two
of the King’s linguists, and various state insignia,) to decide all
cases affecting tribute or revenue, and the appeal to the King is seldom
resorted to. He generally reclined on his lofty bed, (of accumulated
cushions, and covered with a large rich cloth or piece of silk,) with
two or three of his handsomest wives near him, whilst the pleadings were
going forward. He was always much gratified when I attended, and rose to
seat me beside him. I observed that all calculations were made,
explained, and recorded, by cowries. In one instance, after being
convinced by a variety of evidence that a public debtor was unable to
pay gold, he commuted sixteen ounces of gold, for twenty men slaves.
Several captains, who were his followers, attended this court daily with
large suites, and it was not only a crowded, but frequently a splendid
scene. Before the footoorh or treasury bag is unlocked by the weigher,
though it be by the King’s order, Apokoo must strike it with his hand in
sanction.

In all public trials, the charges are preferred, in outline, against the
criminal by the King’s linguists, and he is always heard fully, and
obliged to commit or exculpate himself on every point, and to take the
various primary oaths, before the witnesses are confronted with him; of
whom he is kept as ignorant as possible until the moment of their
appearance. The oaths, sometimes four or five, are progressive,
generally beginning by the King’s foot, or some arbitrary form, and are,
apparently, not considered awful or decisive; such perjuries being
commutable by fine. But when the oath, “by the King’s father,” is
administered, every one looks serious, and if, “by Cormantee and
Saturday” (see History) is resorted to, there is a gloomy silence; but
this is seldom ventured, if the witnesses, (hurried in with a sort of
stage effect between that and the former oaths,) confound or perplex the
accused.

There are various ways of taking fetish; the two I observed, were,
licking a white fowl twice or thrice, and drinking a nauseous vegetable
juice without coughing: it was administered by the linguists out of a
brass pan in a folded leaf of the plant. If the accused is cleared, he
comes forward, and is marked with white chalk by the linguists, after
which he bows to, and thanks all the great men in the council. Taking
doom is the infallible test, when they consider the case to be too
doubtful for human decision. The bark of that tree is put into a large
calabash with water, so as to make a strong infusion; it is stirred up
whilst the suspected parties sip in turn. It operates, instantaneously
and convulsively, as a most violent emetic and purge; those who sip
first may recover, and the dregs are frequently left designedly for the
obnoxious.[91]

The criers, upwards of a hundred, who always attend the linguists, are
all deformed or maimed, to make them more conspicuous; they wear a
monkey skin cap, with a gold plate in front, and the tail hanging down
behind. Their common exclamations are, Tehoo! Tehing! Odiddee! Be
silent! Be quiet! Pray hear! and these are so incessantly uttered, that
they are themselves the only interruption. Several less interesting
peculiarities are represented in the drawings of the Yam Custom, and
associated with other subjects.

A general is appointed to the command of an army by receiving a gold
handled sword of the King’s from his hand, (who strikes him gently with
it three times on the head,) swearing to return it encrusted with the
blood of his conquered enemies. One of the King’s linguists always
accompanies an army of any consequence, to whom all the politics of the
war are entrusted, and whose talent and intelligence in negotiating, are
expected to mature the fruits of the military genius of the general, and
to reimburse the expense of the war by heavy fines and contributions.
The Ashantees are as superior in discipline as in courage to the people
of the water side, though their discipline is limited to the following
precautions. They never pursue when it is near sun set; the general is
always in the rear; the secondary captains lead the soldiers on, whilst
those in command, with a few chosen individuals, urge them forward from
the rear with their heavy swords, and cut any man down who retreats
until the case is desperate. The first object of the Ashantee in close
fight, is, to fire and spring upon the throat of his enemy; to advance
every time he fires he feels to be imperative, if his commander thinks
it possible, who would, otherwise, if he escaped death in the action,
inflict it on him directly it was over. It is one of the sentences of
the most popular song in Coomassie, “if I fight I die, if I run away I
die, better I go on and die.” They are as the antient Spaniards have
been described, “prodiga gens animæ et properare facillima mortem.” The
general has his umbrella spread in the rear, and, besides his guard, has
several extra muskets ready loaded for those soldiers who may be driven
to him in case of reverse. His band plays all the time, and in his
assumed contempt for the enemy, it is the etiquette for him to divert
himself at some game, whilst the heads of the slain of any rank in the
hostile army are sent to him to put his foot on. When the result of an
important action is expected, even with an anxiety by no means sanguine,
and the messengers are known to be near the capital, the King is always
seated in public, with his golden worra board before him, playing with
some dignitary; and thus receives the news, to impress the people with
confidence by his affected indifference to victory or defeat, when
superstition had revealed and fated inevitable success ultimately.

All the superior captains have peculiar flourishes or strains for their
horns, adapted to short sentences, which are always recognised, and will
be repeated on enquiry by any Ashantee you may meet walking in the
streets, though the horns are not only out of sight, but at a distance
to be scarcely audible. These flourishes are of a strong and distinct
character. The King’s horns uttered, “I pass all Kings in the world.”
Apokoo’s, “Ashantees, do you do right now?” Gimma’s, “Whilst I live no
harm can come.” Bundahenna’s, “I am a great King’s son.” Amanqua’s, “No
one dares trouble me.” This will be further noticed in the chapter on
Music. These peculiar flourishes are more particularly for their
government in action, for all the soldiery, indeed I might say all the
women and children, being familiar with every flourish, the positions of
the various chiefs are judged of when they cannot be seen; whether they
are advancing, falling back, or attempting to flank the enemy by
penetrating the woods, is known, and the movements of all the others
become co-operative, as much as possible. The King’s horns go to the
market place every night, as near to midnight as they can judge, and
flourish a very peculiar strain, which was rendered to me, “King Saï
thanks all his captains and all his people for to-day.”

Several of the hearts of the enemy are cut out by the fetish men who
follow the army, and the blood and small pieces being mixed, (with much
ceremony and incantation,) with various consecrated herbs, all those who
have never killed an enemy before eat a portion, for it is believed that
if they did not, their vigor and courage would be secretly wasted by the
haunting spirit of the deceased. It was said that the King and all the
dignitaries partook of the heart of any celebrated enemy; this was only
whispered; that they wore the smaller joints, bones, and the teeth of
the slain monarchs was evident as well as boasted. One man was pointed
out to me, as always eating the heart of the enemy he killed with his
own hand. The number of an army is ascertained or preserved in cowries
or coin by Apokoo. When a successful general returns, he waits about two
days at a short distance from the capital, to receive the King’s
compliments, and to collect all the splendor possible for his entrée, to
encourage the army and infatuate the people. The most famous generals
are distinguished by the addition of warlike names, more terrific than
glorious, as they designate their manner of destroying their prisoners.
Apokoo was called Aboäwassa, because he was in the habit of cutting off
their arms. Appia, Sheäboo, as he beats their heads in pieces with a
stone. Amanqua, Abiniowa, as he cuts off their legs.

The army is prohibited during the active parts of a campaign, from all
food but meal, which each man carries in a small bag at his side, and
mixes in his hands with the first water he comes to; this, they allege,
is to prevent cooking fires from betraying their position, or
anticipating a surprise. In the intervals, (for this meal is seldom
eaten more than once a day,) they chew the boossee or gooroo nut. This
meal is very nourishing and soon satisfies; we tried it on our march
down. Ashantee spies have been stationed three and four days in the high
trees overlooking Cape Coast Castle, with no other supply than this meal
and a little water, before the army has shewn itself. There is always a
distinct body of recruits with the army, to dispatch those with their
knives whom the musket has only wounded, and they are all expected to
return well armed from despoiling the enemy, or they are not esteemed of
promise, and dismissed to some servile occupation. I could not find that
they had any idea of fortifications, though undoubtedly common to the
large cities on the Niger.

It is the invariable policy of Ashantee to make the contingency of the
power last subdued, the revolters recently quelled, or the allies last
accepted, the van of their army throughout the campaign, and very
frequently there are no Ashantees but captains with the army; but it is
composed entirely of tributaries and allies. Thus Odumata subdued Banda
with an army of Gamans. In the Ashantee body of the army, which is
always that of reserve, the youngest or last made captain marches and
engages first, and the others follow seriatim, until Odumata precedes
Quatchie Quofie, Amanqua follows him, and Apokoo precedes the King. Were
the country generally open, I have no doubt, necessity and their
military genius would have suggested greater arrangement and compactness
in their movement, which is nevertheless very orderly. Two divisions of
an army are rarely allowed to go the same path, lest, being in want of
supplies, the neighbourhood should prove inadequate. Aboidwee, our house
master, (see correspondence on the Ashantee suicide) who has 1700
retainers, always precedes the King’s or Apokoo’s division, (which will
exclusively occupy the Banda path in the invasion of Gaman) to raise a
bamboo house for the King’s reception when he comes up.

Infants are frequently married to infants, for the connection of
families; and infants are as frequently wedded by adults and elderly
men. The ceremony is to send the smaller piece of cloth, worn around the
middle, to the infant, and a handsome dash of gold to the mother, as her
care then ceases to be a duty, but becomes a service performed to the
husband, who also sends frequent presents for the support of the child.
Apokoo told me it was a good plan for a man to adopt who wished to get
gold, for as the circumstance was seldom generally known, the most
innocent freedom when the girl became ten or eleven years old, grounded
a palaver against the individual, though he might consider he was but
fondling a child, and be wholly ignorant of her marriage. I afterwards
understood from several others, that this view was the leading
motive.[92]

It frequently happens, when the family of the wife is too powerful for
the husband to venture to put her to death for intrigue, that he takes
off her nose as a stigma and punishment, and makes her the wife of one
of his slaves. A wife who betrays a secret is sure to lose her upper
lip, and, if discovered listening to a private conversation of her
husband’s, an ear. Women so maimed are to be met with in all parts of
the town. Prostitutes are numerous and countenanced. No Ashantee forces
his daughter to become the wife of the man he wishes, but he instantly
disclaims her support and protection on her refusal, and would persecute
the mother if she afforded it; thus abandoned, they have no resource but
prostitution. During the menses, the women of the capital retire to the
plantations or crooms in the bush.[93]

In visiting, the chief always gives his principal slaves a few sips of
the liquor offered to him, not for security, for it is more frequently
after than before he has drank, but as a mark of his favour. He will
frequently give his daughter in marriage to a confidential slave, but
where there are a few thus distinguished and indulged, (apparently as a
political check upon a heterogeneous populace,) there are thousands
barely existing.

Their principal games are Worra[94] (see drawing, No. 10.) which I could
not understand, and Drafts, which both Moors and Negroes play well and
constantly. Their method resembles the Polish, they take and move
backwards and forwards, and a king has the bishop’s move in chess. They
have another game, for which a board is perforated like a cribbage
board, but in numerous oblique lines, traversing each other in all
directions, and each composed of three holes for pegs; the players begin
at the same instant, with an equal number of pegs, and he who inserts or
completes a line first, in spite of the baulks of his adversary, takes a
peg from him, until the stock of either is exhausted.


[Footnote 84: The description of the siege of Pondicherry in Voltaire
occurred to me; it will assist the imagination of the reader: “De grands
magasins de liqueurs fortes y entretenaient l’ivrognerie et tous les
maux dont elle est le germe. C’est une situation qu’il faut avoir vue.
Les travaux, les gardes de la tranchée étaient faits par des hommes
ivres · · · · · · · · De-là les scènes les plus honteuses et les plus
destructives de la subordination et de la discipline. On a vu des
officiers se colleter avec des soldats et mille autres actions infâmes,
dont le détail, renfermé dans les bornes de la vérité la plus exacte,
paraîtrait une exagération monstreuse.”]

[Footnote 85: In Ahanta, at the Contoom or Harvest custom, each family
erects its rude altar, composed of four sticks driven in the ground, and
twigs laid across the top; the whole is then covered with fresh pulled
leaves. A hog, a sheep, a goat, or a fowl is killed, according to the
means of the family, and the most delicate parts laid on the altar, a
mixture is made of eggs, palm oil, palm wine, the blood of the animal
slain, and other ingredients, and also dedicated to the fetish, in small
pots placed on the altar. In a few days these altars become so offensive
as to render it disagreeable to pass them, but they are never removed.]

[Footnote 86:


  “Idem ter socios purâ circumtulit undâ,

   Spargens rore levi et ramo felicis olivæ.” Æn. VI.


]

[Footnote 87: The Ahanta’s divide time into periods of three weeks. The
first week is called Adaï, and is termed the good week, in which much
work is done; and traders visit the markets more frequently in this week
than at any other time, supposing all they do in it must prosper. The
second week is Ajamfoe, or the bad week, in which no work or trade is
done, the natives believing every thing undertaken in it must fail. The
third week is Adim, or the little good week, in which they both work and
trade, but not as much as in the Adaï.]

[Footnote 88:


  · · · Tum membra toro defleta reponunt,

  Purpureasque super vestes, velamina nota,

  Conjiciunt;

                                          Æn. VI.


In Fantee they dress the body richly, and usually prop it erect in a
chair, exposing it until it is dangerous to do so any longer: they bury
it in their house, with as many gold ornaments as they can afford to
dedicate. The men called the town drummers are only allowed to die
standing, and when expiring are snatched up, and supported in that
posture. In Ahanta they frequently exhibit the body chalked all over.]

[Footnote 89:


  “Hic duo rite mero libans carchesia Baccho

  “Fundit humi.

                                             Æn. V.

  “Οἶνον δ’ἐκ δεπάων χαμάδις χέον, οὐδέ τις ἔτλη

  “Πρὶν πιέειν, πρὶν λεῖψαι ὑπερμενέϊ Κρονίωνι.”

                                             Ομηρ. η.


The Ashantees do so not only on solemn occasions, but invariably; and it
would seem that the Greeks did, from the following words of Hecuba to
Hector,


  “Ἀλλὰ μέν’, ὄφρα κέ τοι μελιηδέα οἶνον ἐνείκω,

   Ὡς σπείσῃς Διῒ πατρὶ καὶ ἄλλοις ἀθανάτοισι

   Πρῶτον· ἔπειτα δέ κ’αὐτὸς ὀνήσεαι, αἴ κε πίῃσθα·”

                                             Ομηρ, ζ.
]

[Footnote 90: Suetonius tells us that Augustus sacrificed 300 of the
principal citizens of Perusia, to the manes of his uncle Julius. We read
in Prevost, that 64080 persons were sacrificed, with aggravated
barbarity, in the dedication of a temple in Mexico.]

[Footnote 91: In the Warsaw country there is said to be a more dreadful
poison called Sabë: if it is thrown upon the skin, it is absorbed by the
pores, and has nearly the same instantaneous mortal effect as when given
internally.]

[Footnote 92: On the Coast, the bride’s character is very notoriously
published, for part of the husband’s present to her family being a flask
of rum, and that not sent until the next day; whether it is brimful, or
somewhat wanting, indicates her virginity, or early frailty.]

[Footnote 93: The women of Ahanta, on the same occasion, are prohibited
from entering any inhabited place; and if they attempt to go into a
house, are heavily fined or punished. If the family is respectable, they
generally erect a temporary shed to shelter her; the poorer class are
forced to endure the inclemencies of the weather without any retreat.]

[Footnote 94: This game is said to be played in Syria also.]




                              CHAPTER VI.

                               * * * * *

                _Architecture, Arts, and Manufactures._


The construction of the ornamental architecture of Coomassie reminded me
forcibly of the ingenious essay of Sir James Hall, (in the Edinburgh
Philosophical Transactions,) tracing the Gothic order to an
architectural imitation of wicker work. The drawings will serve to shew
the various and uncommon character of their architectural ornaments,
adopted from those of interior countries, and, confessedly, in no degree
originating with themselves.

In building a house, a mould was made for receiving the swish or clay,
by two rows of stakes and wattle work, placed at a distance equal to the
intended thickness of the wall; as two mud walls were raised at
convenient distances, to receive the plum pudding stone which formed the
walls of the vitrified fortresses in Scotland. The interval was then
filled up with a gravelly clay, mixed with water, with which the outward
surface of the frame or stake work was also thickly plastered, so as to
impose the appearance of an entire thick mud wall. The houses had all
gable ends, and three thick poles were joined to each; one from the
highest point, forming the ridge of the roof, and one on each side, from
the base of the triangular part of the gable; these supported a frame
work of bamboo, over which an interwoven thatch of palm leaves was laid,
and tied with the runners of trees, first to the large poles running
from gable to gable, and afterwards, (within,) to the interlacing of the
bamboo frame work, which was painted black and polished, so as to look
much better than any rude cieling would, of which they have no idea; a
small part appears in the houses in the drawing of Adoom-street (No. 9.)
The pillars, which assist to support the roof, and form the proscenium
or open front, (which none but captains are allowed to have to their
houses) were thick poles, afterwards squared with a plastering of swish.
The steps and raised floor of these rooms were clay and stone, with a
thick layer of red earth, which abounds in the neighbourhood, and these
were washed and painted daily, with an infusion of the same earth in
water; it has all the appearance of red ochre, and from the abundance of
iron ore in the neighbourhood, I do not doubt it is.

The walls still soft, they formed moulds or frame works of the patterns
in delicate slips of cane, connected by grass. The two first slips (one
end of each being inserted in the soft wall) projected the relief,
commonly mezzo: the interstices were then filled up with the plaster,
and assumed the appearance depicted. The poles or pillars were sometimes
encircled by twists of cane, intersecting each other, which, being
filled up with thin plaster, resembled the lozenge and cable ornaments
of the Anglo-Norman order; the quatre-foil was very common, and by no
means rude, from the symmetrical bend of the cane which formed it. I saw
a few pillars, (after they had been squared with the plaster) with
numerous slips of cane pressed perpendicularly on to the wet surface,
which being covered again with a very thin coat of plaster, closely
resembled fluting. When they formed a large arch, they inserted one end
of a thick piece of cane in the wet clay of the floor or base, and
bending the other over, inserted it in the same manner; the entablature
was filled up with wattle work plastered over. Arcades and piazzas were
common. A white wash, very frequently renewed, was made from a clay in
the neighbourhood. Of course the plastering is very frail, and in the
relief frequently discloses the edges of the cane, giving however a
piquant effect, auxiliary to the ornament. The doors were an entire
piece of cotton wood, cut with great labour out of the stems or
buttresses of that tree; battens variously cut and painted were
afterwards nailed across. (See drawing, No. 5.) So disproportionate was
the price of labour to that of provision, that I gave but two tokoos for
a slab of cotton wood, five feet by three. The locks they use are from
Houssa, and quite original; one will be sent to the British Museum.
Where they raised a first floor, the under room was divided into two by
an intersecting wall, to support the rafters for the upper room, which
were generally covered with a frame work thickly plastered over with red
ochre. I saw but one attempt at flooring with plank, it was cotton wood
shaped entirely with an adze, and looked like a ship’s deck. The windows
were open wood work, carved in fanciful figures and intricate patterns,
and painted red; the frames were frequently cased in gold, about as
thick as cartridge paper.

What surprised me most, and is not the least of the many circumstances
deciding their great superiority over the generality of Negroes, was the
discovery that every house had its cloacæ, besides the common ones for
the lower orders without the town. They were generally situated under a
small arch way in the most retired angle of the building, but not
unfrequently up stairs, within a separate room like a small closet, (see
drawing No. 3.) where the large hollow pillar also assists to support
the upper story: the holes are of a small circumference, but dug to a
surprising depth, and boiling water is daily poured down, which
effectually prevents the least offence. The rubbish and offal of each
house was burnt every morning at the back of the street, and they were
as nice and cleanly in their dwellings as in their persons.

[Illustration: ODUMATA’S SLEEPING ROOM.

_No. 5._]

[Illustration: _Drawn by T. E. Bowdich Esqr._

_No. 6._

INNER SQUARE of APOOKOOS HOUSE.

_Published Decr. 2, 1818, by John Murray, Albemarle Street._]

[Illustration: THE OLDEST HOUSE in COOMASSEE.

_No. 3._]

[Illustration: _Drawn by T. E. Bowdich Esqr._

_No. 4._

PART of the QUARTERS of the MISSION.

_Published Decr. 2, 1818, by John Murray, Albemarle Street._]

Drawing No. 3, is one of the oldest houses in Coomassie, inherited by
the unfortunate Bakkee, and part of the quarters of the Mission. Its
comparative rudeness is evident.

No. 4, is a more modern part of the same house, being one side of a
small area about 15 feet square, allotted to the chief officer of the
Embassy. These areas are all distinct, and a house consists of an
indefinite number of them, some 36 feet square, with several long
courts. In paying a visit to a principal man, the state was to detain us
some minutes at the door of each area, as he generally received us in
the innermost. The figure is one of the King’s body guards, which have
been described before. The figures are introduced to shew the proportion
of the buildings, and to give some idea of the costume.

No. 5, is the exterior of a bed room of Odumata’s, which is one side of
an oblong area in a very retired angle of his house, about 25 feet by 8.
The cloth suspended to the left of the door on the top of the steps,
hides the bloody stools which are in the recess. The small gallery in
front of the upper room is only wide enough for one person to walk in.
The recess and small room below accommodate confidential slaves. The bed
room was very small, about 8 feet square, but being hung round with a
variety of gold and silver ornaments, had a very rich appearance. The
bed is generally about 5 feet high, and composed entirely of large silk-
cotton pillows piled one above another. The King of Gaman, we were
assured, had steps of solid gold to ascend to his bed. A man wearing a
crier’s cap, is playing the sanko.

No. 6, is a perspective view of the entrance area to Apokoo’s house; the
fourth side is an open fronted building like those on the right and left
for attendants to wait in, and for the hearing of palavers. The opposite
closed side is a bed room. The figure is playing the bentwa (see Music.)

[Illustration: PART of a PIAZZA in the PALACE.

_No. 7._]

[Illustration: _Drawn by T. E. Bowdich Esqr._

_No. 8._

PART of a PIAZZA in the PALACE.

_Published Decr. 2, 1818, by John Murray, Albemarle Street._]

[Illustration: _Drawn by T. E. Bowdich Esqr._

_No. 9._

PART of ADOOM STREET.

_Published Decr. 2, 1818, by John Murray, Albemarle Street._]

[Illustration: _Drawn by T. E. Bowdich Esqr._

_No. 10._

THE KINGS SLEEPING ROOM.

_Published Decr. 2, 1818, by John Murray, Albemarle Street._]

No. 7, is a part of a piazza, which lines the interior of the wall
secluding the palace from the street. The piazza is 200 yards long, and
inhabited by captains and other attendants on the King; above is a small
gallery. Piles of skulls, and drums ornamented with them, are frequent
in this piazza. The figure is a common soldier of Ashantee, his belt
ornamented with red shells, and stuck full of knives.

No. 8, is the upper end of the piazza, which is more ornamented, and
appropriated to the superior captains, who have each a suite of rooms,
marked by the small doors under the piazza. A woman is dancing whilst a
man plays the flute and rattle.

No. 9, is a view of part of Adoom-street: each open front denotes the
residence of a captain, being used for talking palavers, receiving
strangers, observing or superintending customs, and evening recreation.
The dwelling is entered by the small door at the side, which generally
leads through a narrow passage or court to a large area like No. 6, and
thence by various intricate ways to smaller and more retired areas like
No. 4 and No. 5. A fetish woman has just quitted the centre house; she
has on a white cloth, and various pieces of rich silk are hanging round
her girdle, her breasts are confined with a scarf, a fillet encircles
her head, in each hand she waves a horse’s tail, and she continues
yelling and swinging round and round until she is quite stupified. A
weaver and loom are on her right, and a market woman under her shed on
the left.

No. 10, is the exterior of the King’s bed room, being one side of an
inner area, about 30 feet square. The stunted silk-cotton and the
manchineal tree are fetish or sacred, as are the white and red rags at
the top of the pole, and the small brass cups supported by the forked
sticks. The colored bags hanging over the round doors (the chequering of
which is in relief,) contain Moorish charms. The carving of the left
hand window is cased in silver, of the right hand, in gold. The two men
are playing at Worra. The King made frequent enquiries about the
architecture of England, of which we gave him some idea by drawings. He
was very fond of referring to a project ascribed to Saï Cudjo, and which
he declared he would carry into effect directly the Gaman war was over.
This was to build a house for his own immediate residence, roofed with
brass pans, beaten into flat surfaces, and laid over an ivory frame work
appearing within. The windows and the doors to be cased in gold, and the
door posts and pillars of ivory. Whether the Moors originated or
encouraged this extravagance by the descriptions in their tales, for
some of the stories of the Arabian Nights were commonly in their mouths,
or whether it was the scheme of his own disposition, prone to
magnificence and novelty, the King dwelt ardently on the intention, and
by their frequent conversations on the subject, his chiefs appeared
scarcely less anxious for the execution than himself. He meditated great
improvements and embellishments in his capital, on his return from the
war, when it was intended that every captain should be presented with an
extraordinary sum out of the public treasury, for adorning or enlarging
his house. The ruined streets between Asafoo and Bantama were to be
rebuilt, and the six or seven small crooms between Coomassie and
Baramang, (the King’s country residence,) were to be pulled down, and
the inhabitants to occupy a wide street to extend from the city to that
croom. This was the darling design of the King; he had already made a
sound, broad, and almost direct road, and numerous labourers were
continuing to bring it as near as possible to a straight line.

The Ashantee loom is precisely on the same principle as the English; it
is worked by strings held between the toes; the web is never more than
four inches broad. A weaver is represented in the drawing, No. 3, and a
small loom complete is amongst the articles for the British Museum. They
use a spindle, and not a distaff, for spinning, holding it in one hand,
and twisting the thread, (which has a weight at the end,) with the
finger and thumb of the other. The fineness, variety, brilliance, and
size of their cloths would astonish, could a more costly one be
exhibited; in the absence of which, that for the Museum will doubtless
be admired for the two first qualities, and for having precisely the
same appearance on both sides. I shall notice in the Chapter on Trade,
that the richest silks are unravelled to weave into them. The white
cloths, which are principally manufactured in Inta and Dagwumba, they
paint for mourning with a mixture of blood and a red dye wood. The
patterns are various, and not inelegant, and painted with so much
regularity, with a fowl’s feather, that they have all the appearance of
a coarse print at a distance. I have seen a man paint as fast as I could
write. There will be a very fair specimen in the British Museum, the
price of painting which was one ackie.

They have two dye woods, a red and a yellow, specimens of which I
brought down; they make a green by mixing the latter with their blue
dye, in which they excel; it is made from a plant called acassie,
certainly not the indigo, which grows plentifully on the Coast. The
acassie rises to the height of about two feet, and according to the
natives, bears a red flower, but the leaf is not small, fleshy, or soft,
nor is it pale or silvery coloured underneath; it is a thin acuminate
leaf about five inches long, and three broad, of a dark green.[95] I
regret to add, our best specimens of this plant perished in the
disasters of our march, and no drawing was made of it, as it bore no
flower in that season; it grows abundantly in the woods, and produces a
fast and beautiful colour without requiring a mordant. They gather a
quantity of the leaves, bruise them in a wooden mortar, and spread them
out on a mat to dry, this mass is kept for use, a proportion of it is
put into a pot of water and remains six days previous to immersing the
thread, which is left in six days, drying it once every day in the sun,
it is then a deep lasting blue colour. When a light blue is wished for,
the thread is only allowed to remain in the dye pot three days.

They excel in pottery, as the pipes for the Museum will shew; they are
rested on the ground when smoked; the clay is very fine, polished (after
baking) by friction, and the grooves of the patterns filled up with
chalk. They have also a black pottery which admits of a high polish.

The people of Dagwumba surpass the Ashantees in goldsmith’s work, though
the latter may be esteemed proficients in the art. The small articles
for the Museum, a gold stool, sanko, bell, jaw bone, and drum, are not
such neat specimens as I could wish; the man who made them having too
much costly work on hand for the King, to pay our trifles his wonted
attention; unfortunately too, he was committed to prison before they
were quite finished; however, they will give an idea. I weighed out
nineteen ackies and a half of gold dust for making these articles, one
third of an ackie was lost in melting, and five was the charge of the
goldsmith. We lost a beautiful silver pipe in the bustle. Bees wax for
making the model of the article wanted, is spun out on a smooth block of
wood, by the side of a fire, on which stands a pot of water; a flat
stick is dipped into this, with which the wax is made of a proper
softness; it takes about a quarter of an hour to make enough for a ring.
When the model is finished, it is enclosed in a composition of wet clay
and charcoal, (which being closely pressed around it forms a mould,)
dried in the sun, and having a small cup of the same materials attached
to it, (to contain the gold for fusion,) communicating with the model by
a small perforation. When the whole model is finished, and the gold
carefully enclosed in the cup, it is put in a charcoal fire with the cup
undermost. When the gold is supposed to be fused, the cup is turned
uppermost, that it may run into the place of the melted wax; when cool
the clay is broken, and if the article is not perfect it goes through
the whole process again. To give the gold its proper colour, they put a
layer of finely ground red ochre, (which they call Inchuma,) all over
it, and immerge it in boiling water mixed with the same substance and a
little salt; after it has boiled half an hour, it is taken out and
thoroughly cleansed from any clay that may adhere to it. Their bellows
are imitations of ours, but the sheep skin they use being tied to the
wood with leather thongs, the wind escapes through the crevices,
therefore when much gold is on the fire they are obliged to use two or
three pair at the same time. Their anvils are generally a large stone,
or a piece of iron placed on the ground. Their stoves are built of swish
(about three or four feet high) in a circular form, and are open about
one fifth of the circumference; a hole is made through the closed part
level with the ground, for the nozzle of the bellows. Their weights are
very neat brass casts of almost every animal, fruit, or vegetable known
in the country. The King’s scales, blow pan, boxes, and weights, and
even the tongs which hold the cinder to light his pipe, were neatly made
of the purest gold that could be manufactured.

Their blacksmith’s work is performed with the same sort of forge as the
above, but they have no idea of making iron from ore, as their interior
neighbours do. Their swords are generally perforated in patterns like
fish trowels; frequently they make two blades springing parallel from
one handle, which evince very fine workmanship. The needles and
castanets will only give some idea of their progress. The iron stone is
of a dark red colour, spotted with gray, and intermixed with what had
all the appearance of lava, they cut bullets out of it for the army,
when lead is scarce. I have brought some arrows of native iron. They
have no idea of making a lock like the people of Houssa and Marrowa.

They tan or dress leather in Ashantee, but they do this, and dye it, in
a very superior manner in Houssa and Dagwumba; see the sandals and
cushion in the British Museum, the former varied and apparently
stitched; doubting that there could be such stitching, I undid a part,
and discovered that they perforated the surface, and then stuck in the
fine shreds of leather. The curious will observe, that the patterns of
the stool cushion are all produced by paring the surface. They make
their soldiers belts and pouches out of elephant or pig skin, ornamented
with red shells. (See drawing, No. 7.)

Of their carpenter’s work the stool is a fair specimen, being carved out
of a solid piece of a wood called zesso, white, soft, and bearing a high
polish; it is first soaked in water. They sell such a stool for about
three shillings, in Accra or Fantee it would fetch twenty. The umbrella
is even more curious, the bird is cut almost equal to turning, and the
whole is so supple that it may be turned inside out. This, only a
child’s umbrella, is a model of the large canopies I have described in
the procession; I gave a piece of cloth value twenty shillings for it.
The sanko or guitar is also neatly made, and the chasteness and Etruscan
character of the carving is very surprising. The surface of the wood is
first charred in the fire, and then carved deep enough to disclose the
original white in the stripes or lines of the patterns.

Numbers of workmen are employed in breaking, rounding, and boring the
snail shells, as big as a turkey’s egg generally, and sometimes as large
as a conch. They are first broken into numerous pieces, then chipped
round, the size of a sleeve button, and afterwards bored with a bow and
iron style fixed in a piece of wood. Lastly they are strung, and
extended in rows on a log of wood, and rubbed with a soft and bluish
gray stone and water, until they become perfectly round.

Their pine apple thread is very strong, and is made from the fineness of
a hair to the thickness of whip cord, it bleaches to a beautiful
whiteness, and would answer for sewing any strong material, but, when
muslin is stitched with it, it is liable to be cut from the harshness.
The women frequently join their cloths, and ornament their handkerchiefs
with a zigzag pattern, worked with unravelled silks of different
colours. The fetish case is a specimen of their needle work, in the
manner of chain stitch.


[Footnote 95: It is a shrub with opposite leaves, no stipules, and
having a certain degree of resemblance to _Marsdenia suave-olens_ (the
indigo of Sumatra) but as the leaves are toothed in the acassie, it
probably does not belong even to the same natural order.]




                              CHAPTER VII.

                               * * * * *

           _Climate, Population, Revenue, City, Market, &c._


The climate will be best judged of by the account of the thermometer
(from May to February) in the Appendix. During the first two months, May
and June, it rained about one third of the time, throughout July and
August it rained nearly half, and abrupt tornadoes were frequent in the
evening, just after sun set, ushered in by a strong wind from the south-
west. The heaviest rains were from the latter end of September to the
beginning of November, they fell even in more impetuous torrents than
are witnessed on the coast.[96] The influence of the harmattan was
described as very powerful. Generally speaking, from the elevation of
Ashantee, (unfortunately we had no barometer,) it was much cooler in
Coomassie than at Cape Coast; indeed, from four to six in the morning,
there was a severity of cold unknown on the coast.

I can only calculate the population of the kingdom of Ashantee, small in
itself, from its military force, of which the following is the most
moderate of the estimates I received.

  Coomassie district (extending to the northern frontier)         60,000

  Dwabin ditto                                                    35,000

  Marmpon ditto                                                   15,000

  Soota ditto                                                     15,000

  Kokoofoo ditto                                                  15,000

  Becqua ditto                                                    12,000

  Adiabin ditto (between Coomassie and the lake)                  12,000

  Aphwagwiasee ditto                                              10,000

  Daniasee ditto (southwards of Coomassie)                         8,000

  Koontarasie ditto (on the lake)                                  8,000

  Gamasie ditto                                                    8,000

  Amafoo ditto                                                     6,000
                                                                 -------
                                                                 204,000

This appears an extravagant force, until we recollect that it is
probably one fifth of the whole population.[97] The Romans when they
were a nation of warriors, which these people are, raised a military
force equally great in proportion to their population. Barbot heard of
the Ashantees losing 50,000 men in two actions, an exaggeration which,
nevertheless, serves to argue great military resources. Since the
Ashantee invasions, their disposable force has been estimated by old
residents in public reports, as upwards of 150,000. From the above
particular statement, the population may be estimated at one million,
which I believe is little more than half the population of Scotland, the
area of which must be more than double that of Ashantee, which certainly
does not contain more than 14,000 square miles. Amanquateä, Quatchie
Quofie, Odumata, and Apokoo’s forces alone amounted to 25,000. The
contingencies at command from tributaries, (21 in number) are too
indefinite to attempt to detail. Neither Inta or Dagwumba furnish any,
the Ashantees pretending to despise their troops too much to use them.
The following, which are known to be pretty correct, have generally been
the first called into action:

  Coranza        10,000

  Assin           8,000

  Takima          6,000

  Dankara         5,000

  Warsaw          7,000

  Booroom        12,000

  Sawee           4,000

  Akim            4,000, before their later destructive revolts 16,000

  Aquapim, &c.    1,000

Though polygamy is tolerated to such an excess amongst the higher
orders, I do not think, from observation, that the proportion of women
to men is two to one. Most of the lower order of freemen have but one
wife, and very few of the slaves (the greater proportion of the military
force) any. The following calculation is the only one I can think of,
and it supports my impression after five months residence.

  204,000 Men able to bear arms, about one-fifth of the
          whole population                                     1,000,000

  101,000 Or one-fourth, children under ten years of age as
          found in Great Britain.

   50,000 Boys above that age not capable of bearing arms.

    7,000 Or one in about 28 incapacitated by old age or
          accidents, as found in Great Britain.
  -------
  362,000                                             Males      362,000
                                                                 -------
                                                    Females      638,000

The men are very well made, but not so muscular as the Fantees; their
countenances are frequently aquiline. The women also are generally
handsomer than those of Fantee, but it is only amongst the higher orders
that beauty is to be found, and amongst them, free from all labour or
hardship, I have not only seen the finest figures, (which the ease of
their costume and habits may account for,) but, in many instances,
regular Grecian features, with brilliant eyes set rather obliquely in
the head. Beauty in a Negress must be genuine, since complexion
prejudices instead of imposes, and the European adjudges it to the
features only, which appeared in this class to be Indian rather than
African; nor is it surprising, when we recollect that they are selected
from, or are the daughters of the handsomest slaves or captives; or are
expressly chosen by their interior neighbours, to compose part of their
tribute to the King of Ashantee, who retains but a small proportion.

Both men and women are particularly cleanly in their persons, the latter
washing themselves, and the former being washed by them daily on rising,
from head to foot, with warm water and Portuguese soap, using afterwards
the vegetable grease or butter, which is a fine cosmetic. Their cloths,
which are beetled, are always scrupulously clean. The lowest orders are
generally dirty. Occasionally, small delicate patterns in green or white
paint are traced on their cheeks and temples. The Moorish negresses
darken the edges of their eye lids with lead reduced to a fine powder.
The ore was brought from Mallowa and is very rich. The powder is
moistened a little, and kept in small boxes, like bodkin cases with a
bulb at the end, and prettily covered with cow’s hair, within which is a
metal stylus to apply the powder, as the women of India do antimony for
this purpose. Top-cloths are generally worn, and not by the higher order
only as in Fantee. They are commonly of a coarse silk bought at
Dagwumba. They wear little or no antiffoo, a sort of cushion projecting
from just below the small of the back in the Fantee women, by the size
of which, frequently preposterous, and at all times unsightly, their
rank, or the number of their children is known. The bosoms of girls of
thirteen and fourteen are frequently models, but the young women
sedulously destroy this beauty for what is considered a greater, wearing
a broad band tight across their breasts, until ceasing to be globular
they project conically. Their heads are shaved in fanciful elaborate
patterns, having as intricate an appearance as a rich carpet.

The food of the higher orders is principally soup of dried fish, fowls,
beef, or mutton, (according to the fetish,) and ground nuts stewed in
blood. The poorer class make their soups of dried deer, monkeys flesh,
and frequently of the pelts of skins. Yams, plantains, and foofoos, (see
the kouskous of Mr. Park) are commonly eaten, and they do not make
cankey of their corn, (a coarser sort of kouskous not cleared from the
husk) as the Fantees do, but they roast it on the stalk, and when young
the flavour closely resembles that of green peas. Besides palm wine they
drink Pittō, made from dried corn, which I think must have been the beer
Lieutenant Martyn relished so much, for it is quite as pleasant as a
brisk small ale. They are forbidden eggs by the fetish, and cannot be
persuaded to taste milk, which is only drank by the Moors. Their stews
and white soups are excellent, and my companions reported their black
soups (made with palm oil) to be equally so.

I cannot pretend to calculate the variable revenue of Ashantee, nor
indeed to report its optional sources; I noted a few particulars.

1. The dust gold of all deceased and disgraced subjects. Boiteäm, the
father of Otee, left five jars (said to hold about four gallons each)
and two flasks. On Appia Nanu’s disgrace three jars were seized.

2. A tax in gold upon all slaves purchased for the coast.[98] Customs
paid in gold by all traders returning from the coast, levied near Ansa
in Assin.

3. A tax on the elephant hunters.

4. The small pits in Soko, which with the washings were reported to
yield, sometimes 2,000 ounces per month, at others not more than 700.

5. The daily washings throughout Dankara, and the hills dividing Akim
and Assin; very rich in gold.

6. A tax on every chief increasing the number of his gold ornaments.
Apokoo paid 20 periguins to the King on melting 100.

7. The soil of the market place (see Laws) has been washed but twice
during the present reign. I was told it produced about 800 ounces of
gold each time. During our stay a heavy rain washed down a large
quantity, which was replaced and carefully covered with the soil, by the
Captain in charge of the market place. It was very easily seen after
rain.

The tributes of the various nations they had subdued, were in some
instances fixed, but more frequently indefinite, being proportioned to
the exigencies of the year; indeed from various conversations with
Apokoo and others, and my own observations during state palavers, it
appeared that the necessities and the designs of the Ashantee government
were the superior considerations, and the rule in levying tribute every
where. I made the following memoranda.

Inta and Dagwumba never pay in gold, which though plentiful from
commerce, is not found there, cowries being the circulating medium.
Their capitals and all their large towns send the following tribute
annually, and the smaller in proportion.

  500 Slaves.

  200 Cows.

  400 Sheep.

  400 Cotton cloths.

  200 Ditto and silk.

Takima a smaller proportion of the same kind.

Coranza is generally excused, from fidelity, and a long series of
military services.

  Sawee                                200 periguins annually.

  Moinseän                              50 bendas ditto.

  Gaman had paid, (besides all large
  pieces of rock gold,)                100 periguins ditto.

Akim, Assin, Warsaw, Aowin, &c. &c. were taxed indefinitely by crooms.

Coomassie is built upon the side of a large rocky hill of iron stone. It
is insulated by a marsh close to the town northwards, and but a narrow
stream; half a mile distant from it N.W., and 60 yards broad; close to
it N.E., E., S.E., and S., and about 100, 20, 70, and 50 yards broad at
these points. In many parts depth after heavy rains was five feet, and
commonly two. The marsh contains many springs, and supplies the town
with water, but the exhalation covers the city with a thick fog morning
and evening, and engenders dysentery, with which the natives of the
coast who accompanied us were almost immediately attacked, as well as
the officers. It is a little extraordinary that we never saw a musquito
in Ashantee. I could find none but birds eye views of the city, which
were uninteresting, presenting nothing but the thatch of the houses; it
was encircled by a beautiful forest, which required more time than I
could spare, and a more expressive pencil to pourtray. Coomassie is an
oblong of nearly four miles in circumference, not including the suburbs
of Assafoo nor Bantama, (the back town,) half a mile distant, and
formerly connected by streets with the city, as is evident from the
numerous ruins of houses on the path. The slaughter of constant warfare,
and the extinction or removal of several ill affected chiefs with their
adherents, account for this even in a rising state. The ruins in the
interval to Bantama were indeed accounted for by Amanquateä (who holds
his court there, as Quatchie Quofie does at Assafoo) informing us, that
almost all the Ashantees killed before Annamaboe (about 2000 by the most
moderate computation) belonged to him, as it was his division which
marched along the beach from Cormantine, exposed to the cannon of the
fort. Four of the principal streets are half a mile long, and from 50 to
100 yards wide. I observed them building one, and a line was stretched
on each side to make it regular. The streets were all named, and a
superior captain in charge of each; ours for instance, was Aperremsoo,
big gun or cannon street, because those taken when Dankara was
conquered, were placed on a mound at the top of it, near Adoo Quamina’s
house. The area in which we had our first audience was called Daëbrim,
the great market, in distinction to a lower street called Gwaba, or the
small market. The street above where we lived was called Osamarandiduüm,
meaning literally, “with 1000 muskets you could not fight those who live
there.” One street was named after Odumata, and there was another near
it, whose title I forget, but it was equal to prison street. The palace
was situated in a long and wide street running through the middle of the
town, from which it was shut out by a high wall, terminating at each end
at the marsh, where it was discontinued, that being a sufficient
boundary. It included Odumata’s and the King’s brothers residences, and
two or three small streets, (besides the several areas and piazzas,) for
the King’s relief and recreation when the superstitions of the country
confine him to the palace. I reckoned twenty seven streets in all, which
I have laid down in a ground plan of the town. The small grove at the
back of the large market place was called Sammonpomë or the spirit-
house, because the trunks of all the human victims were thrown into it.
The bloody tracks, daily renewed, shewed the various directions they had
been dragged from, and the number of vultures on the trees indicated the
extent of the recent sacrifice; the stench was insupportable, and the
visits of panthers nightly. Several trees were individually scattered
about the town for the recreation of the inhabitants of those quarters,
and small circular elevations of two steps, the lower about 20 feet in
circumference, like the bases of the old market crosses in England, were
raised in the middle of several streets, on which the King’s chair was
placed when he went to drink palm wine there, his attendants encircling
him.

[Illustration: _Ichnographical Sketch of_ COOMASSIE, _with the principal
Streets and the Situations of remarkable Houses._

  1. Entrance from Fantee and Assin.

  2. Agwabu or the small market.

  3. King’s eldest Sister’s house.

  4. —— Goldsmith’s ditto.

  5. Appia Nanu’s ditto.

  6. Otee’s (3d Linguist) ditto.

  7. Odumata’s (1 of the 4) ditto.

  8. King’s youngest Sister’s ditto.

  9. Adoom Street.

  9.* Baba’s house and the Crambos (Moors) Street.

  10.* Aboogaywa or place of execution.

  10. Palace.

  11. King’s wives Croom.

  12. Marsh.

  13. Entrance from Dwabin.

  14. ——— Barramang.

  15. King of Dwabin’s temporary Court.

  16. King’s Blacksmith’s Croom.

  _a._ Himma or the King’s fetish temple.

  _b._ Apokoo’s (1 of the 4) house.

  _c._ Adoocee’s (chief linguist.)

  _d._ Apirremsoo Street.

  _e[Symbol]._ Aboidwee’s house, the quarters of the Embassy.

  _f._ Adoo Quamina’s (chief Captain) house.

  _g._ Osarramandiduum Street.

  _h._ King’s Umbrella maker’s Croom.

  _i._ Entrance to the high street of Bantama.

  _k._ Croom.

  _l._ Ditto.

  _m._ Ditto.

  _n._ Long irregular suburb, and road to Dankara.

  _o._ Sammonpome or the Spirit Grove.

  _p._ Adooebrim, the large market place.

  _p*._ Small Market.

  _q._ High Street of Assafoo. Course of the procession of the Embassy
  on its entré.

  _r._ Halted to witness the war dance.

  _s._ Halted to pass the baggage and presents.

  _t._ Halted to witness the human sacrifice.

  _u._ Presented to the King and Chiefs.

  _w._ Seated to see them march home.

_T. E. Bowdich_, 1817.]

The Ashantees persisted that the population of Coomassie, when
collected, was upwards of 100,000. I think it likely to be much greater
than that of Sego, (which Mr. Park reported as 30,000,) from the
extended masses of crowd I observed on festivals, when the plantations
of the environs are almost wholly deserted. I compared them in my
recollection with the crowds I have seen collected in the secondary
cities of England, on similar occasions of public curiosity; the only
criterion, as I had not time to finish reckoning the number of houses. I
say when collected, because the higher class could not support their
numerous followers, or the lower their large families, in the city, and
therefore employed them in plantations, (in which small crooms were
situated,) generally within two or three miles of the capital, where
their labours not only feed themselves, but supply the wants of the
chief, his family, and more immediate suite. The middling orders station
their slaves for the same purpose, and also to collect fruits and
vegetables for sale, and when their children become numerous, a part are
generally sent to be supported by these slaves in the bush. Perhaps the
average resident population of Coomassie is not more than from 12 to
15,000.

The markets were held daily from about eight o’clock in the morning
until sun set. The larger contains about sixty stalls or sheds, (a small
square frame covered with cotton cloth with a pole from the centre,
stuck into the ground, see drawing, No. 9.) besides throngs of inferior
venders, seated in all directions. Amongst the articles for sale, were
beef, (to us about 8_d._ per lb.) and mutton, cut in small pieces for
soup, wild hog, deer, and monkey’s flesh, fowls, pelts of skins; yams,
plantains, corn, sugar-cane, rice, encruma, (a mucilaginous vegetable,
richer than asparagus, which it resembles,) peppers, vegetable butter;
oranges, papaws, pine apples, (not equal to those on the coast,)
bananas; salt and dried fish from the coast; large snails smoke dried,
and stuck in rows on small sticks in the form of herring bone; eggs for
fetish; pittō, palm wine, rum; pipes, beads, looking-glasses, sandals,
silk, cotton cloth, powder, small pillows, white and blue cotton thread,
calabashes, &c. &c. See Chapter on Trade.

The following are the comparative prices of the markets of Coomassie and
Yahndi, the capital of Dagwumba:

                   _Coomassie._           _Yahndi._

  A fat bullock      £.6   0  0          £.1  0  0

  A sheep              0  15  0            0  4  0

  A fowl               0   1  8            0  0  5

  A horse             24   0  0            8  0  0

  Yams                 0   0  8 for two    0  0  8 for ten.

The surprising exorbitance of the former is to be accounted for by the
abundance of gold, yet labour and manufacture was moderately purchased.
In Mallowa, provision is dearer than in Dagwumba, but the articles of
trade much cheaper; they manufacture very little cloth, the Moorish
traders supplying it so abundantly. The cattle we saw in Ashantee were
as large as the English, unlike those on the coast, which resemble the
Jersey. The sheep are hairy in Ashantee, but woolly in Dagwumba, an open
country, where they manufacture a coarse blanket. The horses in Dagwumba
are generally small, some were described to be 15 hands high, but these
were never parted with, and the Ashantees did not desire them, for I
never saw but one who rode fearlessly. The horses I saw were like half
bred galloways, their legs lathy, with a wiry hair about the fetlock,
only requiring to be pulled. Their heads were large; dun and mouse
colours were said to be common; they were never shod, and their hoofs
consequently in the eye of the European, though not in nature,
disproportionate; they were fed on guinea grass, occasionally mixed with
salt, and sal-ammoniac was frequently dissolved in the water. The
saddles were Moorish, of red leather, and cumbersome; the bridles of
twisted black leather thongs, and brass links, with a whip at the end;
the bit severe, with a large ring hanging from the middle, and slipped
over the under jaw instead of a curb chain; the stirrups were like large
blow pans, and hung very short. Some of the Moors rode on bullocks, with
a ring through the nose.

The extent and order of the Ashantee plantations surprised us, yet I do
not think they were adequate to the population; in a military government
they were not likely to be so. Their neatness and method have been
already noticed in our route up. They use no implement but the hoe. They
have two crops of corn a year, plant their yams at Christmas, and dig
them early in September. The latter plantations had much the appearance
of a hop garden well fenced in, and regularly planted in lines, with a
broad walk around, and a hut at each wicker gate, where a slave and his
family resided to protect the plantation.

All the fruits mentioned as sold in the market grew in spontaneous
abundance, as did the sugar cane: the oranges were of a large size and
exquisite flavour. I believe this fruit has hitherto been considered
indigenous to India only. We saw no cocoa nut trees, nor was that fruit
in the market. Mr. Park’s route was through a very different
country.[99] In the marshy ground, a large species of fern is very
abundant, there are four varieties of it; in shady places that have been
cultivated, various tribes of urtica; and the leontodon grows abundantly
to the north of Coomassie. The miraculous berry, which gives acids the
flavour of sweets, making limes taste like honey, is common.[100] The
castor oil, (ricinus communis) rises to a large tree, I have only seen
it as a bush about three feet high on the coast; and the wild fig is
abundant, though neither of them are used by the natives. The cotton
plant is very plentiful, but little cultivated. The only use to which
they apply the silk cotton, is to the stuffing of cushions and
pillows.[101] Mr. Park observed the tobacco-plant, which grows
luxuriantly in Inta and Dagwumba, and is called toah. The visitors from
those countries recognised it in a botanical work. They first dry the
leaves in the sun, then, having rubbed them well between their hands,
mix them with water into oval masses, as will be seen; it is further
noticed in the Trade Report.

Lions are numerous on the northern frontiers of Inta, elephants (assoon,
F. A. soorer, B.[102]) are remarkably numerous in Kong, but they are
also found in Ashantee, with wild hogs (yambo, F. A.) hyænas (patacoo,
F. A. boofooree, B.,) cows (anantwee, F. A. B.,) sheep (ygwan, F. A.
tsan, B.,) goats (apunkie, F. A. terrie, B.,) deer (wonsan, F. A. B.,)
antelopes (ettwan, F. A. B.,) dogs (boddum, etcha, F. tweä, A. opooree,
B.,) approximating to the Danish, cats (agramwaw, F. A. B.,) extremely
sharp visaged and long necked, Gennet cats (essoor, F. A. B.,) pangolins
(appra, F. A. aypra, B.,) alligators (dankim, F. A. B.,) &c. &c. &c. The
rhinoceros (năree) is found in Boroom, and the hippopotamus (shonsa, A.
tchoosooree, B.) in the Odirree river.

The Ashantees say, that an animal called sissah or sissirree, will
attack every other however superior in size. The Fantees who had never
seen it, had imbibed a tremendous idea of it, from the stories in their
own country. I doubt its being so formidable to all other animals, for
the skin I saw was not more than three feet long, and the legs short, it
resembled that of a boar, but the natives said it was between a pig and
a goat. I enquired of the people of Inta and Dagwumba if they had ever
heard of a unicorn; one replied, yes! in the white man’s country. It is
extraordinary that the gnoo, (antelope gnu,) which is found behind the
Cape of Good Hope, is known in Inta by the same name.[103] Where the
beds were not an accumulation of cushions, the skin of the gnoo was
nailed to a large wooden frame, raised on legs about a foot from the
ground, and stretched as we would sacking. It was a revered custom that
no virgin of either sex should sleep on this kind of bed. Another
animal, called otrum, was described by the inhabitants of the eastern
frontier as having one very long horn on one side of the head and a
short one on the other; it is much larger than the gnoo. We met with a
spotted animal of the cat kind (gahin, F. A. B.,) very common, and
allied to the leopard or panther, but whether referable to either of
those species, or to be considered as distinct, we could not determine,
owing to the very vague and unsatisfactory character by which
naturalists have attempted to distinguish them, the kind and number of
the rows of spots; which we have observed in individuals of the same
decided species, to present almost an infinity of variation.

The vulture (pittay, F. A. epraykee, B.,) which I have before mentioned
to be venerated by the natives, for the same reason which the Egyptians
venerated the Vulturus Percnopterus, is the Vulturus Monachus, figured
by Le Vaillant. Green pigeons (assam) are found, and crows with a white
ring round their necks, probably the corvus scapularis figured by Le
Vaillant. There were several small birds of beautiful plumage, which
sung melodiously; two in particular, the one like a blackbird, and the
other of the same colour as the English thrush, but larger. Also a
variety of parrots beautifully spangled with different colours. M.
Cuvier was misinformed when he wrote (Regne animal, tom. i. p. 108)
“Macaque est le nom générique des singes à la côte de Guinée.” The name
is unknown there as well as in the interior. Dokoo is the generic name.
The Simia Diana (effoor, F. A. B.,) which has the most beautiful skin of
any monkey, is found in Ashantee as well as in Warsaw. All the natives
agree that they do not know of any monkies which dare to attack men, but
the akonëson, which they describe as small, and always seen in troops.

Snakes (aboïtinnee, F. A. ewaw, B.,) green, and of all colours;
scorpions, lizards, &c. &c. were found as on the coast, with a curious
variety of beetles, and the most beautiful butterflies. A few specimens
preserved in spirits will be sent to the British Museum,[104] as the
best apology for my ignorance rather than neglect of natural history.


[Footnote 96: At Cape Coast in 1815 there was scarcely any rain fell in
its season, from May to August. In 1816, the rains were heavy, but no
fogs succeeded. In 1817, there was but little rain, but a protracted
succession of slight fogs. The climate has been observed, by old
residents, to alter as unaccountably within these few years as that of
Europe.]

[Footnote 97: “My friend Mr. Morton Pitt, M.P. has proved, by the
enumeration of the inhabitants of a country parish in Dorsetshire, that
the men of an age capable of bearing arms are one fourth of the whole
community. Mr. Horneman, if I understand him rightly, states the number
of actual warriors to be 1500; so that we ought, perhaps, to multiply
that number by 5, to get nearer to the total amount of the population.”
_Major Rennell_.]

[Footnote 98: Issert mentions this being levied in Akim and other
tributary states.]

[Footnote 99: “It is observable, however, that although many species of
the edible roots which grow in the West India islands, are found in
Africa, yet I never saw, in any part of my journey, either the sugar
cane, the coffee, or the cocoa tree; nor could I learn, on inquiry, that
they were known to the natives. The pine apple, and the thousand other
delicious fruits, which the industry of civilized man (improving the
bounties of nature,) has brought to such great perfection in the
tropical climates of America, are here equally unknown. I observed,
indeed, a few orange and banana trees, near the mouth of the Gambia; but
whether they were indigenous, or were formerly planted there by some of
the white traders, I could not positively learn. I suspect that they
were originally introduced by the Portuguese.” Park’s First Mission.]

[Footnote 100: The curious fruit mentioned in the introduction, and to
which I have given the name of oxyglycus, I find was known to Des
Marchais, who describes it as a little red fruit, which, being chewed,
gives a sweet taste to the most sour or bitter things. Dalzel’s
Dahomey.]

[Footnote 101: Cotton of the cotton tree (or _silk_ cotton) _Bombax
Pentandrium_ _Lin._ This cotton is not made into thread, but is used
for making pillows and beds. It is also, from its catching fire so
easily, commonly put into tinder boxes, and employed in the preparation
of fire works. Ainslie’s Materia Medica of Hindostan.]

[Footnote 102: F. A. affixed to assoon, denote that to be the native
name in the Fantee and Ashantee languages, as B. represents Boroom.]

[Footnote 103: C’est probablement lui qui a donné lieu à leur
_catoblepas_. Voyez Pline, lib. 8, c. 32, et Ælien, lib. 7, c. 5,
Cuvier. The gnoo is almost always _looking down_.]

[Footnote 104: See Dr. Leach’s notice in the Appendix.]




                             CHAPTER VIII.

                               * * * * *

                                _Trade._


The currency of Ashantee is gold dust, that of Inta, Dagwumba, Gaman,
and Kong, cowries. Mr. Lucas writes, “to the merchants of Fezzan who
travel to the southern states of the Negroes, the purchase of gold,
which the dominions of several, and especially those of Degombah,
abundantly afford, is always the first object of commercial
acquisition.” I could not learn that any gold was dug or collected in
Dagwumba, though considerable quantities are imported, from its
extensive commerce. Sixteen ackies make an ounce or newemeën, 36 a
benda, 40 a periguin: eight tokoos (a small berry) are reckoned to the
ackie, but it will not weigh more than seven: there are eight distinct
names for quantities of gold dust from one to eight ackies. Five strings
or 200 cowries are equal to a tokoo, as at Accra. The clearest manner of
shewing the articles, prices, and profits of the Ashantee, Inta, and
Dagwumba markets, will be by a table with remarks; substituting, for the
greater convenience, English monies calculated at the currency of gold
here, which is £4. the oz.

  [Q.: Quantity.; P.: Profit.; P. pC.: Profit. per Cent.;
   Pce.: Piece.; Gll.: Gallon.; Brl.: Barrel.; fth.: fathom.;
   hdk.: hdkchf.; chg.: charge.]

  +------------------------------+------------------+------------------+
  |                _Cape Coast._ |  _Coomassie._    |   Sallagha and   |
  |                              |                  |     Yahndi.      |
  +---------------+--+--+--+-----+--+--+--+-----+---+--+--+--+-----+---+
  |  Articles.    |£ |s.|d.| Q.  |£.|s.|d.| Q.  |P. |£.|s.|d.| Q.  |P. |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |pC.|  |  |  |     |   |
  +---------------+--+--+--+-----+--+--+--+-----+---+--+--+--+-----+---+
  |(_a_) Silk,    |4 |  |  | per |  |5 |  |  1  |175|  |  |  |     |   |
  |India          |  |  |  |Pce. |  |  |  |span.|   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  | —— Fezzan     |  |  |  |     |2 |  |  |  1  |100|1 |  |  |  1  |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |fth. |   |  |  |  |fth. |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |(_b_)          |1 |10|  |     |  |2 |6 |  1  |400|  |  |  |     |   |
  |Sarstracunda   |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |span.|   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |(_c_) Glasgow  |1 |10|  |     |  |5 |  |  1  |75 |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Dane           |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |hdk. |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |(_d_) Romal    |1 |  |  |     |1 |5 |  |pce. |20 |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |(_e_) Guinea   |  |10|  |     |  |15|  |     |33 |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Stuff          |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |(_f_) Silesia  |  |10|  |     |  |15|  |     |33 |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Dagwumba       |  |  |  |     |  |5 |  | sq. |100|  |2 |6 | sq. |   |
  |white Cotton   |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |yard.|   |  |  |  |yard.|   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Rum            |  |10|  |Gll. |  |  |7½|dram.|400|  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |(_g_) Tobacco, |6 |  |  |Roll.|10|  |  |roll.|75 |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Portuguese     |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |7½|span.|   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  | —— Inta       |  |  |  |     |  |2 |6 | lb. |150|  |  |  | lb. |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |(_h_) Gunpowder|4 |  |  |  ¼  |  |  |7½|  1  |400|  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |Brl. |  |  |  |chg. |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Iron           |1 |  |  |Bar. |1 |15|  |bar. |75 |3 |  |  |bar. |200|
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Lead           |  |10|  |     |  |  |7½|  ½  |75 |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |inch.|   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Flints         |  |5 |  | 100 |  |  |¼ |each.|600|  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |(_i_) Spanish  |  |5 |  | ea. |  |5 |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Dollar         |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |(_k_) Sandals  |  |  |  |     |  |10|  |pair.|100|  |5 |  |pair.|   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Cushions       |  |  |  |     |1 |  |  | ea. |100|  |10|  | ea. |   |
  |               |  |  |  |     |  |  |  |     |   |  |  |  |     |   |
  |Marrowa Locks  |  |  |  |     |  |5 |  |     |100|  |2 |6 |     |   |
  +---------------+--+--+--+-----+--+--+--+-----+---+--+--+--+-----+---+

(_a_) The red taffetas (11 yards in each piece) are unravelled by the
Ashantees, and wove into the cloths of their own manufacture: they
unravel a few of the fancy silks, but these are generally bought for
wear, though they prefer those from Fezzan for that purpose, because the
colours are more shewy. Coarse thick scarves are also brought from the
interior, equal in substance to a double wove ribbon. One ackie a span
was the price in the public market, where it was retailed in these small
quantities, for the convenience of the weavers, who did not require, or
could not afford to purchase more: the price of a piece was uncertain,
as the person who could purchase so much, generally sent a trusty
servant to the foreign market, and seldom bought of the traders but when
they were necessitated to sell at little more than prime cost. The
richest silks, I saw, were worn by the Moors, who had bought them at
Yahndi and Houssa.[105] Reckoning nine inches to a span, there are eight
spans in a fathom, which is the Ashantee measure; but the fathom of Inta
and Dagwumba, contains only six spans. Even if the Ashantee traders give
twenty shillings a fathom, in barter of boossee, salt, rum, iron, &c.;
it is considerably cheaper to them than ours, considering that they get
100 per cent. on it at Coomassie. Mr. Lucas mentions “silk wrought and
unwrought amongst the articles exported from Fezzan to Kassina. Apokoo
and several others related to me, that Saï Cudjo bought a piece of silk
at Yahndi, so very fine, that although it could be compressed between
two hands, it was nevertheless larger than any cloth I had seen the
present King wear, and his appeared monstrous. Apokoo added, that six
slaves were paid for it, which would have produced £160. at the water
side.

(_b_) This is a highly glazed British cotton of bright red stripes with
a bar of white: it is bought solely for the red stripe, (as there is no
red dye nearer than Marrowa) which they weave into their own cloths,
throwing away the white. There are 280 inches in a piece. A cloth of
Ashantee manufacture will be sent to the British Museum, and, I expect,
the size, fineness, and variety will surprise.

(_c_) This is also a highly glazed British cotton of more colours, and
in handkerchiefs; ten of which are in a 30_s._ piece.

(_d_) This is an unglazed India cotton, not much in demand, and yielding
the least profit. The Manchester cotton called Tom Coffee is preferred.

(_e_) This is India cotton unglazed, for all of which there is, in
proportion, but a small demand. The Ashantees invariably prefer cloths
of the Dagwumba, or their own manufacture, and we rarely saw any others
worn in Coomassie.

(_f_) These are white cottons, six yards in a piece, but narrow, they
are bought for fetish cloths; but the next article, the white cotton
cloth of Dagwumba, is preferred, a piece of which, painted, will be sent
to the British Museum.

(_g_) These are the wholesale and retail prices at Coomassie, the
average length of a roll is 42 fathoms.

(_h_) Powder is retailed for customs or festivals: those who purchase it
for war, or can afford a ¼ barrel, send to the water side for it. A ¼
barrel contains 25 lbs. and the Ashantee charge weighs 16 ackies, equal
to ¾ of an ounce avoirdupoise.

(_i_) This was owing to their brisk intercourse with the Spanish and
Portuguese slave ships, a dollar generally fetches two ackies or 10_s._
Mr. Park writes, from £1. 5_s._ to £2. 10_s._ at Sansanding.

(_k_) Sandals and a cushion will be sent to the British Museum. In
Marrowa they decoct a good red dye from a tree called mossarātee.

The reason green ells are purchased by the Warsaws only, is, that they
must be the wedding garment of the females of that country: if they are
fast colours, and will not change to a blue with lime-juice, they will
not look at them.

Most of the slaves in Coomassie, were sent as part of the annual tribute
of Inta, Dagwumba, and their neighbours, to Ashantee; very many were
kidnapped, and for the few who were bought, I was assured by several
respectable Ashantees, 2000 cowries, or 1 basket of Boossee was the
greatest price given; so full were the markets of the interior. I have
brought some pods of the Boossee; it is astringent, and the natives chew
it to excite a flow of saliva, and allay the sensation of hunger.
The[106] Boossee must be the Gooroo nut, which Mr. Lucas describes as
one of the articles of trade between Fezzan, Kassina, Bornoo, and the
states south of the Niger. He writes, “Gooroo nuts, which are brought
from the Negro states on the south of the Niger, and which are
principally valued for the pleasant bitter that they communicate to any
liquor in which they are infused,” and again “a species of nut—which is
much valued in the kingdoms to the north of the Niger, and which is
called Gooroo. It grows on a large and broad leafed tree, that bears a
pod of about 18 inches in length, in which are inclosed a number of nuts
that varies from 7 to 9. Their colour is a yellowish green; their size
is that of a chesnut, which they also resemble, in being covered by a
husk of a similar thickness, and their taste, which is described as a
pleasant bitter, is so grateful to those who are accustomed to its use,
and so important as a corrective to the unpalatable or unwholesome
waters of Fezzan, and of the other kingdoms that border on the vast
Zahara, as to be deemed of importance to the happiness of life. They
are purchased at the rate of 12_s._ for 100 pods.”

Sal ammonia is found abundantly in Dagwumba: in the Ashantee market, a
lump the size of a duck’s egg, was sold for 2_s._: they grind it to mix
with their snuff, (of which they take large quantities,) as it gives it
a pungency agreeable to them. They also dissolve it in the water they
give to their cattle, and sometimes drink it themselves for pains in the
bowels. The Tamool practitioners in the East Indies suppose it to be a
useful remedy in certain female obstructions, and morbid uterine
enlargements. Mr. Lucas writes, “No commercial value appears to be
annexed to the fleeces which the numerous flocks of the Negro kingdoms
afford; for the cotton manufacture, which, the Shereef says, is
established among the tribes to the south of the Niger, seems to be the
only species of weaving that is known among them.” In Dagwumba, however,
they manufacture a coarse kind of blanket from sheep’s wool. There is a
white grease, which has long been called Ashantee grease by the natives
on the coast, who supposed it to be produced in that country. They use
it daily to anoint their skins, which otherwise become coarse and
unhealthy. The Ashantees purchase it from the interior, and make a great
profit by it: it is a vegetable butter, decocted from a tree, called
Timkeëä: it is doubtless the Shea butter of Mr. Park.[107] Mr. Lucas
mentions, “small Turkey and plain Mesurata carpets,” among the articles
exported from Fezzan to Kassina: a small carpet fetches 2 oz. of gold at
Coomassie. The Ashantees procure most of their ivory from Kong, where
they give 8 ackies, or 40_s._ in barter, for a very large tooth.

“The preference of the Ashantees for the Dagwumba and Inta markets, for
silk and cloth, results not merely from their having been so long
accustomed to them, but because they admit of a barter trade. The
Boossee or Gooroo nut, salt, (which is easily procured, and affords an
extravagant profit,) and small quantities of the European commodities,
rum, and iron,[108] yield them those articles of comfort and luxury,
which they can only purchase with gold and ivory from the settlements on
the coast. Gold they are all desirous of hoarding; even those less
covetous than is generally their nature, that they may be prepared for
the purchase of guns and powder to a large extent, on any sudden war,
and thus ingratiate themselves with the king and the government. Were
the Ashantees a commercial people, they might be the brokers between the
interior and Europeans, or, purchasing supplies more adequate to the
demands of their neighbours for European commodities, which would be
bought with avidity, realize large properties. But they have no idea of
buying more of the various articles than will supply themselves; and
leave a small residue to barter for the cloth, silk, and tobacco in the
Inta and Dagwumba markets. They are as little commercial as the Romans
were in their infancy, and their government would repress rather than
countenance the inclination, (believing no state can be aggrandized but
by conquest,) lest their genius for war might be enervated by it, and
lest, either from the merchants increasing to a body too formidable for
their wishes to be resisted, or too artful from their experience to be
detected, they might sacrifice the national honour and ambition to their
avarice, and furnishing Inta, Dagwumba, or any of their more powerful
neighbours (who have yielded to circumstances rather than force) with
guns and powder (which are never allowed to be exported from
Ashantee,[109]) break the spell of their conquests, and undermine their
power. The chiefs are fed bountifully by the labours of their slaves,
and sharing large sums of the revenue, (the fines their oppression has
imposed on other governments,) with incalculable fees for corruption or
interference, refine upon the splendor of equipage even to satiety, and
still possess a large surplus of income daily accumulating. Were they to
encourage commerce, pomp, the idol of which they are most jealous, would
soon cease to be their prerogative, because it would be attainable by
others; the traders growing wealthy, would vie with them; and for their
own security, stimulated by reflections they have now too little at risk
to originate, they would unite to repress the arbitrary power of the
Aristocracy; and even if they did not, inevitably (as the chiefs
conceive) divert the people’s genius for war.

It will occur that even to furnish the necessities or luxuries of the
Ashantees alone, in cloth, silk, &c. would, considering the extent of
the kingdom, considerably augment the returns of our commerce in this
part of the world; and therefore it would be well to wean them,
gradually, from the markets of the interior, by inducing their
cultivation of cotton, which grows abundantly, is of a superior quality,
and which, offered in quantities, in addition to the ivory, would lessen
the balance of trade now in our favor, and by enabling them, in some
degree to purchase with produce instead of gold dust, remove the present
comparative disadvantage in trading with Europeans entirely. This
occurred to me, and I explained the view not only to the king, but to
the more enterprising and reflecting natives: but they had no idea of a
quantity, and immediately concluded cotton to be so desirable to us,
that 40 or 50 lbs. would be received in barter for twenty times its
value; and they required one tokoo and a half per lb. for it, (say one
shilling,) even in gold, and on the spot. When I urged that they must
clear the ground, form plantations, and superintend the labours of their
slaves; they replied, that the Boossee or Gooroo nut grew spontaneously,
and required no labour, that salt was brought to their frontier by
poorer nations, and sold for little without the trouble of fetching it;
and these articles, with the value, their prevention of all intercourse
but their own with the water side nations, attached to a little rum and
iron in the interior, furnished them with silks and cotton cloths at a
much easier rate, pattern and quality.

A serious disadvantage opposed to the English trade, is that the
Ashantees will purchase no tobacco but the Portuguese, and that eagerly
even at 2 oz. of gold the roll. Of this, (the Portuguese and Spanish
slave ships regularly calling at Elmina,) the Dutch Governor-General is
enabled to obtain frequent supplies, in exchange for canoes, two of
which, though they cost him comparatively nothing, fetch 32 rolls of
tobacco; and the General has sometimes received 80 oz. of gold a day
from the Ashantees for tobacco only. If they cannot have this tobacco,
they will content themselves with that grown in the interior, of which I
have brought a sample. A preference for the Dutch has long been natural
to the Ashantees, from an earlier though limited intercourse with them,
and from the natural impression, that the English settling amongst their
enemies, the Fantees, have encouraged and assisted their provocations
and resistance. With this bias in his favor, though the Dutch market,
destitute of supplies, had not been visited for many years, the talent
of General Daendels, “callidum quicquid placuit,” would no doubt have
again raised it to a level with the English, cæteris paribus; and his
unlimited importation of powder and guns in the first place, with the
still more valuable supplies of Portuguese tobacco he receives at
present, as superior advantages, have, of course, possessed the Dutch
market of superior inducements.

It is to be lamented, the indifference of the Dutch and Danes to their
settlements here, being evident from their neglect and reduction of
them, that the British government did not take advantage of the
disregard, and add them to their own. Elmina is a much finer position
for head quarters than Cape Coast; the Dutch fort at Succondee, the best
point for the Warsaw trade, and where we have but a house, is strong,
admirably situated, and might be put in good condition for £1000. in
addition to which, Axim, near the mouth of the Ancobra, would be the
only fort to windward worth keeping; and the Danish head quarters,
Christiansburg Castle at Accra, with their fort at Adda, (to secure the
navigation of the Volta,) would have answered every purpose and view to
leeward. One system could then have been acted upon towards the natives,
the commerce, confined to the English, would have grown from wholesome
regulations, which no other settlers could counteract by selfishness,
jealousy, or by facilitating the illegitimate trade we would crush; and
the benevolent views of the British government for the improvement and
civilization of the natives, would not be defeated by those, who,
holding their private interest superior to views in which their own
government has evinced no interest, militate against them by fostering
suspicions to bar our progress in the interior, and by indulging those
habits and customs of the natives, which it must be our first step to
correct and divert.

In addition to the obstacles which the inconsistent and selfish conduct
of the different European powers towards the natives presents to
intercourse and civilization, the continuance of the slave trade under
the Spanish flag, is one more serious: no one can imagine the stubborn
impediment it was to our negotiations at Ashantee, where the native
emissaries from these slave ships arrived not long after us. It not only
injures the British commerce here, almost to annihilation, but, slaving
being the natural trade of the natives, because it is the most indolent
and the most lucrative, the opposition, which is insinuated and believed
to proceed from the English alone, conveys a disagreeable impression of
us to the interior, as inauspicious to our intercourse and progress, as
the even partial continuance of such a trade is to legitimate commerce
and civilization. One thousand slaves left Ashantee for two Spanish
schooners or Americans under that flag, to our knowledge, during our
residence there, doubtless the whole number was much greater; since our
return it must have been very considerable, for the slave trade was
never more brisk than it is at this moment under the cloak of the
Spanish flag, and great risk has been incurred, in consequence, of
offending our new friend and formidable neighbour the King of Ashantee,
from the firm resistance of his strong intreaties to the Governor in
Chief, to allow the return of a powerful mulatto slave trader to Cape
Coast town, whence he had been expelled under the present government, as
the most daring promoter of that commerce. It is a great pity, in the
infancy of our intercourse with this great interior power, that there
should have been occasion either for the request or refusal; which there
would not have been had the slave trade been abolished, instead of
crippled, at the expense, probably, of our own interests and views in
the interior, and, which is worse, of the happiness and improvement of
the natives. For it is certainly our duty, because it is the most
acceptable and the only efficient acknowledgment we can make of the
superior blessings and endowments by which we are so indulgently
distinguished from these nations, to extend the influence and the
participation, both by enterprise and policy, even if our commerce may
not be benefitted; and if we gain no other recompense than the
satisfaction of our own minds in the ameliorated condition of others,
and the opportunity we have made to ourselves of exemplifying our own
gratitude.[110] Whilst one slave ship is allowed to visit this coast,
the great convenience and the great profits of the trade will recur, and
be perpetuated amongst the Ashantees; they will linger in the hope of
its entire renewal, and view the English invidiously, as the enemies to
what they conceive to be their only natural commerce; this is another
advantage to the Dutch, added to the inherent bias in their favour; and,
from the reception and facilities which slave ships meet with at Elmina,
our odium is aggravated instead of being participated. “Delenda est
Carthago.”

Let us suppose this irreconcilable obstacle to be annihilated, as no
doubt it will be, and resume our reflections on a commercial intercourse
with the interior. The people of Inta and Dagwumba, being commercial
rather than warlike, the object, deliberately to be obtained, is an
intercourse with them, which would in fact be an intercourse with the
interior as far as Timbuctoo and Houssa northwards, and Cassina, if not
to Bornoo, eastwards. The wealth, civilization, and commerce of
Dagwumba, Mr. Lucas has before reported. Now, in effecting such an
intercourse through the Ashantees, who are indisputably the greatest and
the rising power of western Africa, and who, having acquired their
present extent of influence and command in little more than a century,
may be expected to aggrandize their empire considerably; in seeking this
connection through them, there are these adverse circumstances, their
policy, their jealousy, and their inaptitude to commerce. It has been
suggested to the King, and urged with all the address of General
Daendels, to open a path to the interior through his kingdom, and to
receive a duty or tax on all the merchandize transported, which would
afford him a certain and considerable addition to his revenue; but even
this appeal to the avarice of the Ashantee government has had no
influence. It would be dangerous as well as impolitic to offend the King
of Ashantee at any time, with the present garrisons of the forts,
madness; and though his influence through that of Dagwumba, which is at
his command, would extend to the Niger, yet, I think our anxiety to
explore so far should be suppressed for two or three years, until he is
satisfied that commerce and not ambition is the impulse. But in the
interim, it would be desirable gradually to approach Inta and Dagwumba,
by establishing a settlement up the Volta, which has been shewn to run
close to Sallagha, the grand emporium of Inta, and is navigable within
four days of it; and possibly might be made so even nearer. The Danes
would no doubt relinquish their claim to the navigation of the Volta,
for it is a doubtful one. Dalzel writes, “the Danes claim the exclusive
navigation of the Volta, which is disputed by the English, who have a
settlement near it, called Loy.” The great prices the Ashantees get for
rum, iron, &c. from the people of Inta and Dagwumba, and the avidity
with which they purchase their small supplies, leave no doubt of the
eagerness with which they would resort to our market; and the silks they
obtain from Fezzan being dearer than our own, I should think we could
induce a preference. Our Manchester cloth and cotton manufactures would
be novel and useful to them, as those I saw wore vests and tunics. But
here I must observe, that whenever our commerce with the interior may be
established, the returns of it, in my opinion, will fall short of the
general idea and expectation.

The King of Ashantee viewing our settlements on the Volta, would, I have
no doubt, be reconciled by our undertaking to sell neither guns or
powder to any but his own people; a measure due to humanity as well as
policy, for the preponderance of one great nation is auspicious to the
civilization as well as the tranquillity of Africa; but for that, the
slaughter of the human species would be incalculable; there would be a
constant warfare between the numerous states, naturally querulous, and
our passage to the interior would be impossible, not only on that
account, but because there would be no powerful monarch to recommend or
protect us. If the King of Ashantee were not satisfied with our new
settlement confining the trade of guns and powder to himself, he would
certainly be repressed by the alarming reflection, that it was at our
discretion, (depending on his behaviour,) to supply Inta and Dagwumba
with both, and thus to undermine his empire; for it is well known, and
has been confessed, that the greater population of these countries,
could they but procure fire-arms, would give them a superiority over the
Ashantees, to which their greater civilization seems to entitle them.
Our force and establishments should be respectable; not to arrogate or
to intrude, but to protect the legitimate commercial views, sanctioned
and invited by the voice of less arbitrary powers, and also to make
their first impression of the English imposing and preservative.
Residencies should be established at these courts, and young men of
talent, temper, and discrimination be found to fill them, collecting the
geographical and statistical desiderata, and forwarding them to be
investigated and digested into one report at head quarters, before they
were transmitted to England. One or two intelligent Moors might also be
engaged to trade by different routes, and minute the directions,
distances, and descriptions of the several places; thus paving the way,
and lessening the difficulties of a future Mission to the Niger. If the
working of gold mines were also an object, the vicinity of the Ancobra
affords a rich field; and a small district might either be purchased of
the natives, or they might receive a dividend of the proceeds, which
would produce them much more than their present inadequate researches,
suppressed by their more powerful neighbours the Warsaws.

The benevolent and politic views of the British Government, would thus,
by making use of what we have or might easily get, be more probably, if
not more speedily realized, than by the perilous, desultory, and limited
enterprises of two or three individuals.


[Footnote 105: Since my return to England I have seen some silk brought
from Aleppo, and manufactured there, precisely resembling these, which
were frequently enriched by gold threads interwoven.]

[Footnote 106: Sterculia acuminata _Palis de Beauvais Flore d’Oware_, 1.
_p._ 41, _tab._ 24.]

[Footnote 107: See Sketch of Gaboon.]

[Footnote 108: Though iron is manufactured in Dagwumba, that from Europe
is preferred for finer purposes. The former is an imperfect steel
containing a mechanical mixture of unreduced ore.]

[Footnote 109: “Fire arms are unknown to such of the nations on the
south of the Niger as the Shereef has visited; and the reason which he
assigns for it is, that the kings in the neighbourhood of the coast,
persuaded that if these powerful instruments of war should reach the
possession of the populous inland states, their own independence would
be lost, have strictly prohibited, and by the wisdom of their measures
have effectually prevented this dangerous merchandize from passing
beyond the limits of their dominions.” Lucas.]

[Footnote 110: The dissuasion from barbarities of which millions are now
the victims, as the descriptions of the customs of Ashantee and the
interior have shewn, and the interests of science, render this duty more
imperious. It has been well observed, “apologies for our present
ignorance of every thing that regards geography, &c. might be pleaded by
mercantile speculators, but can have little weight with those who have
the interests of science at heart, or the national honour and fame,
which are intimately connected with those interests. It was not with a
view to any immediate commercial advantages, that this liberal
encouragement for the discovery of the north-west passage was held out,
but with the same expanded objects that sent Cook in search of a
southern continent.”

Voltaire’s remark on India is now only applicable to Africa, “Plusieurs
y ont fait des fortunes immenses, peu se sont appliqués à connoître ce
pays.” I would even recommend indulging the wish of the King of Dahomey
to renew and perpetuate his connection with the English, not indeed by
resuming the fort, that would be a useless expense, as there is no trade
but in ivory, but by establishing a Residency at his capital, the most
frugal method of collecting the various accounts of the interior of that
neighbourhood for geographical investigators, besides supplying the
naturalist. Geographical discoveries in Africa have long been ardently
emulated between England and France, and they have stimulated a generous
rivalry of investigation between the men of science of both countries.
An Englishman first penetrating to the Niger, and determining its course
at the moment a learned investigator of the other kingdom had concluded
it to be a contrary one, was one of those rational and illustrious
triumphs which adorn the historical pages of a nation much more than
those of war; for the gratification and the benefit is shared by both,
and such successes cease to be invidious when the interests of science
are thus mutually at heart. The following immortal tribute from a
classic of a rival nation, should stimulate us to challenge as
illustrious a record of intellectual research,


  · · · · “monumentum ære perennius,

  Regalique situ pyramidum altius;”


by a correspondent pursuit of intelligence in Africa.

“Un Anglais, détruit tout ce vain amas d’erreurs dont sont remplies nos
histoires des Indes, et confirme ce que le petit nombre d’hommes
instruits en a pensé.” Voltaire.]




                              CHAPTER IX.

                               * * * * *

                              _Language._


The hypothesis I have met with, I think in Parsons’s Remains of Japhet,
that the confusion of languages at Babel was a visitation on the family
of Ham only, which spread itself over Africa, is certainly supported
(considering the radical affinities which have been traced between the
Arabic the Russ and the Greek, the Persian and the German, the Qquichua,
or language of the Incas, and the Sanscrit, and many others[111]) by the
variety of languages in Africa which cannot be assimilated in the least
degree to each other, and which would, I think, resist the laborious
ingenuity of the philologist.

I have heard about half a dozen words in the Fantee, which might be said
to be not unlike the same nouns in the Welsh language; and this is the
only affinity which has been imagined. Two words only in the Accra
language have struck me as assimilating to those of any other, the
conjunction “_kay_” (_and_), which with a broader sound would answer the
corresponding Greek conjunction και; and _fai_ (_to do_,) pronounced as
the perfect participle of the same verb in French, and which is spelled
_fai_ in the old songs of Richard the first, and the troubadour Faydit.
The Fantee word _umpa_ (_true, indeed_,) may be imagined to resemble the
Greek εμπας, which has the same meaning; but it is a solitary instance.

From Apollonia or Amănăheä to the Volta, about 300 miles, six languages
are spoken: the Amanaheä, Ahanta, Fantee, Affoottoo, Accra, and the
Adampë. The numerals of which will appear, collaterally with others
hitherto unknown, at the end of this chapter.

The Ashantee, in comparison with the Fantee, Warsaw, &c. &c. from its
refinement of idiom, oratory being so much more cultivated, may be
considered as the Attic amongst the dialects of the Greek, but it owes
its superior euphony, striking to any ear, to the characteristics of the
Ionic, an abundance of vowel sounds, and a rejection of aspirates:

          _Fantee._     _Ashantee._

  Key      Sāfie         Saphwooa.

  Lock     Karradacoo    Karradoo.

  Night    Adayfwa       Adagio.

  Day      Aweeabil      Aweeabillee.

  Gun      Etoorh        Oteuh.

Vocabularies of these languages would not be interesting to the public,
especially as no affinity can be traced; and I know not how to acquit
myself of every thing like indifference to the curiosity at home,
(without the dulness of the subject proving more irksome than a
disappointment,) unless I endeavour to give an idea of the philosophy of
the languages,[112] and submit their progress, collaterally with that of
the arts and manners. The genius of the Accra language differing the
most essentially from that of the Ashantee or Fantee, examples from both
will be instanced for illustration. I have principally consulted two
gentlemen, natives of the country, but educated in Europe: the one
resident between forty and fifty years; the other, who has a respectable
knowledge of the grammar of the English and French languages, returned
from England about ten years back, and both are as fluent as the Negroes
in the Fantee and Accra, the latter being their vernacular tongue.

Impressed with the ingenious hypothesis of the learned author of the
Diversions of Purley, my first care has been to investigate the
particles of the Fantee and Accra, considering the languages of
uncivilised people, to be least advanced or removed from the primeval
simplicity, to which Mr. Horne Tooke’s system refers. I found, however,
both the Accra and Fantee languages more complete than I expected in
conjunctions, and seldom using verbs instead of them, which I presumed
they might do. Yet I have no doubt, their half dozen of conjunctions, if
examined etymologically by a person thoroughly conversant in the
languages, might be traced, and shewn to be the contracted imperatives
of the most recurrent verbs, as Mr. Tooke has proved those of our own
language to be. Neither the Accra or Fantee have conjunctions answering
to each of ours; the distinction between many is neither comprehensible
or necessary to them. I will submit their conjunctions, with those
investigated in the first volume of the Diversions of Purley.

  _Fantee._                        _Accra._

  Onee           and               Kay

              {  if
  Sey         {                    Kedgee
              {  unless

              {  still
  Emphee      {                    Shee
              {  but

              {  because           Nooyĕwon
  Interah     {
              {  since             Nunnë

              {  notwithstanding
  Namoo       {                    Nemoolay
              {  though

              {  otherwise
  Anna        {                    Noollay
              {  or

There are no adverbs in either language. There are but two in our own
which may not be expressed by a verb or an adnoun, _still_ and _since_;
and these they express by the conjunctions _but_ and _because_. “I
intreated, but (still) he would not,” “because (since) it is so,” as the
Latins frequently used prepositions for the Greek adverbs. Indeed
_since_ is expressible by a verb, being derived according to Mr. Tooke
from the Saxon _sithan_, seeing that. They express the adverb _much_ by
the adjective _many_; _ago_ by a verb, “_it passes_ ten years;” _almost_
by the verb _it wants_, “_it wants_ to rain;” and _when_ by a noun,
“_the time_ I was there,” coincident with Jones’s derivation of
ὁτε.[113] _Nooyĕwon_, (_because_) in Accra, is literally, “_for the sake
of_.” _Intērah_, the corresponding word in Fantee, “on the head of,”
(_tirree_ is head) thus, they would say, “I do this on your head,” or
because you told me. Lest, which is considered by Mr. Horne Tooke to be
the past participle of the Saxon verb leyan, to dismiss, is not to be
found either in the Accra or Fantee: in the former they would say,
“_Menkaw hauh ebbēbărădi_,” “do not go there, you fall down;” and in the
latter, “_Kaiheah djai nee oheäbwayshee_,” “do not go there, and (or
for) you fall down.” The use of the noun for the adverb is frequent in
Demosthenes, (“εϛι δικαιος εχειν,” “he justly deserves”) and can only be
accounted for in a prose writer, who does not need poetical licenses, as
an archaism, disused generally, through invention or refinement. The
term adverb is not a just indication of the origin of that part of
speech, for, although they are derived from verbs as well as nouns, yet,
in our own language, as well as in the Greek, following Mr. Horne Tooke,
the greater number are derived from nouns: and those (of which there are
some in the Greek) which may be indifferently derived from a noun, or a
verb, may be referred to the former; because, many of the adnouns from
which adverbs are derived in the Greek, have been pointed out as
disused; and therefore the verbs from which adverbs are exclusively
derived, are likely to be derived themselves from obsolete adnouns,
which cannot be recalled; for it has been philosophically advanced, that
originally there could have been but one sort of words, that is, nouns,
or the names of the objects of our sensations and ideas.[114]

I consider the absence of adverbs, participles, and prepositions,
certainly the least indispensible parts of speech, and favouring
copiousness rather than energy, to be a proof of the almost genuine, or
primeval simplicity of the Accra and Fantee languages, which have not
advanced or altered, even in the small degree of their arts or manners;
for these have only been ameliorated by commercial intercourse with
strangers, who not understanding their language could not have suggested
improvements, and from whose languages, they being equally
unintelligible, amendments could not have been copied. We find
Portuguese nouns, and nouns only, adopted in the Fantee; and that, of
necessity, as Saxon nouns were adopted in the Welsh or Celtic, because
they had no words to designate novelties they had never before seen or
heard of; and, therefore, they called them as those did who introduced
them. These primitive languages being, nevertheless, thoroughly adequate
to oratory as well as the commoner purposes of speech, is a strong proof
that language was revealed, as Johnson, Blair, Warburton, and others
have maintained, and that it was not the fruit of human invention or
industry, as Lucretius, Horace, and most of the antients imagined.

Neither the Accra or Fantee distinguish genders, the name of the person,
or the context, is the only explication; they have not even a third
person feminine, but one pronoun serves for _he, she, it_.

The Accra has a definite and indefinite article, but both are affixed to
the noun, as “_minna nooleh_,” I saw the man; “_minna nookoo_,” I saw a
man. The indefinite article “_koo_” is the contraction of numeral one,
“_ekoo_,” so that I saw a man, is literally “I saw man one.” _An_ is
simply another form of the numeral one, still used in North Britain
under the form ane; and in the French, the numeral and the article
corresponding to one, are the same. The Fantee, like the Greek, has no
indefinite article, or according to Mr. Harris’s expression, on which
Mr. Horne Tooke is so pleasant, “supplies it by a negation of the
definite,” which is “_noo_,” affixed, as “_mehoon nimpanoo_,” I saw the
man.[115]

In the Accra, the plural is formed by inflection, epenthesis, paragoge,
and apocope: these changes are almost peculiar in every noun; the more
frequent inflections are, ai, ay, and ee.

            _Singular._    _Plural._

  A woman     yeo           yeay.

  A box       adikka        adikkai.

  A stone     teh           tai.

  Ground      shepong       shepongee.

  A hyæna     krang         krangee.

  A father    tchay         tchaymë.

  A liar      amallalo      amallaloi.

  A gun       toon          tween.

  A vessel    lelen         ledgenë.

  A man       noon          nhal.

  A house     tchoon        tchuë.

In the Fantee the plural number is distinguished by the prefix _en_,
though generally, if they can, (in a glance whilst speaking) discover
the number of objects, they use a numeral with the noun singular; or, if
they cannot be so precise in the instant, they substitute _many_ to mark
an indefinite number. The Chinese also, are said to drop their plural
adjunct “_min_,” when there is another word of plurality attached to the
noun.

Neither language has prepositions, and of course peraphrasis is
generally resorted to: conjunctions are sometimes substituted, as _and_
for _with_; occasionally verbs, as “the King _to give_ his captain,” for
_to his captain_; and, sometimes, they are presumed from the tone or the
context. Mr. Horne Tooke, who values prepositions very much, has traced
all but five, of our own language, to nouns and verbs; and of these
five, three have since been traced to nouns and a numeral; so that _out_
and _off_, only, are unaccounted for. Jones, in his Greek Grammar,
writes, “the roots of prepositions are nouns and verbs,” and,
accordingly, he derives απο from the Hebrew, _ab_, a stem, περι from the
Arabic _pera_, eminence, υπερ from the Hebrew _aber_, sky, or the
Persian _ober_, a cloud: the inseparable prepositions had been traced to
nouns and verbs long before.

Degrees of comparison are not expressed by adjectives or adverbs, in
either language: but, for he is richer than he, the Accras would say,
“_eh phay leh ne_;” the Fantees, “_aw tchen adee_,” he _passes him_ (in)
things: neither language has an adjective answering to rich or wealthy,
but “_ne_,” and “_adee_,” in both, correspond exactly in meaning and use
with the _res_ of the Latins: the superlative would be expressed by “_he
passes all_.” The antient idiom of comparison, antecedent to the general
use of inflections or adverbs, was probably similar, judging from the
following, and many other sentences in the Greek, “Παῥ ἑαυτὸν μηδένα
ἐπιτὴδειον ἡγεῖτο, he thought no body fitter than himself;” “πλείονος
δοξης παρὰ Μωσῆν ἠξίωται, Heb. xiii. he was counted of more glory, or
more glorious than Moses.” Here παρα, so frequently expressing
comparison, being derived from the verb περαω, _to pass_, is identical
with the Accra and Fantee expression.

I observed before that the Accra and Fantee have no adjective answering
to rich, they are also deficient in many others, which they supply by a
second substantive in the same manner. This idiom is found in the Greek,
“Το σωμα της ταπεινωσεως ἠμων, our humiliated body, the body of our
humiliation; Αιρεσεις απωλειας. destructive heresies, &c. &c.” and it
is said to be both a Hebrew and Celtic idiom; primeval languages, and
the latter, I presume, as rude as those we are investigating.

In the Accra, the personal pronouns are

  I             me

  thou          boh

  he, she, it   lheh

  we            whah

  you           nnheay

  they          amăy

_Me_ is generally reduplicate before verbs, as “_me me yay_” I eat.
_Boh_ before verbs generally suffers aphæresis as “_oh yay_,” thou
eatest, but sometimes not, as “_boh fai_,” thou doest: this is also the
case with _lheh_ as “_heh yay, lheh fai_.” _Me_ is added, as _met_ in
Latin, to make these pronouns compound. In Fantee the personal pronouns
are

  I             me

  thou          awaw

  he, she, it   narra

  we            yarra

  you           awoo

  they          warra;

the latter is used as a possessive pronoun also; _woodde_ is affixed to
make them compound; they are irregularly contracted before verbs.
Considering these barbarous languages of primitive simplicity, and
recollecting the original and philosophical deduction of pronouns from
verbs, by the Greek professor of Glasgow, as εγω or εγων (which is the
more ancient) from λεγων, ipse from επω, I particularly enquired for
verbs resembling their pronouns; but, after a long and diligent
recollection, neither of my authorities could furnish me with any to the
point. It is curious to observe, that the _me_ represents the pronoun I,
in both these rude languages,[116] as it does, though not in the
nominative case, in most other primitive languages, and in the modern
ones derived from them: it would seem to be the natural and involuntary
expression for that pronoun.

There is only an active voice in the Accra or Fantee; the passive is
expressed by a circumlocution, as he loves, or they love me, for I am
loved, &c.[117] It appears erroneous to consider the infinitive mood as
the root of the verb, when it has a separable or distinguishing
termination, and _mong_ is as distinctly the verbalizing adjunct in the
Accra language, as _ere_ or _are_ in the Latin, ειν in Greek, or an in
the Anglo-Saxon. If we consider the imperative as the divested
fundamental form of the verb, it is still difficult in these languages
to get at the root, for the use of the infinitive for the imperative,
occasional in the Greek, is, in the Accra, so general, that for some
time I thought it unexceptionable, and that it had not the two moods.

The Accra has the neuter verb _to be_ in the present, perfect, and
future tenses, but in the perfect, it is irregular.

  I am   I have been   I shall be

  meyeh      metay       mahyeh

The Fantee only has it in the present, “_oh yea_, he is.” It is
remarkable that even the linguists of our forts, who speak English
fluently, never understand or use our neuter verb _to be_, but
substitute _live_ for it, and that, whether they speak of animate or
inanimate things; a servant would say, “your keys live in your pocket.”

The imperative mood has a present tense complete in each language.

They express the potential mood by adding auxiliary verbs, such as our
can, may, &c., have been shewn to be derived from.

The termination of the infinitive in the Accra is generally _mong_,
which is rejected in conjugating. In the Fantee it is not distinguished
from the first person present, or root. The use of the infinitive mood,
even in Accra, is very circumscribed, for it is not found even in the
most natural case when two verbs come together, as I want to eat, for
which they say, “_metōn meyay_,” I want I eat. The infinitive is
generally used for the imperative in the Accra, but, otherwise, it only
occurs in an idiom almost peculiar to that language, for instance, for
are you walking now, they say,

  “_Neo_mong oh _neo_ neh,”

  “To walk are you walking now.”

For I am straightening it,

  “_Jadjumong_ me _jadjio_ leh.”

  “To straighten I am straightening it.”

Verbs are invariably used thus, interrogatively, and, generally, in
replies. I said almost peculiar, because I think this pleonasm is
identified in the Greek idiom, “Ουχι μενον σοι εμενε. Remaining, did it
not remain to thee.”

The Accra has the present, imperfect, perfect, and future tenses: the
imperfect and future being distinguished by the prefixes _bleh_ and
_ah_, the one before, the other after the pronoun.

  “me yāyne.   bleh me yayne.   me yăy.    m’ahye.”

  I eat it.   I was eating it.  I eat.   I will eat.

But the imperfect tense is never used, unless a sentence precedes it, as

  “Bennay heh bă bleh me yay.”

  “When he came I was eating.”

Otherwise, they use the perfect for the imperfect, never replying to a
question even, in the latter. The perfect is only distinguished from the
present by being pronounced short. These explicative particles, _bleh_
and _ah_, would, no doubt, be found to be remnants of verbs of
appropriate signification, as the _ai_ of the French future is derived
from _avoir_, were any philologist sufficiently acquainted with the
languages to investigate them. _Ne_, signifying it or thing, is adjoined
to many verbs, frequently in the present tense only, like the
explicative particle _en_ conjugated with “_aller_.”

The Fantee has a present, perfect, and pluperfect: as “me dedee,” I eat,
“me adee,” I have eaten, “me waya dedee,” I had eat. It has no future,
yet the time is marked precisely, by adding _soon_, _to-morrow_, &c. to
the present.

Neither language has participles; for, I see him coming, the Accras
would say, according to their idiom,

  “Minnā eh ba’lheh.”

  “I see his coming.”

_Ba_ being a noun, with the definite article _lheh_ affixed. The Fantees
would say,

  “Mehoon deh orraba.”

  “I see that he comes.”

Many verbs in the Accra language are conjugated like reflectives, though
they are not so in their nature, as

  “Me  nakoo  me  fai  lheh

   I    not   I   did   it, for I did not do it.

In the Accra, _ko_, the contraction of _nakoo_, (not,) is added to verbs
as a negative, as “_meyayko_,” I did not eat; yet, in some instances,
they have distinct verbs to express the negative of the action, as
“_mahttay_,” I will go, “_meyang_,” I will not go.

The Fantee prefixes _neën_, not, as “_me dedee_,” I eat, “_me neën
dedee_,” I do not eat; and they have also, apparently, distinct negative
verbs, as “_me becko_,” I go, “_me’nkoko_,” I do not go.

The Accra resembles the Greek in the nice distinctions of some of its
verbs and nouns.

  Gnăghmong         To salute in the morning.

  Cotaghmong        To roll up.

  Balbaghtoomong    To draw towards

  Tehtemong         To gather up

  Kakow             The tooth ache (_nanyong_ a tooth)

  Kodjomong         To talk a palaver

  Song              To work as a smith  }
                                        } neechoomong to work
  Ghnāmong                    mechanic  }

  Ninnamong         To separate weeds from earth

The Accra and Fantee interjections are generally parts of sentences, as,
Mr. Horne Tooke has shewn most of our own to be: “_minnannako_,” what do
I see now, “_me ä whoo!_” I die, “_màdja!_” oh my father, equally
responsive to grief, joy, or surprise; and used as involuntarily, and as
frequently as the two syllables _boh_, _hah_, which answer to our _oh_,
and _ah_, and which, of course, cannot be called words. An Ashantee
striking his foot against a stone, or any thing in his way, exclaims
“the thing is mad.”

I was surprised to find little, or no inversion in the Accra or Fantee
prose[118]; the substantive precedes the adjective, but there is
scarcely any other trace of it: yet, it is one of their poetical
licenses, as may be instanced in the following line of a Fantee song;

          “Abirrikirri croom ogah odum.”

          Foreign town fire put in,

for “the foreign town is set on fire.” In addition to this inversion, so
many peculiar additives, (generally vowels,) and inflexions are allowed,
as well as the figures Synæresis, Diæresis, Metathesis, and Anastrophe,
in their poetry, and in their poetry only, (making it unintelligible
even to those who can converse fluently with them) that both languages
may be said to have a Prosody. From the following song, I imagined the
Fantees (for the Accra’s are said to possess none but fetish hymns in
their own language) to have some idea of rhyme, considering the
inversion of the first line as forced, and expressly accommodated to the
metre,

  Abirrikirri croom ogah odum,

  Ocoontinkiï bonoo fum,

  Cooroompun,

  Coom agwun,

but I have not met with any other instance.

The Ashantees generally use much and vehement gesture, and speak in
recitative: their action is exuberant, but graceful; and from the
infancy of the language,[119] nouns and verbs are constantly repeated,
for force, and distinction, as _one one_, for, _one by one_, or, _each_;
_one tokoo one tokoo_, for, _one tokoo a-piece_. They frequently are
obliged to vary the tone, in pronouncing a word which has more than one
meaning, as the Chinese do. They have no expression short of you are a
liar, and the king was surprised, when I told him we made a great
difference between a mistake and a lie; he said the truth was not spoken
in either case, and, therefore, it was the same thing; they did not
consider the motive but only the fact.

Like the American languages, those of this part of Africa, are full of
figures, hyperbolical and picturesque.[120] One of the kings of the
interior, whose territories the Ashantees had long talked of invading,
sent forty pots of palm oil to Coomassie, with the message, that, “he
feared they could not find their way, so he sent the oil to light them.”
The Accras instead of good night, say “_wooäu d’tcherrimong_,” sleep
till the lighting of the world: one of their imprecations against their
enemies, is, “may their hiding place be our flute,” that is, “our
plaything:” when they speak of a man imposing on them, they say, “he
turned the backs of our heads into our mouths.” Having occasion, whilst
at Coomassie, to protest against the conduct of an individual, the king
replied, through Adoosee, “The horse comes from the bush, and is a fool,
but the man who rides him knows sense, and by and by makes him do what
he wishes; you, by yourself, made the horse, who was a fool, do better
the other day, therefore, three of you ought to teach a man, who is not
born a fool, and does not come from the bush, to do what you know to be
right by and by, though I see he does wrong now.” Other instances will
appear in their songs.

I shall transfer the imperfect Vocabularies which I formed, and the
incidental observations, to the Appendix; as they may not be indulged
with so much attention by the generality of readers, as the
investigation of the structure.


[Footnote 111: The eastern and western branch of this polar race, the
Eskimoes and the Tschougazes, notwithstanding the enormous distance of
800 leagues which separates them, are united by the most intimate
analogy of languages. This analogy extends, as has been recently proved
in the most evident manner, even to the inhabitants of the north-east of
Asia; for the idiom of the Tschouktshes at the mouth of the Anadin has
the same roots, as the language of the Eskimoes who inhabit the coast of
America opposite to Europe. The Tschouktsches are the Eskimoes of Asia.
Humbolt, P. N. v. 3, p. 291.]

[Footnote 112: “I am aware that languages are much more strongly
characterised by their structure and grammatical forms, than by the
analogy of their sounds and of their roots; and that their analogy of
sounds is sometimes so disfigured in the different dialects of the same
tongue, as not to be distinguishable; for the tribes into which a nation
is divided, often designate the same objects by words altogether
heterogeneous. Hence it follows, that we are easily mistaken, if,
neglecting the study of the inflexions, and consulting only the roots,
for instance the words which designate the moon, sky, water, and earth,
we decide on the absolute difference of two idioms from the simple want
of resemblance in sounds.” Humboldt’s Personal Narrative, vol. iii. p.
251.

I am gratified to find, since my return to England, and consequent
perusal of the Congo publication, that my investigations of these
languages have happened to be consonant with the instructions of Mr.
Marsden in his letter to Captain Tuckey, as appears from the following
extract. “Where a longer residence admits of freer intercourse, and a
means of acquiring a more perfect knowledge of the language, it will be
desirable, besides attempting to fill up the larger vocabulary, that
pains should be taken to examine its grammatical structure, and to
ascertain, for instance, how the nominative and subjunctive words in a
sentence are placed with respect to the verb; how the adjective with
regard to the substantive; how plurals and degrees of comparison are
formed; whether there is any kind of inflexion or variation of syllables
of the same word, according to its position in the sentence and
connection with other words; whether the pronouns personal vary
according to the rank or sex of the person addressing or person
addressed; and whether they are incorporated with the verb; and to
observe any other peculiarities of idiom, that the language may present;
noting the degree of softness, harshness, indistinctness, intonation,
guttural sounds, and the prevalence or deficiency of any particular
letters of the alphabet, as we should term them, such as R and F. The
extent of country over which a language is understood to prevail should
also be a subject of investigation; and, by what others it is bounded on
every side. Also, whether there may not be a correct language of
communication between nations, whose proper languages are distinct.” I
think the very frequent use of _q_ is one distinguishing character of
African languages: the _r_ and _f_ are very frequent, the latter
especially; the former as a liquid is frequently substituted for _l_, as
I have illustrated in the Chapter on Geography. Their pronunciation of
_z_ approximates to that of the _aspro z_ of the Italians. I hope to
have leisure and opportunity hereafter for paying this subject more
attention. I have not yet had time to make sufficient progress in German
to read Vater’s Mithridatis, which will no doubt assist my
observations.]

[Footnote 113: “From the Hebrew עתה, ote, _time_, has flowed ὁτε,
_when_; which τ, π, οπ, being prefixed, becomes τοτε, ποτε, ὁποτε.”]

[Footnote 114: “Every verb consists of a pronoun, expressing an agent,
and of a noun, or the substitute of a noun, expressing an object. Thus,
οινος and εγω joined and abbreviated is οινοω; and this term would be
sufficient to express _I drink wine_, though originally it meant only
_wine I_; association supplying to the speaker and the person addressed
the intermediate notion _of drinking_.” Jones.]

[Footnote 115: The word _caboceer_ (_chief_,) which I have used in the
correspondence, history, and other parts of this work, as the only title
familiar to Europeans, (being always substituted, even by native
interpreters for the vernacular,) was of course introduced by the
Portuguese, and consequently unknown in the interior. It is applied to a
chief who has the charge or government of a town, (_croom_.) Such
however are indiscriminately called _ōhen_ or _king_, in Fantee.
Throughout Ashantee the monarch only is called _ōhennie_ or _king_, and
the chiefs who have the care or government of the towns of his
dominions, _sāf ĕhen_. _Sāfie_ or _saphwooa_, means _key_, and the last
syllable of the compound, _hen_, is evidently an abbreviation of
_ōhennie_. _Safie_, a _charm_, is without doubt identical in a
figurative sense with _sāfee_, _key_; and should, on consideration, be
spelt as such, and not _saphie_ as I have generally written it hitherto.
A Moor is called _Crambo_ by the Negroes of the interior, which bears
the same interpretation as _Pongheme_, a Spaniard, in the Tamanack, i.e.
_a man clothed_.]

[Footnote 116: It is also found in the Empoönga, and other African
languages.]

[Footnote 117: “The distinction of active and passive is not essential
to verbs. In the infancy of language, it was in all probability not
known; in Hebrew, the difference but imperfectly exists, and in the
early periods of it, possibly did not exist at all. In Arabic, the only
distinction which obtains, arises from the vowel points, a late
invention compared with the antiquity of that language. And in our own
tongue the names of active and passive would have remained unknown, if
they had not been learnt in Latin.” Jones.]

[Footnote 118: “He (the savage) would not express himself according to
our English order of construction, Give me fruit, but according to the
Latin order, Fruit give me, Fructum da mihi, for this plain reason, that
his attention was wholly directed towards fruit, the desired object.
This was the exciting idea; the object which moved him to speak, and of
course would be the first named. Such an arrangement is precisely
putting into words the gesture which nature taught the savage to make,
before he was acquainted with words; and therefore it may be depended
upon as certain, that he would fall most readily into this arrangement.
· · · · · · We might therefore conclude, à priori, that this would be
the order in which things were most commonly arranged at the beginning
of language, and accordingly we find, in fact, that in this order words
are arranged in most of the antient tongues; as in the Greek and the
Latin; and it is also said, in the Russian, the Sclavonic, the Gaelic,
and several of the American tongues.” Blair.

The arrangement of words in the Chayma is such as is found in every
language of both continents, which has preserved a certain air of youth.
The object is placed before the verb, the verb before the personal
pronoun. The object on which the attention should be principally fixed,
precedes all the modifications of that object.

The American would say; “liberty complete love we;” instead of we love
complete liberty; “Thee with happy am I”—instead of I am happy with
thee. Humboldt’s Personal Narrative, vol. 3, p. 261.]

[Footnote 119: “In the infancy of language, while words were yet scanty,
the most natural way, whereby a writer or speaker might give an
additional force to his discourse, was to _repeat_ such terms as he
wished to render _emphatic_. The more ancient any language is, the more
numerous appear the traces of such repetitions; and next to the Hebrew,
they form a remarkable feature in the Greek tongue. This μαω μαω, I
desire desire, blended into one word, become μιμαω, and mean, I greatly
desire. βαω βαω, I walk walk, βιβαω, I stride, &c. &c. &c. See Jones.]

[Footnote 120: “The messenger concluded this insulting notification by
presenting the king with a pair of iron sandals, at the same time
adding, that until such time as Daisy had worn out these sandals in his
flight, he should never be secure from the arrows of Bambarra.” Park’s
1st Mission.]




                               CHAPTER X.

                               * * * * *

                                _Music._


The wild music of these people is scarcely to be brought within the
regular rules of harmony,[121] yet their airs have a sweetness and
animation beyond any barbarous compositions I ever heard. Few of their
instruments possess much power, but the combination of several
frequently produces a surprising effect. The flute is made of a long
hollow reed, and has not more than three holes; the tone is low at all
times, and when they play in concert they graduate them with such nicety
as to produce the common chords. Several instances of thirds occur,
especially in one of the annexed airs, played as a funeral dirge; nor is
this extraordinary considering it is the most natural interval; the
addition of fifths, at the same time, is rare. The natives declare they
can converse by means of their flutes, and an old resident at Accra has
assured me he has heard these dialogues, and that every sentence was
explained to him.

On the Sanko (see Drawing No. 5, and Specimen in the Museum) they
display the variety of their musical talents, and the Ashantees are
allowed to surpass all others. It consists of a narrow box, the open top
of which is covered with alligator, or antelope skin; a bridge is raised
on this, over which eight strings are conducted to the end of a long
stick, fastened to the fore part of the box, and thickly notched, and
they raise or depress the strings into these notches as occasion
requires. The upper string assimilates with the tenor C of the piano,
and the lower with the octave above: sometimes they are tuned in
Diatonic succession, but too frequently the intermediate strings are
drawn up at random, producing flats and sharps in every Chromatic
variety, though they are not skilful enough to take advantage of it. I
frequently urged this by trying to convince them they were not playing
the same tune I had heard the day before, but the answer was invariably,
“I pull the same string, it must be the same tune.” The strings are made
from the runners of a tree called Enta, abounding in the forests. All
airs on this instrument are played very quick, and it is barely possible
to make even an experienced player lessen the time, which quick as it
is, is kept in a surprising manner, especially as every tune is loaded
with ornament. They have a method of stopping the strings with the
finger, so as to produce a very soft and pleasing effect, like the Meyer
touch of the harp.

The horns form their loudest sounds, and are made of elephant’s tusks,
they are generally very large, and, being graduated like the flutes,
their flourishes have a martial and grand effect. It has been mentioned
in the Military Customs of the Ashantees, that peculiar sentences are
immediately recognised by the soldiers, and people, in the distinct
flourishes of the horns of the various chiefs: the words of some of
these sentences are almost expressible by the notes of the horns; the
following, uttered by the horns of a captain named Gettoä, occurs to me
as an instance

  “O Saï tĭntĭntoo, ma yūāyĭä pa pa.”

   O Saï great king! I laud thee every where, or exceedingly.

The Bentwa (see Drawing No. 6.) is a stick bent in the form of a bow,
and across it, is fastened a very thin piece of split cane, which is
held between the lips at one end, and struck with a small stick; whilst
at the other it is occasionally stopped, or rather buffed, by a thick
one; on this they play only lively airs, and it owes its various sounds
to the lips.

The Mosees, Mallowas, Bournous, and natives from the more remote parts
of the interior, play on a rude violin: the body is a calabash, the top
is covered with deer skin, and two large holes are cut in it for the
sound to escape; the strings, or rather string, is composed of cow’s
hair, and broad like that of the bow with which they play, which
resembles the bow of a violin. Their grimace equals that of an Italian
Buffo: they generally accompany themselves with the voice, and increase
the humour by a strong nasal sound.

The Oompoochwa is a box, one end of which is left open; two flat bridges
are fastened across the top, and five pieces of thin curved stick,
scraped very smooth, are attached to them, and (their ends being
raised,) are struck with some force by the thumb. I can compare it to
nothing but the Staccado nearly deprived of its tone.

The Ashantees have an instrument like a Bagpipe, but the drone is
scarcely to be heard.

The rest of the instruments can hardly be called musical, and consist of
drums, castanets, gong-gongs, flat sticks, rattles, and even old brass
pans.

The Drums (see Drawing No. 7.) are hollow’d trunks of trees, frequently
carved with much nicety, mostly open at one end, and of many sizes:
those with heads of common skin (that is of any other than Leopard skin)
are beaten with sticks in the form of a crotchet rest; the largest are
borne on the head of a man, and struck by one or more followers; the
smaller are slung round the neck, or stand on the ground; in the latter
case they are mostly played with the inside of the fingers, at which the
natives are very expert: amongst these drums are some with heads of
leopard skin, (looking like vellum,) only sounded by two fingers, which
are scraped along, as the middle finger is on the tamborine, but
producing a much louder noise. The gong-gongs are made of hollow pieces
of iron, and struck with the same metal. The Castanets are also of iron.
The Rattles are hollow gourds, the stalks being left as handles, and
contain shells or pebbles, and are frequently covered with a net work of
beads; the grimaces with which these are played make them much more
entertaining to sight than hearing.

I was fortunate enough to find a rare instance of a native able to play
the radical notes of each tune; he is the best player in the country,
and I was enabled to collect the airs now offered: with some of the
oldest date I have also selected a few of the latest compositions. Their
graces are so numerous, some extempore, some transmitted from father to
son, that the constant repetition only can distinguish the commencement
of the air: sometimes between each beginning they introduce a few
chords, sometimes they leave out a bar, sometimes they only return to
the middle, so entirely is it left to the fancy of the performer. The
observation made on the time of the Sanko may be extended to almost
every other instrument, but it is always perfect, and the children will
move their heads and limbs, whilst on their mother’s backs, in exact
unison with the tune which is playing: the contrasts of piano and forte
are very well managed.

The singing is almost all recitative, and this is the only part of music
in which the women partake; they join in the chorusses, and at the
funeral of a female sing the dirge itself; but the frenzy of the moment
renders it such a mixture of yells and screeches, that it bids defiance
to all notation. The songs of the Canoe men are peculiar to themselves,
and very much resemble the chants used in cathedrals, but as they are
all made for the moment, I have not been able to retain any of them.

To have attempted any thing like arrangement, beyond what the annexed
airs naturally possess, would have altered them, and destroyed the
intention of making them known in their original character. I have not
even dared to insert a flat or a sharp.

No. 1. is the oldest air in the whole collection, and common both to
Ashantees and Warsaws; I could trace it through four generations, but
the answer made to my enquiries will give the best idea of its
antiquity; “it was made when the country was made.” The key appears to
be E minor.

The old and simple air No. 2, is almost spoiled from the quick method of
playing it, but when slow it has a melancholy rarely found in African
music, and it is one of the very few in which the words are adapted to
the tune. I think it is decidedly in the key of C major. The noun
aganka, an orphan, is from the verb agan to leave. Oboïbee is a bird
that sings only at night, for which I know no other name than the
Ashantee. The Warsaw air, No. 3, also in C major, was composed in
consequence of a contest between the two principal caboceers of that
country, Intiffa and Attobra; one extremely thin and the other very fat;
Attobra ran away, and is derided by Intiffa in the following satirical
words:

          Asoom cōōcŏŏrŏŏcōō ŏninny ăgwanny.

Asoom is a dolphin, which, as a beardless creature, is an epithet of the
strongest contempt. The literal translation is,

          The big dolphin runs away from the small man.

No. 5, which I should conjecture to begin in E minor, and to end in D
minor, was occasioned by an English vessel bringing the report of a
battle, in which the French were defeated and their town burned. The
words are allegorical.

      Abirrikirri croom ogah odum;

      French town fire put in;

      Ocoontinkii bonoo fum;

  Great fighting man, wolf take you away;

      Cooroompun coom agwun.

      Cooroompun kills all goats.

Abirrikirri applies indiscriminately to all nations beyond the sea, as
Dunko does to all nations far in the interior. Cooroompun is a very
large insect of the genus mantis (soothsayer) frequently met with here,
and the natives believe that it kills the sheep and goats by
fascination, standing with its eyes fixed on those of the object, and
swinging its head and body from side to side without moving its feet,
until the animal falls in fits and dies.[122] Agwun is a noun of
multitude, comprehending all the goat kind.

A long tale accompanies No. 6. An Ashantee having been surprised in an
intrigue with another man’s wife, becomes the slave of the King, and is
obliged to follow the army in a campaign against the celebrated Attah,
the Akim caboceer mentioned in the history. The Ashantee army having
retired, this man either deserted or could not join his division, and
after concealing himself some time in the forest, was taken by a party
of Attah’s, whom he addresses in the following words:

    Eqqwee odin ahi,

    Panther bush here (belongs to)

      Minăwoo! Minăwoo!

      I die! I die!

    Me’din adoo croom,

    Bush now my croom,

      Minăwoo! Minăwoo!

      I die! I die!

    Babisseäche Minăwoo! Minăwoo!

  For woman’s sake I die! I die!

    Attah m’incomie! Attah m’incomie!

    Attah don’t kill me! Attah don’t kill me!

The man’s life, it was added, was preserved when he urged that he
understood how to make sandals. The key appears to be E minor.

No. 7, in G major, seems to convey the moral, that riches prompt mankind
to wickedness, the word “_makes_” is understood.

No. 9, became a common song in March last in praise of the present
Governor in Chief; who, in consequence of the famine occasioned by the
preceding invasion from the Ashantees, daily distributed corn to the
starving multitude: the words are even more incoherent and figurative
than the others, therefore I have not written them, but the meaning to
be gathered is, “Poor woman and poor child got no gold to buy kanky;
good white man gives you corn.” It will be observed that the air much
resembles No. 11, wherefore I suspect it is an alteration, and not a
composition; although the key seems to be G major, and it is impossible
to attach any key to the latter.

The dirge, No. 12, certainly in the key of C major, has been mentioned
before, but here I must add, that in venturing the intervening and
concluding bass chord, I merely attempt to describe the castanets, gong-
gongs, drums, &c. bursting in after the soft and mellow tones of the
flutes; as if the ear was not to retain a vibration of the sweeter
melody.

No. 13, in D minor, is played by only two flutes, and is one of the
softest airs I have met with.

No. 14, is an Accra fetish hymn, sung by one man and one woman, or more,
at Christmas:

  Afĭnaïē pweë,

  The year’s ends have met,

  Gnōr woorra

  Somebody’s child

  Mŏrbee.

  Take blessing.

“Somebody’s child,” means the child of a person of consequence,
reminding us of Hidalgos, “the son of somebody,” so applied in Spanish.
Its regularity is surprising, and its transition from G major to C major
is very harmonious.

No. 15, in G major, is a specimen of the Kerrapee or Kerrapay music,
which I have made a point of preserving, as it appeared to me superior
even to Ashantee. A young man acknowledges a crime he had attempted to
conceal:

  Kennĕödvay nooblou adomevai,

  Oh pity! the palaver is spoiled,

  Noodooloo adomevai,

  It is found, it is spoiled;

    Ēnnŏblou;

    Think for me;

  Dootŏh mĕ pŏ mĕ blōh,

  Elders, settle it for me,

    Adăn vō,

    I am at a loss,

        Iëe!

        Oh!

The following is a translation of a long Ashantee song, with little or
no air. The men sit together in a line on one side, with their sankos
and other instruments; and the women in a line opposite to them.
Individuals rise and advance, singing in turn.[123]

  _1st Woman._   My husband likes me too much,

                 He is good to me,

                 But I cannot like him,

                 So I must listen to my lover.

  _1st Man._     My wife does not please me,

                 I tire of her now;

                 So I will please myself with another,

                 Who is very handsome.

  _2nd Woman._   My lover tempts me with sweet words,

                 But my husband always does me good,

                 So I must like him well,

                 And I must be true to him.

  _2nd Man._     Girl you pass my wife handsome,

                 But I cannot call you wife;

                 A wife pleases her husband only,

                 But when I leave you, you go to others.

[Illustration: Music score

The oldest ASHANTEE and WARSAW AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

A very old ASHANTEE AIR.

  Aganka oshoom noofa Oboibee oshoom noofa Aganka oshoomnoofa

  Orphan cries at night · · · cries at night Orphan cries at night

  wekirree wekirree oimiyow wekirree wekirree oimiyow wekirree

  sad thing sad thing I’m sorry sad thing sad thing I’m sorry sad thing
]

[Illustration: Music score

WARSAW AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

ASHANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

FANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

AN ASHANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

AN ASHANTEE AIR.

  Onoompah yahpah onompah yahpah onoompah yahpah

  (Makes) Person do bad · · · · · · · · · ·

  sicca sicca onoompah yahpah onoompah yahpah

  gold gold (makes) person do bad · · · · · · · ·

  onoompah yahpah Akim sicca onoompah yahpah.

  · · · · · · Akim gold (makes) person do bad.
]

[Illustration: Music score

MODERN FANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

MODERN FANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

ASHANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

ASHANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

A FANTEE DIRGE.]

[Illustration: Music score

AN ASHANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

AN ACCRA FETISH HYMN.

  Afinaiepwaëe gnorwoorra afinaiepwaëe

  gnorwoorra gnorwoorra

  gnorwoorra afinaiepwaëe gnorwoorra morbee gnorwoorra

  gnorwoorra gnorwoorra morbee gnorwoorra
]

[Illustration: Music score

A KERRAPEE SONG.

  Kenneovay nooblou adomevai Kenneovay nooblou adomevai

  noodooloo adomevai ennoblou Dootoh me po me bloh adanvo Iëe
]

[Illustration: Music score

FANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

FANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

ASHANTEE AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

MALLOWA AIR.]

[Illustration: Music score

MOSEE AIR.]


[Footnote 121: “A few melodies in national music have been found
incapable of harmony; such as the two first bars of the second part of
the Irish tune called The Fair Hair’d Child.” Dr. Crotch.]

[Footnote 122: The power of fascination by the eyes, is believed and
dreaded in those parts of Africa as mortal, whether exercised by the
fetish priests against men, or by the cooroompun against animals. The
idea prevailed in Pliny’s time, but it was ascribed to the voice. “In
libro quodam Plinii naturalis historiæ legi esse quasdam in terrâ Africâ
familias hominum voce atque linguâ effascinantium. Qui si impensiùs
fortè laudaverint pulchras arbores, segetes lætiores, infantes
amœniores, egregios equos, pecudes pastu, atque cultu optimas,
emoriantur repentè hæc omnia.” A cooroompun will be found amongst the
specimens for the British Museum.]

[Footnote 123: I never heard this sung without its recalling Horace’s
beautiful little dialogue ode, (9. lib. 3) “Donec gratus eram tibi.”]




                              CHAPTER XI.

                               * * * * *

                     _Materia Medica and Diseases._


The report of the Materia Medica and Botany of Ashantee, was the only
one which I was not required to furnish. It was afforded by Mr. Henry
Tedlie, assistant surgeon, whose subsequent death has mingled a regret
with the recollection of the Embassy, which the recall of my own
sufferings, and the family affliction it entailed on me, could never
have exacted. The intelligence reached me in England, to correct the
pride of success by associating misfortune with it; for the recollection
of Mr. Tedlie’s social virtues, of his enterprise and ability, makes it
a severe one to myself, and to the world. Mr. Tedlie suffered severely
from intermitting dysentery during the Mission, but I had hoped it would
have been eradicated after his return. He had previously attended the
expedition to Candy, and expired at Cape Coast Castle in the 27th year
of his age. Throughout the Mission he indulged the feelings of the
natives, in his professional capacity, with a patience few could have
exerted; whether labouring under sickness himself, or disturbed in the
moments of a scanty rest; he awed and conciliated the people by the
importance of his cures, and thus contributed to the success of the
enterprise.

“During the earlier part of our residence at Coomassie, the season was
tolerably favourable to the gathering of plants, but we were then
allowed to go out but seldom, and never beyond the town. Latterly, when
better impressions succeeded, and our walks were unrestrained by limits
or attendants, the rains not only checked, but generally disappointed my
researches, by presenting the subject flowerless, (or in an unfit state
for preservation,) and consequently not admitting their classification,
as is too evident in the following list of such plants as are used as
medicines by the Ashantees.

1. Cutturasuh. ([124]_Chrysanthellum procumbens_. _Persoon. syn._ 2.
_p._ 471, _Verbesina mutica_ _Willd._) A small plant, a decoction of
which is purgative, before boiling it should be bruised.

2. Adumba, (a species of Ficus.) The bark and fruit are pounded with
Mallaguetta pepper and a small plant called awhinteywhinting, boiled in
fish soup: two doses in the third month of gestation are said to cause
abortion.

3. Koofoobah (_Gloriosa superba_. _Linn._) is bruised with Mallaguetta
pepper (lesser cardamom seeds) and applied to the ancle or foot when
sprained.

4. Tandoorue (_perhaps a_ _Cupania_ _or_ _Trichilia_.) The bark is
pounded and boiled with Mallaguetta pepper; used for pain in the belly,
and acts as a purgative.

5. Bissey. (_Sterculia acuminata_. _Palis. de Beauvois, Flore d’Oware_
1. _p._ 41. _tab._ 24.) The fruit is constantly chewed by the Ashantees,
especially on a journey; it is said to prevent hunger and strengthen the
stomach and bowels; has a slight bitter aromatic astringent taste, and
causes an increase of the saliva while chewed.

6. Attueh. (_Blighia sapida_. _Hort. Kew. ed._ 2. _vol._ 3, _p._ 350.
_Akeesia africana_ _Tussac Flor. des Antilles_ 66.) A decoction of the
bark is said to be anti-venereal. The fruit is eaten.

7. Ricinus Communis _Linn._ Castor oil nut tree, 30 feet high here, and
not a bush as on the coast: not used as medicine by the natives.

8. Apooder. (_Two species of_ _Leucas_, _of which one is hardly
different from_ _L. Martinicensis_ _Hort. Kew. ed._ 2. _vol._ 3, _p._
409, _the other is perhaps new._) A mixture of the bruised leaves with
lime juice is applied to inflammations.

9. Hooghong. (A species of Urtica) is bruised, mixed with chalk, and
drank by pregnant women to correct acidity in the stomach, heartburn,
&c.

10. Accocottocotorawah. (_Heliotropium indicum_. _Linn._) The juice
expressed from this plant is snuffed up the nostrils in cases of severe
head-ach. They also inhale the smoke of it into the nose.

11. Crowera (_Acalypha ciliata_. _Willd. sp. pl._) is bruised with
lesser cardamom seed, and rubbed on the chest and side when pained.

12. Enminim (_a species of_ _Vitis_.) A climbing plant. The juice
expressed from the leaves is dropped into the eyes when affected with
opthalmia or pain.

13. Secoco. (_Leptanthus_?) A small marshy plant. Is pounded with lime
juice and rubbed on the body to cure the crawcraws; a severe and
obstinate species of itch.

14. Ammo.—The juice is applied to cuts and bruises.

15. Petey (_possibly a_ _Piper_.) The leaves are pounded and applied as
a plaister to inflammatory swellings and boils.

16. Abromotome.—The bruised leaves are used to discuss boils.

17. Yangkompro. (_A syngenesious plant related to_ _Cacalia_.) The
pounded leaves are applied to cuts and contusions.

18. Oeduema. (_Musanga cecropioides_ _Br. See Tuckey’s Congo, p._ 453.)
The hairy sheath or stipule of a large palmated leaved tree; it
resembles a skin, is boiled in soup, and used as a powerful emmenagogue.

19. Semeney, (_probably a species of_ _Aneilema_.) The leaves are
pounded and applied as a plaister to favour the discharge of boils and
collections of pus.

20. Wowwah (_perhaps a_ _Sterculia_.) The inner bark of this tree is
scraped fine and mixed with Mallaguetta pepper, and drank for colic and
other pains in the belly.

21. Anafranakoo.—The bruised leaves are applied to discuss boils and
other inflammatory swelling.

22. Kattacaiben (_Leea sambucina_.) A decoction of the leaves is drank
every morning by pregnant women when they experience any uneasiness in
the abdomen. The bark of the tree powdered is rubbed on chronic
swellings.

23. Aserumbdrue (_a species of_ _Piper_ _related to_ _umbellatum_.) The
leaves are used in soup to allay swellings of the belly.

24. Ocisseeree.—The bark of this tree is used to stop the purging in
dysentery and diarrhoea.

25. Gingang. (_Paullinia africana_ _Br. See Tuckeys Congo, p._ 427.) The
bark of this tree is used internally and externally, mixed with
Mallaguetta pepper for pain in the side.

26. Cudeyakoo.—A very small plant. The leaves and stalk pounded are
applied to eruptions on the head. A mixture of it with lime juice is
applied to the yaws.

27. Affeuah (_unknown_) and Nuinnuerafuh (_Hedysari species_.) A mixture
of the bruised leaves of these plants with Mallaguetta pepper, is rubbed
on the body and limbs when swelled or pained: a decoction of them, with
an addition of the plant Comfany (_Alternantheræ, sp._) is used
internally in the same cases.

28. Adummah. (_Paullinia africana_. _The same as No._ 25.) A decoction
of the bark of this tree, reduced to powder with Mallaguetta pepper,
drank once a day, stops the discharge of blood and cures the dysentery.

29. Tointinney (_probably a_ _Menispermum_.) Is chewed with Mallaguetta
pepper as a cure for a cough.

30. Apussey. (_A leguminous plant, probably allied to_ _Robinia_.)

The bark of this tree pounded with Mallaguetta pepper is applied to the
head in cases of head-ach.

31. Thuquamah.—The bark is pounded and drank in Palm wine, with
Mallaguetta pepper, for pain in the belly.

32. Conkknoney, a dark purple coloured Toadstool, the size of a hazel
nut, rubbed with Mallaguetta pepper and lime juice, it purges briskly.
To stop the purging, a mess of boiled Guinea corn meal and lime juice
should be eaten.

33. Suetinney.—(_Brillantaisia owariensis_. _Palis. de Beauvois Flor.
d’Oware_, 2. _p._ 68 _tab._ 100, _fig._ 2.) A decoction of the leaves is
drank for pain in the belly.

34. Soominna, (Tetandria Monogynia,) is bruised with lime juice and used
to abate cough.

35. Thattha (_Scoparia dulcis_. _Linn._)—The expressed juice of this
plant is dropped into the ears when pained.

36. Aquey (_Melia Azedarach_. _Linn._) A decoction of the leaves of this
tree is used with Palm wine as a corroborant.

37. Dammaram (_Mussænda fulgens_. _nov. spec._)

The diseases most common in the Ashantee Country are the Lues, Yaws,
Itch, Ulcers, Scald-heads, and griping pains in the bowels. Other
diseases are occasionally met with, I should suppose in the same
proportion that they occur in civilized countries; but I do not know to
what cause to assign the prevalence and frequency of one of the most
unsightly diseases that can occur in any country: it is an obstinate
species of ulcer, or, Noli me tangere, which destroys the nose and upper
lip; it attacks women chiefly, although men are not exempt from it;
there are more than 100 women in Coomassie who have lost the nose or
upper lip from this cause alone: it commences with a small ulcer in the
alæ nasi, or upper lip, the size of a split pea, excavated, with the
edges ragged and turned inwards, it proceeds by ulcerating under the
skin; the bottom of the ulcer is uneven, covered with a foul slough, of
a very disagreeable smell, and the discharge is thin, watery, and very
irritating: it seldom cicatrices before the alæ nasi and lip are
completely destroyed; when it does cease, the skin is puckered and
uneven, and has a very disagreeable appearance; the only remedy which
the natives use, is an external application of bruised leaves; they seem
to let it take its course, without being very anxious about a cure.

Framboesia, the Yaws, is a very frequent disease with the children of
the poor and slaves: before the eruption takes place they are severely
afflicted with pains in the joints, and along the course of the muscles
of the superior and inferior extremities; in young persons, hard, round
bony excrescences, the size of a walnut, form on each side of the nose
under the eyes. The Natives either are not acquainted with a remedy for
this enlargement of the bones, or if they are, they do not put it in
practice. I administered alterative doses of calomel and antimonial
powder with success, as it stopped the enlargement of the bones and
caused them to be absorbed, and relieved the pain in the arms and legs
particularly; during the exhibition of the alterative pills, a foul
ulcer on the head got well: the natives apply a mixture of the plant
Cudey-akoo, with lime juice, to the eruption, but apparently with very
little benefit.

Psora, the itch, a very severe species of which, called craw craw, is a
frequent disease, and is very contagious; it is most commonly met with
in children, few of the Dunko slaves are without it, from their poor
diet and extreme dirtiness; they do not seem to experience much
uneasiness from it, as they seldom apply any remedy; sometimes they use
a rubefaciant, made of a plant called secoco, bruised and mixed with
lime juice.

Gonorrhœa is of rare occurrence, two cases came under my care, the
patients had never used injections, they drank decoctions of leaves and
bark, but could not tell me the plants they used; one of the
ingredients, was a small plant call Cutturasuh, of a purgative nature.
The disease is allowed to take its course by the natives, as they are
unacquainted with any method to stop it.

Tinea Capitis, the scald head, is a common disease with the poorer sort
of Ashantees and slaves, arising from their neglect of cleanliness; the
applications which they use to cure it have seldom the desired effect.
They apply plaisters of pounded leaves and charcoal, but do not wash the
head. In one case, where a boy was placed under my care, he got well in
eight days, by having his head very well washed with a brush, soap, and
warm water; then a strong infusion of tobacco, applied with a sponge,
and when the head was dry, a composition of resinous and mercurial
ointment was rubbed on it.

Hydrocele occasionally occurs; they attempt to cure it by frictions of
the castor oil nut, burnt and bruised with Mallaguetta pepper, but
without any benefit. I drew off the water from one hydrocele, but, from
our want of stimulants, could not perform any radical cure. Their
applications to Inguinal hernia are equally ineffectual. They never
attempt the reduction of umbilical hernia, although some are very large,
and the disease very frequent.

When a fracture of the leg or arm happens, the part is rubbed with a
soft species of grass and palm oil, and the limb bound up with splints.
“If God does not take the patient he recovers in four months,” as they
say.

I have not seen a single instance of fracture in the Ashantee country.
Gun-shot wounds of the extremities, when the bone is fractured, are
generally fatal, or, where a large blood vessel is wounded, as they are
unacquainted with any method of stopping the hæmorrage; in fact they pay
little attention to their wounded men; if they are not able to travel,
they are abandoned. One of the King’s criers had his thigh dislocated at
the hip joint with an anchylosis of the knee; the limb was considerably
longer than the other, and the accident must have occurred a long time
ago, as he walks very well.

During the time we remained in Coomassie, and from our first entrance
into the Ashantee country, I was every day applied to for advice and
medicines by those who were afflicted with diseases, of which the number
was great, and in the capital more especially, from its very unhealthy
situation, being entirely surrounded by an extensive tract of swampy
ground, and the natives consequently very subject to dysentery and
fever. On first entering the country I was applied to by numbers of
patients, many of them miserable objects, from the effects of the
venereal disease: to as many of those as applied, during our halt in a
town, I gave boxes of pills and strict directions for their use, and
told them if they came to Coomassie during my residence there, I would
do every thing in my power to cure them. Many availed themselves of my
offer, and attended me on my arrival. To those who had ulcers or wounds,
I applied the proper dressings, and left with them lint, adhesive
plaister, and ointment. Most of them as a mark of their gratitude, sent
presents of fowls, fruit, palm oil, wine, &c. to me after I had arrived
in the capital. One man in Assiminia, who was nearly in the last stage
of existence from a complication of disorders, originating from lues
venerea, after I had seen him, sent every week to Coomassie for
medicines, and completely recovered. Another in Sarrasoo who had the
worst looking ulcers of the inferior extremities, that I have ever seen,
did the same, and with the same success. A great many caboceers attended
me every morning with their slaves and children affected with dropsy,
crawcraws, yaws, fever, bowel complaints, &c. and expressed the most
unbounded thanks for the medicine and advice they received.

At the King’s particular request, I attended his own brother, the heir
apparent, who had oedematous feet: by the use of friction, a roller, and
an alterative course of calomel, and diuretics, he soon recovered.

The King’s uncle, heir to the crown after the brother, was severely
tormented with stricture of the urethra; he could only pass urine, drop
by drop; three weeks passing the catheter, enabled him to make it in a
full stream; when he immediately requested some powerfully stimulating
medicine to correct impotency, which it was not in my power to grant.

The captain whose office it is to drown any of the King’s family who
have offended, had an ulcer two inches long in the palate bone; when he
drank, part of the fluid passed out of his nose, and his speech was very
unintelligible; the sides of the opening were scarified, and the
granulations touched every third or fourth day with lunar caustic until
they united; he got well in one month.

The only unfortunate case I attended, was our guide Quamina Bwa; shortly
after we arrived in Coomassie he was attacked with remittent fever; by
the use of febrifuge medicines, the cold bath, bark, &c. he recovered,
and was able to attend his usual duty of waiting on us, when we visited
the king; he went into the country, and I did not see him for six weeks;
at the end of that time, he sent for me, and I found him labouring under
a severe bilious dysentery, and liver complaint. I was unable to prevent
the formation of matter in his liver; it formed a large swelling with
distinct fluctuation, and as he hesitated to have it discharged by
puncturing with a trochar, it burst internally, and he died. I had one
case of cancer of the upper lip, although the disease is said rarely to
occur in that part. This case had all the marks of a true cancer; I
dressed it every day during the whole time I remained in Coomassie, but
the effect flattered and disappointed me by turns.

The most importunate man for medicine, especially of an invigorating
kind, in the whole Ashantee country, was old Apokoo, the treasurer and
chief favourite. He was afflicted with inguinal hernia: I wrote to Cape
Coast for a truss, which I applied, and it gave him immediate relief and
satisfaction. He would take the most nauseous drug with pleasure. I
generally gave him bark and peppermint water, which he regularly either
sent or came for every day, during the two last months of our residence,
and earnestly requested me to leave plenty of medicine with Mr.
Hutchison, the British resident there. Most of the chief men were very
earnest in their solicitations for me to give them stimulating
medicines. I always assured them that it was impossible, that the
English never used any, and that nothing astonished me more than that
they should ask for such things. Their answers were, “they knew that the
English had good heads and knew every thing, and must know that too, but
I did not wish to give them any.”

  _A List of the Diseases which I have seen in the Ashantee country._

  Febris remittens        2 cases

  Hepatitis               1

  Dysenteria mucosa       6

  Colica                  1

  Anasarca                3

  Ascites                 3

  Scrophula               many cases

  Syphilis                many

  Gonorrhœa               2

  Stricture               3

  Cataract                2

  Staphyloma              5

  Ectropium               1

  Bronchocele             many

  Cephalagia              many

  Odontalgia              10

  Ulcers                  8

  Framboesia              many

  Psora                   many

  Hernia inguinal         1

  Umbilical (hernia)      many

  Dracunculus             7

  Tinea capitis           many

  Hydrocele               many

  Cancer                  1

  Elephantiasis           1

  Lepra                   7


[Footnote 124: I am indebted to Mr. Brown’s knowledge for the names and
references in the parentheses.]




                              CHAPTER XII.

                               * * * * *

                        _Mr. Hutchison’s Diary._


September 26. After we left the palace this morning, Apokoo invited me
home to take some refreshment. He entered into a long conversation
concerning the slave trade: he heard, he said, that an English vessel
had arrived at Cape Coast, and had brought out a letter from the King of
England to the Governor-in-Chief, ordering a renewal of the slave trade,
and asked me, if I had received any letter. I said I had not, but if
such a thing had taken place, I thought I should have early accounts. He
enquired what were the objections we had to “buy men?” I told him what I
conceived to be proper; he laughed at our ideas, and enquired if the
king of Dahomey had not sent a “book four moons ago to Cape Coast,
inviting the English to trade again, in his kingdom.” I replied there
was a message sent, but I could not say exactly in what words, as I was
at Dix Cove at the time. “England,” he said, “was too fond of fighting,
her soldiers were the same as dropping a stone in a pond, they go
farther and farther:” at the same time he described an enlarging circle
with his hand, and shook his finger and head significantly at me. He was
anxious for me to write a “proper book” on the slave trade, many slaves,
he told me, had revolted, and joining the Buntokoo standard were to
fight against them; there were too many slaves in the country, (an
opinion I tacitly acquiesced in), and they wanted to get rid of some of
them. There might be a deal of trouble from them; he alone had one
slave, who had 1000 followers at arms, and he might trouble them as
Cudjo Cooma did, who was a slave of his when he revolted, and whose
adherents alone were 10,000, independent of runaways, &c.

In the afternoon the King sent me a ceremonious message, with his
compliments, saying he would be glad if I attended him in his customs,
&c. when he should sit in public. I replied that I would be happy to do
so, as it was the King’s wish, except when human sacrifices were
offered, but then it would be contrary to my inclinations, my religion,
and my instructions.

Shortly after I was told the King was in the market-place drinking palm
wine. I went for the first time and took my seat on his left. The King
made me a present of a pot of wine, as did several of his chiefs. When
he drank, the whole of the music played, while the executioners, holding
their swords with their right hands, covered their noses with their
left, whilst they sung his victories and titles. About half a dozen
small boys stood behind his chair, and finished the whole with a fetish
hymn. The King enquired how many servants I had, and several questions
of the same kind. After sitting about half an hour the assembly broke
up, the King rising first, which is the signal to retire.

Since the mission departed I have not been annoyed by any boys calling
after me. After seeing Messrs. Bowdich and Tedlie through the town, on
their going away, as I returned home the crowds thanked me as I passed,
for staying. I suppose they hardly imagined, when it came to the last,
that I would do so: indeed when I returned to my lodgings I found them
solitary enough; and, in the night time, three men found their way into
the house; one of my servants awakening, shouted out; I struck at one of
them with my sword, but missed him: in the morning it was discovered
that he had succeeded in stealing nearly half a sheep, a quantity of
kankey belonging to the boys, and a table knife. I am not sanguine
enough to imagine I shall be long allowed to take my walks unmolested;
when the novelty of my remaining alone passes away, they will return to
their old insolencies.

Monday 29. Paid Apokoo a visit, and dashed him a razor. Several people
were there talking palavers, and wishing him to interest the King for
them; among others, an old captain complained heavily of Quamina Bwa,
our guide, but since dead, who he said had stolen a slave from him and
sold him during the Fantee war; he had unavailingly applied to the
family, he therefore wished it to be brought before the King.

Apokoo complained of head-ach, and one of his women brought a decoction
of herbs, which she poured into a hollow piece of wood with two tubes,
these were inserted in the nostrils, and the liquor poured in, while the
head was held back, and afterwards spit out by the mouth; I have seen
the same poured into the ear for a like complaint. He wished me to try a
little of it; I of course declined it. He called one of his daughter’s,
and wished me to consaw, or espouse her; I told him she was too young;
he said that was nothing, as he would keep her for me: he added, the
Ashantee custom was, if a great man’s wife with child took another man’s
fancy, he consawed the child in the womb, and if born a girl, when she
grew up she became his wife; if a boy, it was his to serve and attend on
him, and he took care of it. Four ounces of gold it generally cost to
consaw a girl. I said he was a rich man; “true,” he replied, “but it
sometimes costs eight or ten ounces, sometimes only two.” Observing a
bow and arrows standing in the room, I began to amuse myself with
shooting them; he told me these were only for play, but when they went
to fight, they tipped them with iron, and put a deadly poison on it,
which caused almost instant death; the poison is made from vegetables
boiled in a large pot, and the arrows steeped in it. He shewed me the
marks of two arrow wounds which he received in battle. He then began to
consult his fetish, by a quantity of strings, with various ornaments on
one end to denote their good or evil qualities; these were mixed
promiscuously together, and taking them in his right hand, he put them
behind his back, and drew out one with his left; this was repeated about
20 times. A wicker basket was then brought on a small stool covered with
a silk cloth, in it were two lumps like pincushions, made of eggs, palm
oil, &c.: he then turned up the bottom of his stool, and making three
holes in it with something like a cobler’s awl, he drove in three pegs
with a stone, muttering to himself all the time, and waving each string
round his right ear; an egg was then brought in broken at one end, and
placed alternately on the lumps in the basket, and crushed on the stool
where the pegs were put in: this he did every morning before he went
out, to keep him out of bad palavers through the day.

Tuesday 30. This morning Apokoo invited me to take a share of his
umbrella, and attend the King, who went to finish his ablutions. We
walked along through an immense crowd; the streets were lined with the
chiefs and their respective suites. We went down to the place where the
King washes; a low platform was erected where the stools were laid on
their sides. The linguists and officers of the household stood on one
side holding gold rods and canes, the fetishmen formed a crescent to the
north side. The King performed the ceremony of laving the water over
himself, sprinkling the various articles the same as on Saturday, and
the procession concluded as before.

On walking back Apokoo wished to try on one of my gloves, and as usual
put it on the wrong hand; his gold castanets pinched him when the glove
was on, which made him shout out rather lustily, and stop short, I
called out “you stop the King;” “never mind,” said he, and his
attendants pulled to get the glove off. The King sent to know what
occasioned the stoppage, Apokoo held up his hand compressed, exclaiming,
“_Gamphnee_,” (it hurts me,) and stopped till it was got off.

In the afternoon I called on Odumata, who said he was angry that I had
not called before. I told him I came to thank him for allowing a slave
boy he has, to do any thing for me; he said I might have him so as I fed
him, I replied I would do so. He entered into conversation concerning
the power of England over other nations, and the danger of going to sea;
he had lived three years at Apollonia when a young man, and had seen
many Portuguese, but did not like them, “as they were all wenches!” He
seemed pleased that I did not like them either. He wished me to purchase
a horse from him for eight ounces, I said I would give him four.“ “I
must not want one, or I would not offer him so,” was his reply. I said
that I had no place to ride it in, the country being all bush, and the
King did not like me to go very far; he replied, they were soon going to
fight, and, as I should go with them, it would be better for me to have
a horse to ride than to walk. I answered, I should lay hold of some wild
boar and gallop it; this observation struck him with astonishment, and
stroking down his beard, he asked my servant if he thought I could do
so, who replied, if I took it in my head I certainly would. Odumata said
the people would think the devil was come among them. This he told me is
the last day of the year, according to their calculation, but from what
reason I do not know. In the Sarem countries, he told me, they work iron
from the stone, and silver, gold, &c. into trinkets, better than in
Ashantee. I enquired why they did not make iron here, as they have
plenty of ore; his reply was truly African; “why should they do so, when
they had plenty of gold to buy it, and could get it so near.” I told him
of England’s resources from her own manufactories; he said it was not
good for white men to know so much; if black men knew those things they
would all run to England. When I got home I sent him a present of a
razor, he sent two messengers to thank me, such is their fashion; and
for even the smallest article they return thanks the next day. Odumata
enquired why I did not get drunk sometimes, and come to see him then, I
told him, were I to get drunk in Ashantee, I ought to have my sword
broke over my head, that I had indeed got tipsey the evening before I
came away, with my friends, and might perhaps do so when I returned, but
not till then. He gave me some palm wine, and looked amazed at my
swallowing only half a tumbler full, “he would drink three pots before
he went to bed!” (about 15 gallons.)

Wednesday, October 1. The King dictated a letter to the Governor at Cape
Coast, stating, that the King of Cape Coast had broken the law by
insulting an Ashantee man, who swore, by the King of Ashantee’s head,
that if the Cape Coast King did not kill him, he must pay 110 periguins
of gold to the King. This practice, though it savours of madness, is yet
often resorted to for revenge, as it is almost sure to end in the ruin
of the other party. The Cape Coast King had threatened, that the
Governor would put the Ashantee man in the slave hole till he died,
which appeard to irritate the King very much.

The King then enquired if I had any yams at home; I told him I had a few
of his last present; he told me he would send more to the house for me,
which he did, and gave me 5½ ackies gold; then pressed me to take some
gin and water; on his being told that it must be very little, for I was
afraid of an attack of spleen and liver, and eat little and walked much,
he said that was proper.

Thursday 2. Through this and the afternoon of yesterday I felt very
feverish, not being able to get any sleep for the rats at night. I kept
my room all day; the King sent a pot of palm wine in the evening. Adoo
Quamina called.

Friday 3. Whilst writing letters, Apokoo sent his compliments and would
be happy to see me; I went, and he said he was sorry he had not seen me
for some days. I told him I was sick the two former days, and to-day was
writing to my family how I liked Ashantee; he hoped I would give the
King a good name in England. I should tell truth. He enquired if I would
like to see his croom (village.) I replied yes! He was going there this
evening, and if no palaver came, he would send his people for me in the
morning, to carry me. He asked if I was not for one of his daughters,
that he might be called my father. He then enquired why I did not wear
my hair tied, and let my beard grow; he recollected Colonel Torrane and
Mr. White having tails at the siege of Annamaboe, and they looked very
handsome. He requested me to show him the skin of my arm, he gazed on it
with seeming pleasure, begged I would allow him to touch it; on
receiving permission, he rubbed his hand over it, exclaiming “_Papa
Taffia_,” (very handsome) and repeated his invitation to go to the
croom. I took my leave.

As I was going home I met a man white-washed, carrying a vessel covered
over with a white cloth: this I have been often told is Tando fetish,
but can learn nothing more. Music and a great crowd went with it to Adoo
Quamina’s house, at the front of which they put it down, and sacrificed
a child of Cudjoo Cooma’s, the Akim revolter, over it, as an annual
sacrifice of the King’s.

Saturday 4. Apokoo sent his people for me in the morning, who took me to
his croom, about three miles S.W. of Coomassie. The road was in good
order, and newly cut on account of my going; his slaves all turned out
to see me, many of them never having seen a white man before. Apokoo
came to the entrance of the croom, which is small, to meet me, and took
me into the place where he lives himself; it is like all country houses
here, a square lined with palm leaves and thatched with grass; his own
room, raised on the floor, painted with red inchuma or ochre, and at one
end of it, his couch raised on wood with plaited palm leaves, and
covered with large cotton cushions. Near his head hung three strings of
fetish, made of gold, red earth, horn, and bone, in the shape of thigh
bones, horns, jaw bones, &c. &c. One side of the square was fitted up
with a forge and bellows to work gold; another served as a cooking
place, and the fourth for his sons to sleep in. About 11 o’clock he went
to one of the side places to eat, that he might not trouble me in his
room, as he said. Before he began, small pieces of yam were laid on his
fetish; a small table was then set before him, and clean water poured
into a brass pan, with which he washed his right hand, and then eat with
it:—they are careful not to touch victuals with their left hand. A large
pot of yams and another of fish being boiled, he satisfied himself
first; the remainder was then divided into as many lots as there were
persons to partake; when the door was opened, and about twenty sons and
daughters, with their calabashes, received each their mess. He had given
my servant two fowls, some fish and yams, and told him to make any thing
I could eat; I told him to make a soup of the fowls. When I was eating,
Apokoo said he thought I was ashamed, and requested I would let him put
down the screen; I told him I dared not eat much through the day, being
afraid of sickness. He enquired if I wished to go to sleep, for his
couch was at my service. I declined the offer, and he went to sleep
himself. Shortly after, four of his wives came from town with a mess for
him; he was awaked to know if they were to have admittance, as usual: he
ordered them to set down the meat and go away; they pretended to do so,
but sat down under one of the sheds, and began to annoy the slaves, but
their stifled laughter soon awoke Apokoo, who stretched out his neck,
and seeing them, told them in a passion, it was because I was there that
they wished to stop, and that they had better be off; they took the hint
and made their retreat. He got up to shew me his gold ornaments, which
weighed 146 bendas (£1168.) and made his people kindle the forge fire to
melt some rock gold to make a fish; but the mould not being perfect, it
was spoiled. He enquired if ever I had been in a yam plantation; on my
replying in the negative, we went to see one; he asked if I would allow
him to ride in my hammock, I gave him leave; it was better than his
basket, he said, except that he did not like his legs hanging down. He
wished me to dig up a yam; the people brought me a long pointed stick,
which is forced into the earth to loosen the yam, afterwards the fibres
are cut with a knife. After I had dug up ten, he hoped I would accept of
them as a present; yams are set like potatoes in Europe, they are put in
the ground about December, so that they are nine months growing to
maturity. He said he should not go to Coomassie that night, as he had to
decorate his drums with tigers skins, but that he would be in on
Tuesday. If I wished to come out and see him before that time he would
send people for me, and be glad. I said I should come out some other
time, but not so soon. I set off for Coomassie about six o’clock, having
spent a very agreeable day.

About seven o’clock the King sent for me; on my going, he would trouble
me, he said, to read a book he had that day found in a man’s possession.
It proved to be a Danish note to the King for three ounces per month,
dated August 1, 1811; it seemed as if a seal had been affixed to it, but
the impression had disappeared, and it was very much worn. The King said
he never knew of it; that an Ashantee captain had received and kept it,
but he would enquire about it. His majesty wished me to drink something,
I declined it; he hoped I was not sick, I said no, but drinking made my
head ach; he hoped I would sleep sound, paid me many compliments that I
cannot repeat; enquired of my servant if I was a good master, with other
questions of the like nature.

Saturday 11. The King sent for me, and on going to the palace I found
them in full council talking palavers. Adoosee was ordering a messenger
to go to Quamina Bootaqua, to make him proceed to Cape Coast, and inform
the Governor that Payntree had sworn by the King and had broke his oath,
Bootaqua having sent word to the King of it; but they did not mention
any thing to me. After this, Adoosee informed me, that messengers have
gone from Amanfoo, sent by Sam Brue, to complain that the Cape Coast
people had come armed against him to kill him. After hearing a long
statement of grievances, they told me I must write to the Governor about
it; I said I would, at the same time I assured the King that Sam Brue
was a slave trader, and not to be tolerated at Cape Coast, his conduct
was so infamous; they then called on his messenger to know what reason
Sam had to leave Cape Coast; he entered at great length into the
grievances experienced by Brue from the Governor in Chief and officers,
because he owed eight ounces of gold; I was called in to reply, which I
said I could not condescend to do, until I heard from the Governor in
Chief, as they had sent messengers to complain to him. Adoosee charged
four messengers with what they were to tell the Governor, making them
take fetish and other formalities usual only on great occasions, thereby
giving the affair an importance it did not merit. The King, on the
breaking up of the council, said he would send for me shortly after, to
write an account of the affair to the Governor; when I returned home, I
did communicate the whole to the Governor, as the King’s letters are so
hurried.

I heard nothing from the King all day, but at night a Fantee man called
on me, who had been taken by the Ashantees in last year’s war, and whom
I had been trying to liberate by speaking in his behalf to the King, and
concerning four ounces of gold that had been taken. The captain
concerned in it, to get quit of the palaver, had urged one of his wives
to swear the man had lain with her; she accordingly made a formal
complaint; the man was put in irons in the bush and only released
yesterday morning as they thought to catch the King when he had some
palavers pending, which would make him angry; they therefore brought it
before the King yesterday morning, thinking he would order the man’s
head to be cut off; but he told the King that this palaver was brought
against him because I had spoken for him; the woman was called, who
insisted the man had lain with her, the man denied it, and on being
offered fetish he cheerfully took it, and swore by the King to the
contrary. The woman would not do so, and the King ordered the irons to
be taken from the man, and put on the woman, telling her, she had not
looked at the man properly, as it must be some other person.

Tuesday 14. This morning a man was beheaded at the door of the house
where I live, by Aboidwee, the house master: it appears, the man in
question was brother to a caboceer, and presumptive heir to his
property; tired of waiting so long he made fetish incantations, and
other ceremonies peculiar to them, to destroy his brother; this coming
to the brother’s ears, and also, that he had enjoyed one of his wives
five times, he complained to the King and requested he would put the
offender to death to save his own life; the King complied, and ordered
Aboidwee to put the sentence in execution.

Wednesday 15. The Adaï custom. I went as usual with flags, and first
received the usual offering of rum, and ten ackies of gold instead of a
sheep. I called on Baba, the chief of the Moors, in the afternoon, who
said he would teach me Arabic if I would teach him English; I said I
would; but I am afraid he is too old for progress. I called on Odumata
in my way back, who annoyed me as usual to drink palm wine, although it
gives me a head ache. Akotoo, the King’s brother, was there, who said he
had only seen me four times since the mission went away, and wished me
to call on him. The conversation turned on the King’s going to war, and
his anxiety for me to go and see how they killed their enemies, and he
would give me gold to feed me. I was told by a Fantee man, that Sam Brue
had procured 200 guns and a quantity of powder for the King, for slaves
he had sold to the Spaniards now on the coast.

Friday 17. Deputies from the Warsaw states arrived a few days ago, to
settle the differences between them and the Ashantees. It is thought, a
fine to the King and future tribute may compromise the matter. Odumata
informed me, that the slave ship has 600 slaves on board; and that,
through Sam Brue’s exertions; he confirmed the report of the guns and
powder.

Sunday 19. The heaviest rain, thunder, and lightning I ever saw, and has
continued for several days and nights. About 7 o’clock A.M. the King’s
drums announced his going to the market-place, where all his chiefs went
and were drenched with wet till 2 o’clock P.M. when the King sent for
rum and palm wine and dismissed them drunk and dirty. On Monday the
scene was continued till the slaves had got the house covered in.

Tuesday 21. Agay the linguist returned from Assin, where he had been
four months; and brought with him a number of Fantees and their
families, as slaves. During the eruption of the Fantees in 1816, many of
them ran to the Assin country to try and elude the vigilance of the
King, but he heard of it, and sent Agay to demand them, who, after a
long negociation, succeeded. A council was held at Abrassoo on the
Barramang road, and the slaves were sent to Barramang to build a new
croom for the King.

Sunday, November 2. The King has been busy for the last twelve days
making fetish, &c. for the success of the war; the Moors going every
morning to the palace for prayer and sacrifice: to day being Adaï
custom, I went as usual, and received ten ackies of gold and a flask of
rum, the foremost in the assembly, which was numerous.

Friday 7. A serious palaver has arisen between the King and Adoosee the
chief linguist, he having taken a bribe from some person to misrepresent
a palaver to the King; this coming to the King’s ear, he sent in a fury
to Adoosee, who, on being charged with it, thought his life would be the
forfeit, and sent an express to Apokoo to come and intercede for him;
Apokoo being at his croom, it has been several times talked before the
King, but no settlement, has taken place.

Several people have been making application to me to demand them of the
King, as belonging to the forts, having been detained as slaves during
the Fantee war, and when Winnebah fort was destroyed. They are commonly
very old, and of the female sex.

Saturday 8. Adoosee has got his palaver settled by paying twenty ounces
of gold, and six or eight sheep to the King; Adoosee’s friends alleged
that he ought not to pay any thing, because when any palaver comes he
settles it at once; but if he is not there, they have to go to council,
which in fact is true; but notwithstanding his abilities, and that he
takes his seat as usual, the King looks at him with a gloomy eye. The
King has been busy making human sacrifices for the success of the war,
at Bantama, Assafoo, and Aduma, in the evenings; and the Moors make
their offerings of sheep in the palace in the mornings according to the
moslem ritual. Though the zealous Christian may lament that the Gospel
has not taken place of the fetish, yet the friends of humanity will
rejoice that the King favours the Moors, as many lives have been saved
that would otherwise have been destroyed at the present crisis. To day a
bullock was offered up in the chief market-place, previous to the
entrance of the chiefs, caboceers, &c. into the town, to meet in
council, and determine on the method of conducting the war: in the
afternoon, Boitinnë Quama, King of Dwabin, sent his compliments to me to
announce his arrival. Shortly after, the various bands of music declared
the arrival of the tributaries, &c.; the King of Ashantee took his seat
in the market-place, and received their compliments as they passed
before him. About nine o’clock at night Boitinnë, King of Dwabin paid me
a private visit, and brought me a present of two curious Gennet cats.

Sunday 9. At day break the firing of guns, music, &c. announced a custom
for the husband of the King’s sister (the second woman in the kingdom),
he having died in the bush on Friday, about 7 o’clock; the King went to
the market-place to make custom, and sacrificed two men; several others
were killed by various caboceers. In the evening Apokoo and the other
captains who are to exhibit their gold, paraded the streets, firing
musketry, &c.; the crowd was great. At 8 o’clock, his majesty of Dwabin
came with the messengers he sent to Cape Coast to have a suit of
clothes, he said two trunks were at his house and he brought a sword to
shew me, which the Governor had sent.

Friday 14. Before I got up, I was annoyed with a crowd of captains who
began to annoy me for liquor. I ordered them out and desired a boy to
keep the door fast. I sent a dash of wine, rum, sugar, soap, butter, and
perfumery to the king, who was highly pleased. To all the principal
captains, a dash of rum, wine, and sugar, till I had nearly expended my
stock: the whole day was a continual annoyance from visitors, troubling
me for drink, but as I was resolved to give to those only who were
worthy, many of them were disappointed. This week past Apokoo and
several of the captains have been making an exhibition of their riches;
this is generally done once in life, by those who are in favour with the
King, and think themselves free from palavers. It is done by making
their gold into various articles of dress for show. Apokoo, who sent for
me before his uproar began, shewed me his varieties, weighing upwards of
800 bendas of the finest gold; among the articles, was a girdle two
inches broad. Gold chains for the neck, arms, legs, &c. ornaments for
the ancles of all descriptions, consisting of manacles, with keys,
bells, chairs, and padlocks. For his numerous family of wives, children,
and captains, were armlets and various ornaments. A superb war cap of
eagle’s feathers, fetishes, Moorish charms, &c. Moorish caps, silk
dresses, purses, bags, &c. made of monkey skin. Fans, with ivory
handles, made of tiger skin, and decorated with silk. New umbrellas made
in fantastical shapes, gold swords and figures of animals, birds,
beasts, and fishes of the same metal; his drums, and various instruments
of music, were covered with tiger skin, with red belts for hanging them.
Ivory arrows and bows, covered with silk and skins, and many other
weapons of war or fancy, such as the mind in a like situation would
devise. Apokoo was anxious that I should come and see him when out, but
from the noise, I judged that they were too turbulent for me to venture
without a chance of being insulted.

Saturday 15. Again annoyed by the people wishing for drink. Apokoo
called with his retinue to thank me; for the Governor had given his
people a flask of Jamaica rum. He had got three days to play, as he
called it, and was sorry that he had not seen me. I told him I had very
seldom been out, except when there was no noise, as the people were so
unruly in the evening.

Monday 17. In the afternoon Apokoo sent a message, saying he was come to
the door of the house to play and shew me his gold, hoping I would come
out. I went and found a Moorish carpet spread, at one end of which I was
seated under an umbrella, while Apokoo and his wives, children, and
captains danced by turns before me. Some of his young wives were dressed
with great taste, a rich silk cloth with a bag made of fine fur, slung
over the shoulder, studded with gold ornaments: on the left shoulder
they held a pistol, and in the right hand a silver bow and arrow. During
the dance, if Apokoo was pleased with them he took the bow and hung it
on some of the ornaments, when she retired from the dance; this was a
strong mark of approbation, if I may judge from the applause that
followed: to some he gave a little gold. Several times he took from
their necks various ornaments which he placed on my knees and over my
left shoulder; this was the greatest mark of honour he could shew me;
and his band played a tune in praise of England, and of our abilities in
settling differences. Many of the captains sent him presents of gold and
rum. I gave him a large flask of wine, which he said pleased him more
than all the others, as it would shew the people I thought him a good
man.

Thursday 20. The Moorish caboceer of Alphia called to day, requesting I
would allow him to bring his brother and nephew who had arrived, as they
wished to see me: on receiving my permission he sent for them, and as
they immediately made their appearance, they must have been waiting at
the door. I shewed them a compass, sand-glass, quadrant, some
phosphorus, and several other things; at the sight of each they bent
their heads to the ground, exclaiming “Allahoo Akabir!” God is great. I
gave the caboceer a wax candle, piece of a perfumed soap (which he was
going to eat!) a flask of Jamaica rum, and some sugar; things he had
never seen before: he begged to be allowed to touch my hand, and
continued calling out Ah! bielane Wasieh! Ah Nasara! Ah white visier! Ah
Christian. He said he had a sister whom he would make me a present of,
if I would have her. The caboceer of Alphia is brother to the caboceer
of Premehinie, east of Ashantee, in the Sarem region, and subject to Saï
Tootoo; it is 14 days journey to Alphia, one day to Brookoom, where the
head fetish of that country dwells, and one day more to Crumassia and
Sodie, a range of high hills.

I told him I would buy his horse if he would put a reasonable price on
it, and would give him a note to get powder, rum, &c. at the Cape: he
said the Ashantees brought rum to Sarem, but they boiled pepper in water
and sold it to them; he never tasted such good adrue (medicine) as mine.

I have been learning Arabic this last month, principally from the
Shereef Abraham, who comes from Boussa, where Mungo Park was drowned,
and he, as he says, was an eye witness to it; his great sanctity made
the King of Ashantee send for him to pray and make sacrifice for the
success of the war. The other Moors here look on him with an evil eye,
because he will not wear fetishes as they do, and be present at human
sacrifice. This place now presents the singular spectacle of a Christian
and Mahometan agreeing in two particulars, rejecting fetishes, and
absenting themselves from human sacrifices and other abominations: the
rest of the people, of whatever country they may be, when the King’s
horns announce any thing of the kind, strive who will get there first to
enjoy the agonies of the victims. The Shereef told me to-day, that the
reason he came so seldom to see me, was, that the King had heard he was
teaching me the Koran, but he wished him not to do so, he did not wish
me to know how “to call on God;” but, said Abraham, I shall teach you as
much as I can, that when you go to your own country you may give the
Moors a good name, for I told the King you knew Arabic before you saw
me, and we sometimes spake together in that language. He had a beautiful
copy of the Koran which he intended to leave me, but the King had told
him he must have it, that when any trouble came he might hold it up to
God, and beg his mercy and pardon: but he would try and get a small one
for me.

Saturday 22. This morning a slave belonging to the house master swore by
the King’s head that he must kill him to-day. A great uproar ensued,
while they put him in irons, and they got out the family stools and
sacrificed fowls and sheep, pouring the blood on them to propitiate the
wrath of the King from the family. The King was then told of it, who
said as that was his fetish day he could not kill a man that day, but
to-morrow he would behead him.

It appears he had connection with one of his brother’s wives, who,
hearing of it, cautioned him from doing so again, or else he would tell
the King and make him kill him: he was again found with the woman, and
his brother went to the King to complain. Hearing this, and fearing the
torture, he swore by the King that he must shoot him with eight muskets.
The King on being told this, said he would put such small shot into the
muskets as only to wound him, and then he should torture him; hereby
fulfilling his own law, which he considers sacred.

Sunday 23. About 12 o’clock sent for by the King, whom I found scolding
his sister for disobedience in one of her slaves. After sitting some
time talking on indifferent subjects, the King said he should go to
council, about what he was going to say to me. Shortly after he sent one
of his sons to say his father was going to eat and wash, if I would be
kind enough to return home. I heard that messengers from Elmina had
arrived the evening before, and expected to hear of some complaint of
breaking the law, as they style it: although I could not reconcile it
with an observation I had made; a pair of razors I had presented to the
King were invariably sent to me to sharpen, as the King wished to shave
with them, when any favourable affair was to be talked, and that morning
they came as usual.

I was again sent for, and the King announced in a formal manner his
intention of going in person to make war on Adinkara, the King of
Buntookoo, and wished me to announce it to the Governor. I therefore
wrote a letter of the King’s dictating, stating this to the Governor,
and requesting him to give on trust 300 oz. kegs, powder, and 300
muskets, and sending to the Governor in Chief six periguins of gold, and
to the Governor of Annamaboe four periguins, to purchase a cloth for
him, the handsomest they could find, and inviting them to send him a
dash and make the town’s people do the same, for the prosperity of the
war. His Majesty was very lavish in his compliments of the generosity of
the English, and their great riches; he then enquired if I was willing
to go to fight, I replied certainly, if I could obtain the Governor’s
permission, I should like it very much: he thanked me very warmly. I
heard, on my return to the house, that the Dutch General had sent as a
present to the King 60 oz. kegs powder, and the Elmina people 40, which
caused this stir.

Monday 24. Sent for again to write the Governor word that the King sent
down 30 men to be clothed as soldiers, if the Governor could spare
clothes, one of them to be as captain and one a serjeant, with a flag.
His Majesty also wished to have arrow root, Port wine, sugar, candles,
and a few other things for the campaign. I was then told to write a
letter to the Danish Governor in Chief to the same effect, and to ask
him for payment of what was due on his note. I foresaw this would make
an uproar; and on the note being handed to me to know what was due on
it, when I told the King that nothing was on it, he got into the
greatest rage I have yet seen him in, with the captain who receives the
pay. This man had been sent down to Accra about three months ago, to
receive what pay was due, Mr. Bowdich writing to the Danish Governor in
Chief to know, for the King’s satisfaction, what was sent. On his
return, the latter stated that the King’s note was paid up to the
ensuing Christmas. There being a great deficiency between what was
stated in the letter, and what the captain produced, he charged Mr.
Bowdich with mis-stating what was in the letter; Quashie Apaintree, the
linguist, was sworn on the King’s fetish to interpret proper; the
Ashantee still insisted, and to clear himself, said the book was _not_
paid to Christmas. The King and linguists remembered this, and when they
heard that the note was actually paid to the end of the year, every one
tried who would be loudest in their accusations against him. Apokoo, who
is his chief, was loudest against him, he said he had used him
disrespectfully, and never gave him any of the dashes he received;
besides he had given the lie to an English officer, and at the same time
he cheated the King; he therefore left him to the mercy of his Majesty.
The King said he must return him all the gold back he had lent him; and
as for the fort at Accra, he might take the pay when he pleased. A hat,
certainly a bad one, was brought in, and the King asked me if I thought
it worth the price charged for it. I replied I was not a judge, as such
hats were not sent out for us; but if I were, I must positively decline
interfering in the King’s affairs with his servants. By degrees the King
worked himself to such a height of passion, that throwing his cloth
around him, and hastily rising, he ordered the captain’s arrest. The
King’s sons seized on him, and he stood appalled, as the silver cane
fell from his hand. I once thought the King would have committed some
extravagance, none of the chiefs daring to rise; Agay at length arose,
and in his energetic manner requested that his majesty would recollect I
was present. The King ordered his sons to go with the captain to his
house, and bring him all the gold they found; he then withdrew, but I
heard him storming in his apartments. Shortly after, Odumata’s brother
came to say, that the chiefs might thank me, as were it not for my sake,
every one of them would have been turned out of the palace by the
slaves. Agay, who was the only one who followed the King, came to
apologise for the abrupt departure of his Majesty: he hoped I would not
be offended, and requested I would go home and dine, as it was late, and
the King would send for me soon.

Tuesday 25. The King sent for me to write another letter to the
Governor, saying he had sent down three pieces of rock gold as a pawn
for powder; they were the largest I have yet seen, one of them weighing
about 20 ounces. I gave his Majesty a packet of letters to be forwarded
to Cape Coast: he rallied me on the size of it, and said he supposed I
wrote the Governor and Mr. Bowdich every palaver in town.

To-day the stool of Alphia was declared in abeyance; the son of the
caboceer Premehinia having brought a complaint against the caboceer of
Alphia, who is brother to the former; his sable highness came on a
beautiful Arabian, of a very small size; at the sound of drums and horns
he danced and went through various evolutions.

Friday 28. To-day the caboceer of Alphia was deposed, and his brother
the caboceer of Premehinia had the stool attached to his other
possessions. In the afternoon whilst I was out, the Moorish prince, with
a large retinue, called to pay me a visit, I found one of his attendants
sitting at the door with a gold sword, who, on receiving permission,
went and told him I was come home; shortly after he came, and expressed
great wonder at all he saw. He said I had too many silver spoons, and
modestly requested I would give him one or two; his attendant who fanned
him thought so too, as he attempted to steal one, but one of the
servants happening to pass, he threw it under the table. I wished him to
sell me his horse, but he said he was too great a man to walk home, and
the ground hurt his feet.

Sunday 30. The King paid me a long visit, he heard, he said, that my
horse had died, and had come to see me least I should think he forgot
me, but he had so much fetish to make, and so many palavers to settle,
that he had little time. The conversation then turned on the travels of
Englishmen, and the white men drowned in the Quolla (Niger.) I explained
to his Majesty the objects of the expeditions sent from England to the
interior of Africa, and expressed how anxious I was to get Mr. Park’s
books and papers for the King of England; his Majesty promised to aid me
in doing so, and before he went away, desired me to point out to him
what I conceived the proper method.

The King then began to talk about my living with him, and if I liked to
do so; he said I was like a king, and wished his people to treat me with
respect, and every one run to see me when I went out, as they run to see
him. I said that some of his people wished to accuse me of treason for
putting buckles in my shoes at the Adaï custom. The King said that none
dared do so, but those whom he ordered, any other would have their heads
cut off: but I was different, and he knew Englishmen did what was
proper. His majesty took his leave with many expressions of personal
attention, which, whether they were sincere or not, were at least to be
received with politeness.

Monday, December 1. One of the King’s nephews came to see me, but was
terribly afraid to pass the man in irons who swore on the King, least he
should swear that when the King killed him, he must also kill his
nephew, which would cost a deal of gold; for such is the sacredness of
the law, that in that case the King must do it. I had a key of a door
where I could privately let him out, without passing through the courts
of the house, by which he gladly made his escape. This man has been no
small annoyance, as no person of rank will venture to call on me, least
they should be brought into trouble by his swearing on their heads.

Tuesday 2. The King to-day made a present of 10 periguins of gold to the
Moors in town for their services, and they were to divide it themselves.
This created no small altercation among them; those belonging to the
town wished to keep it all, and not give the Shereef Abraham any, who
came from the banks of the Niger; as the King had that morning told him
he wished him to accompany him to the war, he told them it was of no
consequence, as he should not accompany the King unless he was looked on
with the same degree of rank as Baba, as, indeed, he was superior from
his knowledge, and belonging to Mahomet’s family. On this they gave him
three periguins, the same that Baba had: all were then pleased with
their portion except one, called Aboo, who only had 10 ackies; he
consoled himself by making the usual exclamation, “God is great! he
never dies, he never sleeps,” and said he left the palaver in his hands.

Thursday 4. Apokoo paid me a visit to thank me for some medicine I had
given him, being sick after his great custom; he enquired if I heard
that Fantee messengers were come to this place, I said no, but I
expected them soon to take the King’s fetish, as he wished them to do
so, previous to his going to war; he then told me that the King heard
there were some on the path, and could not think what their message was;
I told him they must either be those the Governor was sending up, or
Fantees with the King’s tribute; on his going away, he requested I would
let him out by the door I had the key of, as he also was afraid of the
man in irons swearing on his life, and was glad he could avoid passing
him.

Friday 5. This was the coldest morning I have felt since I came to
Africa, being scarcely able to take breakfast, I was so chilly; the
thermometer stood at 65°.

I was desired to write a letter to General Daendels, telling him the
King had lost his notes for the Dutch forts, and requesting him to give
new ones to Akimpon. The King’s father had conquered the Akim chief, who
held a note for Dutch Accra; he also conquered the King of Adinkara, who
had the Elmina note, both of which were given up to him; he would not
take them both in one note as the General wished, but he must have one
payable at Elmina and one at Accra. When the King weighed out the gold
for his messengers expences, he weighed 10 ackies for me, which I hoped
his Majesty would take back, as I did not wish for them, and requested
he would not think I wished payment for writing a letter for him. My
scruples were laughed at by them all, and the King said “that white men
were very singular, as they gave gold or a good dash to any one who did
any thing for them, yet they would not take any: he wished to do
something like white men, and when any one did any thing for him he gave
them something, and he wished me to take this to shew his good will.”
Odumata, who is the greediest man in Coomassie for gold, whispered, if I
did not like it, I might send it to him when I got home. I did not
exactly understand him, or I would have offered it to him then with
pleasure, to expose his avarice.

The captain who was arrested last week for peculation on Danish Accra,
appeared in his place to day; he had promised Amanquateä and Quatchie
Quophie, the two chief captains, a large present if they would settle
the affair for him, which they did, and he received the letters to
proceed to the fort as usual.

Apokoo having told the King of the inconvenience arising to any chief
coming to me, from the culprit in irons being in the way, he was removed
to a private part of Apokoo’s house, where he could annoy no one, till
the Adaï custom, when he is to be beheaded, as the affair cannot be
settled without.

Sunday 7. Several of the Moorish caboceers came to take leave, as they
were going to-morrow to their own country previous to the war, and were
to meet the King on the road when he went, and consequently would not
see me again for some time; on my enquiring how long the King was to be
absent, they replied, God had told them seven months would finish the
war; they enquired if I should like to see them at Cape Coast, as they
should come and see me, to which I said I should. After drinking coffee,
&c. they took a hurried leave, as one of the King’s people came to tell
me one of his Majesty’s daughters was dead, and shortly after, constant
discharges of musketry announced the custom. The King in the afternoon
came to the market place close to the house, to make custom with his
chiefs. I understood that human sacrifices were to be offered, and
walked out to avoid the uproar.

On my way I paid a visit to Baba, who was performing ablution; he said
he was going to prayer, but would soon have done, I told him I would sit
down till he had finished. Cow hides were spread in rows for the
worshippers, in the front was a large hide for Baba. All having taken
off their sandals and prostrated themselves with their faces to the east
(to Mecca,) the service began by one of them chaunting the usual call to
prayer; the chorus of Allahoo Akaber! (God is great) was well performed
by the others.

There was something solemn and affecting in it, contrasted with the
heavy discharges of musketry and shouts of the populace in the distance,
which proclaimed the bloody sacrifice was begun, while the vultures and
crows wheeled in mazy circles expecting their usual share of the
banquet, and the sun shot his last gleams through the heavy fogs that
encircled the town.

As I went home I passed the headless trunks of two female slaves, laying
neglected and exposed in the market place, that had been sacrificed, one
by the King and one by the deceased’s family. The vultures were
revelling undisturbed amidst the blood.

I happened to-day to throw down a tumbler of wine and water with my
foot, having placed it on the ground, while the Moorish Shereef was with
me; he bent his head to Mecca, pronouncing “God is great!” and told me
it was my good angel who had done so, for who might tell but there was
poison in the cup to destroy me? he said man had always two angels
attending him, one on his right hand as his good angel, and one on his
left as his evil one; whatever good he did was prompted by the former,
and whatever ill by the latter one. I have never found them without a
reason for every thing, or a name, except to the mother of Moses, whom
they say nobody knows on earth; the Shereef gravely enquired if I knew
the name of Aboobaker’s father, I assured him I did not; he told me many
of the Moors could not tell, but as he was of Mahomet’s family he knew
more things, and told me it was _Kahābata_.

I heard from the Sarem Moors that they fight with bows and arrows
steeped in deadly poison, the least scratch of which is instant death.
They gather scorpions tails, snakes heads, and the poisonous parts of
any reptile that affects man; this, with several vegetable substances
which they would not name, are put in a pot, and set over the fire at
sun rise; they boil it all day and must not eat or drink, but stir it
about repeating incantations, and shaking a pair of iron castanets,
without which, the charm would be incomplete. I saw an old hag at this
work on the Bantama road, who would not answer my question as to what
she was doing, but made many wry faces, and squint looks, for me to be
gone and not spoil her work, and while I stood, she stirred, and
muttered, and clattered the castanets with greater fury.

My attention being anxiously turned towards information concerning the
Niger and its course, all enquiries end in making the Nile its
continuation. An old Moor from Jennë told me, unasked, that while he was
at Askanderee (Alexandria) twenty-six years ago he saw a fight at the
mouth of the Nile between ships, and one of them was blown up in the air
with a terrible explosion. This must have been the battle fought by Lord
Nelson, although there is a mistake in the date of seven years; he
surely could not invent such a story. He states also, that returning to
Masser (Grand Cairo) the European armies advanced to that place; the
first army took every thing they wanted and would not pay: but when the
second European and Turkish army got possession of it, they paid for
whatever they wanted. All the Moors were ordered to retire to one
quarter of the city, and not allowed to mix with the soldiers; this
agrees with Sir Robert Wilson’s account of the Egyptian campaign. I
shewed him a seal I have, of Pompey’s pillar, which he said he knew; he
had travelled from Jennë to Masser on a joma (camel) and drew me a map
of the Quolla and Nile from its source to its emptying itself into the
sea at Alexandria. There is one thing that disagrees with Mr. Park’s
account, they call the Niger Quolla at Jennë, Sansanding, &c. and
describe the Jolliba as falling into the Quolla to the east of
Timbuctoo. When I told them of the conjectures that the great river of
Africa emptied itself into a large lake, they laughed at such an idea,
and reasoned so as to put wiser heads to the blush. “God,” say they,
“made all rivers to run to the sea, you say that small rivers go there:
the Quolla is the largest river in the world, and why should it not go
there also? Was it to lose itself in the lake, where could the waters go
to?” They describe the Quolla as about five miles in breadth, and having
a very rocky channel, the banks on both sides very high and rugged; in
many places, canoes often take a day to pass a short distance, from the
dangerous whirlpools, and sudden squalls: at other places, the stream
runs with great rapidity.

They think the Mediterranean sea to be circular, without mixing with the
ocean; seven rivers from Africa turn their course to it, but only two
reach the shores, of which the Nile is one. The rush of the waters of
the Nile, when they meet the sea is so great, that the waves are driven
into the air with great force, and retire like waves against a rock.
They call the Mediterranean sea Bahare Mall. The Red sea, say they,
assumes various colours at different periods, from seven streams pouring
their course into it, red, blue, yellow, &c. Hence they call it Majumaal
Bahare, or the confluence of streams. They are very fond of mystical
numbers, and often quote seven. The lake Caudie they call Bahare Nohoo,
or the water of Noah, from the tradition that the deluge broke out from
thence. They describe it as encompassed with rocks, within which is a
bed of sand, and then the water. This we may allow to be a little
fanciful, as I have seen a map of the earth drawn by Baba, where the
world is supposed to be round, and encompassed with a rocky girdle, the
sea is supposed to flow between this and the earth, which is placed in
the centre. They are not singular in this idea; as all rude nations form
the same notions of the globe: but though we reject, with reason, their
foolish notions of many things, it would be no great sign of wisdom to
refuse every information from them.

Man is a reasoning animal, and enquires into the nature of things in a
rude, as well as in a civilised state; and if he cannot give a just,
will at least give a plausible reason for many things.

The Moors say “That the noise people hear, when they stop their ears
with their hands, is the rolling of the waters of libation in paradise,
where Mahomet purifies all those he saves from hell, before they enter
into the state of the blessed. It is for this reason they perform
ablution before they pray; the fire burning other parts of their bodies,
while their face, hands, feet, &c. remained untouched, hence Mahomet
when he looks for them, knows them from Jews, Christians, &c. They have
also a sentence written on their foreheads, “Hooalie Jahanamoo naataka
raboo baskafaatee Mahomada roosoola lahee sallee allahoo alahe
wasalame.”

Inoculation for the small pox is practised in the Moorish countries;
they take the matter, and puncture the patient in seven places, both on
the arms and legs. The sickness continues but a few days, and rarely any
person dies of it. It is also done in Ashantee. Seven is their mystical
number.

Monday, December 8. To day the King killed a man on account of his
daughter who died yesterday, and to be out of the way, I called on
Odumata, whom I found well charged with palm wine: his usual discourse
of the greatness of the King and the manner of the Ashantees fighting
took up his time: he said that when white men wished to fight, they sent
a book to the other party, telling them they would meet them on such a
day, but the Ashantees took their enemies by surprise, which shortened
their wars. I told him he had repeated the same story about fifty times
in two months, and wished to know if the English did so at Annamaboe,
where fifteen white men killed thousands of Ashantees; this put him on
the fidget, as I knew it would, and he said that it was on him the
English fired first, and he fought them without the King’s leave, who
was angry when he heard that they had returned the fire of the fort; I
told him it was a fine excuse to cover their defeat. He enquired if I
thought they could not have taken the fort? I told him if they could
have done it they would. He said, if the King says we must do any thing,
we must do it. I asked him, if the King told them to pull down the moon,
if they could do it? He then got up from his chair and began to
manoeuvre how he and Apokoo were to have made a breach in Annamaboe
fort, to the no small enjoyment of several of his wives, captains, and
slaves, who were present; they were to have burned the gates, and with
axes to have cut through the walls. He said they had Dutch and Danish
flags, which they had taken from forts; why, I enquired, did they not
show the English trophies? They had none, he said: and the King had told
them, that were he to kill white men from England, he might as well kill
all the cocks in the kingdom; the one told the hour, and when to rise in
the morning; the other brought them good things from England, and
learned them sense; besides, if any of their slaves did ill, they told
them they would sell them to the whites, which made them better. I told
him black men had the eyes of a thief, the paws of a tiger, and the
belly of a hog, for they were never satisfied; he said I was right, for
they were now going to war, and would take whatever they could find; he
thought 30,000 Ashantees would be killed, but that was nothing. He then
locked up his wives because I put evil in their heads, by saying that
Englishmen allowed every one a husband. I then took my leave.

Monday 15. Baba, the chief of the Moors, having told me that a Moor was
going to Jennë, I took the opportunity of writing a letter to two
Europeans who reside there, and, I suppose, belonged to Mungo Park’s
expedition, seven soldiers being unaccounted for, who were in good
health when they were separated from Mr. Park. There are also two white
men at Timbuctoo, who have been there several years. The Moors are
confident that the letter will reach them, which is much to be desired,
as some information may be obtained of that celebrated traveller. Baba
came, and the old Moor with him, to whom I delivered the letter; he
received it from Baba with much ceremony, and to induce him to forward
an answer, I promised him a suitable reward[125]. The whole of the Moors
came in a body with drums, muskets, horns, and all the attendant pomp of
chiefs; they had just taken leave of the King, and came to do the same
to me. Having remained about half an hour, and drank some wine, they set
out for their journey with noisy clamour.

Sunday 21. Apokoo called and told me he was going to morrow, with the
King, to the camp, on the Barramang path, to make fetish, and would
return on Wednesday: he seemed to expect that I would say I would go
also; but as the King had not sent to me, I did not express any wish. A
boy brought some milk covered up, and he lifted the lid to look what it
was, some of it touched his fingers, and he sent for water, herbs, and
different things to purify his fingers; he said he would give me a
present if I would give over drinking milk: I told him if he sent me an
ounce of gold daily, I would not do it; he cursed the milk, and the boy
for bringing it. Thus many of them are so particular, they will not stay
where eggs are, another shuns a fowl, one hates beef, and many mutter a
charm if they meet a pig. The Moorish Shereef discovered a piece of pork
one day in the boy’s room, and made such a noise, that I thought one had
struck him, nor would he cease till I ordered it away.

Monday 22. The King, and almost all the captains, set out early this
morning, with great bustle for the camp, many sent their compliments
previous to going.

Wednesday 24. The King and all the people returned in the evening, and
went to the upper market place; where the King seeing me at the door,
ordered them to pass down the street to the palace, the chiefs all
saluting as they passed. The King, who was the only one that did not
walk, made his people halt, and held out his hand to me, which I took,
and bade him welcome to his capital; he enquired if I was well, and
after he passed, he looked round with a smile and shook his finger at
me: I suppose because I did not follow him to the camp. His Majesty
afterwards sent his compliments, as did several of the chiefs.

Thursday 25. This being Christmas day, I displayed the flag, and paid
every attention to it that I possibly could; many of the chiefs hearing
of it, sent their compliments, expecting a present, but of course were
disappointed.

Friday 24. Baba called, and began an oration about Sam Brue, hinting
that he should like if I could get Brue, the slave trader, back to Cape
Coast. He was my good friend, I was his friend, the Governor was my
friend, Brue was his friend, and a long genealogy fit to puzzle a
Scottish or Welch family herald. I told him no person must interfere in
such affairs. He had that morning received from Brue, powder, guns, and
cloth for slaves he had sent down; he brought me a piece of the cloth to
shew me, it was very coarse with large red figures on it. I told him
when he washed it, he would need to take his staff and put on his
sandals to hunt after the colours; he told me he had found that out; for
he had washed a piece, and he could not tell what colour it was. He then
began a dissertation on the _good_ the slave trade did them, and what
changes he had seen since he came here; he thought God intended to
change the power of white men, and give it to the blacks and Moors. I
told him he was going to make Mahomet a liar, as the Alkoran told them
that the whites were to have sovereign dominion to the end, because of
Noah’s sons’ behaviour to him when drunk; and if God was inclined to
hide his face from white men, because of any ill they did, I did not
think he would transfer it to Africans for any good they had done; he
said I was right, and when they thought wrong the Christians could put
them right. Seeing a Prayer Book on the table, he enquired if that was
“Lingeel,” the name they give the New Testament; I replied it was the
form of worshipping God in English Churches; he wished me to read a
little of it to him, as he had heard that white men prayed to God so—and
muttered in a form, it must be allowed, too often resorted to by lazy
clergymen. They conceive to worship God in any other way than chaunting
or singing is absurd. I have had more than once to sing (if I may
presume to call it so) from the psalms of David, and chaunt the
responses of the service, to convince them that there is something more
than mere muttering in prayer, were it properly performed, besides
describing the organ used in churches to assist the harmony. They have
often asked me about the high priest at Rome, and whether or not we had
any thing shaped out that we called god. I told them the English
abhorred all representations of the Eternal, and that nothing was
adequate to represent him. They are very tenacious on this point, and as
scrupulous as any Protestant may wish, conceiving it an inexcusable
crime to have any thing of the kind. They have many times enquired if we
offer any sacrifice to God. I told them that our Scriptures do not allow
the shedding of blood of any kind; the last great expiation of the
Christians being performed by Jesus when he died on the cross, in
commemoration of which, the offering of bread and wine formed the
sacrifice. Neither did we pour out libations[126] before drinking,
because any thing poured forth before drinking, or victuals set apart
before eating, is an offering to devils.

The Shereef Abraham coming in with one or two more, I enquired about
Solomon’s Al Genii, and whether or not they knew any thing of free
masonry. I had questioned them several times before, and knew none of
them were free masons; they now told me that there was such a sect in
Arabia, and conceived them to be magicians, as they controlled the
spirits of air. They were much astonished to hear that I was one, and
eagerly enquired if I knew about Solomon’s seal, the building of the
temple, and other matters, which universal belief endows free masons
with,—matters, I told them, I might not speak of. They told me they knew
we kept some of our genii on a floating island in the sea; if any ships
came near it, the genii were instructed to laugh at them, and the island
disappeared; with other such stories. One of the boys told them I had a
stuff (phosphorus) which they supposed gave me such power; they wished
to see it, and laughed at first at the idea of any thing in water
producing fire, or that I could confine that element and dare to keep it
in a trunk; I put it to the proof, by burning a piece of cloth, paper,
and mat, and told them if they were not satisfied they might have some
on their skins, but they did not choose it, and called out in wonder,
“Houa Kahina iakul naroo malekaneran,” “he is a magician and eats fire,
he is the King of fire;” be it remembered that this last appellation is
peculiar to the devil. The Shereef after thinking some time, enquired if
that stuff was not made from the bones of genii? I told him bones were
in the composition. He wished to know if we killed genii and took their
bones, I told him blood was never shed in England but for great crimes;
true, he said, but none could see _us_ do so. I told him there was an
eye that never sleeps, at which he bent his head, pronouncing “God is
great.” The Moors then held a conversation in Arabic, by which they
settled that I must be in the secrets of Solomon, and the Shereef
Abraham related one of the Arabian tales, by which Balkes or Bilkis,
Queen of Sheba, is made out to be the child carried away by the dog in
one of the stories of that work. Balkis, according to them, adored the
sun, and Solomon made her turn and worship God; he commanded the genii
to transport her palace from her own country to Jerusalem, and the three
palaces he built for her in Arabia Felix had gold mixed with the mortar
with which they were formed. They wished to know if I could move a
house? I told them, such was the mystery attached to our concerns, that
it was difficult to answer them; any thing not concerned with masonry, I
might answer; this, they said, was what the people in their country
said. Abraham said he was sure the Arabian magicians made use of bones
from genii to make fire and control them. It would be a curious
circumstance to know that phosphorus, and inoculation, existed in Arabia
in the days of its splendour, and continue now; as they are considered
as two of the most eminent among modern European discoveries. After they
were gone, I called on Odumata, whom I found all talk as usual. He said
he knew I wished to take some of the King’s sons to Cape Coast for
education, but the captains had represented to his Majesty, that they
did not wish it. If the King wanted gold, and they had it, they would
give it him; and were always ready when he called them, to receive his
foot on their necks, and swear to do whatever he wished them, or never
to return. The reason he gave, was, that they were afraid of being
discovered when they cheated the King, which they made no secret of
avowing, and having their heads cut off. I told him he did not like a
white man to live here then; yes, he said, they all liked that; but he
was sufficient to settle all palavers between the King and the English,
without any of the King’s people knowing English. He began to boast of
the many wives and children he had, more than Englishmen. I told him
there was a possibility of an Englishman knowing his father; but no
black man could tell his; they were all slaves, and rendered incapable
of inheriting their father’s property; none of his children need to
thank him, he neither could give them any thing while alive, nor leave
them any thing when dead, and many of them kept wives, while their
slaves enjoyed them. He said I spoke very true, but that I could not
show keys with him; he produced two large bunches, and I offered him an
ounce of gold if he would shew me a lock for each key; he evaded this: I
took them in my hand, and found many of them broken, and various
articles of lead and iron to make the bunches large; his people, and
some chiefs that were with him, enjoyed his perplexity, if I might judge
from their chuckling.

Several of the King’s brother’s slaves appeared in pursuit of two of
their fellows, flogging them with whips; one of the culprits bounding
over every obstacle, threw himself at Odumata’s feet, which saved him
from their flogging; the man who had charge of him appeared, and in a
long and animated harangue, with many gestures, stated the trouble he
had had from the runaway, and concluded by swearing, the man must be
given up to him in the morning to go and work. It is customary for
slaves, when they fall under their master’s displeasure, to take shelter
in some other chief’s house, who tries to get them excused.

Saturday 27. The King sent for me, to give me letters which had arrived;
and on my opening them, two small packages of gold tumbled out. The King
asked, if they were for me or him. I enquired if he expected gold from
any one at Cape Coast, he said, no. I told him, it was unlikely gold
would be sent to any one but me. The King, turning to his captains, said
the Governor was a good man, sending me gold whenever I asked for it,
and I eat a great deal of gold. I told him, I never wished a present of
gold from any one; what I got was my pay, as Englishmen did not give
gold to one another. He intended returning his messengers on Tuesday, as
he said, two of them having come up in English uniforms, as the Governor
was to fit out thirty at the King’s request. His Majesty wished me to
taste a bottle of tincture of rhubarb the Governor had sent him; I did
so, lest he should think there was something bad in it. I had then to
taste some tincture of cinnamon he had received some time ago; I
swallowed them with great distaste, as I had felt very unwell the
preceding day, and that morning, and had taken medicine just before the
King sent, and not eaten any breakfast.

In the afternoon Apokoo called; he had heard Adoo Bradie had been on
board a ship, and that 400 flags were hoisted to receive him;[127] that
was the reason, he said, they did nor wish any of the King’s people to
learn to read and write, they became white men, and saw so many fine
things, they never thought of returning to Ashantee. I told him if it
was disagreeable, it would be given over. Every one was pleased, he
said, to think any Ashantee great man was well used at Cape Coast; but
it turned their heads, not being accustomed to it. The King would give
Adoo Bradie fetish when he came back, and if he told the King lies, the
fetish would catch him, and where would be the good? The English would
have all their trouble for nothing.

His Majesty, some years ago, took one of Apokoo’s daughters to wife; she
is now one of the finest women in Coomassie, and must have been a great
beauty. It was discovered by the chief eunuch that she had intrigued
with one of the attendants. It was told the King that one of his wives
had proved false; “let her die instantly,” said he in a rage; the slave
whispered him “it is Apokoo’s child.” He rose in silence, and went to
the harem, and the culprit being sent for, the King turned his head
away, while he folded his cloth around him, and lifting the curtain to
let her pass, he exclaimed “go, you are free! your father was my
father,[128] he is my friend, and for his sake, I forget you; when you
find any man good enough for you, let me know and I will give him gold.”
Her father has not allowed her to marry again.

When any public execution, or sacrifice, is to take place, the ivory
horns of the King proclaim at the palace door, “wow! wow! wow!” “death!
death, death, death!” and, as they cut off their heads, the bands play a
peculiar strain, till the operation is finished.

The greatest human sacrifice that has been made in Coomassie during my
residence, took place on the eve of the Adaï custom early in January. I
had a mysterious intimation of it two days before, from a quarter not to
be named. My servants being ordered out of the way, I was thus
addressed, “Christian, take care and watch over your family; the angel
of death has drawn his sword, and will strike on the neck of many
Ashantees; when the drum is struck, on Adaï eve, it will be the death
signal of many. Shun the King if you can, but fear not.” When the time
came to strike the drum, I was sitting thinking on the horrors of the
approaching night, and was rather startled at a summons to attend the
King. This is the manner he always takes to cut off any captain or
person of rank; they are sent for to talk a palaver, and the moment they
enter, the slaves lay hold of them, and pinion them, and throw them
down; if they are thought desperate characters, a knife is thrust
through their mouth to keep them from swearing the death of any other,
when they are charged with their crime, real or supposed, and put to
death or torture.

Whilst I was with the King, the officers, whose duty it is to attend at
sacrifices, and are in the confidence of the King, came in with their
knives, &c. and a message was sent to one chief to say, that the King
was going to his mother’s house to talk a palaver, and shortly after his
Majesty rose, and proceeded thither, ordering the attendants to conduct
me out by another door.

This sacrifice was in consequence of the King imagining, that if he
washed the bones of his mother and sisters, who died while he was on the
throne, it would propitiate the fetish, and make the war successful.
Their bones, were therefore taken from their coffins, and bathed in rum
and water with great ceremony; after being wiped with silks, they were
rolled in gold dust, and wrapped in strings of rock gold, aggry beads,
and other things of the most costly nature. Those who had done any thing
to displease the King, were then sent for in succession, and immolated
as they entered, “that their blood might water the graves.” The whole of
the night, the King’s executioners traversed the streets, and dragged
every one they found to the palace, where they were put in irons: but
(which is often the case) some one had disclosed the secret, and almost
every one had fled, and the King was disappointed of most of his
distinguished victims. Next morning being Adaï custom, which generally
brought an immense crowd to the city, every place was silent and
forlorn; nothing could be found in the market, and his Majesty proceeded
to the morning sacrifice of sheep, &c. attended only by his confidents,
and the members of his own family. When I appeared at the usual time, he
seemed pleased at my confidence, and remarked that I observed how few
captains were present. He appeared agitated and fatigued, and sat a very
short time.

As soon as it was dark, the human sacrifices were renewed, and, during
the night, the bones of the royal deceased were removed to the sacred
tomb at Bantama, to be deposited along with the remains of those who had
sat on the throne. The procession was splendid, but not numerous, the
chiefs and attendants being dressed in the war costume, with a musket,
and preceded by torches; the sacred stools, and all the ornaments used
on great occasions, were carried with them; the victims, with their
hands tied behind them, and in chains, preceded the bones, whilst at
intervals, the songs of death and victory proved their wish to begin the
war. The procession returned about three P.M. on Monday, when the King
took his seat in the market place with his small band, and “death!
death! death!” was echoed by his horns. He sat with a silver goblet of
palm wine in his hand, and when they cut off any head, imitated a
dancing motion in his chair; a little before dark, he finished his
terrors for that day, by retiring to the palace, and soon after, the
chiefs came from their concealment, and paraded the streets, rejoicing
that they had escaped death, although a few days might put them in the
same fear. I had been attacked by a violent fit of ague in the morning,
from having stood so long in the sun the day before while with the King,
it being unusually hot. I dared not send out my people to procure any
thing, least they should be murdered, and in fact there was nothing in
the market to be had: there was not even a drop of water in the house.
The sacrifice was continued till the next Adaï custom, seventeen days.


[Footnote 125: “Mr. Wm. Hutchison, British Resident at Coomassie, the
capital of Ashantee, hearing there are two Europeans at Jennë, takes the
opportunity of a Moor returning to that place, to write to them. It is
earnestly requested, that some information will be sent to Cape Coast
Castle, whether or not, those, to whom this is addressed, belonged to
the expedition of Captain Mungo Park, or by what means they reached
Jennë. As no certain accounts have reached England of the fate of that
gentleman and his companions, any particulars will be interesting; also,
whether or not the Niger is the river known here by the name of Quolla,
Joliba, or any other appellation unknown in Europe. Also, its course,
and the opinions among the natives as to its termination, with the names
of any towns or countries it may run through. It is also reported that
there are two white men at Timbuctoo: should it be possible to render
any assistance to either, it will be done from Cape Coast Castle on
accounts being received of the certainty of their situation; and the
means which may be found to make the Europeans on the Quolla revisit
their native country: in the mean time, any information will be
anxiously expected, as to the fate of their companions; and whether they
have heard of an English expedition, lately arrived at the Niger. Two
notices in English and Arabic accompany this, offering a reward for
information.

December 9th.]

[Footnote 126: I have observed some of the Moors who have been a long
time in Ashantee pour forth a little of any thing before drinking. It
may be remarked, that all the worshippers of the fetish do this, and
also set apart some of their victuals before they eat.]

[Footnote 127: The signals happened to be drying on board H.M.S. Cherub,
Captain Wills, then lying in the roads of Cape Coast.]

[Footnote 128: It will be remembered, that the present King carried an
elephant’s tail before Apokoo, until he unexpectedly succeeded to the
stool.—See page 295.]




                             CHAPTER XIII.

                               * * * * *

                 _Sketch of Gaboon, and its Interior._


The River Gabon, or Gaboon, as the English pronounce it, is placed by
some, N. 30’, E. 8° 42’, by others, on the equator and E. 9° 23’: the
former longitude is certainly the more correct; judging from three
reckonings of the vessel in which I visited it; unfortunately, I had not
the requisites for an observation. The former latitude also, is,
doubtless, the correct one of Cape Clara; for an observation, taken as
we were beating in by Round Corner, gave 23’ N.; and another, taken
about 35 miles up the river, 15’ N. From Cape Clara (which is not ‘very
high land,’) to Sandy point, being an oblique line, may be about 25
miles, but the direct width of the mouth of the river, cannot be more
than 18. From 22 to 25 miles up the river, lay Parrot and Konig islands,
called by the natives Embenee and Dambee; the former (on which ships
have been hauled to careen) 1¾ miles in circumference and uninhabited,
the latter considerably larger, and having a village on the hill. The
natives mentioned the ruins of a Portuguese fort there. Konig island is
not more than a mile from Rodney’s or Oweëndo point, where there is a
large bight; which, with the one opposite, within Eghirrighee point,
makes the width of the river nearly thirty miles in this part. From
these points it seems to form an inner basin, the greatest width of
which, just above Goombena creek, is about twelve miles, judging from
shots; for the work of the ship being heavy whilst in the river, and the
crew suffering from the climate, (the first mate and carpenter dying,)
no assistance could be spared for a survey. There are several large
creeks in the river, Goöngway is the most so, and Goombena the second.

These names, being, of themselves, as uninteresting as the list of
bearings would be, I shall reserve both the one and the other, with the
outline of the river adjusted to them, for the Portfolio of the African
Association; and also two or three sketches of the different parts of
the river, not worth publishing, but, possibly, useful for the
introduction of more accurate observers.[129]

About forty-five miles from the mouth, the river forms two arms. The one
runs north eastwards, by a point called Ohlombompole by the natives of
Gaboon, and Gongoloba by the Shekans or interior people; the entrance is
about four miles wide. The other, runs apparently S.S.E. by a point
called Quawkaw, and Quanlie by the two nations, and is about two miles
broad. It was an inconsiderate observation of Mr. Maxwell’s, “If the
Niger has a sensible outlet, I have no doubt of its proving the Congo,
knowing all the rivers between Cape Palmas and Cape Lopez to be
inadequate to the purpose.” The Volta may be thought so, but the Lagos
certainly cannot, nor the Danger, or Gaboon; and, surely, the rivers del
Rey, and Formoso are not; which are thus noticed, within a few pages of
Mr. Maxwell’s observation, by the judicious Editor of Mr. Park’s last
mission, “The Rio del Rey and the Formoso, are stated to be of
considerable size, being each of them seven or eight miles broad at the
mouth; and the supposed Delta, estimated by the line of coast, is much
larger than that of the Ganges: consequently, the two streams, if
united, must form a river of prodigious magnitude.”

There being little prospect of the ship completing her cargo (red wood
and ebony) within two months, I determined to divert such a tædium under
an insalubrious climate, by investigating and compiling the interior
geography, as far as I could from the reports of the slaves, and
traders. The most enterprising of the latter, and the greatest
travellers in the interior, living on board the vessel during her
loading, I conversed with them constantly, as they spoke good English;
and I went on shore twice, passing a night the latter time, to Naängo or
George’s Town, two miles up the romantic creek of Abaäga, about forty-
five miles from the mouth of the river. I found the Governor (so his
title was interpreted) a very hospitable and intelligent native, and
speaking good English. He had travelled much in the interior, when
young, was still very inquisitive for particulars, and produced me a
troop of slaves for questioning, which furnished a native of almost
every country I could hear of. I saw two young negroes, the sons of
native rulers, who spoke and wrote French fluently. The one had been
sent to that country for education, and the other in his voyage to
England for the same purpose, was taken and carried to France, and
generously educated and maintained by the owner of the privateer.[130]
Each remained in France upwards of eight years before they were sent
back to Gaboon, and professed to be very anxious to return to it,
depicting the native habits not only as uncongenial, but disgusting to
them. The Congo hypothesis, the primary stimulus to my enquiries, making
geographical particulars the most desirable, I will defer those on other
subjects, and submit the compilation of seven weeks investigation and
inquiry under the above advantageous circumstances.

The native name of the country of Gaboon, is Empoöngwa; it dos not
extend above the branching of the river, or more than forty miles in
length; and is about thirty in breadth, including the river, which they
call Aroöngo. We will pursue the north-eastern arm first. There is a
sand-bank in the middle of the entrance, and three small islands,
Soombëä, Ningahinga, and Ompoöngee, are just beyond it, where the water
becomes fresh. About two miles further, is a larger island called
Cheēndue, inhabited, and the women of which are constantly employed in
fishing for white mullet, being abundant. They dress them with a kind of
chocolate, which I shall notice presently. Several large trees grow out
of the water, one, eminently high, is directly in the middle of the
river; they are called Intinga, or the iron tree. The eastern banks of
this arm are inhabited by the Sheekans, who, with all the nations of the
interior, are called Boolas by the Gaboons, a term synonymous with Dunko
in Ashantee. Adjoining Sheekan are the Jomays, who speak a dialect of
the same language. The Sheekans bury their dead within the house, under
their beds. The Gaboons prohibit these people from visiting the coast,
lest they should deprive them of their profits, as the medium between
the interior and shipping, whether for slaves or manufactures.

The Sheekans, like their neighbours, only reckon from 1 to 5, conjoining
these numerals afterwards, as Mr. Park has shewn the Feloops and the
Jaloffs to do.

  One       Ilwawtoe

  Two       Ibba

  Three     Bittach

  Four      Binnay

  Five      Bittah

  Ten       Ducoom

  Twenty    Eboomebba

  Hundred   Kama

The source of the north-eastern arm is unknown, it probably flows from
the River Danger, called by the natives Moöhnda, which flows very far
from the interior; and, though not so wide, is considerably deeper than
the Aroöngo or Gabon. There is a creek passing Quaw Ben’s town in the
River Gabon, which runs inland, within a short distance of the Moöhnda,
so that traders proceeding so far by it, carry their canoes over the
interval to that river. The Nokos, Apooks, and Komebays, inhabit the
lower space between the Rivers Gaboon and Danger.

Having pulled up the N.E. arm for two days and nights, they land,
leaving the river about one mile broad; and after two journies,
(skirting Sheekan,) reach Samashialee, the capital of the country of
Kaylee, (sometimes called Kalay,) and the residence of the King Ohmbay.
Samashialee, is described as a considerable town, and Asāko, as the
second to it; their houses are all of bamboo. The Kaylees manufacture
iron from the ore, which abounds every where in this part of Africa; but
they are very careful not to let the coast people see them do so, as
knives, spears, mats, and bamboo cloth, are their articles of barter
with them, for brass rods, cottons, and other European commodities. I
procured some of the knives and spear heads, of their own iron. The
bamboo-cloth has the appearance of coarse brown Holland. Their mats are
very fine, and much varied in colors and patterns. It is remarkable,
that the latter do not partake at all of their own wild character, but
are of that chaste, simple outline which would be called elegant by
civilized nations. These people are cannibals, not only eating their
prisoners but their dead, whose bodies are bid for directly the breath
is out of them. A father has frequently been seen to eat his own child.
Fowls abound in their country, but they never eat them, nor will they
goats, which are equally numerous, whilst human flesh is to be had. Salt
fetches an enormous price. The people of Gaboon would be afraid to
venture amongst them, even as traders, but for their musquets, and a
strong body of Sheekans, always engaged to accompany them. Their country
is mountainous and woody. There are people inhabiting a mountain close
to the north-eastward of Kalay, who are said to see best in the night
time, when they travel and work, sleeping most of the day, because the
light hurts their eyes, which are remarkably brilliant. Ivory is
plentiful. The Kaylee seems to be a dialect of the Sheekan.

  One      Woto

  Two      Ibba

  Three    Battach

  Four     Binnay

  Five     Bittan

  Ten      Duëoom

Northward of Kaylee, two journies, is Imbekee, adjoining the Moöhnda or
Danger. One moon distant, in the same direction, passing through the
countries, Beesoo (three journies from Imbeekee) Aösa, and Hetan, are
the larger kingdoms of Badayhee, and Oongoomo; the King of the latter is
Enjukayamoo, and the capital Mattadee, described as a very large town.
The numerals assimilate to those of Kaylee.

  One      Woötta

  Two      Beeba

  Three    Bittach

  Four     Binnay

  Five     Bitten

Travelling (still northward,) through the small states of Oondamee and
Bolaykee, in six journies they reach the extensive countries of Paämway,
and Shaybee, which adjoin each other; and on their northern frontier is
Bayhee, through which kingdom the River Wola or Wole flows; the largest
river they had ever seen or heard of, and running eastward. My friend
the Governor, always impressed on me, that this was the largest river in
the world, and ran, to use his own words, “farther than any one, except
God, knows, farther than Indee; all the great rivers in this country
come from Wole.” The Moöhnda, he had always understood in the long
course of his enquiries, to flow from it; but he could not speak so
positively of that, as of the junction of the Ogooawai and the Wole, as
he had himself been to a considerable distance up the Ogooawai, which,
returning to Gaboon, we shall proceed to. All the nations on this route
were said to be cannibals, the Paämways not so voraciously so as the
others, because they cultivate a breed of large dogs for their eating;
this seems the favourite meat in most parts of Africa.

Those who travel eastward, pull for a day and a half up the right hand
or south-eastern arm of the Gaboon or Aroöngo, which arm is formed by
the junction of several small streams, about sixty miles from its
confluence with the north-eastern arm. Landing about thirty-five miles
up it, two and a half journies are occupied in travelling over an
uninhabited country, described as savannah, and called Woongawoonga; it
is entirely open, and buffaloes are numerous. Here they reach the
Ogooäwai, a rapid river, frequently as wide, and, generally,
considerably deeper than the Gaboon; and which, as we shall presently
see, runs to the Congo, of itself insignificant. One day up the
Ogoöawai, is the small kingdom of Adjoomba, consisting but of four
towns. One journey beyond, on the Ogooäwai, and north-eastward, is
Gaelwa, a kingdom of more importance, its length three journies. The
King’s name is Roiela, and the capital, a considerable town, Inkanjee:
Goondemsie is second to it. Adjoining Gaelwa is Eninga, where the river
widens considerably; this country is larger than Adjoomba, very
populous, and composed of several small governments. The river winds
very much; frequently they save time by carrying their canoes over the
peninsulas; they are also opposed by impetuous currents. Hitherto the
language is the same as the Empoöngwa or Gaboon. Twenty journies from
the frontier of Gaelwa and Eninga, through the small state of Okota, is
the kingdom of Asheera; and ten beyond it, that of Okandee, the greatest
they know. The King’s name is Adoomoo, the capital extensive, and kept
particularly clean: their law forbids any native of Okandee to be sold
as a slave. None of the nations on the Ogooäwai are cannibals. On the
eastern confines of Okandee this river is described to join or flow from
the Wōla. The countries between the Moöhnda and Ogooäwai, are called
Sappalah, Koomakaimalong, and Okaykay, and described as vast extents of
savannah. Deeha was spoken of as a large country in the neighbourhood of
the Wōla. I could not make these interior natives, or the people of
Gaboon, understand what I meant by a Moor; there are none but pagan
negroes throughout. The slaves recently arrived viewed me with affright;
they said none in their country would believe there were white men.

I could hear of no great controlling kingdom, like Ashantee, in these
parts of the interior, nor do I think any such exists eastward of
Yarriba, or other than numerous small states, as far behind Dagwumba and
its neighbours in civilization, as they are behind Europeans. The
name,[131] situation, magnitude, and course of the Wōla, leave little
doubt of its being the Kulla or Quolla; though I am not clear that they
said there was a country of the name of the river, nor did I recognize
the name of any of the countries I had before heard of, as being in its
neighbourhood. With those on the northern banks of this large river they
did not profess to be acquainted, and those on the southern may be
intermediate between the Moöhnda and Ogooawai routes, which diverge from
Empoöngwa, the former northward, the latter north-eastward. Forty
journies from the Empoöngwa frontier to the Bahr Kulla agree very well
with the distance. A strong argument, in addition to the above, for the
Wōla and the Quolla being the same river, (recollecting my description
of the Paämways, and all the nations on the line of the Moöhnda, as
cannibals,) is suggested by the reperusal of the following remarks of
Mr. Horneman, and Mr. Hutchison, already quoted in page 202: “The Yem
Yems, cannibals, are south of Kano, ten days,” which agrees very well
with the lowered course of the Niger, which I have been obliged to lay
down. “It is to the King of Quallowliffa that the country in which
Canna, Dall, and Yum Yum, where cannibals are, is subject.” It is true,
that the character only, and not the names of the nations visited from
Empoöngwa, can be identified with Mr. Hutchison’s Canna, Dall, and Yum
Yum; but the Moorish pronunciation, or writing of negro names,
especially those only known to them by report, is very incorrect and
capricious. To Mr. Horneman, they were called Yem Yems; to Mr.
Hutchison, Yum Yums, and sometimes Jum Jums. The names Bapoonoo,
Okobella, Banginniga, Oonbamba, and Asango, may possibly be identified
hereafter amongst the countries approximating to the Wōla.

We will return to Adjoomba, where the Ogooäwai divides itself; the
smaller arm called Assazee runs to Cape Lopez, which is in the kingdom
of Oroöngoo; the monarch, Ogoöla, from his power surpassing every other
in the neighbourhood of the coast, has acquired the name of Pass-all
with the traders who speak English. Between Oroöngoo and Adjoomba is the
kingdom of Oongobai. The King’s name is Pendanga, and the numerals are,

  One      Rappeek.

  Two      Ramboise.

  Three    Mittasee.

  Four     Binnay.

  Five     Bittan.

  Six      Sambal.

  Seven    Bittooba.

  Eight    Bissamen.

  Nine     Bwoi.

  Ten      Deëoom.

An intelligent native of this country had fled to Gaboon to avoid
execution.

The larger arm of the Ogooäwai, flowing south-eastward, as wide as the
Gaboon, through the country of Tanyan, (the western frontier of which is
five journies from that of Adjoomba,) runs into the Congo, (which is
comparatively small before the confluence,) about ten days pull from the
mouth of that river. A very intelligent man who acts as interpreter or
trade man to the vessels which frequent the river Gaboon, confirming
this account of the slaves and traders, I enquired into the
circumstances to which he owed his knowledge. He is the son of the
principal trader in Gaboon, called Tom Lawson, who speaks English
fluently. Eight years ago, this young man, Wondo, went from Gaboon to
the Congo, in the Nimble, Everett master. After the vessel had traded
some time, as high up in the river as she might safely venture, the
captain sent him and three or four other negroes in a boat with goods,
to go up as much higher as they could. His account was, that they passed
Evehelee and Cormee, when they came to a fall of water upwards of twenty
feet high. A native, who preceded them in his canoe, directed them to
enter a small channel to the east, which, by a considerable sweep,
avoided it, but the natives, he persisted, both pulled their canoes up,
and let them down this fall, by long fibrous roots twisted into cordage,
and affixed to the large trees above; frequently, however, the most
expert were victims to their intrepidity, generally in the descent;
their canoes were made purposely in the shape of a bow. I expressed my
doubts, questioned him with seeming indifference, at many different
times, on this subject, and requested others to do the same; his account
never varied. He was naturally very cautious in what he said, by no
means given to the marvellous in recounting his travels, but a corrector
of that disposition in others. To the last moment he persisted in this
report. Just beyond this fall is the confluence of the Ogooawai and the
Congo, which takes place in Tanyan.[132] From this point he described
the latter as gradually dwindling to its source, (not more than six days
distant, by Encombë and Eveheea,) so that the Congo owed its magnitude
and rapidity entirely to the Ogooawai.[133] He mentioned a chief named
Mangoff, to have been a principal man in the Congo, and he sung his boat
chorus as a specimen of the language, “Malava napa, malava mabootay,
mabootay.” He said, Mangoff lived at Barrima. He spoke of a place called
Ohlobe, but I omitted to minute the particulars.

The master of a Liverpool ship, laying in Gaboon river, having visited
the Congo annually for many years, I availed myself of an opportunity of
conversing with him also. He mentioned Bōma as the principal place of
trade, but he did not consider it more than forty miles up the river; it
was so called after a chief, whose son has now succeeded him. Binda, a
secondary place of trade, he reckoned to be ninety miles from the
entrance of the river, on the north side; but there are so many arms or
branches there, that it is very difficult to distinguish the Congo
itself, which he had always understood to terminate soon
afterwards.[134] The houses he described as wretched, and transportable,
so that a trader buying one for a trifle, could have it moved to any
part of the banks he pleased. Sea horse teeth were to be bought
plentifully, they buried them with their dead, dedicating them as the
Ashantees do gold, and generally sticking one erect on the grave, as a
sort of monument. He spoke very ill of them from his own experience;
they had frequently attempted to poison the water on board his vessel. A
few months back they cut off a Portuguese vessel, destroyed the crew,
and plundered her. I anxiously anticipate the perusal of Captain
Tuckey’s journal.

Tom Lawson, who has as much, if not more influence than his brother the
King, says he would provide an escort headed by his son Wondo, and
guarantee the safety of any exploratory party to the river Ogooawai, and
five days up it; that is as far as Okota. Two hundred pounds laid out in
goods, I think, would defray the expenses, and presents, en passant,
handsomely, and there are many opportunities by which two officers might
be sent from Cape Coast to Gaboon for the purpose, and by way of the
islands, return to it. A man of war might convey them, and call for
them, on her cruise.

Kings are numerous in Gaboon, and scarcely comparable even with the
petty caboceers of Fantee. The greatest trader, or the richest man of
almost every small village assumes the title, and frequently suffers
gross indignities from his subjects, from not having the power to punish
them. The King of Naängo seems of acknowledged superiority, and is
comparatively respectable, both in means and power; he is known to
trading vessels by the name of King George. The brother succeeds before
the son. The legislative and judicial power is vested in the Governor,
controlled by the King, who may order the death of a man; but, if he
assigns no good reason, the offensive party is generally allowed to
retire elsewhere. All children share the property of the father in equal
portions, except the eldest son, who has about half as much again as any
other. If a man kills another, he has a public trial; and, if he cannot
justify the act, which it seems he may in many instances, his own death
is inevitable. If he kills one of his wives, (his rank is designated by
the number,) he pays a fine to her family, who, and not the husband, are
involved in all her palavers. The acknowledged heir to a property may
bring a palaver against his father, or whoever may be possessor of it,
for killing a slave unjustly, or otherwise injuring the property, and
oblige him to make good the injury.

A man may not look at, or converse with his mother-in-law, on pain of a
heavy, perhaps a ruinous fine; this singular law is founded on the
tradition of an incest. It is a common custom to lend their wives to one
another; if a man evades a promise of this kind, the Governor awards
heavy damages to the plaintiff. If an applicant is refused, and is
detected in intrigue, the whole of his property is forfeited to the
husband of the woman, who, if it is not speedily delivered, may kill the
man, and burn his house. I heard of no law so barbarous or disgusting,
as this any where in the interior of the Gold Coast. They assured me
they never made human sacrifices.

A man of consequence never drinks before his inferiors, without hiding
his face from them, believing that at this moment only, his enemies have
the power of imposing a spell on his faculties, in spite of the
guardiance of his fetish. When a man dies, the door of his house is kept
shut seven days. The whiskers of the men, and the side locks both of
them and the women, hang down in narrow braids, sometimes below their
shoulders, the ends commonly tipped with small beads, and the front
locks are generally braided to project like horns. The women wear a
number of thick brass rings (the trade brass rod twisted) round their
legs. A woman of consequence has a succession of them from the ancle to
the knee, which announce her approach when walking, and jingle when she
dances. The female slaves support even the heaviest burdens from a broad
band or string around the temples. Like other negroes, different
families have different fetish, some will not eat a cock, nor others a
hen. I could not discover any distinct ideas of the creation, or of a
future life. They believe implicitly in the superior fetish of
individuals from Sappalah and other countries in the interior.

Tom Lawson’s ‘fetish man,’ a native of Sappalah, has so thoroughly
persuaded his master, by his address and fortuitous circumstances in
war, that no bullet can injure him, strike him where it will, (either
rebounding, or penetrating to be thrown from the stomach at pleasure)
that this old man, who has lived almost the whole of his life in
European vessels, always presses every stranger to become equally
convinced by firing at him. His son bribed this man to endue him with
the same fetish, and eagerly making trial of its virtue, received a
musket ball, which fractured the small bone of his arm. The address of
the fetish man accounted for this, to the entire satisfaction of every
body, by declaring (being the most probable crime he could guess in the
emergency) that it was at that instant revealed to him by the offended
fetish, that this young man once had a stolen intercourse with his wife
at an improper season; it was immediately confessed as a truth, and they
are as obstinate believers as ever.

Naängo consists of one street, wide, regular, and clean. The houses are
very neatly constructed of bamboo, and afford a ground floor of spacious
and lofty apartments. They sleep on bedsteads encircled with musquito
curtains of bamboo cloth. The manners of the superiors are very pleasing
and hospitable, and a European may reside amongst them, not only with
safety, but with comfort and dignity. I do not think the old and new
town contain 500 inhabitants between them. From the sickness which
prevailed on board the vessel, the climate must be very insalubrious.
The density of the atmosphere from exhalation was even more oppressive
than the heat, which was intense before the setting in of the sea-
breeze, and at all times sensibly much greater than I had experienced on
the Gold Coast, or in the interior: there was no thermometer on board.
The Empoöngwa is the softest negro language I have ever heard, being
characterized by the duplication of vowels, separately pronounced. Their
numerals are;

  One      Hemoödee

  Two      Mban

  Three    Ntcharoo

  Four     Nahee

  Five     Nchanee

  Six      Oroöba

  Seven    Ragginnoömoo

  Eight    Ennanakee

  Nine     Enogoöm

  Ten      Hegoöm

They do not possess a single manufacture, depending for all their
comforts and conveniences on the superior ingenuity of their inland
neighbours, and the supplies of shipping. They plant but handfuls of
corn, and rear a few goats and fowls. Cotton grows spontaneously. They
make a good black dye from the mangrove and ebony shavings. They reduce
the red wood to a very soft powder, by breaking a soft species of stone,
and sprinkling the finest particles of it on a flat piece of red wood,
which they rub violently against another flat piece; the mixed powders
are then thrown into water, and that of the wood floating on the surface
is strained and dried. They rub children with this powder for cutaneous
eruptions.

The African Ourang-outan (Pithecus Troglodites) is found here, the one I
saw was two feet and a half high, but said to be growing. I offered a
fair price for it, considering they are not rare there, and would not
give more when I heard of one being already in England. The native name
is Inchego: it had the cry, visage, and action of a very old man, and
was obedient to the voice of its master; its agony on espying the
panther on board was inconceivable.[135] There is a curious variety of
monkeys. The favourite and most extraordinary subject of our
conversations on natural history, (which I introduce merely to excite
enquiry) was the Ingēna, compared with an Ourang-outan, but much
exceeding it in size, being generally five feet high, and four across
the shoulders; its paw was said to be even more disproportionate than
its breadth, and one blow of it to be fatal; it is seen commonly by
those who travel to Kaylee, lurking in the bush to destroy passengers,
and feeding principally on the wild honey, which abounds. Their death is
frequently accelerated by the silliness which characterizes most of
their actions: observing men carry heavy burthens through the forest,
they tear off the largest branches from the trees, and accumulating a
weight (sometimes of elephants teeth,) disproportionate even to their
superior strength, emulously hurry with it from one part of the woods to
another, with little or no cessation, until the fatigue, and the want of
rest and nourishment, exhausts them. Amongst other of their actions,
reported without variation by the men, women, and children of Empoöngwa
and Sheekan, is that of building a house in rude imitation of the
natives, and sleeping outside or on the roof of it; and also of carrying
about their infant dead, closely pressed to them, until they drop away
in putrefaction.[136] The larger birds in the creeks were uncommon, if
not unknown. Pelicans abounded.

Chamelions were plentifully caught, but none lived more than a month on
board the vessel, whether fed with flies, or not at all. The changes of
those I watched seemed confined to the shades between a very dark, dusky
green, and a bright yellow; when placed on any black substance they
became the former, and when any thing light approached them, they
changed to a bright green, which hue, if the substance was yellow, was
interspersed with the most brilliant spots of that colour. I could not
discern that they ever acquired a tinge of blue or red; when at rest in
their cage, their color was dark green, mottled with still darker spots.

In my rambles about the environs of Naängo, I formed some idea of the
general face of vegetation in Empoöngwa. Being the rainy season, of
course it did not possess its usual beauty. The red wood trees abounded,
with many which were new to me. The Mangroves clothed the banks of the
creeks and river, even growing some yards from the banks in the water,
and their lower branches frequently covered with oysters. The palm wine
tree was plentiful. Like most parts of Western Africa, the woods were so
covered beneath with shrubs and plants, that they seemed impenetrable.
Immense runners, twisting together, dropped from the branches like large
cables, generally covered with parasites; sometimes adhering to the
parent stem, they became themselves a tree, and at others, shooting
across to the branches of neighbouring trees, seemed to connect the
forest in a general link. The climbing plants contributed to this
entanglement, for, interlacing their tendrils amongst the trees, they
enwreathed them in the most beautiful flowers, or dropping in festoons,
formed a splendid drapery to the sober green of the canopy: amongst
these the convolvolus cairicus was conspicuous, from its extreme
variety, the flowers being not only of that beautiful lilac, so much
esteemed in England, but of the brightest blue, dark brown, pale yellow,
white, pink, buff with a purple eye, and all the shades which an opening
flower presents from budding to decay.[137] I gathered a few specimens
of the plants as I walked along, which may be acceptable to botanists. I
can only lament that so many circumstances conspired to render my
account of them imperfect; the rainy season, my slight knowledge of
botany, and the absence of all instruments which might have enabled me
to examine the very minute flowers which frequently presented
themselves; but I am convinced many new species might be discovered. I
will submit a few which were remarkable for their different virtues, and
of which drawings or specimens are preserved.

The Cosa Cosa grew upon a tree about ten feet high, the flowers in
clusters, but rarely two fully blown at the same moment, the corolla
white, tube shaped, but cleft to the bottom, tinged at the top with
crimson and yellow; a slightly tinged glutinous petal was fixed within
the corolla, and adhered firmly to it; when separated, I found the two
anthera fastened to it, without filaments, and between them laid the
style, the stigma having a small hook at the back to fasten it between
the two anthera. The juice is used for curing inflammations of the eyes.

The Endaägoo (_Cyperas articulatus_. _Linn._) had the appearance of a
grass, the bulbous root was used as a worm medicine.

The Owallifa was not in blossom, the prickly leaf was applied to
swellings when they wished to reduce them by bleeding; flogging the part
affected, as boys frequently do their chilblains with holly.

The Edjamba (_a species of_ _Urtica_) bears a multitude of minute green
flowers, the leaves wear the appearance of nettles, and when laid on the
skin produce blisters.

The Eninda Aboönee (_Leea sambucina_) is an umbelliferous plant, the
infusion of which is said to correct nausea.

The Oonkoolankolee (_Aneilema bracteolata_. _Br._) bears a very delicate
lilac blossom, with only two petals, which fly back and expose the other
parts of the flower; the least breath of air will disturb them. The
natives wash their children with its infusion, if they are backward in
walking.

The Econda Boomba (_Bidens_, probably a new species, but too imperfect
to be determined) is anti-venereal, as an infusion; the flower resembles
the chamomile.

The Shewawono bears a spike with leaves resembling those of Hedysarum.
The decoction is said to cure rheumatism.

The tobacco grows spontaneously, but I do not consider this so strong a
proof of its being indigenous to Africa, as that it grows in Inta. The
Portuguese have probably introduced it into Gaboon.

The natives here as well as elsewhere have a number of fetish plants;
the most remarkable seems the Ewelly welly, (the Aserumbdrue of
Ashantee, a species of Piper related to Umbellatum) the broad leaf of
which, when rubbed on a fetish man, is said to render him invisible.

The Eroga, a favourite but violent medicine, is no doubt a fungus, for
they describe it as growing on a tree called the Ocamboo, when decaying;
they burn it first, and take as much as would lay on a shilling.

The medicine they most prize is the Neoöndoo; a small quantity was
spared to me reluctantly. Four nuts grow in a pod on a very large tree
of the hardest wood; it is purchased greedily, only growing on the
frontier of Empoöngwa, and is used successfully by those afflicted with
gravel.

In killing elephants they use two poisons, both of which are the milky
juices of the stalks of plants. Inquaw indjoo (a plant belonging to the
natural order _Aroidea_, and referable to the Linnean genus _Arum_)
bears a hard white berry in a spiral cluster. The Ygwan agwan berries
are red, and in perfection at the time that the flowers are budding.
These juices are rubbed on the muskets balls, spears, arrows, and
knives, and the effect on the elephant is described as almost
instantaneous.

They make bird lime from a tree called Epoowa.

Besides the pine apple, the common thread of Africa, they use that of
two other plants, the Ezoönee (_Triumfitta elliptica_, _Nov. Sp._) and
the Naängoo, an _Urtica_, or genus nearly allied to it. The former bears
a yellow flower, too minute for my inspection. The top of the latter is
surmounted by five or six delicate flower stalks; the blossoms were
exceedingly minute, and of a lively green.

The governor of the town brought me two or three very harsh rough
leaves, which he said were from the plant Egoögoo (a species of _ficus_)
not then in blossom; they are used in planing wood, polishing and
cleaning various articles of household furniture, and feel like emery
paper. At the same time he gave me what they are very fond of chewing, a
delicate little mimosa, (_Abrus precatorius_. _Linn._) the taste of
which resembles liquorice.

A beautiful red pod, the blossom of which was out of season, contains
small black seeds, in taste exactly resembling the cardamom. The natives
of this place, and also of the interior, are very fond of them. In
Booroom the plant is called Booroomma, and at Gaboon, Entoöndo.

The Caoutchouc is to be met with here; the natives describe it as the
product of one tree only,[138] the olamboo; their method of collecting
it is curious. After the incision is made in the tree, whence it oozes
like a glutinous milk, they spread it over their arms and breasts with a
knife, (having first shaved themselves, that the hair of the skin may
not be torn up when it is taken off,) in the form of a plaister. It is
either rolled up in balls to play with, or stretched over the heads of
drums; they do not seem to apply it to any other use.

They make their torches from the wood (odjoo) of which they form their
canoes, the resinous parts are broken in small pieces, and tied closely
in very long leaves; the smaller end is fixed to an upright stick placed
in the ground of the apartment; they afford a brilliant light, and the
resin, when burning, emits a grateful odour.

The Odica, from which they make a kind of chocolate, is a very high and
large tree, bearing an acuminate shining leaf. The nuts, which are
white, are contained in a round pod with a bulb at the end, twice as
large as a man’s fist, green without, and yellow within; the parts
surrounding the nuts are squeezed into water, which they sweeten like
honey. The kernels are strung and smoke dried, and then beat in water
into large masses, having the appearance of coarse chocolate, but the
flavour of a rank gross gravy. It might be more palatable otherwise
prepared.

The vegetable butter (which certainly belongs to the natural order
_Sapoteæ_) brought to the Ashantee market, is here well known by the
name of Onoöngoo: it is a large tree, and the nuts are enclosed in a
round red pod, containing from four to six: the flower is also red, from
description. My servant, a native of Booroom, called the tree
Kirrimkoon, and the butter Incoom; the Ashantees call the latter
Sarradee; in Mallowa the tree is called Timkeëä. The nut is first
boiled, and the oil or butter afterwards expressed; in Booroom and
Mallowa it is skimmed from the surface. It tasted quite as good as fresh
butter before any salt is added, and we relished the meat fried in it
exceedingly. Being the rainy season I could neither get a sight of the
flower or the pod of this or the odica, but I procured the nuts and
produce of both. The curious may compare this butter with the specimen
of the Ashantee grease. Before I understood them to be distinct trees, I
concluded the odica and the butter both to be the produce of the cacao-
nut, but the butter answers closely to Mr. Park’s description of the
shea-tolu, though the tree did not resemble the American oak.

The Kolla nut grows on one of those trees which are supposed to sow
their own seed; it is round, and the size of an Orleans plum, having a
very hard shell, the kernel is white, and, after being exposed to the
sun for a few days, becomes even sweeter than a filbert. The natives
frequently soak them in salt water for a few weeks, and relish the rank
flavour they then acquire. They form the principal food of the lower
orders. They have a round orange coloured fruit, called Incheema, the
size varies from that of a small cocoa nut to a large one; the capsule
is very thick, and when cut yields a milky juice; a number of hard, dark
brown seeds, surrounded by a pulp, are found within, the latter only is
eaten, and when gathered fresh from the tree, is of a very delicious
flavour, not unlike that of a green gage. If the fruit is suffered to
fall from the tree, the bruise renders it unwholesome and unpalatable.

Every dark night, Tom Lawson was sure to direct me to look in the
direction of what some foolish Europeans had persuaded him must be a
diamond mountain. It lays about three days eastward of Empoöngwa in
direct distance, but from the fear of the intervening people, he had
been obliged to visit it by a circuitous route, which occupied seven
days; he lost the pieces he procured, in a skirmish on his return; they
illuminated a great circumference. It is considered a powerful fetish,
and described as a very high mountain. I must admit, that when there was
no moon, a pale but distinct light was invariably reflected from a
mountain in that quarter, and from no other.

The red and yellow ochres brought to me, were dug in the neighbourhood
of a savannah three journies south-eastward of Empoöngwa, where they
insisted there were large pits of strata, not only of red and yellow,
but of other colours. They believe, that if a man attempts to carry off
different colours at the same time, he is paralyzed on the spot. Gold
has never been found in this part of Africa.

[Illustration: Music score

EMPOÖNGWA SONG.]

[Illustration: Music score

EMPOÖNGWA SONG.]

[Illustration: Music score

Notes sung by the white Negro from Imbeekee.]

The music of Empoöngwa is, generally, very inferior to that I have
before noticed. The enchambee, their only peculiar instrument, resembles
the mandolino, but has only five strings, made from the root of the palm
tree; the neck consists of five pieces of bamboo, to which the strings
are fastened, and, slipping up and down, are easily, but not securely
tuned; it is played with both hands; the tones are sweet, but have
little power or variety. Long stories are recited to the enchambee in
the moon-light evenings, in a sort of recitative; a favourite one, is an
account of the arts by which the Sun gained the ascendancy over the
Moon, who were first made of coeval power by their common father.

No. 1, (which, I imagine, commences in F major, and ends in G major) is
an Empoöngwa air played on the enchambee. I do not know if the inversion
of words is common in their conversation as well as in their songs. A
native envies a neighbour, named Engaëlla, who has ivory to barter with
a vessel.

  Amorill injanja        Engaëlla;  impoongee  m’adgillinjanja.

  A brass pan he has got Engaëlla;   ivory,    I have got none.

Here again we find _me_ answers to the personal pronoun I.

No. 2, in G major, is a song in which the men sing the air alone, and
the women join in the chorus. It is an old one, and the subject the
first appearance of a white man. One verse will be quite enough to
satisfy others and exculpate myself. At least half a dozen followed it.

       Ma         bengwoo        ma bengwa           baïa.

  A fine strange  thing,    A fine strange thing,  my mother.

          Deboonga sai                 camberwoona  nayennee.

  Like the leaf of the fat tree,[139]  true I say,  so it is.

     Sangwa moochoo,          baïa.

  I make you look to-day,  my mother.

        Baï yamgwan boonoo.

  My mother fears this fetish man.

My patience during a series of dull Empoöngwa songs, was recompensed by
the introduction of a performer, as loathsome as his music was
astonishing. It was a white negro from the interior country of Imbeekee;
his features betrayed his race, his hair was woolly, and of a sandy
colour, with thick eye brows of the same; his eyes small, bright, and of
a dark grey; the light seemed to hurt them, and their constant quivering
and rolling gave his countenance an air of insanity, which was confirmed
by the actions of his head, and limbs, and the distortions of his mouth.
His stature was middling, and his limbs very small; his skin was
dreadfully diseased, and where it was free from sores bore the
appearance of being thrown on, it hung about him so loose and so
shrivelled; his voice was hollow, and his laugh loud, interspersed with
African howls. His harp was formed of wood, except that part emitting
the sound, which was covered with goat skin, perforated at the bottom.
The bow to which the eight strings were fixed, was considerably curved,
and there was no upright; the figure head, which was well carved, was
placed at the top of the body, the strings were twisted round long pegs,
which easily turned when they wanted tuning, and, being made of the
fibrous roots of palm wine tree, were very tough and not apt to slip.
The tone was full, harmonious, and deep. He sat on a low stool, and
supporting his harp on his knee and shoulder, proceeded to tune it with
great nicety; his hands seemed to wander amongst the strings until he
gradually formed a running accompaniment (but with little variety) to
his extraordinary vociferations. At times, one deep and hollow note
burst forth and died away; the sounds of the harp became broken;
presently he looked up, pursuing all the actions of a maniac, taking one
hand from the strings, to wave it up and down, stretching forth one leg
and drawing it up again as if convulsed, lowering the harp on to the
other foot, and tossing it up and down. Whilst the one hand continued
playing, he rung forth a peal which vibrated on the ear long after it
had ceased; he was silent; the running accompaniment served again as a
prelude to a loud recitative, uttered with the greatest volubility, and
ending with one word, with which he ascended and descended, far beyond
the extent of his harp, with the most beautiful precision. Sometimes he
became more collected, and a mournful air succeeded the recitative,
though without the least connection, and he would again burst out with
the whole force of his powerful voice in the notes of the Hallelujah of
Handel. To meet with this chorus in the wilds of Africa, and from such a
being, had an effect I can scarcely describe, and I was lost in
astonishment at the coincidence. There could not be a stronger proof of
the nature of Handel, or the powers of the negro.

I naturally enquired if this man was in his senses, and the reply was,
that he was always rational but when he played, when he invariably used
the same gestures, and evinced the same incoherency. The accompanying
notes were caught whilst he was singing; to do more than set them down
in their respective lengths, was impossible, and every notation must be
far inadequate.

As regards the words, there was such a rhapsody of recitative, of
mournful, impetuous, and exhilarated air, wandering through the life of
man, throughout the animal and vegetable kingdom for its subjects,
without period, without connection, so transient, abrupt, and
allegorical, that the Governor of the town could translate a line but
occasionally, and I was too much possessed by the music, and the
alternate rapture and phrenzy of the performer, to minute the half
which he communicated. I can only submit the fragments of a melancholy
and a descriptive part.

Burst of a man led to execution,

  Yawa yawa wo wo oh

  Yawa waï yawa

  What have I done? what have I done?

Bewailing the loss of his mother,

  Yawa gooba shangawelladi yaisa

  Wo na boo, &c.

  My mother dies; who’ll cry for me now

  When I die? &c.

  Pahmbolee gwoongee yayoo, &c.

  Which path shall I seek my love?

  Hark! I know now,

  I hear her snap the dry sticks,

  To speak, to call to me.

Jiggledy jiggledy, jiggledy, too too tee too, often invaded or broke off
a mournful strain; it was said to be an imitation of the note of a bird,
described as the wood-pecker.

Three Portuguese, one French, and two large Spanish ships, visited the
river for slaves during our stay, and the master of a Liverpool vessel
assured me that he had fallen in with 22 between Gaboon and the Congo.
Their grand rendezvous is Mayumba. The Portuguese of St. Thomas’s and
Prince’s islands send small schooner boats to Gaboon for slaves, which
are kept after they are transported this short distance, until the coast
is clear for shipping them to America. A third large Spanish ship, well
armed, entered the river the night before we quitted it, and hurried our
exit, for one of that character was committing piracy in the
neighbouring rivers. Having suffered from falling into their hands
before, I felicitated myself on the escape. We were afterwards chased
and boarded by a Spanish armed schooner, with three hundred slaves on
board; they only desired provisions.


[Footnote 129: I believe no instructions for entering the River Gabon
are in print, the following were compiled from the log-book of the Lord
Mulgrave, which has been laden in the river the three successive years
she has been chartered as a store-ship by the African Committee, and
beat into it this time. When standing for the river, from the southward,
it is best to give Round Corner a good birth, as a shoal or sand-bank
runs off between that and Sandy point, and also in case of being
becalmed, as the ground is foul and bad for anchoring. A channel goes in
by Sandy point, but it is rarely used but by small vessels. Leave Round
Corner about three leagues, and stand over for Cape Clara until you have
the river well open, then steer for a bluff point about two miles inside
of the Cape, where you will find from eight to ten fathom water. You may
stand in, till you are about two miles from the above point, and then
steer up the river, keeping the north shore aboard, and steering for the
highest land you see, which lies above Quaw Ben’s town. In mid-channel,
you will find nine fathoms, until you bring Sandy point on a line with
Cape Clara bearing S.S.E. You are then in the narrowest part of the
channel, which is not more than two or three miles wide, and your
greatest soundings will be six fathoms. When you are well inside these
bearings you may haul off from the shore at your leisure, and steer for
Parrot Island. When athwart of Quaw Ben’s town, and about five miles off
shore, you will find twelve and thirteen fathoms. In standing up from
Quaw Ben’s, give Prince Glass’s town a good birth, as a shoal runs off
to some distance, your soundings will be from seven to nine fathoms; you
may anchor on any part of the north side, without danger. Between Konig
and Parrot Islands, is very good anchorage in seven fathoms, and a soft,
muddy, bottom; thence to Abraham’s town, you will have from seven to
four fathoms at low water; and small vessels may go a considerable way
up the river, for there are three fathoms at Naängoo or George-Town
creek, about forty-five miles up the river. If you are turning into the
river, when you are within the Cape, stand no further off than into five
fathoms, for as you close the middle ground, the soundings are very
irregular; you may have five fathoms; and, before the next cast, the
ship may be ashore. The widest part of the channel, is not more than
about 5½ miles, until you are nearly athwart of Quaw Ben’s town, when
you may stand over to the south side, as you are then inside the bank.
There is a very good watering-place at Rodney’s point. Ships
unacquainted, may anchor off the Cape and wait for the sea breeze, which
generally sets in before noon.]

[Footnote 130: I am sorry to say those whom their parents have been
persuaded to entrust to English vessels for the same purpose, have
invariably been sold as slaves, in violation of every assurance; an
infamy of which the French have never been guilty in a single instance.]

[Footnote 131: Wōla is probably the Empoöngwa corruption of the original
name Quolla or Kulla, for, presuming that name to be given to it in the
Mallowa or Houssa country,[a] to denote its being a branch or arm of the
great river, dividing into it and the Gambaroo after leaving the lake
Dibbir, (Kulla being _child_ in the Mallowa,) it doubtless retains the
same name in the country known at Gaboon; not only because Mr. Brown
first reported the river Kulla (_Bahr Kulla_) and the kingdom (_Dar
Kulla_) to be situated thereabouts, but because from the following
observation of Mr. Hutchison’s, received since I wrote my geographical
chapter, it appears, that the language of the kingdom which bears the
name of the river, is at least a dialect of the Mallowa language. “I
send you the numerals of Quolla liffa, as given me by the servant boy I
have got lately, who comes from that country, which is near the
cannibals:” see Appendix, Language.]

[Footnote a: The Jennë Moors however called it Quolla, which inclined me
at first to derive its name from _Killi_, the numeral _one_ in the
Bambarra, as if to denote it the first or greatest river; as Yahndi, the
name of the capital of Dagwumba, implies its pre-eminence; _Yahndi_
being _one_ in the language of the country.]

[Footnote 132: “The information received here (at Mavoonda) of the
upward course of the river, was more distinct than any we have yet had;
all the persons we spoke to agreeing that after ten days in a canoe, we
should come to a large sandy island, which makes _two channels, one to
the north west, and the other to the north east; that in the latter
there is a fall, but that canoes are easily got above it_; that twenty
days above the island, the river issues by many small streams from a
great marsh or lake of mud.” Captain Tuckey’s Narrative. In a map,
“Regna Congo et Angola,” in Dapper’s Description de l’Afrique, 1686, a
large arm is laid down, about two hundred and fifty miles up the Zaire,
running to or coming from the north-east. As this book is scarcely
known, there being but one copy in England, it may be interesting to the
reader to see a description of the Congo and its source, according to
the geographical opinions, a century and a half ago, for 1686 is the
date of the translation from the German. Refer first to my copy of a
part of one of the many maps in Dapper’s work, p. 211. Au midi de cette
riviere (Niger) est le Zaire, ou la grande riviere de Congo qui prend sa
source de trois lacs, au sentiment de Pigaser. Le premier se nomme
Zambre d’où procede le Nil, le second Zaire d’où sortent les rivieres de
Lelunde et de Coanze, et le troisiême est un lac formé par le Nil. Mais
le principal est le Zambre qui est comme le centre d’où les fleuves de
nord le Nil, au levant Cuama et Coavo, au midi Zeila et Manice ou
Manhessen, et au couchant la riviere de Zaire, qui par divers bras
arrose toute la partie occidentale de l’Afrique, situé au delà de la
ligne, les royaumes de Congo, d’Angola, de Monomatapa, de Matamam, de
Bagamadiri et d’Agasymba jusqu’au cap de bonne-esperance; pendant que le
Nil, Cuama, Coavo, Zeila, et Manice traversent l’Abyssinie et tous les
pais qui sont entre la mer-Rouge et Cuama. L’embouchure de Zaire est à
cinq degrez quarante minutes de latitude Meridionale. Elle a trois
milles de large et se décharge dans l’ocean avec tant d’impetuosité, que
l’impression qu’elle donne à la marée, dont elle rend le cours ouëst-
nord-ouëst et nord-ouëst au nord se ressent en pleine mer, à douze
milles de la côte. Quand on a perdu la terre de vue, on découvre une eau
noire, de la verdure, des cannes et des roseaux qui ressemblent à de
petites îles, et que la violence de la marée entraine après soi du haut
des ecœuils. De sorte qu’à moins d’un vent d’arrière il est fort
difficile de resister au courant et d’aller jetter l’ancre dans la rade
de Cabo Padron. On ne sauroit remonter ce fleuve plus de vint ou vint
cinq lieues au-dessus de son embouchure, à cause des cascades qui sont
au milieu de son lit et qui s’élancent du haut des rochers avec tant de
bruit qu’on l’entend à deux ou trois lieues de là. Plusieurs ruisseaux
se déchargent ou sortent de ce fleuve et arrosent le pais: ce qui est
fort commode pour les marchands et les habitans qui peuvent aller
commodément d’un village à l’autre sur des canots. Les peuples qui
demeurent le long de ces ruisseaux sont des gens de petite taille.]

[Footnote 133: The following, which Baron Humboldt sketched before me,
(and which is only laid down in Walker’s Map of the World on the
globular projection) is a more extraordinary concatenation of rivers;
considering the opposite courses of the Orinoco and Amazon when
connected by the Casiquaire, which is more curiously situated than the
south eastern branch of the Ogooawai, flowing, through Tanyan, into the
Zaire.

[Illustration]
]

[Footnote 134: “Captain Tuckey could only learn that the paramount
Sovereign was named Blindy N’Congo, and resided at a banza named Congo,
which was six days journey, in the interior from the ‘Tall Trees,’
where, by the account of the negroes, the Portuguese had an
establishment, and where there were soldiers and white women. This place
is no doubt the St. Salvador of the Portuguese. The following is the
description in Dapper: La province de Pembo est la plus considerable de
tout le royaume dont elle contient la ville capitale, et forme comme le
centre. Cette ville porte le nom de banza chez les Ethiopiens, les
Portugais la nomment présentement S. Salvador, et Marmol l’appelloit
Ambas Congo. Elle est presque au milieu de la province, située sur une
roche fort haute, _à 76 lieues de France ou 150 milles de la mer_, au
sud-est de la riviere de Zaire, et ombragée de Palmiers, de Tamarins, de
Bacoves, de Colas, de Limoniers et d’Orangers. Le côtau sur lequel elle
est bâtie est si haut, que de dessus son sommet on porte la vue aussi
loin qu’elle se peut étendre, sans qu’aucune montagne l’arrête. Il n’y a
point de murailles autour de cette ville, si ce n’est d’un côté de
devers le Midi, que le premier roi chrétien donna aux Portugais pour les
mettre à couvert des insultes. Il fit aussi fermer de murailles son
palais et toutes les maisons royales qui sont aux environs, laissant une
place vuide où l’on bâtit ensuite un palais et un cimétiere. La cime de
la montagne est occupé par des maisons baties fort près l’une de
l’autre: les personnes de qualité en possedent la plus grande partie, et
sont des enceintes de bâtimens qui ressemblent à une petite ville. Les
habitations des personnes du commun sont rangées de file, en diverses
rues, elles sont assez grandes, mais les murailles ne sont que de
paille; excepté quelques unes que les Portugais ont faites, dont les
murs sont de brique & le toit de chaume. Le palais du roi est aussi
grand qu’une ville ordinaire; il est fermé de quatre murailles, celle
qui regarde sur le quartier des Portugais est de chaux & de pierre, les
autres ne sont que de paille, mais travaillée fort proprement. Les
murailles des sales & des chambres sont orneés de tapisseries de paille
nattées avec beaucoup d’art. Dans l’enceinte interieure du Palais, il y
a des jardins & des vergers embellis de berceaux & de pavilions fort
beaux pour le pais, quoiqu’au fond ce ne soit pas grande chose. Il y a
dix ou douze Eglises, la Cathedrale, sept chapelles dans la ville &
trois Eglises dans le chateau du Prince. Il y a aussi un couvent de
Jesuites, où trois ou quatre de ces Peres sent tous le jours le
Catechisme au peuple, & des écoles où l’on enseigne le Latin & le
Portugais. Il y a deux fontaines, l’une dans la rue de St. Jaques &
l’autre dans une cour du Palais, qui fournissent abondance d’eau
fraiche, sans qu’on se donne la peine de refaire les aqueducs ou de les
entretenir. Outre cela il y a un bras de la riviere Lelunde, qu’on nomme
Vese, qui sort au pié de la montagne, au Levant de la ville; son eau est
fort bonne, le peuple en va puiser, & elle sert à arroser & rendre
fertiles les campagnes d’alentour. On y a des pourceaux & des chevres;
mais peu de moutons & boeufs; on les renferme la nuit dans des parcs qui
sont dans la ville près des maisons.]

[Footnote 135: This panther or leopard, was sent to the Governor-in-
Chief by the King of Ashantee, and was so perfectly tame as never to be
tied up, but strolled at liberty through the apartments, playing with
the servants and children. It was presented to the Duchess of York, and
died at Exeter ’Change, a short time after it landed, of an inflammation
on the lungs. The extraordinary playfulness and good humour of the
animal, and the preservation of its health and tameness during a four
months voyage, (during the colder part of which he banquetted
sumptuously on dead parrots) made the loss very mortifying.]

[Footnote 136: The description the natives give of this animal agrees
extraordinarily with that of the Quoja Morrou in Dapper.

Les Quojas Morrou, dont on a parlé dans le royaume de Quoja, naissent
dans le royaume d’Angola. Comme cet animal tient beaucoup de l’homme,
bien des gens ont cru qu’il étoit issu d’un homme & d’un singe, mais les
Negres même rejettent cette opinion. Il y a trente ou quarante ans qu’on
apporta en Hollande un de ses animaux, dont on fit present à son Altesse
le Prince Frederic Henri. Il étoit de la grandeur d’un enfant de trois
ans, _mais il avoit bien le double d’épais, étant d’une taille carreé_,
fort vigoureux & agile: _car il levoit des choses fort pesantes & les
portoit d’un lieu en un autre_. Le devant de son corps étoit nud, mais
le dos étoit couvert de poil noir. Sa face avoit quelque chose d’humain,
mais son nez étoit plat & retroussé. Ses oreilles, son sein, et ses
mamelles, ses coudes ses mains, le bas de son ventre & ses parties
naturelles, ses jambes & ses pieds resembloient parfaitement à ceux
d’une femme, parce que c’étoit un animal femelle. _Il se tenoit debout &
marchoit souvent tout droit; il buvoit fort proprement, portant, d’une
main le pot à la bouche et le soutenant de l’autre; il se couchoit de
même, mettoit sa tête sur un chevet, ajustoit la couverture sur son
corps, & à le voir ainsi étendu on l’auroit pris pour un homme_. Aussi
les Negres rapportent-ils des choses prodigieuses de cet animal; ils
assurent qu’il force des femmes & des filles, _& qu’il ose s’en prendre
à des hommes armez_. Et selon toutes les apparences c’est là ce Satyre
si celebre chez les Anciens, dont Pline & les poëtes ont tant parlé par
oui-dire & sur des rapports incertains.]

[Footnote 137: “Les Botanistes remarquent même très fréquemment ces
accidens de couleurs dans les plantes venues en lieux agrestes. Je n’en
citerai qu’un exemple entre mille. Sur les rives sauvages du Volga et du
Samara, Pallas a trouvé l’_Anemone patens_ chargé de périanthes tantôt
bleus, tantôt blancs, tantôt jaunes.”—Mirbel 1ère partie, p. 264.]

[Footnote 138: “India rubber is obtained from the milky juice of
different plants in hot countries. The chief of these are, the Jatropha
elastica and Urceola elastica. The juice is applied in successive
coatings on a mould of clay, and dried by the fire or in the sun, and
when of a sufficient thickness the mould is crushed and the pieces
shaken out.” Nicholson.

“It has been discovered that caoutchouc is not exclusively the produce
of the Heven caoutchouc, but that it is furnished by several other
plants. We know it to be obtained in large quantities from the Jatropha
elastica of South America, and Dr. Roxburgh has given us a description
of an Indian plant (Urceola elastica) which affords a juice that when
thickened has all the properties of the caoutchouc. We moreover know
that the milky exudations of the Jack tree (Artocarpus integrifolia) the
Banyan tree (Ficus Indica) and also that of the Arasum tree (Ficus
religiosa) possess nearly similar qualities.” Ainslie’s Materia Medica
of Hindoostan.]

[Footnote 139: The vegetable butter.]




                              CHAPTER XIV.

                               * * * * *

      _Suggestions for future Missions to the Interior of Africa._


A mission to Dagwumba is of the first importance. See Geography, p. 178.
The commercial genius and opulence of its people, their disinclination
and inaptitude to war, their superior civilization, and the numerous
caravans which frequent this emporium, from the most remote parts of the
interior, make a treaty of intercourse most desirable, both for commerce
and science. But it is more imperiously desirable, or rather this
enterprise becomes a duty, from the recollection, that, from this King’s
proverbial repute for sanctity, if he were persuaded by the deliberate
remonstrance of a British Resident, at least to mitigate, if not
ultimately to abolish human sacrifices, his example would naturally be
followed by the several neighbouring monarchs who make him their oracle.

Mr. Hutchison’s courage, his love of enterprise, and his interest in
intellectual pursuit, to say nothing of a feeling towards myself, which
I cannot but be proud of, would, I am sure, lead him to anticipate my
wishes and strengthen my hopes of success, by having him again as a
companion; and his diary must have proved, though very imperfectly,
compared with a personal acquaintance with him, how well he is qualified
for an appointment, so important to the interests of commerce, science,
and humanity, by his discretion, zeal, and benevolence.[140]

A third officer (and a zealous and able successor to Mr. Tedlie has
presented himself) should accompany this mission, to proceed under the
King of Dagwumba’s guarantee and recommendation, which is omnipotent to
the Niger, to Wauwaw (on the banks of that river where Mr. Park was
buried; for no plea could be less suspicious, than the King of England’s
natural anxiety to send an officer to the Sultan of Wauwaw, to learn the
particulars of Mr. Park’s death, and to enquire for his papers,
especially as a Moorish emissary passing through Yahndi, was instructed
to do so, directly we heard of the circumstance in Ashantee. The officer
alluded to (who is a medical man, well acquainted with natural history,
and an accurate draftsman) should be content with a sight of the Niger,
and remain at Wauwaw collecting and observing, until an exchange of
letters with Cape Coast, through the Resident at Yahndi[141]; when it
would be seen how far it might be prudent, (having replaced him at
Wauwaw) to allow him to proceed to Cassina, Houssa, or Timbuctoo; that
is, if the Sultan of Wauwaw would guarantee his safety, under the same
promise of reward previously held out to the King of Dagwumba.

No moment could be more auspicious than the present for this enterprise
to Dagwumba, since the King of Ashantee’s absence and perplexity in the
Gaman war bars his molestation or hindrance; though I have no
expectation that he would offer either, were he at liberty, or aware of
the occasion: see page 342.

If the trade of Dagwumba be so extensive as was invariably reported to
us (and to Mr. Lucas at Mesurata on the Mediterranean) it might then
become desirable to establish a British market up the Volta; but this is
an after consideration. Geographical circumstances are much more in
favour of a mission to Dagwumba than they were in that to Ashantee,
(besides, that there are no irritating political retrospects to be
debated on arrival,) for the Volta or Adirree is navigable from the sea
to within eight days march of Yahndi; (see page 176;) even if we do not
calculate on the reported junction of the river Laka, which would bring
us close to Yahndi.

The presents should all be ingenious novelties, rather than costly
apparel, for they are not only more acceptable and more imposing, but,
which is very important, much more portable; and would require so few
carriers, as to diminish the expense of conveyance as much as the
expense of purchase. The negroes have more than anticipated our
_portable_ displays of splendour, from the pageantry and descriptions of
the Moors; and we have had the advantage of witnessing what kind of
presents made the most auspicious impression on the King of Dagwumba’s
powerful neighbour, which were certainly all of the class of ingenious
novelty. I should recommend, therefore, a few pieces of tissue and rich
silk, with gold thread interwoven, to shew that our manufactures can be
accommodated to their taste; see note page 331.

Pieces of worked muslin.

One piece of ditto, worked with gold thread.

Scotch damask.

Palampours, with gold and silver leaf.

Manchester cottons, of rich pattern.

Red, blue, and yellow broad cloth.

Raw silk, of various colours; see page 331.

Of the foregoing, only small quantities as presents to the King and
principal Moors, by way of samples of our manufactures.

Two pair of richly cut glass decanters.

A small silver bowl embossed.

A handsome lamp.

A military saddle and bridle, with pistols, &c.

Two musical snuff boxes.

A good bird organ.

Two or three common violins, being the instrument of the country.

Pandean pipes.

Cymbals.

Two bugles.

Kaleidescopes.

An inferior gold repeater for the King.

Two or three common silver watches.

A telescope.

Camera obscura.

Magic lantern.

Microscope.

Pocket compasses.

Boxes of phosphorous matches.

Arabic Bibles, and Arabic literature.

Two or three landscapes, in sympathetic ink.

A port-folio of engravings of English costume and public buildings, with
a set of the drawings of this work.

A copying writing apparatus for the chief Moor.

Wax, seals, pencils, Indian rubber.

Two boxes of water colours.

Drawing and writing paper, and vellum.

Razors, scissors, knives.

A handsome double barrelled gun.

Two boxes of carpenters tools.

A small turning lathe.

A small plough.

A made up turban of gold tissue, with a gilt circle for the head, set
with false stones, for the chief Moor.

A silk union flag.

An air gun.

Candles and perfumed soap.

Bark, and other medicines.

The officers of the mission should be provided with Troughton’s pocket
sextant, Dollond’s 32 feet telescope, the new barometers, &c. &c.

The Danes having deserted their fort (Adda) at the mouth of the Volta,
their government, on being solicited, would surely not only not
obstruct, but favour so important a scientific enterprise, and not
compel us to reach the river over land, as we could do, by marching
through Aquapim and Quaoo. The man of war on the station might convey
the mission to the mouth of the Volta, and one of her boats accompany
the canoes (which should be brought from Cape Coast) a day or two up the
river.

It would be well to be prepared with several impressions of a manifesto
(in Arabic,) explanatory and impressive of the legitimate and benevolent
views of the British government, as an introduction to the King of
Dagwumba, preparatory to our negociation, and also to serve the same
purpose at Wauwaw, and to circulate through the interior. Numerous
impressions of the certificates circulated in behalf of Major Peddie,
should also be circulated, Mr. Ritchie’s name being substituted, and the
reward for an act of kindness acknowledged in a letter from that
gentleman, being made payable (after an authority from Cape Coast) at
either of the British Residencies, Coomassie, Yahndi, or Dahomey; for as
there are many officers to spare at Cape Coast, the expressed wish of
the latter monarch should be immediately gratified, and our intercourse
renewed by a Residency. See note, p. 340.

I think all the objects of the Dagwumba mission could be effected in
four months; when I should feel impatient to visit the river Gaboon, for
the purpose of penetrating to the Ogooawai, and going as far up it as I
might with prudence. See p. 436. The discovery of so large a river in
this situation is very important.

Arrangements could probably be made at Eninga or Okota (p. 429.) for the
guarantee of an after mission to Asheera: also for one from Gaboon to
Kaylee; and, which is most important, for the south-eastern navigation
(from Adjoomba, p. 431) of the branch of the Ogooawai running through
Tanyan into the Congo.

But there is another enterprise which should not be forgotten, the
navigation of the Lagos river to the highest point, (p. 224) and a visit
to Kosie, (p. 225,) a Residency at which court would doubtless lead to a
similar establishment in the powerful and commercial kingdom of Yarriba.
See p. 209.

The Residents at the various courts, who, as I have impressed before,
should be young men of acquirement, patience, and address, should
receive occasional instructions from head quarters, directing their
enquiries and observations to the geographical and scientific
desiderata, more peculiarly belonging to or expected from their
different neighbourhoods, which would be suggested from the closer study
of these subjects by the individual at the head of a department of
discovery at head quarters, and also by the scientific Societies in
England according to their peculiar pursuits.

The Residents should make quarterly reports, accompanied by specimens of
natural history, to be digested into one annual report at head quarters,
(with the various geographical improvements and discoveries, adjusted
and embodied in one large chart) for forwardance to England.

All Residents and Conductors of Missions, should be provided with small
copying apparatuses, so that they might forward their original dispatch,
and one duplicate, to Cape Coast, by two different opportunities, always
retaining the other copy, in case of accident, or until the receipt were
acknowledged.

If it could be afforded, a medical officer should afterwards be added to
the more important Residencies, to attach and relieve the natives.

Botanical and Mineralogical excursions, (taking sextants, telescopes,
and barometers,) into Ahanta, Aowin, Warsaw, Akim, and Aquapim, small
surveys, &c. &c. should be undertaken, ad interim, not only from the
smallness of the expense and the great comparative benefit, (as we know
nothing of these countries beyond their position,) but to qualify the
younger officers (of congenial disposition and acquirement,) for future
missions and residencies.

The young men soliciting appointments in England, should be required to
make themselves acquainted with the grammar of the Arabic language, and
practical astronomy, before they receive their commissions; and one or
two intelligent Moors from the interior, should be invited, by a pay, to
settle at Cape Coast Castle, to perfect these officers in writing and
speaking the language. The Fantee language should also be cultivated, as
it is a dialect of the Ashantee.

The soldiers of the settlements should no longer be enlisted from the
mulattoes and Fantees of the neighbourhood, making the present paltry
force the more inefficient, from local and family attachments,
inseparable from human nature, and preventing their acting cordially, if
at all, on emergencies for the rescue of human victims, or the
punishment of their relatives and townsmen, for insult, or contempt of
the British legislation for the abolition of the slave trade, &c. The
Negroes captured in the illicit Spanish and Portuguese slave ships, of
whom there must be a number unemployed at Sierra Leone, would form the
most desirable military force, even preferable to European, which has
recently been adopted by the Dutch. These rescued Negroes would possess
no attachment, beyond that which the considerate kindness and good
conduct of their officers might induce; the climate would be natural to
them; and they would prove valuable companions, if not intelligent
guides, in future missions to the interior. There should at least be two
hundred and fifty of these soldiers at head quarters, (one company being
trained as artillery by European serjeants) and fifty at each other
settlement, if but two.

The three missions, to Dagwumba, Wauwaw, and Ogooawai, would not cost
above a thousand pounds, judiciously expended in England; which is not
so much as the annual expense of either of the six paltry out-forts
(exclusive of the head quarters, and the vice presidency, which is but 9
miles from Cape Coast, and, since the abolition of the slave trade, an
useless and absurd position;) the mere existence of which, although it
may excite astonishment, and reflect credit on the mercantile ingenuity
and economy of the African Committee, is notoriously a disgraceful
caricature on the British name.

Three respectable establishments, one at Cape Coast Castle, one at
Accra, (a rich and open country,) and one at Succondee, (if we could not
purchase Axim, which commands the navigation of the Ancobra,) with an
allowance of a thousand a year for a progress in the interior,
(beneficial to commerce, science, and humanity,) would be productive of
fame and honour, and probably of wealth, to our nation.


[Footnote 140: This gentleman being already superseded by Mr. Dupuis
(formerly Vice-consul at Mogadore, and now Consul at Coomassie) is of
course at liberty to indulge his disposition for enterprise.]

[Footnote 141: The King of Dagwumba should be promised additional
presents on the receipt at Cape Coast Castle of the first dispatch from
the Niger.]

                               * * * * *
                               APPENDIX.
                               * * * * *


                            APPENDIX. No. I.

                               * * * * *

          _Extract from Meredith’s Account of the Gold Coast._


               _Origin and History of the Ashantee War._


The Assin country lies at the rear of the Fantee, and borders on the
Ashantee country. It was divided into two states: the one governed by
King Cheboo and Quacoe Apoutay; and the other by King Amoo. Apoutay,
although not elevated to the dignity of King, held equal sway with
Cheboo; but they were each subordinate to the King of Ashantee. A man of
opulence died in Amoo’s town; and, as is customary on such occasions,
gold and other valuable articles were deposited with the body in the
grave. On this occasion, one of Cheboo’s people was present, and seeing
what was done, watched an opportunity to rob the grave; which he
effected, and escaped with the treasure. Amoo his neighbour sought
redress of Cheboo and Apoutay, but without success: he then laid the
affair before the King of Ashantee; who summoned all the parties before
him, gave them an impartial hearing, and awarded in favour of Amoo.
Quacoe Apoutay was detained as a hostage until restitution should be
made: but he, in a short time, contrived to make his escape, and, when
at liberty, refused to accede to the award made by the King of Ashantee.
On this Amoo attacked the town in which Cheboo and Apoutay resided, and
routed his opponents: after this, at the instigation of the King of
Ashantee, the parties met to settle the dispute; but Quacoe Apoutay
acting treacherously on the occasion, sent privately to Cheboo for an
armed force to support him: and a battle was the consequence, which
ended in the death of the man who had committed the theft, and the total
defeat of Apoutay and his forces. At this crisis the King of Ashantee,
willing to bring about a peace, again interfered. He sent two gold
manillas, the one to Amoo, the other to his adversary, directing them to
cease all hostilities; to which both parties agreed, and took the
manillas. Amoo obeyed the King; but Quacoe Apoutay attacked Amoo, and
drove him in his turn from his town. Amoo, indignant at the repeated
deceptions of Apoutay, obtained succours, and overthrew his treacherous
opponent. The King of Ashantee still anxious to reconcile his
neighbours, and unwilling to draw his sword, presented two gold swords
and an axe to Amoo, and recommended him to conciliate Quacoe Apoutay,
and terminate their quarrels. Amoo consented to obey the King, but in
the mean time was again attacked by his implacable foe, and totally
defeated, and lost in the contest the golden sword and hatchet. His
opponent committed ravages wherever he came, killing messengers, and
every man who fell into his hands, not sparing even the King of
Ashantee’s messengers! A war with the King of Ashantee followed
hereupon: Quacoe Apoutay and Cheboo dreading his vengeance, fled to the
Fantee country: in consequence of which the King sent a message to
Acoom, the caboceer or mayor of Assecoomah (a small state tributary to
the King of Ashantee,) accompanied by a present of twenty ounces of
gold; stating the necessity of his pursuing his enemies to the Fantee
country, but giving assurance of the King’s pacific disposition towards
the Fantees, and that his only object was to get into his possession
Cheboo and Apoutay: the Fantees would not interfere, nor allow the
Ashantee forces to come into their country. Upon this answer, Appey
Dougah,[142] the King of Ashantee’s general, collected, by command of
his master, a large force, and gave the enemy battle at Buinka in
Fantee; he displayed great gallantry, and defeated the two Kings, in
conjunction with the Fantee forces that had joined them. Next day Cheboo
and Apoutay having rallied their forces, and formed a junction with a
fresh Fantee force, gave Appey Dougah battle; but were totally defeated,
with the loss of many killed and made prisoners: among the latter was
Atia,[143] the caboceer of Abrah, the principal town of Fantee. A large
sum was offered for his ransom, but refused; and he was committed to the
care of Acoom, the caboceer of Assecoomah, in whom the King had great
confidence; but this person betrayed his trust, and liberated the enemy.
Quacoe Apoutay, baffled at all points, sent to the King of Ashantee to
accept his conditions, provided he would discharge his debts on his
return home. To this proposal the King agreed, and, in token of his
friendship, sent various presents to Cheboo and Apoutay; who, instead of
receiving them with gratitude, beheaded the messengers. This wicked and
unprovoked act roused the indignation of the King of Ashantee, and he
vowed eternal war against the aggressors. Acoom (who had been forgiven
by the King for his treachery in suffering Atia to escape,) being in
possession of a large quantity of provisions, was applied to by the King
of Ashantee for a supply, which he with seeming cheerfulness granted:
six times he delivered faithfully those that were contracted for, but,
the seventh time, he betrayed about one thousand men who had been sent
for them, and sold them in March or April, 1806. In consequence of this
conduct Acoom became involved in the war: very shortly afterwards the
King of Ashantee defeated him, and made rapid progress with his army
towards the coast in search of Cheboo and Apoutay. The Fantees opposed
his march, but were defeated in every onset, and the Braffoes were
nearly extirpated by the Ashantees in their march. The Annamaboes,
instigated by the remaining Braffoes, were impudent enough to receive
and protect Cheboo and Apoutay; which proved fatal to them. At this
period the Governor of Cape Coast Castle, being under some apprehension
for the safety of the British settlements, was inclined to send a flag
of truce with a message to the King of Ashantee, who was now (May, 1806)
at Abrah, and only fifteen or twenty miles from the coast. The
Annamaboes (who were consulted on the measure) objected to it, and the
design was consequently suspended. The Governor was anxious to know upon
what terms the King would consider the British, and wished to become a
mediator; but the Annamaboes, who placed a vain dependence on their name
and strength, fully expected that the King and his army would be
conquered; and that if not the whole, the greater part of the army would
fall into their hands; and hence were not disposed to pacific measures,
nor would they permit the Governor’s messenger to proceed inland.
Shortly after this, a division of the Ashantee army made its appearance
at Cormantine, and routing the inhabitants from the town, completely
destroyed it. The captain of this division contrived to get into the
Dutch fort, and having pillaged it of a number of articles, took up his
residence there. It was now time to become acquainted with the King’s
intentions; and for that purpose the Governor of Annamaboe fort sent a
messenger with a flag of truce to the commander of this division,
intimating a wish to be acquainted with the King’s motives for marching
an army to the coast, and proposing himself as a mediator. This message,
we may suppose, was conveyed to the King; and on the following day three
men were observed coming from Cormantine with a white flag displayed,
and (Mr. White) the Governor, expected they were the bearers of some
agreeable and satisfactory intelligence: in this however he was much
disappointed; for the commander of that division of the Ashantee army
being in possession of fort Amsterdam, was elated with his success,
particularly in getting to the sea side; (a circumstance which inspired
him with such joy, that he went to the beach and dipped his sword three
times in the sea, some of which he had conveyed to the King as a proof
of his success:)—whether those circumstances stimulated him to try the
disposition of the English chief, we know not; but the message he sent,
imported a degree of haughtiness by no means agreeable to Mr. White, and
was to this effect: that when the Governor would send him twenty barrels
of gunpowder, and one hundred muskets, he would be told what the King’s
designs were. To comply with this demand would be acknowledging too much
submission, and would doubtless give the King a very indifferent opinion
of the British character. Mr. White behaved politely to the people, gave
them some refreshment, and told them that he regretted that the King, or
their master, did not appear inclined to come to an explanation, or to
conciliate matters: that if the King would point out in what manner the
Annamaboes had offended, he would use his authority to have satisfaction
given: that until he was assured of their having transgressed, or having
injured his Majesty, they were entitled to the protection of the fort,
if they sought for it: and that, finally, if the King’s army should come
with any hostile intentions near the fort, it would be fired upon.

After this two or three of the heavy guns were fired with shot, for the
purpose of giving them an idea of the destructive power of artillery;
and they were preparing to depart, when private information was
received, that the flag of truce would be violated in its return, and
the men murdered. Whereupon Mr. White and Mr. Wilson (a gentleman not in
the service,) escorted them, and left them in safety within a short
distance from their quarters. The Governor now anxiously looked for a
definitive reply from the King, and every assiduity was used to place
things in a defensive position; and the towns-people having heretofore
placed a firm reliance on their strength, became alarmed, and were
solicitous to be assured of the Governor’s protection. Mr. White
informed them, that if the King of Ashantee intended to attack the town,
he would give them all the assistance and protection in his power; at
the same time advised them of the most prudent measures to be employed
for their safety and defence. He instructed them, in the first instance,
to have strong parties on the look-out, and to guard every avenue
leading into the town; and, on the first alarm, or approach of the
enemy, to send the old men, women, and children to the fort, where they
would be received; and as many as the fort would not accommodate, to
come close to the walls, where they would be under the protection of the
guns.

At this crisis Mr. White and the inhabitants of the town were ignorant
as to the strength of the Ashantee forces, and had but an imperfect idea
of the bravery and intrepidity of the men who composed the King’s army.
It was supposed that the Ashantees partook of the dispositions of the
natives on the coast, who in general cannot stand against a regular and
determined fire, and often creep into some concealed hole, when cannon
or musket shot are heard to whiz among them; or, if the Ashantees were
superior, it was little imagined that their courage, or ardour for
conquest, would carry them to the very muzzles of the guns, and
consequently expose them to inevitable destruction.

About a week had elapsed, and no news from the King; which was no
favourable indication of pacific measures. The commander of the division
at Cormantine, and who proved to be the King of Dinkara, sent forward a
party to ascertain the strength of the town of Annamaboe, and succeeded
in gaining possession of a village called Agah, situated upon a point of
land about one mile eastward from Annamaboe; whence every movement of
the Annamaboes on that side could be observed. This was considered an
annoyance, and on the 14th of June a strong body (indeed almost the
whole of the town’s people) marched out for the purpose of dislodging
the Ashantees. The action was clearly seen from the fort. The Annamaboes
were received in the most gallant and spirited manner by nearly a third
of their force, and for some time the contest was doubtful. The
Ashantees fired with more regularity than could be expected, and their
muskets were well directed; whereas the Fantees kept up a confused fire
without taking aim; they however succeeded, and the Ashantees retreated
in excellent order, keeping possession of part of the village which lay
concealed in a valley, and where the Annamaboes did not think proper to
proceed. The Annamaboes were either too confident of their strong
position, or thought too insignificantly of their opponents, to attend
to the advice given them by Mr. White; for while they were amused by
this small party, the King, with the main body, was vigilant in securing
the different passes leading to the town, and was at this time only
three miles to the rear of it.

Early on the 15th those who were on the look-out observed the Ashantee
army in motion: the alarm was given, and every man who was able to carry
a musket, repaired to meet the enemy. As the town was situated at the
rear of the fort, and extended some distance inland, no prospect of the
contending parties could be obtained; smoke was seen to arise from
different parts of the surrounding country, and heavy discharges of
musketry were distinctly heard. Alarm and confusion now prevailed
throughout the town, and the women, children, and old men, made the best
of their way to the fort, the area of which they soon filled, after
which the gates were closed. The volleys of musketry were advancing very
fast, and the Fantees were retreating in great disorder: one or two
great guns were fired over the town with a view to impel terror on the
assailants, but they were too much elated with hopes of conquest, and
too resolute to be affrighted: about eleven o’clock the musket balls
were heard to whistle in every part of the fort, and the Ashantees
entered the town in every direction, pursuing the vanquished to the
beach, where the slaughter was great.

The Annamaboes conceived, that with the aid of their canoes and their
knowledge of swimming, they should be able to escape, but they were
pursued too closely by the Ashantees, whose fury appeared to be
insatiable; men, women, and children were followed by indiscriminate
destruction. During this work of carnage, the Governor was very active
with his small garrison to repel the assailants; a twenty-four pounder,
that pointed along the beach to the westward, several times discharged
grape-shot among them, whereby vast numbers must have fallen: a three-
pounder likewise, which flanked the gate on the east side was frequently
fired with grape, notwithstanding fresh parties came on much quicker
than they could be repelled; and at length they came under the walls for
the purpose of carrying away the women who could not be received into
the fort. About this period the Governor[144] was wounded in two places;
one ball struck his mouth and carried away four of his teeth, another
ball passed through his left arm; and nearly at the same time an officer
and two men were wounded, and one man killed.

Things assumed now a more serious and dangerous aspect than was
apprehended, and gave the garrison a strong assurance of the disposition
of the enemy, who, it was evident, intended to bend his utmost efforts
against the fort. The Ashantees were confident that by gaining
possession of it, a large booty would be obtained. However, the small
number which composed the garrison of Annamaboe at this period,
consisting of Governor White, Messieurs Meredith, Swanzy, Smith, and
Baines; also four free mulattoes and twenty men, including soldiers,
artificers, and servants, were confident of the severity of their
situation. The walls being high, and accurately flanked, and the gates
sound and well barricadoed; the Governor, from the nature of his wounds,
from great debility in consequence of much effusion of blood, being
constrained to retire, and the command of the fort having devolved on
the senior officer, who perceiving that the cannon in one quarter could
not be used with effect, for the enemy fired with such precision as to
cut off every man who was exposed at an embrasure, depended solely on
the musket; and another man having been killed about noon, and two more
wounded:—the garrison was now reduced to the small number of eight,
including officers, who could be depended upon, and the Ashantees were
using every effort to force the western gate; but were twice repulsed
with no small loss. A third time they attempted it, and endeavoured to
apply fire to the gate; but the man who brought the materials for that
purpose, extinguished the fire by falling a corpse upon it. In all their
attempts they were defeated with musketry alone, and notwithstanding
that their efforts to gain an entrance into the fort proved ineffectual,
the contest was continued till six o’clock. After this cessation, and
before total darkness came on, the garrison used all possible energy in
repairing injuries, and preparing for the defensive, in case of
hostilities being renewed in the night.

On the following day a scene replete with the horrors of war exhibited
itself:—heaps of dead and wounded around the walls, and for a mile along
the eastern shore, tossed about by a violent surf:—houses unroofed, and
others on fire:—the sorrowful countenances of the old men, who sought
refuge in the fort; the mournful lamentations of the women, and the
pitiable cries of the children, presented a picture of exquisite feeling
and of the greatest distress! Of the number the town contained, and
which we will calculate to have been at least fifteen thousand souls, we
may suppose that two-thirds of that number perished. The fort afforded
refuge to about two thousand of every description, and about two hundred
escaped to a rock surrounded by the sea, and at pistol-shot from the
beach, where they remained unmolested, and notwitstanding the vigilance
of the Ashantees, we may suppose that two or three thousand effected
their escape. Without going into further enquiry, we may venture to
state that eight thousand Fantees were destroyed; and although they were
attacked by at least three times their number, yet if they were actuated
by one-third of the bravery of their opponents, they would have
committed some execution, and doubtless would have checked that
intrepidity and ardour which were so pre-eminently conspicuous in their
enemy. Their resistance was very feeble; terror seized them at the
commencement of the attack, and it impressed them so forcibly, that the
sea formed but an indifferent barrier to their precipitate flight.

When the fury of the Ashantees against the Fantees was a little
diminished, they turned part of their force against the fort with great
coolness and resolution, advancing with shouts expressive of their
loyalty and courage, to the very muzzles of the guns. At the east side
of the fort, two three pounders, which were well served, destroyed
numbers of them with every discharge of grape: but at the west side, the
cannon which flanked the gate could not be rendered useful, in
consequence of advantages the enemy possessed, and which were not to be
found on the opposite quarter, where the musket alone was to be
dependended upon: and we have the authority of the gentleman who
commanded (after Mr. White was wounded) of stating, that he and another
officer (Mr. Swanzy) fired nearly three hundred rounds of ball-cartridge
in keeping the gate clear, and protecting those who were under the
walls. Mr. Swanzy was so injured with the recoil of his musket, that he
could not use his right arm for some days without much pain, and the
other officer (Mr. Meredith) was nearly in the same state.

What loss the Ashantees sustained cannot be precisely laid down: the
King, prior to his departure from Annamaboe, said, he lost three
thousand men: but in that number he probably included those who were
carried off by disease. His men however suffered very severely; for
their approach was made with such large bodies, that twenty, thirty, or
perhaps more, fell with every discharge of grape-shot; and the musket
not only killed, but very often wounded at the same time, so close were
the enemy.

At this period (the 16th of June,) the fort was in an awkward
state,—completely blockaded on the land-side, and a very imperfect
communication by sea, and only a few weeks provisions for the number it
contained; add to which, the effluvia from the dead bodies, which were
approaching fast to a putrid state, excited very uneasy apprehensions.
These circumstances demanded some extraordinary effort, which the
garrison, from its weakness, could not attempt. Every person, from great
exertion and constant exposure to a vertical sun on the 15th, and from
solicitude and want of rest, was much fatigued. Nevertheless things wore
a more promising appearance; whenever plunder was attempted, which now
and then was the case, it met with resistance. There was not, however,
any desire manifested by the Ashantees to renew hostilities, and every
motion indicated a wish for peace. The garrison too was very desirous of
such an event, but did not wish to be the first to yield, or to offer
any terms without orders from the chief-governor. The King, from his
late successes, had a high opinion of his power and the bravery of his
army. On the other hand the small garrison, notwithstanding its reduced
state, had no mean opinion of itself, and wished to confirm in his
Majesty an idea of the superior skill of Europeans.

The Governor at Cape Coast was apprised of the state of affairs at
Annamaboe, and lost no time in sending assistance. Two ships were
provided for the purpose, which sailed from the Cape on the morning of
the 16th: but, from unavoidable circumstances, the re-inforcement the
ships brought could not be landed before four o’clock in the afternoon.
This re-inforcement consisted of twelve men and four officers; and their
arrival in the fort afforded much satisfaction. This party was landed
under cover of the smoke of some heavy guns, and was not fired at; but
the canoe, on returning, was fired upon and one man wounded. It was the
Governor’s order that a flag of truce should be sent to the King, to
endeavour to bring about an amicable understanding. A white flag was
accordingly lowered over the wall, accompanied with the national
colours; and when the emblem of peace was observed, it is impossible to
express sufficiently the joy that diffused itself among the people: the
multitude which crowded around the flags was inconceivably great, and it
was with difficulty that the King’s officers, who were known by golden
swords and axes, could clear the way leading to his quarters: the air
resounded with acclamations in praise of their King, and expressive of
their satisfaction at the prospects of peace.

And here we cannot forbear remarking, that although the Ashantees are so
remote from polished or civilized nations, they seem not to be
unacquainted with the customs of a civilized people, as they are
connected with the rules of war; for they paid every respect to the flag
of truce: a few indeed of them were making towards the rock on which
were a number of Fantees, but they well understood the signal of recall,
when a musket or two were fired over their heads. The flag of truce
returned about seven o’clock, with three messengers from the King; and
they, in order to justify the King for his proceedings against the
Fantees, entered into a long detail of the origin of the war, which we
have been attempting to describe. The King was pleased that the flag of
truce was sent, and expressed his satisfaction by giving the two
soldiers who were the bearers of it a fat sheep. After a conference that
continued beyond two hours, the messengers departed.

A communication was thus established with the King and his army; but it
was considered prudent to keep the gates closed until a perfect
understanding was effected. It appeared, however, that this could not be
done, without a meeting between the chief Governor and the King. To
accomplish this Mr. Meredith tried to persuade the King to go to Cape
Coast, but in this he was disappointed; he however gained his Majesty’s
consent to send some of his confidential and chief men to wait upon the
Governor, and to hear his sentiments.

It will, we doubt not, be gratifying to the reader, if we here subjoin
the correspondence between Mr. Meredith and Mr. Torrane, the Governor in
Chief, on this occasion.


                                        _Annamaboe Fort, June 17_, 1807.

   SIR,

MR. WHITE directs me to acknowledge the receipt of your letter to the
Governor of Elmina. The state Mr. White is in, being much weakened with
loss of blood and other causes, prevented him paying that attention to
your letters which they demanded, and my duty was such, that I could not
spare a moment to write you fully. I had a conference with three of the
King’s messengers last night, and at this instant there are two men with
his Majesty; when they return, you shall be acquainted with the result.
I have already mentioned to the King that Cheboo would be given up, and
if it was agreeable for him to send his cane, and one or two of his
gold-headed swords, I would engage their security by going to Cape Coast
with them. The message received from the King was of a favourable
tendency; and I trust he will perceive the expediency of putting an end
to this sanguinary war. Be assured we are all so employed on various
duties, it debars me more particularly of giving you a further detail of
our proceedings. But I trust, by a messenger this evening, to relate
fully every circumstance attending this very severe contest. The party
were landed in safety, viz. twelve privates, one corporal, with Messrs.
Bold, Galloway, and Woolbert. Both ships will remain here until to-
morrow. I am well pleased with the attention and assistance afforded us
by Captain Coley.

                                                  I am, &c.

                                                         HENRY MEREDITH.

 _Colonel Torrane, Governor in Chief, &c. &c. &c._
             _Cape Coast Castle._

                               * * * * *


                                        _Annamaboe Fort, June 17_, 1807.

   SIR,

I WROTE you this morning, acknowledging the receipt of your letters,
and, agreeably to my intentions then, I take the liberty of stating more
particularly the occurrences in this garrison on the 15th and subsequent
to it. I beg leave to remind you, that we were prepared for any attack
that might be made upon us, by any body of men unaccustomed to the shock
of artillery; and I believe Mr. White assured you of the confidence he
placed in the officers and men under his command, and every soul was
animated with a desire to do his duty.

[Here follows a description of the battle as before related.]

The re-inforcement you was pleased to send, got on shore without any
opposition about four o’clock P.M.; and I assure you we were very glad
to receive them, as, from the severe duty we had undergone the preceding
day, we were much cut up by fatigue. About six P.M. the flag of truce,
with a corporal and private from the detachment you sent, were conveyed
to the King; and as they proceeded, they were warmly greeted by the
Ashantees. The message the King returned was modest; he said, it was not
his intention to commence hostilities with the fort, nor to distress any
of the whites; his enemies were the Assins and Fantees, and he now
conceived his anger against them pretty well assuaged. This morning
(17th) according to agreement, his messengers came, and said, that the
King wished to see the same person that conveyed the flag of truce, that
they might hear from his own lips what he had to deliver. Accordingly I
sent them with Dutton, a man of quick understanding, to hear more
particularly the sentiments of his Majesty. After remaining some time
hearing the opinion of his counsellors they returned, and after some
preliminary discourse, they informed me that the King had deputed six of
his principal men, with six deputed by the men of power in his train, to
repair to Cape Coast to hear what you have to say, and to negotiate. In
course of their communication the King deplored the number of lives that
were lost in consequence of the fire from the fort.

As the messengers mean to repair to Cape Coast, I will forbear relating
every particular. The King seemed to say that he must have those who
sought protection in the fort: this he only hinted at, and probably the
same may be hinted to you; but in giving them up, we ought to be assured
of their being used kindly. I send a canoe with this, and have agreed
with the messengers, that you will send canoes and a guard for their
protection. Mr. White’s travelling canoe is in good order, therefore be
pleased to send eleven canoe-men for her. This canoe, with three more
from the Cape, will, in my opinion, be fully sufficient to convey the
whole twelve messengers with their guard. The number of persons here are
reducing our provisions very fast, and if not removed soon, some of them
will be most likely starved, or will be the cause of some serious
malady: the sooner we are rid of them the better. But if you can gain
their protection, it will be a humane act. Mr. White, who I am happy to
say is in a fair way, desires his respects.

                                                   I am, &c.

                                             (Signed)    HENRY MEREDITH.

 _Colonel Torrane, Governor in Chief,
             &c. &c. &c._

                               * * * * *

   SIR,

BOTH your letters of yesterday’s date I have received; the latter has
given me particular satisfaction, not only as it affords every prospect
that this war will be terminated, but also as it removes great anxiety
from my mind respecting the state of Mr. White’s wounds. The assurances
you now give me that he is in a fair way of recovery, are highly
gratifying. I dispatch eleven canoe-men for Mr. White’s canoe; and I
also send three other canoes. I trust the King will appoint persons of
sufficient consequence to negotiate with me: I have an earnest wish to
see the King: make this desire known to him; tell him I think it may
essentially lead to the arrangement of affairs of much importance; that
I have greatly to deplore with him this war; that although these events
cannot always be guarded against, they may even ultimately bring future
good consequences; and herein I think much depends on our meeting.
Assure the King, that notwithstanding the steps I have taken to give
protection to the Fantees, I have ever held him in the highest respect,
from the many reports I have heard of him, and that, had I seen any
messenger from him antecedent to his attack on Annamaboe, I am of
opinion we should have avoided the blow in that quarter. The King I
understand to be a man of strong mind: it will naturally suggest itself
to him, that a meeting between us may be of vast importance to the
country. Assure him I have too high a consideration for my own
character, as well as his consequence, to suffer the smallest indignity
to be offered to him; that if he will come to the castle I shall be
proud to shew him every honour, and that I will give every possible
security for his personal safety. I have apartments ready for him, and
officers shall be sent to attend him here. On receipt of this, send your
accustomed messenger to the King, saying, that you have a letter from
me, and that an officer will wait personally on him to explain the
contents. This officer with this letter in his hand, you will send (say
Mr. F. L. Swanzy) as early as you shall receive the King’s reply. I know
not whether you have a good flag for the occasion; I therefore send one.
Mr. F. L. Swanzy will have two flag-bearers, one with a white flag, the
other carrying the union; and he will be very particular in explaining
every part of this letter, and do his utmost to persuade the King to
visit the Cape. He may also add, that a ship can be procured, if he (the
King) prefers coming that way, and that an officer of distinction shall
be sent to accompany him. In a few words, Mr. F. L. Swanzy will do his
utmost to persuade the King to visit the castle. An officer should come
here, with the guard you send to protect the messengers. You must let me
know of what consequence the messengers are, that I may treat them
accordingly, and this it will be advisable to acquaint me of before
their arrival.

                                                  I am, &c.

                                            (Signed)     GEORGE TORRANE.

_To Henry Meredith, Esq._

Although these men proceeded to the Cape, it was found that nothing
important could be transacted without an interview with the King, and
for this purpose Colonel Torrane was obliged to go to Annamaboe, and a
day was fixed for a conference. To give as favourable and as respectable
an opinion as possible of the British, a number of articles as presents
were sent to the King, and as many officers and soldiers as the service
could afford, were assembled to attend the Governor on the day
appointed; but previous to those preparations, and a few days after the
flag of truce was received by the King, Cheboo (one of the men who was
the cause of the war) was secured by the Governor at Cape Coast and sent
to Annamaboe, to be delivered up to the King, in expectation that any
further effusion of blood would be prevented, and that it would be the
means of saving the Fantees from entire destruction. These benevolent
purposes were not realized: the King had proceeded so far in the war,
that he could not recede without displeasing those auxiliaries he had
with him, and who expected a vast deal of plunder; and besides, Apoutay
and Acoom were again in arms, and collecting all the Fantees they could
to oppose the King’s progress. On the day appointed for the interview,
the Governor and his party were put in motion, and although the
procession was not very numerous, it was arranged with taste, and made
no despicable appearance. About twenty of the Company’s artificers,
habited in a neat manner, marched in front; a guard of forty men, and a
band of music followed them; next walked the Governor, followed by ten
officers, two and two, and some gentlemen traders (who were enticed from
the Cape by curiosity), brought up the rear. When the procession had got
a short distance it was met by a principal man, who was sent by the King
to conduct the Governor, and to keep off the multitude, which was
assembling in great numbers, some of whom had never seen a white man.
Notwithstanding the authority of this person, and the exertions of his
attendants, the curiosity of the people was so great that every avenue
was crowded; which, by preventing the circulation of air, augmented the
natural heat of the day, and this inconvenience was farther increased by
the putrid smell from the dead bodies, and the vast swarm of flies. The
Governor was obliged to visit each man of rank, before he could be
received by the King; a ceremony that could not be prudently denied, and
which occupied some time: for those men had their several courts, and
collectively had formed an extensive circle. Every one of them was
seated under a huge umbrella, surrounded by attendants and guards, with
young persons employed in fanning the air and dispersing the flies,
which were numerous and troublesome. One of those men and his attendants
excited some curiosity and attention: his dress and appearance were so
different from those of the others, that it evidently proved he must
have come from countries situated a considerable distance inland. He was
a tall, athletic, and rather corpulent man, of a complexion resembling
an Arab or an Egyptian. His dress was heavy, and by no means adapted to
the climate. He wore a cap that came down below his ears, and being made
of yellow cloth, it did not contribute to diminish his tawny complexion.
He was a follower of the Mohammedan religion, possessed much gravity;
but was communicative, condescending, and agreeable. He had about him a
great number of sentences from the Alkoran, which were carefully incased
in gold and silver, and upon which he set a high value. He was a native
of Kassina, a country that appears to be situated to the south of east
from Tombuctou. He said he had been at Tunis and at Mecca; had seen many
white men and ships, and described the method of travelling over the
great desert. This person commanded a body of men who fought with
arrows, as well as muskets: four of the arrows were found in the fort;
they were short and pointed with barbed iron. He had many persons in his
train who were of the same colour, but varied a little as to dress: they
were all habited in the Turkish manner, but did not wear turbans. After
the ceremony of visiting those persons was over, the Governor was
conducted towards the King, who was surrounded by a number of
attendants, whose appearance bore evident signs of riches and authority:
chains, stools, axes, swords, flutes, message-canes, &c. were either of
solid gold, or richly adorned with that metal: those dazzling
appearances, added to damask, taffety, and other rich dresses, gave a
splendour to the scene highly interesting. When the Governor approached
the King, and when an interchange of compliments had passed, the air
resounded with the noise of musical instruments, such as drums, horns,
and flutes. After some conversation, during which much politeness was
observed in the behaviour of the King, the Governor wished this
ceremonial visit to be returned; which was agreed to, and a convenient
place was found to receive the King and his train. The Governor, his
officers, and attendants, were formed in a half-circle, and seated under
the shade of some trees, and a passage of sufficient breadth was formed
by the soldiers for the King and his attendants to pass through. It was
full two hours before his Majesty was announced, so numerous was his
train. Each man of rank, as he advanced, paid the necessary compliments
agreeably to the custom of his country, and then filed off. It was
previously directed, that the King should be received with arms
presented and the grenadiers march when passing the soldiers. This mark
of distinction and respect appeared to give him much satisfaction: he
halted to observe the orderly behaviour and uniform appearance of the
soldiers; and the martial air that was playing, seemed to produce the
most agreeable sensations on his mind. The writer had an opportunity of
seeing this man. He was of the middle size, well formed, and perfectly
black, with regular features and an open and pleasing countenance. His
manner indicated understanding and was adorned with gracefulness; and in
all respects he exceeded the expectations of every person. His dress was
plain: it consisted of a piece of silk wrapt loosely about him; a wreath
of green silk ornamented his head: his sandals were neatly made, and
curiously studded with gold. He was not distinguished by any gold
ornaments, as his attendants were. One man who was dressed in a
grotesque manner, and who appeared to act the buffoon, was, literally,
loaded with gold.

As this was a visit of ceremony, no business of consequence was
transacted. The King politely enquired after Mr. White, and expressed a
hope that he would soon be well of his wounds. He said he would move
from Annamaboe soon, as his army felt ill effects from the water, and
from the dead bodies. After this visit, every confidence was placed in
the King and his army, and as the gates were now opened, a free
admittance was allowed: various conferences of a favourable nature were
carried on between both parties; but peace with the Fantees was
considered impracticable. Apoutay had escaped the King’s vigilance; and
Acoom was at the head of a strong party, and marching towards Annamaboe
to give the King battle. The King assured the Governor, that after he
had subdued his enemies to leeward, he would return to Annamaboe for the
purpose of making arrangements relative to the future welfare of the
country, and the regulations of trade.

It was agreed, that those residing under British forts, provided they
observed a neutrality, should not be molested, and that every respect
should be paid to the British flag. The Governor likewise procured the
release of those who sought refuge in the fort, although the King
contested his right to them; for this reason, that as he destroyed the
town, he had a claim to every person and to every thing belonging to it.
On report of Acoom being in arms and making preparations to attack the
Ashantees, the King ordered his army to collect and march to meet him.
Two days subsequent to the King’s departure (3d July,) Acoom’s party and
the advanced guard of the Ashantee’s met; a battle was the consequence,
which ended in the defeat of Acoom, who, with his party, would have been
cut off, if a river, that was in their rear, had not favoured their
flight; the fordable parts of which were known to them, but not to the
Ashantees. After this defeat, the King’s enemies dared not shew
themselves in the field in any force; they however supported a kind of
predatory warfare, and were sometimes successful in cutting off small
foraging parties. As the Ashantees proceeded to leeward, desolation
accompanied them; almost every town and village were laid in ruins; but
disease, which got among them at Annamaboe, and which spread rapidly,
carried off vast numbers. This unexpected calamity altered the King’s
intentions: he could not return to Annamaboe without risking the loss of
his whole army; prudence therefore directed him to face towards his
kingdom, leaving at Accra a sufficient force to dispose of prisoners,
and to convey them in safety to Ashantee.

Cheboo and Apoutay, who appeared inseparable friends at the commencement
of this war, and throughout it, fled to Cape Coast with about five
hundred followers, as soon as they perceived the Ashantees approaching
towards Annamaboe, on the 15th of June. The Cape Coast people were
willing to afford them protection and assistance, but when the Governor
heard how things were at Annamaboe, he warned them of the danger, and
advised them to be neutral. When an account arrived at Cape Coast of the
desperate attack made on Annamaboe fort, the Governor came to the
resolution of securing, if possible, both these men, and delivering them
up to the King as the most probable means of not only putting an end to
the war, but of securing the King’s friendship. A party was accordingly
selected for that purpose; but Apoutay, after a warm contest, wherein
some were killed on both sides, effected his escape. Cheboo was not so
fortunate; he was secured and sent to the King, as we have already
mentioned; his followers too made a precipitate flight, leaving behind
them some bulky articles, among which were the whole of Cheboo’s
regalia, which were carefully lodged for the King; and it had the effect
on his disposition that was intended; it gave a favourable opinion of
the British, and assured him of the Governor’s friendship, and at the
same time it abated the desire he encouraged, to be revenged for the
loss his army had sustained on the 15th. For he concerted a design to
attempt the fort by storm, and Wednesday the 17th was the day appointed
for this enterprise. The plan was not badly arranged; and was to be
conducted in the following manner. Six thousand men were to be selected;
half of them destined not only to mount the walls, but to apply a
quantity of gunpowder under them; the explosion from which was expected
to shake the fort very much, and likewise to create such a confusion
within as to cause the garrison to be off its guard; the other half were
to keep up a continued firing. The plan was averted by the prudent
policy of the Chief Governor, not only by his securing Cheboo, but by
his alacrity in demanding a truce, whereby the King’s resentment was
cooled, and his inclinations diverted towards pacific measures.


[Footnote 142: This should be Appia Dunqua; he was the elder brother of
Appia Nanu, an account of whose disgrace is in the Diary.]

[Footnote 143: This should be Atta.]

[Footnote 144: Mr. White, who, after an absence of twenty seven years
from his native country, expired a few hours after he landed in it.]




                           APPENDIX. No. II.

                               * * * * *


    _Translations of a Manuscript descriptive of Mr. Park’s Death._


                       MR. SALAME’S TRANSLATION.

[The words in italics, so distinguished at that Gentleman’s request, not
                        being in the original.]

A literal translation of a Declaration, written in a corrupted Arabic,
from the town of Yaúd in the interior of Africa.

          In the name of God the Merciful and the Munificent.

This Declaration is issued from the town called[145] Yaúd in the Country
of Kossa[146].—We (the writer,) do witness the _following_ case;
(statement.) We never saw, nor heard of the sea (River) called[148]
Koodd; but we sat to hear (understood) the voice (report) of some
persons _saying_, “We saw a ship, equal to her we never saw before; and
the King of Yaúd had sent plenty of every kind of food, with cows and
sheep; _There_ were two men, one woman, two male slaves and two maids in
the ship;[149] _The_ two white men _were_ derived from the race (_sect_)
of Nassrí; (Christ or Christianity.) The King of Yaúd asked them to come
out to him; (to land[150]; and they refused coming out, (landing,) and
they went to the _King of the_ Country of[151] Bassa, who is greater
than the King of Yaúd; And _while_ they _were_ sitting in the ship and
gaining a position (rounding) over the Cape of Koodd, and _were_ in
society with the people of the King of Bassa, the ship reached (struck)
a-head of Mountain which took (destroyed) _her_ away,[152] and the men
and women of Bassa all together, with every kind of arms; (goods); And
the ship could find no way to avoid the mountain; And the man who _was_
in the ship, killed his wife, and threw all his property into the Sea,
(River), and _then_ they threw themselves _also_ from fear[153]:
Afterwards they took one _out of the_ water till the news reached the
town of Kanji,[154] the country of the King of Wawí, and the King of
Wawí heard of it, he buried him in his earth, (grave), and the other we
have not seen[155]; perhaps he is in the bottom of the water.”—And God
knows best. Authentic from the mouth of Sherif Abrahim.—Finis.


                       MR. JACKSON’S TRANSLATION.

[Of this Gentleman’s considerate politeness in anticipating my wishes by
a spontaneous offer to translate this MS., I shall have occasion to
repeat my acknowledgments in the Geographical Appendix.]

              In the name of God the Merciful and Clement.

This Narrative proceeds from the territory in Housa[146] called[145]
Eeauree. _We observed_ an extraordinary event or circumstance[147], _but
we neither saw nor heard of the River which is called[148] Kude_, and as
we were sitting, we heard the voice of children and _we saw a vessel_
the like to which in size we never saw before; and, _we saw_ the King of
Eeauree send cattle and sheep, and a variety of vegetables in great
abundance: and there were two men and one woman, and two slaves, and
_they tied or fastened them in the vessel_.[149]

There were also in the vessel, two white men of the race called
Christians (N’sarrah) and the Sultan of Eeauree called aloud to them to
come out of the vessel,[150] but they would not.

They proceeded to the country of Busa, which is greater than that of the
Sultan of Eeauree, and as they were setting in the vessel, they hung or
were stopped, by the Cape or Head Land of Kude.[151]

And the people of the Sultan of Busa called to them, and poured their
arms into the vessel, and the vessel reached the head-land or cliff, and
became attached or fixed to the head of the mountain, and could not pass
it. Then the men and women of Busa collected themselves hostilely
together, with arms of all descriptions, when the vessel being unable to
clear or pass the Cape, the man in the vessel killed his wife[153] and
threw the whole of her property into the river: they then threw
themselves into the river, fear seizing them (the news of this
occurrence was then conveyed to the Sultan Wawee) until it reached by
water the territory of Kanjee,[154] in the country of the Sultan Wawee,
and we buried it (a male body) in its earth, and one of them, we saw not
at all in the water,[155] and God knows the truth of this report. From
the mouth of the Shereef Ibrahim.—The end.

                               * * * * *

I have sent the original MS. to the African Association, the following
is Mr. Jackson’s transcript of it. I regret that Mr. Salamé did not also
furnish a transcript of this MS.

                         بسم الله الرحمن الرحيم

هذه الوثيقه خرج من بلد حوسا يقال يَور ونحن راينا الامر لم نري ولانسمع في
البحر الذي يقال كوض انما نحن جلسنا نسمع صاخ صبيان لرايت السفينه لم نري
مثله قط فارسل سلطان يَور لرايته مع البقر والكبس مع انواع الطعام كثيرِ
هما رجلان وامراة واحدة والعبدان وعقدان في السفينة رجلان بيضان خرجوا من
نسب نصري ويدعوهو سلطان يور الي ان خرجوا اليه وابوا خروج ومشوا الي بلد
بسا وهوا كبر من سلطان يور وهم يجلسون ويعلكون ملوك علي راس كُوض ويصاخور
اهل سلطان بُسا لرايته وهم ركوب في السفينة بلغ السفينة راس جبل وياخد
الجبل السفينة ورجال بُسا والنساه بسا يجمعون كلهم مع انواع السلاح
والسفينة لم يجد طريق المنع الجبل ورجل الدي في السفينة قتل امراته ورمي
ماله كله في البحر ورموا نفسهما في البحر لخوف ثم ياخدوا بلغ خبر الي سلطان
واوي حتي بلغ ماه به الي بلد كنجي بلد سلطان وَاوَيَ ودفنه في قرابه وواحد
منهما لم نره اقل في قهر الماه والله اعلم صح في فَم شريف اِبراهيم * تمت *


[Footnote 145: Sir William Ouseley (who very obligingly communicated a
hurried translation from Crickhowel, although the original had been but
two hours in his possession) read this Yaur or Yaôur.]

[Footnote 146: Sir Wm. writes Husa or Haousa: the latter is occasionally
the Moorish pronunciation, but Houssa is invariably the negro. I
certainly never once heard that Houssa included Yawoorie, which has a
distinct Sovereign, who is mentioned in the MS.: Perhaps it may be
accounted for, from Yawoorie being one of the seven kingdoms tributary
to Houssa or Mallowa.]

[Footnote 147: Mr. Jackson has preserved this apparent contradiction in
his fidelity to the original, according to his reading. He considers, it
may be reconciled by presuming that the writer only saw the vessel pass
Yawoorie, and did not witness the ultimate catastrophe at Boussa, where
he imagines the river may first receive the name of Kude, as African
rivers frequently have a different name in every country through which
they flow. This interpretation does not make the writer a mere reporter
as in the other translation, but a witness of all that happened at
Yawoorie, although not afterwards. I never understood the river to have
any other name than Quorra or Quolla, from Shego to Foör, yet of this we
ought not to feel positive.]

[Footnote 148: It is very extraordinary that the name of the Quolla
should always be written Kude, Koad, or Koada, and that Mr. Hutchison,
who was learning Arabic of the Moors, in Ashantee, should be taught to
write and pronounce as Quolla, the same Arabic word which every European
proficient reads as above. I cannot help thinking that, from bad
writing, ignorance, or perhaps some occidental difference, the _d_ is
put for the _l_,[a] and that it should be Kule or Koala, especially as
there appears to be a town called Kula on its banks, (see routes in
Appendix) which comes very close to Kulla, Mr. Brown’s river. The
identity of the Quolla and Kulla, seems confirmed by Mr. Dupuis reading
the name of the kingdom, as written by the Moors, Koora, which seems as
if they had written it for once, according to the negro pronunciation,
(Quorra,) for as I have observed (p. 196) that the negroes always
substitute r for the Moorish _l_ (a defect also characterising a dialect
of the Coptic, the Chayma, the Tamanack, &c. &c., and common, as Baron
Humboldt observes, to every zone) Koora becomes Koola, for the same
reason which the Quorra of the negroes was always pronounced Quolla by
the Moors; and Koola, it will be allowed, is very near to Mr. Brown’s
Kulla.]

[Footnote a: I recollect one, but only one instance of the negroes
substituting _d_ for the Moorish _l_, which was in Toppodo for Toppollo,
a town of Bornoo.]

[Footnote 149: Mr. Jackson writes وعقدان في السفينة Uakkadan fee sfeena,
i.e. and tied or bound them in the vessel or ship, adding, that he is at
a loss to imagine how it can have been converted into “two maids in the
ship.”[a] Sir Wm., however, in his hurried notice, rendered it ‘female
slaves.’]

[Footnote a: _Ockdan fi ássafinat_, means either “_Two maids_, or _two
female slaves_, in the ship,” and no otherwise.—A. S.]

[Footnote 150: “Invited (or entertained them) until they left him,” Sir
Wm.]

[Footnote 151: Sir William, in his hurried perusal, read this, “and went
on to the country of Besa, and (the Sultan of) this country is greater
than the Sultan of Yaour: there they settled or halted, above Ras (Cape)
Koumen. The people belonging to the Sultan of Besa saw the boat, and
they went into the boat, and it reached the Mountain Cape, (or
Headland,) and was there stopped.”]

[Footnote 152]

[Footnote 153: “And _the man who was_[a] in the boat slew his woman
(امراة) and threw every article of his property into the river, and then
cast _themselves_ into the river through fear.]

[Footnote a: I translate this in the singular, yet afterwards, there
seems a confusion with the plural.” Sir Wm. This act, which appears very
improbable, and which I never heard of in the oral accounts which I
received whilst in Coomassie, (Diary, p. 91) if it was committed, must
have been by Lieut. Martyn, recollecting the difference of his and Mr.
Park’s dispositions, and Amadi Fatouma’s anecdote of the former wishing
to kill him for preventing him from firing any more at the people of the
King Gotoijege, I should observe here, that Amadi Fatouma’s _Poul_
nation can be no other than the Fillani, (p. 207) the Fullan of Ben Ali,
for though it has been translated Poul, there is no _p_ in the Arabic,
and the Moors in Ashantee always wrote _f_ for the negro _p_, as _fon_
for _pon_. As Col. Maxwell merely observes in his letter, that “Isaaco’s
Arabic Journal was translated into English, by a person resident in
Senegal, who probably had but an ordinary or colloquial knowledge of
Arabic, it is to be regretted that the original was not transmitted with
it, as a more careful perusal of it by Sir William Ouseley or some
Arabic scholar in England, would probably reconcile the two accounts, at
least in the names of places, if not in the circumstances, more than
they can be from the translation remitted.]

[Footnote 154: See note; p. 202.]

[Footnote 155: “And the other did not,——from the violence of the
water.”—Sir Wm.]




                           APPENDIX. No. III.

                               * * * * *

                                ROUTES.

                                   1.

                               To Dwabin.

  Seepa

  Marmpon

  Pakooroo

  Aquooquamong

  Okimdaia

  Weterkroom

  Bunkooroo

  Boomfeea

  Kinnesoo

                                   2.

                               To Quaoo.

  1. Assiempong

  2. Thro’ Amoom R. to Oseemadoo

  3. Obogoo, Frontier Quaoo town.

  4. Adumpong, the Government of the C. Coast Captain

  5. Assebanasoo

  6. Minidasoo, Famous for Palm Oil.

  7. Assoona

  8. Wantomo

                                   3.

                               To Accra.

  1. Odossoo

  3. Kroofoofroom, Two hours from the lake.

  4. Obirribee, The 1st Akim town

  5. Assinee

  6. Over Boosempra to Gawasee

  7. Meeasee

  8. Monasa

  9. Over the Aninnee, (rising in a hill called Quomshoo, 1 day to the
  W.) on a tree

  10. Ashoosoo

  11. Aquapong

  12. Over Birrim to Measa

  13. Asheeaqua

  14. Kookrantoom

  15. Aguiesso

  16. Marmpon and Aboödee, Visited by Issert, who calls it 24 miles from
  Christiansburg Castle.

                                   4.

                               To Accra.

  1. Ashiedumpong

  2. Assaboo

  3. Assuennie

  5. Antarranaï

  6. Ammoonoom

  7. Akropong

  9. Abirriwantoo

  10. Aradntem

  11. Kookrantoom

  13. Aguiesso.

                                   5.

                               To Elmina.

  1. Thro’ the towns Akasee, Kankawasee, Odasoo, Adiabin, Asakkraka,
  Adoonko, Agafrompon, to Adoomasa

  2. Fiasee, Bonechumay, Asanasoo, to Becquoi

  3. Inshuentem, (_between waters_) Abimpingua, to Atobiasee

  4. Thro’ Hoomassie, Assekosoo, Edoomassie, Akoorkerry, Akotokee,
  Yankeren, to Abateä, the frontier town of Dankara

  5. Thro’ Sewooterasee, (_put your head lower_) Aboposoo, the frontier
  Tufel town, to Ensuaguesoo, (_woman’s town_) the capital of Tufel

  6. Morobim

  7. Thro’ Akoontarrem, (the 1st Warsaw town) Amodai, over Bopoquaw, (a
  high hill where there was formerly a large croom, now deserted) &
  Apachamba, to Kaïrakoo

  8. Over Pra to Demamba

  9. Dadiasoo

  10. Asseecooma, Abannasoo, Abrādi, Elmina, or, as the natives call it,
  Addĭna.

                                   6.

                              To Dankara.

  1. Dakoon

  2. Terraboöom, the frontier town of Dankara

  3. Thro’ Mosiasoo to Enquanta

  4. Thro’ Ofoo, Amasoo, to Dankara.

                                   7.

                             To Buntookoo.

  1. Barree [156]or to Passaroo

  2. Beamasoo, or to Dooniantiffee

  3. Ensoota

  4. Quanta

  5. Across Tando, to Odomassee

  6. Suaterree

  7. Birrakoomee

  8. Yammee

  9. Kirribeeö

  10. Kickiwerree

  11. Buntookoo

                                   8.

                               To Banda.

  1. Tafoo

  2. Ofeesoo

  3. Abofoo

  4. Kinkawasoo

  5. Akomada

  6. Tandosoo

  7. Koontoosoo

  8. Takima

  9. Weäkee

  10. Aousa

  11. Soko

  12. Namasa

  13. Coransoo

  14. Bimma

  15. Banda

                                   9.

                               To Boopee.

  1. Esansoo, or Medima

  2. Through Ofim, which rises close to the E. to Bümsoo or Akimakasie

  3. Soodroo

  4. Takimenteä, or Quamang

  5. Akommadeä, or Boomang

  6. Boisoo

  7. Coranza

  8. Boibin

  9. Koonquoontee

  10. Dawdaw

  11. Akrofroom

  12. Oboosmosoo

  13. Moboäsoo

  14. On the path

  15. Over Adirri

  16. Boopee

                                  10.

                              To Sallagha.

  1. Marmpon

  2. Aphwaguiasee

  3. Gammasee a fetish temple

  4. Akrofroom

  5. Intonnasoo (Cloth Town)

  6. Quanasee or Troabirree

  7. Agwoona

  8. Adoogan

  9. Over rivers and mountains to Aguirra, or Poorra

  10. Through Sennee to Amanting

  11. Pattooda

  12. Atoboboo

  13. Weasee

  14. Pannangha

  15. Yadjee

  16. Over Adirri to Sallagha

                                  11.

                          To Source of Sennee.

  1. Agamachasee

  2. Aboiman

  3. Yatirrim

  4. Oweeamasee

  5. Anyanasue

  6. Assekadoomasee

                                  12.

                           To Odentee ferry.

  1. Kokoofoo

  2. Guia

  3. Weeäsee

  4. Bassa

  5. Tarrisoo

  6. Over Sennee, to ferry

                                  13.

                         From Yahndi to Daboia

  1. Through Patinga to Duetuem

  2. Tampeūn

  3. Through Nantong to Kompoongo

  4. Through Boö to Dindinno

  5. Daboia

           Large Towns on the Route from Boornoo to Oongoora.

  Deeagarra

  Digza

  Gellaroo

  Rakah

  Zaghgah

  Ariggum

  Madellarie

  Zogogdo

  Doobba

  Toppollo, or Toppodo

  Garaga

  Gaskaia

  Matchella

  Goozirrinkoorra

  Dumgabalo

  Potuskum, or Kuskum

  Dawaso

  Woodbo

  Gummo

  Zega

   Adagia, Mallagee, and Katanga, lay between Oongoora, and Kassina.

  Towns adjoining, or laying close to the right and left of the above
                                 Route.

  Serrakeelaia

  Dakum

  Lismaroo

  Goobilwa

  Gobookalashee

  Dazakou

  Danga

  Likhalalie

  Looha

The following transcripts of the most intelligible of the MSS. I
brought, according to the different readings, with the Negro
pronunciation as it was familiar to me in Ashantee, will show how
careless or incapable the Moors are of writing the names of Negro
kingdoms accurately according to the expression of the natives. The
original MSS. will be sent to the African Association, to whom I had
hoped to present the interesting itinerary of Shereef Brahima from
Dagwumba to Mecca, but this valuable MS. which it had cost me so much
pains to procure, after being kept three months by one gentleman before
he discovered that he had not time to translate it, was lost or mislaid
by another in the course of doing so, and I have the mortification of
being unable to submit any other than the mere skeleton of it. See
Geography, p. 205.


                              CHART No. I.

          _Course of the Niger or Quolla (by a Houssa Moor.)_

 Negro pro-   Mr. Jackson’s reading       Mr. Dupuis’ reading and
 nunciation.     and transcript.                transcript.

  Gebowa                                  Gebawa         جباو

  Toro        Futa Jelua    فوت جلوا      Foota Joolaba  فُوتَ جلوب
  Jollabi

  Fota Tora   Futa Tura     فوت طورَ      Foota Tooroo   فُوتَ طُورُ

  Hasoo       Kassua        خَصوا         Khassoua       خَصُوا

  Jaoona      Jäun          جَعونْ        Jafoona        جفون

  Gammoe      G¯remua       غموا          Ghemoua        غمُوا

  Mallaia     Maly Faly     مَلَي فَلي    Malia          مَلي

  Shego       Shag¯ru       شاغُ          Shagho         شاغُ

  Sansandin   Sansandia     سَنسَندي      Sansandia      سَنسَندي

  Jennie      Janni         جَان          Jinnie         جَان

  Mashina     Masheena      مَاشِنَ       Mashena        مَاشينَ

  Jimballa    G¯rimbala     غِمْبَلَ      [157]Ghimballa غِمْبَلَ

              (G¯r nearest sound
              to غ.)

  Kabarra     Kabra         كَبرَ         Kabara         كَبَرَ

  Timbuctoo                               Timbuctoo      ثمْبَكْتُ

  Jolliba     Jilab Karihua جلاب كريهوا   Jilleb Kareho  جلاب كريهوا

              (or Garihua.[158])

  Uzzabin     Asabin        احبن          Azbene         ازبن

  Gaw         G¯raheh       غاي           Ghou           غاو

  Kabi        Keb           كب            Kabi           كب

  Yaoora      Eüra          يورَ          Yaoury         يور

                                          Hooman         حمن
                                          (Dhooman)

  Raka        Baka          بَكا          Raka           رَكَا

  Quarraraba  Kurauabee     كرَوبَي       Koorawaba      كْرَوَبَ

  Mafeegoodoo Mafikadoo     مَافِقُدَ     Mafhygodo      مَافْقِغُدُ

  Cadie,      Shad          شد            Shada          شَدَ
  Caudee,
  and Chadi

  Sharee R.   Shar          شر            Sharry         شَرِ

  Foor        Fure          فور           Foor           فُوُرْ

  Weddai      Wadan         وادان         Wadana         وَادَانَ

               (i.e. two rivers.)

  Soonar      Sanar         سَنَارْ       Sanar          سَنَارْ

  Shuar       Sheua         شوَا بنَسر    Shewa ben      شوَا بن حسن
  Benassa     benasser                    Hassan

              Shousuad      شوسواد        Shousooda      شوسواد

                                          Doulamba       دُلَنْبَ

              Kalen or      فالن or كالن  Kalana         كالن
              Falen

  Jefeesgo    Jafag¯r       جَفَغْ        Jafegh         جفغ

  Massar      Mass’r        مصر           Massir         مصر


                               MS. No. I.

                    _Route from Boussa to Yarriba._

  Wauwaw            Wou             واوْ

  Kaiama            Kima            كيما

  Godoobirrie       Khudubar        خدوبار

  Gamba             Khamba          خَمْبَ

  Kroomie Yarriba   Kurmi Yarabia   كُرْم يَرَبي

  Ageasee           Abashee         ابَشي

A more familiar illustration of the difficulty or carelessness of the
Moors in writing Negro names, is the following route to Sallagha, to
which there are many paths, containing several Ashantee towns, which I
have laid down in the map. I rather think, however, the corrupt Arabic
of the interior is not quite understood.


                              MS. No. II.

  Negro pronun-    Mr. Jackson’s reading and transcript.
  ciation.

                    Jemakashee       جماكاشي

  Gammasee          Khemashee or     خماشي
                    Ghemashee

  Akrofroom         Kukerume or      كوقروم or كوكروم
                    Kuferume

                    Ber kaleela (a   برقليلا
                    narrow or close
                    country)

  Soota             U badha Shta  }
                                  }
                                  }  وبعده شتا
                                  }
  And afterwards Shta or an       }
  alluvial country                }

  The people of Sudi in the          وحيل اسود كان في بلد شتا
  territory of Shta

  Marmpon           U badha Mamefm   و بعده مَمفم

  Aduarrie Kennie   D’keen Adjar     دكين ادجار

  Aguira            Ajuee or Ajree   اجري or اجوي

  Antonasoo         Anteenee         عنتيني

                    Akakuee          اككوي

  Patooda (no P     Ketdee           كتدي
  in Arabic)

  Atoboo            Atab             اتاب

  Weasee            Hooashee or      جومشي or حوعشي
                    Weeashu

                    Feneeueekee      فنيويقي

  Perhaps meaning   Bure             بور
  frontier of
  Booroom

  Sallagha          Salag~r          سلغ

I shall submit more translations or transcripts of routes and charts in
Arabic, adding the Negro pronunciation, as the situations of most of the
places were not so clearly confirmed as to enable me to insert them in
my map, and consequently it is important to enable future travellers to
refer to them; such outlines being a great assistance in directing and
checking enquiry (which they frequently originate) and investigation.
The original MSS. will be sent to the African Association, in case a
further examination may be desirable hereafter.


                              MS. No. III.

          _Course of the Niger or Quolla (by a Bornoo Moor.)_

      Negro        Mr. Jackson’s reading    Mr. Dupuis’ reading and
  pronunciation.      and transcript.           transcript.

  Bambooch         Banbug~r    بَنبُغ الدي  Banboogho    بَنْبغ
                   eladi eeakul ياكل

                   el Ham Abn   الحم ابن ادم
                   Adam

                   Banbug~r, who eat the flesh of men.

                   Firmagr~a   فرمَغَ       Fermagha     فرمَغَ

  Hasoo            Hâsu         حاسُ         Hasoo        حَاسُ

  Jaoona           Jahunu       جَاحُنُ      Jahoonoo     جَاحُيُ

  Gamoo            Jamu         جَمُ         Jamoo        جَمُ

  Malay or Mallaia Mali         مَلي         Malabi       مَلبي

  Shego            Shaegru      شَيْغُ       Shagho       شَيْغُ

  Sansandin        Sansandy     سَنسَندِ     Sansadia     سَنسَدَ

  Jennie           Jany         جَنِ         Jinnie       جني

  Mashina          Masina       مَاسَنَ      Massina      مَاسنَ

  Timbuctoo        Tunbûktu     تُنبَقْتُ    Timbuctoo    تمبقْتُ

  Gauw             G¯rau        غَاوْ        Ghaou        غاوْ

  Kolomanni        Kulman       كُلْمَنِ     Koolmani     كُلْمَن

  Zinberme         Dtanberma    ذَنبرْمَ     Danberma     ذَنْبرْمَ

  Cabi             Kabi         كَبِ         Kabi         كَبِ

  Yawoorie or      Eauri        يَاوُرِ      Yaouri       يَاوُرِ
  Yaoora

  Noofee           Nufy         نُفي         Noufee       نفي

  Boussa           Busâa        بوسَا        Boussa       بوسا

  Rakka            Raka         رَاقَا       Rakka        رَاقَا

  Bornoo           B’rn Bernu   برن          Bornou       برن

  Chadee L.        (The lake drawn, but the name not written.)

  Bagarrimee       Bag¯rarm     باغرو        Baghroom     باغرم

  Kalamfarradoo    Kaferk or    كافرد or     Kaferda      كافرد
                   Kaferd       كافرك        Kalferka

  Weddaï           Wadana (two  وَدَان       Wadai        وَدَان
                   rivers)

  Soonar           Surnar       سُرنَرْ      Soonar       سُونَرْ

                   Siua         سيوا         Sewa         سيوا

  Schweess         Suis         سويس         Souisa       سويس

  Zaloo            Jal          جال          Jaloo        جال

  Kataëba          Katab        قَتَب        Kataibi      فَتَيب

  Makidzue         Mek’duh      مقدوح        Mokad        مقدوح

  Mertabass        M’rtabas     مرتباس       Mertabas     مرتباس

  Hoodayba         Mamudeeb     مَموديب      Haoudeba     هوديي

  Taiboos          Teesuse      تيسوس        Tesoos       تيسوس

  Jarooba          Jerub        جروب         Jarouba      جروب

  Tabarrabass      Tidburse or  تدبرس or     Tarbasa      ترباس
                   Tidfurse     تدفرس

  Gedda.           J’da         جدا          Jidda        جدا

  Geddook          J’duk        جدوخ         Jidoukh      جدوخ

  Limbarr’         Linbabahr    لنبَبَحر     Linbahar     لنبحر

  Tarrowm          Term         ترم          Taroom       ترم

  Massar           M’nser       منصر         Minsor       منصر

  Sakunderree or   Skender, a   سكندر مرج    Sakundria,   سْكَنْدَرِ
  Askandarie       swamp lake                Alexandria

          _Route from Timbuctoo to Ferjan (from the same MS.)_

                   Tuan         توان         Toowano      توان

                   M’brûk       مبروك        Mobaruka     مبَرْوك

                   Jeerban      حيربن        Joojebani    اجوجبن

                   Abugiberk    ابوجبرخ      Kheerabi     خيربي

                   Tehekeem     تحكيم        Tahkema      تحكيم

  Bageeacha  }
             }
  Hootailee  }
             }
  Goosaicha  }    not written, but position marked, and thus pronounced.
             }
  Hayloon    }
             }
  Barrahese  }

                   Ferjan       فرجان        Ferjan       فَرْجَانْ

            _From Timbuctoo to Tunis (from the same Chart.)_

  Ziggie           Jak, Jik, or جق           Jagha        جغ
                   Juk

  Arowalla         Arun or Arul عرول or عرون Aaroon       عرون

  Tarrabaleese     Trahesen     ترهيسن       Trabolas     ترهبليس

  Mooquinassa      M’kenas      ممكناس       Mookanassa   مَكْنَاس

  Hass             Has          حَاسْ        Hhas         حَاسْ

  Landoloos        Lindalsu     لَندَلْسُ    Lankalsoo    لَنكَلْسُ

  Toonis           Tunis        تونس         Tunis        تونس

                   Near the sea كباله بحر

Other towns named on this route were

  Hassaladee

  Hassazedeed

  Hassat

  Omattaras

  Dizzaela

  Dazeleel

  Katerbaîlie

  Bahadzai

  Maratooph

  Swamach


                              MS. No. IV.

    _Course of the Niger or Quolla (by a Jennie Moor who had been to
                                Egypt.)_

  Negro         Mr. Jackson’s reading         Mr. Dupuis’ reading and
  pronun-          and transcript.                  transcript.
  ciation.

  Mallaia        Malh         ملح             Mahh            مَاحْ

  Shego          Shak         سك              Shako           سكُ

  Sansandin      Sansandee    سنسدَي          Sansandia       سنسنديَ

  Jennie         Jin          جن              Jinnie          جنِ

  Massina        Masheen      ماشين           Mashina         ماشين

  Tinbuctoo      Tinbut       تنبت            Tinbuctoo       تنبت

  (Here he draws the Jolliba flowing from or into the Quolla by
  Timbuctoo.)

  Gauw           Gru          غو              Ghou            غو

  Quoälla        Kula         كولا            Koualla         كولا

  Askeä          Assaëe       اَساَي          Askea           اسكي

  Zabirma        Zabuaä       زبوعا           Zaberma         زبرما

  Cabi           Keb          كب              Kaby            كبا

  Yaoora         Eeurë        يور             Yeory           يور

  Boussa         B’sa         بسا             Bussu           بسا

  (Here he branches off a southern route to Yarriba with precisely the
  same names as in MS. I, by the Houssa Moor.)

  Noofee         }
                 }
  Quolla-liffa   }
                 }
  Atagara        } not written, but position marked, and thus
                 } pronounced.
  Sharee R.      }
                 }
  Chadee L.      }

  Foor           Foo          فوُ             Sour            صُره

  Weddai         Wadaee       وداي            Wadai           وداي

  Joonar         Jusenaw      جوسناو          Joosnou         جوسناو

  Shewa          Shuee        شوي             Shouy           سوي

  Sooeess        Siuse        سُوسْ           Sweis           سُوسْ

  Zale           Zal          زاَل            Zal             زاَل

  Zaedooma       Zeehwam      زيهوم           Zeedouma        زيدوم

  Lachtamoo      Lahellam     لاحلام          Lakhtamo        لاخطام

  Makagoodoo     Mehed’twa    محذوْع          Mohadzou        محذوْع

  Dalooba        Deeluba      ديلوبا          Djaoba          دجاوبا

  Tarbass        Tubas        توباس           Terbasa         ترباس

  Jaheesoo       Jekeesee     جخيس            Jakhesa         جخيس

  Latooha        Lituh or     ليعوح or ليطوح  Letouh          ليطوح
                 Liauh

  Mabanoos       M’benuse     مبنوس           Mabanouso       مَبَنُوس

  Itkhame        Atekam       اتخام           Etakhamo        اطخدَمُ

  Massar         Missu        مصو             Massir          مصر

  Sooryada       Sueed        سويد            Sourida         سُويد

  Nezoogoo       Teeawa       تياوع           Nezugh          نيزوخح

  Kataramoo      Kateram      كترام           Kateramo        كترام

  Dahloomoo      D’helume     دحلوم           Dhalomo         دحلوم

  Hateboo        Heteeb       حتيب            Hhateba         حتيب

  Haheenie       Heneen       حنين            Hahhene         ححين

  Hajamie        Khejam       خجام            Hajame          حجام

  Tapasooloo     Tefawn       تفعون           Tafsoona        تفصون

  Askandarie                                  Askundria       اسكندري

  Bahar Mela      (Bahar Melhah the           Bahar al Malah
                      salt sea)


                              MS. No. IV.

This was written by an old Moor, a native of the Mallowa country, but
unfortunately just as he had finished (for I made them all write at the
moment in my own apartment, however hurried, rather than allow them to
go home and compose for me) and was beginning to explain what he had
written, a summons from the King obliged me to quit him, and he left
Coomassie before I could procure another visit from him. In the absence
of all explanation, I can only conclude from some few names that are
familiar to me, that it is a route from Berragoo over the Quolla, and
then westward to Bergoo, known to Mr. Brown. I am only induced thus to
preserve a transcript of this ms. from its fortunate co-incidence in
several names with the valuable lost itinerary of my friend Brahima, as
far as can be collected from a mere sketch of a translation, which was
made in anticipation of the perfect one. I shall submit them
collaterally, as they assist to elucidate each other, and agree very
well in the relative positions of places, although the parties never saw
each other, which is some satisfaction under the disappointment.

 _Outline of Brahima’s                    MS. No. IV.
      Itinerary._

 Mr. Dupuis’ reading and   Mr. Jackson’s reading         Other readings.
 transcript.               and transcript.


 Bazao      بَزاوُ (بَراوُ)  Burg¯ru          بُرْغُ            Bouroughoo
 (Barao)

                             Babigry          بَبِغي            Babaghe

 Kaikshi    كَيَقشي          Keekesh          كيقش              Keekash

 Droo       دروو             Serkune          سركون             Serkoon

 Mashooko   مَشوُكوْ

 Banghoo    بَانْغُوا        Banaka           بانعقا

 Toonooma   تُونُومُ         Tuee             توي

 Yajoury    يَجُورِ          Tenbykukmaetunby تنب كوك مَيتُنْب
 (doubtless
 Yawoorie)

                             Kenbua           كنبوا             Kanboo

                             Dendawy          دنداوي            Danadoo

                             Belg¯rua         بلغوا             Balaghou

 Jabdgho    جَبْذْغُ         Jebeng¯rua       جبنغوا            Jabadghoo

 Keemba or  كمْبَا (كصْبَا)  Kamba            كمبه
 Keerba

 Kadarkoo   اَلجركَدَرْكُ    Kedug¯reh R.     كَدوغه            Kadarko
 R.

 Doodirba   ذُذْرْبَا        Dtedterba R.     ذذربا             Dodarba
 R.

                             Uwawfeh          وواوفه

                             Mhaka Kury       محكا كوري
                             (arrival at
                             Kury)

                             Saffer           سفر

                             Aäu Khashah      اعَوو كحاشه

 Shawanka   اشَوَنْكَا       Shawangra        شاوَنْغَ

 Ghoufel    غوفل             Jafu             جافُو             Japhoo

 Simmer     سمر

 Yarkoo     يركو

 Daghm      دغم

 Bannanao   بَنَنَوْا

 Doonkee    دُنْقيْ          Dunka            دُنقَيْ           Doonkot

 Ghodau     غوضا             G¯ru’w           غووَ              Ghouwa

 Salamo     سَلَمْوُا

 Janboodoo  جَانْبُدُوا      Jabendu          جابندوا

 Soosoo     سُسُوْا          Susu             سُوسُوْا

 Kooreree   كُرر             Koos             كوصْ

 Barghoowa  برغَوَا          Berg¯rua         برغوا

 Nak or     نك
 Naka

 Water of   وض
 Wada

 Douga      ضوغا
 (probably
 Donga)

 Mazim      مزم

 Kal        كل

 Makji      مقجي

 Tafkat     تفقت

 Shal L.    شل

 Koad or    كوض
 Koada

  Here the writer signified that he went back to _Kateen_, as appeared
  to the transcriber, but more probably_Kassina_, and thence proceeded
  to

 Kano       كَن

 Bornou     برنو

 Sher R.    شر

 Shadda L.  شاد

 Foor       فر

 Wada       وداء

 Massir     مصر

 Makata     مكة
 (Mecca)

 Madina     مدينه

 Shem       شام
 (Damascus)

 Jerusalem, بيت المقدس
 &c. &c.


[Footnote 156: When _or_ appears between two names, it means that each
town is equally close to the path, and indifferently visited.]

[Footnote 157: Mr. Dupuis renders the Arabic غ g¯h agreeable to
Richardson. Mr. Jackson has insisted on preferring g˘r throughout. Mr.
Dupuis, having sailed for Africa, has not had the advantage of
correcting the press for himself, but every care has been taken.]

[Footnote 158: Sir W. Ouseley remarks, that the letter _k_ is frequently
softened into _g_.]




                           APPENDIX. No. IV.

                               * * * * *


                         REPTILIA. (REPTILES.)

_Gen._ MONITOR, _Cuvier._

  _Sp._ 1. _Pulcher_, _Leach._

    M. Supra niger albo pulcherrime zonatus et maculatus: zonis
    dorsalibus e maculis effectis, ventre albido nigro transversim vage
    lineato, cauda compressa carinata.

    This elegant species was found in Fantee. The whole upper parts of
    the body, the legs and tail, are black, most beautifully banded and
    spotted with white. The bands on the tail are alternately wide and
    narrow; the wider bands are each much and abruptly dilated above
    into a kind of spot, whilst the narrow ones become gradually wider
    in the inverse direction. The legs are spotted above with white; the
    under parts of them, as well as of the belly and throat, are also of
    the same colour with the spots.

_Gen._ CHAMÆLEON, _of authors._

  _Sp._ 1. _Dilepis_, _Leach._

    Ch. Capite supra sub plano utrinque bicarinato: carinis antice
    conniventibus, occipite utrinque squama magna instructo, dorso
    subspinoso-carinato.

    This species may readily be distinguished from all that have been
    hitherto discovered, by the two large scales, affixed one on each
    side to the back part of the head. These scale-like processes, are
    covered by the same scaly integuments which cover the head and body.

_Gen._ ACONTIAS, _Cuvier._

  _Sp._ 1. _Punctatus_, _Leach._

    A. Supra brunneo-fuscus obsolete purpurascens, squamis postice
    macula ventreque fulvescentibus.

    Fantee.

_Gen._ MACROSOMA, _Leach._

    1. _Elegans, Leach._

    Coluber elegans, _Shaw._

    Fantee.

_Gen._ COLUBER, _Cuvier._

    1. _Bicolor_, _Leach._

    C. Supra badio-niger subtus albidus, squamis dorsalibus elongatis
    gradatim angustioribus; apice obtusiusculis.

    Fantee.

    2. _Irroratus_, _Leach._

    C. Badio-fuscus, gula pallida, squamis pulcherrime albido irroratis;
    dorsalibus subelongatis apice rotundatis.

    Fantee.

    3. _Irregularis_, _Leach._

    C. Azureo-virescens, ventre albido, squamis simplicibus
    irregularibus: dorsalibus ovatis: lateralibus superioribus superne
    truncatis; inferis subhexagonis.

    Fantee.

    The above three species of _Coluber_ are decidedly new, as well as
    the _Acontias_; the latter is more particularly interesting, since
    it encreases the species of a very limited genus.


                              ARACHNOÏDA.

_Gen._ SCORPIO, _of authors._

    _Sp._ 1. _Afer_, _Fabr._

_Gen._ MYGALE, _Latreille._

    The only specimen was too mutilated to enable me to make out its
    specific character.


                               MYRIAPODA.

    Of this class you found two species in Fantee; a _Scolopendra_, and
    a gigantic _Julus_; neither of which are in a sufficiently good
    state to enable me to make out whether they be described or not.


                                INSECTA.

_Gen._ TEFFLUS, _Leach_, new genus.

                           Generic character.

    CAPUT. _Mandibulæ_ æquales edentulæ. _Palpi labiales_ et _maxillares
    externi_ articulo ultimo elongato-securiformi.

    THORAX hexagonus antice et postice rectus. _Alæ_ nullæ. _Elytra_
    coalita abdomen tegentia apicem versus utrinque sinuata. _Tibiæ_
    anticæ latere interiore apicem versus emarginatæ calcare elevato
    instructæ. _Tarsi antici_ MARIS articulis duobus primis tenuiter
    dilatatis.

    Habitus et Antennæ Carabi.

   _Sp._ 1. _Meyerlei_.

    Carabus Meyerlei, _Fabr. Syst. Eleut._ i. 169.—_Voet. col._ ii.
    _tab._ 39, _f._ 49.

_Gen._ ODONTOMERUS, _Dahl._

   _Sp._ 1. _Serratus_.

    Buprestis serratus, _Fabr._

    Fantee.

_Gen._ CETONIA, _of authors._

    _Sp._ 1. _Marginata_, _Fabr._

    Fantee.

_Gen._ PHYLLOTOMA, _Wm. MacLeay, MSS._

    _Sp._ 1. _Reflexa_.

    Melolontha reflexa, _Fabr._

    Fantee.

_Gen._ HELOPS, _Fabr._

    _Sp._ 1. _Marginatus_, _Olivier_.

    Fantee.

_Gen._ UPIS? _Fabr._

    _Sp._ 1. Cuprea.

    Tenebrio Cupreus, _Fabr._

    Fantee.

_Gen._ LAMIA, _Fabr._

    _Sp._ 1. Tri-fasciata, _Fabr._

    Fantee. This species is also found at Sierra Leone, and in the Back
    Settlements of the Cape of Good Hope.

_Gen._ PETROGNATHA, _Leach._

                               Character

    _Caput_ thorace paulo latius. _Antennæ_ (_maris_ corpore duplo
    longiores et ultra,) articulo secundo longiore flexuoso. _Labrum_
    lineare transversum nudum utrinque rotundatum. _Mandibulæ_ petrosæ
    (MARIS interne apicem versus obtuse unidentatæ,) infra et externe
    irregulariter carinatas. _Palpi maxillares_ et _labiales_ articulo
    ultimo basi subattenuato, apice externe oblique truncato-acuminato.

    THORAX transversus utrinque 1-spinosus. _Elytra_ humeris 1-spinosis,
    apiceque ad saturam spinoso-subproducto.

    _Sp._ 1. _Gigas_.

    Lamia Gigas, _Fabr._

    Fantee.

_Gen._ CALLICHROMA, _Latreille._

    _Sp._ 1. _Festivum_.

    Cerambyx festivus, _Oliv. Fabr._

    Fantee.

_Gen._ MANTIS.

    _Sp._ 1. _Superstitiosa_, _Fabr_.

    Fantee

    This species, as well as its congeners, is an object of
    superstitious veneration amongst the natives of north-western
    Africa, Syria, and India. It agrees in all points with the original
    specimen of _Superstitiosa_, so named by Fabricius in the Banksian
    Cabinet.

_Gen._ GRYLLUS, _Fabr._

    _Sp._ 1. _Squarrosus_, _Fabr._

    Fantee.

_Gen._ REDUVIUS, _Fabr._

    _Sp._ 1. _Barbicornis_, _Fabr._

    Fantee.

    I have received this species from the Cape of Good Hope.

_Gen._ CANOPUS, _Rodhe._

    _Sp._ 1. _Punctatus_, _Leach._

    Supra olivaceo-ater impresso-punctulatus rubro punctatus, subtus
    ruber segmentis marginibus stigmatibus tibiis tarsisque nigris,
    capite rubro irrorato.

    Gaboon.




                            APPENDIX, No. V.

                               * * * * *


              _Mr._ TEDLIE’S _Account of the Thermometer._

     Date.     |  A.M. |   M.  |  P.M. |           Weather.
               |       |       |       |
  April 28     |6 74   |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
  29           |7½ 75  |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
               |11 80  |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
  30           |       |       |2 88½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 82½  |
               |       |       |       |
  May 1        |8 77   |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
  2            |8 76½  |       |1 91   |
               |       |       |       |
  3            |6 76   |12 89  |       |
               |       |       |       |
  May 4.       |The Thermometer was broken last night at Asharaman.
               |       |       |       |
  At Coomassie, from the 7th June to the 11th, it varied from 80 to 85,
  between 12 and 2.
               |       |       |       |
  June 15      |       |       |1 82   |
               |       |       |       |
  16           |10 79  |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
  17           |       |12 82  |       |
               |       |       |       |
  18           |9 79   |       |2 84   |
               |       |       |       |
  19           |7½ 73  |       |2½ 78  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |5 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  20           |10 78  |       |1 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2½ 82  |
               |       |       |       |
  21           |8 74   |       |2½ 82  |
               |       |       |       |
  22           |8 76   |12 82  |1 74   |Tornado.
               |       |       |       |
  23           |8½ 74  |       |1 81   |Tornado.
               |       |       |       |
  24           |11½ 76 |       |2 73   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  25           |9 75   |       |1 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  26           |9 76   |12 76  |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  27           |8½ 79  |       |3½ 80  |
               |       |       |       |
  28           |8½ 74  |12 77  |       |
               |       |       |       |
  29           |9½ 74  |       |2 77   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
  30           |9 77   |       |1 80   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  July 1       |9 76   |       |1 80   |
               |       |       |       |
  2            |8 73   |12 78  |       |
               |       |       |       |
  3            |9 78   |       |1 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  4            |8 72   |12 74  |       |
               |       |       |       |
  5            |8 72   |       |1 78   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
  6            |6 71   |12 76  |       |
               |       |       |       |
  7            |6 71   |       |2 80   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  8            |6 72   |12 78  |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |3 80   |Tornado.
               |       |       |       |
  9            |6 72   |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |1 79   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  10           |7 73   |       |2½ 81  |
               |       |       |       |
  11           |8 73   |       |2 81   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 72   |
               |       |       |       |
  12           |6 72   |       |2½ 80  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  13           |8 77   |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
               |11 73  |       |3 77   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  14           |8 71   |       |2 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  15           |8 70   |12 74  |6 72   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
  16           |7 69   |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  17           |7 69   |       |2½ 79  |
               |       |       |       |
  18           |8 71   |       |3 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  19           |6 70   |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2½ 76  |Fair,
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  20           |8 72   |       |2½ 78  |
               |       |       |       |
  21           |7½ 71  |12 75  |2½ 78  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6½ 75  |
               |       |       |       |
  22           |6 70   |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  23           |6 70   |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 72   |
               |       |       |       |
  24           |8 70   |       |2 74   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 72   |
               |       |       |       |
  25           |8 69   |       |1 74   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 72   |
               |       |       |       |
  26           |7 70   |       |2 75   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  27           |7 68   |       |3½ 80½ |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 71   |
               |       |       |       |
  28           |8 70   |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |3 77   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7½ 73  |
               |       |       |       |
  29           |7 70   |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  39           |7 66½  |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  31           |8 70   |12 76  |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  Aug. 1       |7 70   |       |2 77   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  2            |7 71   |       |2 73   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 70   |
               |       |       |       |
  3            |7 69½  |12 72  |3 73   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 70½  |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
  4            |7 70   |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  5            |7 71   |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 75   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  6            |7 70   |       |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 78½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
  7            |7 71   |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  8            |6 70   |12 73  |2½ 77  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  9            |6 70   |       |2½ 78  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  10           |7 71   |       |2 76   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 74   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  11           |7 71   |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  12           |7 70½  |       |3 76   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 73   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 71   |
               |       |       |       |
  13           |7 70   |       |2 77   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  14           |7 70   |       |2 74   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 73   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 71   |
               |       |       |       |
  15           |7 70   |       |2 72   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  16           |7 70   |       |2 75   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  17           |7 70   |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  18           |7 71   |12 77  |2 80½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |3 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  19           |7 71   |       |2 75   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  20           |7 68½  |       |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 72½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 71   |
               |       |       |       |
  21           |6 69   |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |1 77   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  22           |6 68   |12 73  |2 77   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 71   |
               |       |       |       |
  23           |7 68   |       |1 76   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  24           |7 69   |       |3 74   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 71½  |
               |       |       |       |
  25           |6 68   |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  26           |6 68   |       |3 78½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  27           |7 69   |       |       |Hazy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |1 72   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |3 72   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 70½  |
               |       |       |       |
  28           |6 69 ½ |       |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 74   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 72   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  29           |7 70   |       |3 78   |Fair
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  30           |7 70   |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2½ 76  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  31           |7 70½  |       |3 77   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  Sept. 1      |7 71   |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |3 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  2            |6 71   |       |       |Hazy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 75   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 74   |Slight showers
               |       |       |       |
  3            |6 71   |12 74  |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |1 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  4            |7 71   |12 77  |7 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  5            |5 71   |       |3 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 76   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
  6            |6 70   |       |2 74   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  7            |8 71   |       |3 76   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |Slight showers
               |       |       |       |
  8            |7 71   |12 76  |       |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  9            |6 71   |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  10           |7 71   |       |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |3 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  11           |6 72   |       |       |Heavy rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 77   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |10 72  |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  12           |7 72   |12 78  |3½ 80½ |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |10 76  |
               |       |       |       |
  13           |7 22   |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |3½ 80  |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |9 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  14           |7 72   |       |       |Hazy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2½ 79  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 76   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  15           |5 71   |       |3 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  16           |7 72   |       |2½ 80  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  17           |7 72   |12 78  |2½ 81  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |9 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  18           |7 72   |       |2 77   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  19           |7 71   |       |3 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |9 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  20           |7 72   |       |2 79   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  21           |7 72   |       |2½ 81  |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 72   |
               |       |       |       |
  22           |8 71   |       |       |Hazy.
               |       |       |       |
               |12½ 71 |       |2 82½  |

 _Mr._ HUTCHISON’S _Account of the Thermometer, after the Departure of
                              Mr. Tedlie._

     Date.     |  A.M. |   M.  |  P.M. |           Weather.
               |       |       |       |
  Sept. 23     |8 73   |       |       |Thunder, with rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  24           |6 72   |       |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |12 78  |       |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 82   |Fair, but cloudy
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  25           |6 71½  |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
               |10 76  |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |12 83  |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 75   |Violent tornado
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 71½  |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  26           |6 70   |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |12 73  |       |Hazy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80   |Cloudy
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |4 77   |Wind
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 71   |Heavy rain.
               |       |       |       |
  27           |6 73   |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
               |10 75  |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |12 80½ |6 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  28           |6 71   |       |2 81½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  29           |6 71½  |       |2 82   |
               |       |       |       |
  30           |6 73   |       |       |Cloudy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 71½  |
               |       |       |       |
  Oct. 1       |6 72½  |       |2 82   |
               |       |       |       |
               |10 70  |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  2            |6 70   |       |2 79   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |Sultry.
               |       |       |       |
  3            |6 71   |       |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 82   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 80   |
               |       |       |       |
  5            |6 72   |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  6            |6 72   |       |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 79   |Much rain, thunder.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  7            |6 72   |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  8            |6 71   |12 79  |2 73   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 71   |
               |       |       |       |
  9            |6 71   |       |2 79   |Sultry and cloudy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  10           |6 73   |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |12 78  |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 71½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 73½  |Much rain, thunder.
               |       |       |       |
  11           |6 73   |       |       |Heavy fog.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 76½  |Fair, cloudy.
               |       |       |       |
  12           |6 71½  |       |       |Sultry, foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80½  |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  13           |6 73   |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |12 78  |       |Sultry.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 77   |Rain, thunder.
               |       |       |       |
  14           |6 74½  |       |       |Rain, foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 78½  |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  15           |6 72½  |       |       |Rain, foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 74   |Hazy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  16           |6 72½  |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80½  |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  17           |6 73½  |       |       |Rain, foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74½  |
               |       |       |       |
  18           |6 73   |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 75   |Rain and thunder.
               |       |       |       |
  19           |73½    |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
               |71½    |       |       |Much rain.
               |       |       |       |
  20           |6 70½  |       |       |Dense fogs.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 73   |Foggy, with showers.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  21           |6 72½  |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78½  |
               |       |       |       |
  22           |6 73   |12 77  |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 82½  |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  23           |6 72½  |       |       |Foggy, with thr. showers.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |12 80  |2 83   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  24           |6 73   |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |12 80  |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |3 78½  |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  25           |6 74½  |12 82  |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 82   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  26           |6 72½  |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |78     |Rain, thunder.
               |       |       |       |
  27           |6 72   |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 76   |Thunder shrs.
               |       |       |       |
  29           |6 7    |       |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 82   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  30           |6 73   |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 83   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  31           |6 72½  |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 82   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  Nov. 1       |6 72½  |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 80   |Sultry.
               |       |       |       |
  2            |6 73   |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 81½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  3            |6 73   |       |       |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 82½  |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  4            |6 72   |       |2 78   |Rain, foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74½  |Sultry.
               |       |       |       |
  5            |6 72½  |       |2 79½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  6            |6 74   |       |2 80½  |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 79   |Rain, sultry.
               |       |       |       |
  7            |6 72½  |       |2 82½  |Fair, thunder
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |3 79   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  8            |6 72   |       |2 78½  |Thunder.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |Hazy.
               |       |       |       |
  10           |6 71   |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 82   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  11           |6 72½  |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |2 81½  |       |       |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  12           |6 74½  |       |2 79   |Cloudy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 78   |Sultry.
               |       |       |       |
  13           |6 73   |       |2 83½  |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  14           |6 69   |       |2 78½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  15           |6 70½  |       |2 82½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 79   |
               |       |       |       |
  16           |6 69   |       |2 82   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 80   |
               |       |       |       |
  17           |6 70½  |       |2 82½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 79   |
               |       |       |       |
  18           |6 72   |       |2 82½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 80   |
               |       |       |       |
  19           |6 72½  |       |2 80½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  20           |6 70½  |       |2 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  21           |6 72½  |       |2 83½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 79   |
               |       |       |       |
  22           |6 72   |       |2 83   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  23           |6 75   |       |2 82   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
  24           |       |       |6 72   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  26           |6 71   |       |2 83   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  27           |6 73   |       |       |Slight showers.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80   |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  28           |6 70   |       |2 80½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  29           |6 78   |       |2 82   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75½  |
               |       |       |       |
  30           |6 78½  |       |2 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  Dec. 1       |       |       |6 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 80½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  2            |6 77½  |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  3            |6 68½  |       |2 79   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |Fair.
               |       |       |       |
  4            |6 67   |       |2 81   |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  5            |6 68   |       |2 80½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  6            |6 65   |       |2 78   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  7            |6 63   |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  8            |6 70   |       |2 78½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  9            |6 63   |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  10           |6 71   |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  11           |6 73   |       |2 80½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  12           |6 74   |       |2 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  13           |6 74½  |       |2 79½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 77   |
               |       |       |       |
  14           |6 72   |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  15           |6 73¼  |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  16           |6 74   |       |2 80½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  17           |6 73½  |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  18           |       |       |6 71½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 79   |Tornado.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  19           |6 68   |       |2 79½  |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  20           |6 64½  |       |2 79   |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  21           |6 75   |       |2 80   |Tornado.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  22           |6 76   |       |2 81   |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  23           |6 76½  |       |2 83½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 80   |
               |       |       |       |
  24           |6 79   |       |2 84   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |4 82   |Thunder.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |7 80   |Tornado.
               |       |       |       |
  25           |6 78   |       |       |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |2 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |Tornado.
               |       |       |       |
  26           |6 69   |       |2 81   |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |6 80   |Tornado.
               |       |       |       |
  27           |6 70   |       |2 82   |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  28           |6 74   |       |2 82   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  29           |6 73   |       |2 80½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76½  |
               |       |       |       |
  30           |6 74   |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  31           |6 72   |       |2 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  Jan. 1 1818. |6 70½  |       |2 81   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  2            |6 72   |       |       |
               |       |       |       |
  3            |6 72   |       |2 85   |Thunder.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |Rain.
               |       |       |       |
  From sickness, the Thermometer was not attended to till the 10th,
  during the interval the weather was excessive cold, and the fogs
  very dense.
               |       |       |       |
  10           |       |       |2 74   |Foggy.
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 68   |
               |       |       |       |
  11           |6 62½  |       |2 76   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 70½  |
               |       |       |       |
  12           |6 60   |       |2 77   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 70   |
               |       |       |       |
  13           |6 61½  |       |2 74½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 68   |
               |       |       |       |
  14           |6 58   |       |2 74   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 66   |
               |       |       |       |
  15           |6 60   |       |2 75½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 70   |
               |       |       |       |
  16           |6 61½  |       |2 76   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 72½  |
               |       |       |       |
  17           |6 62   |       |2 76½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 71   |
               |       |       |       |
  18           |6 60   |       |2 74   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 73   |
               |       |       |       |
  19           |6 62½  |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 75   |
               |       |       |       |
  20           |6 64   |       |2 78½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  21           |6 64½  |       |2 79   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  22           |6 66   |       |2 80   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  23           |6 64   |       |2 82   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 76   |
               |       |       |       |
  24           |6 62   |       |2 82½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 74   |
               |       |       |       |
  25           |6 64   |       |2 84   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 80   |
               |       |       |       |
  26           |6 68   |       |2 83½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 67½  |
               |       |       |       |
  27           |6 68½  |       |2 84   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 80½  |
               |       |       |       |
  28           |6 72   |       |2 84¼  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 78   |
               |       |       |       |
  29           |6 72   |       |2 85   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 80   |
               |       |       |       |
  30           |6 74   |       |2 85   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 80   |
               |       |       |       |
  31           |6 76   |       |2 86   |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 80   |
               |       |       |       |
  Feb. 1       |6 74   |       |2 84½  |
               |       |       |       |
               |       |       |8 79   |
               |       |       |       |
  2            |6 73½  |       |2 86½  |




                           APPENDIX. No. VI.

                               * * * * *


I will now submit the numerals of 31 nations, which, with the exception
of three, the Fantee, the Accra, and the Bornoo, (and those but
imperfectly,) have never been reported before. I will arrange them
according to their geographical approximation, remarking any apparent
affinity which occurs to me, in notes. I shall place the Inta first,
because it is the most remote, inland, which can be assimilated to the
Fantee, Ahanta, Aöwin, and Amanaheä; and may, probably, from that
circumstance, be the root of these languages; as it has been shewn, in
the history, that the nations of the water side have been gradually
pressed down, or have emigrated from the interior, and it is
consequently to be expected that the etymology of the names of these
countries are not to be found in the languages of the people who _now_
inhabit them, but more probably in the languages of their southern
neighbours. Thus,

_Inta_ is likely to be derived from the _Booroom_ word _inta_, _water_,
as it has been noticed as an alluvial country.

_Yngwa_, a northern province of Dagwumba, from the Ashantee _anggwa_,
_fat, rich_, or the Booroom, _yngia_, _a wood_.

_Soko_ from _Soko_, _one_, in the Badaggry (below Dahomy) as _Yahndi_
the capital of Dagwumba was so called from _yahndo_ the numeral _one_,
to indicate its pre-eminence.

_Assin_ from the Ashantee _Assoon_, an elephant. But this expectation is
not further supported in the two or three other probable etymologies
which occur to me, as _Takima_ from the Ashantee _takramma_, tongue.
_Akim_ (formerly the greatest trading country,) from the Booroom
_Akimmie_, cloth; _Booroom_ from _boora_, full, in that language.

It is curious how nearly the _word_ for _God_ in the Malemba,
_M’Poungoo_, approaches the native name, _Empoongwa_, of the country
Europeans call _Gaboon_. _Wonga_ is fear in the Malemba, and _Woonga-
woonga_ is the name of an uninhabited savannah of three days extent,
between Empoöngwa and Adjoomba.

          1. _Inta._    2.          3.           4. _Aöwin._ 5.
                        _Booroom._  _Ashantee._              _Amanaheä._

  One     Koko          Ekoo        Akoon        Aconë       Aconë
  (_a_)

  Two     Anyoe         Enoo        Anoo         Enyow       Enyow
  (_b._)

  Three   Assa          Essa        Mensa        Inza        Insa
  (_c_)

  Four    Anna          Enna        Ennung       Inna        Enna
  (_d_)

  Five    Annoo         Annoo       Ennoom       Noo         Enoo
  (_e_)

  Six     Assee         Esseä       Inseëä       Inzeah      Inseah
  (_f_)

  Seven   Assoonno      Assoono     Inshong      Inzoo       Insoon
  (_g_)

  Eight   Adoobrooa     Aquiay      Woquee       Motteä      Mottuay
  (_h_)

  Nine    Digrakoono    Akonno      Oonkonnong   Ongoona     Ongona

  Ten     Koodoo        Edoo        Edoo         Boloo       Booloo
  (_i_)

          6. _Ahanta_   7. _Fantee_ 8.           9.          10.
                                    _Affootoo_   _Inkran_    _Adampë_
                                                 [159]

  One     Akoon         Akoor       Achoomee     Ekkoo       Kakee

  Two     Ayue          Abeeën      Ennuë        Ennuë

  Three   Assan         Abiasseh    Assah        Ettayh

  Four    Arra          Anan        Annah        Edjuë

  Five    Aoonoo        Ennoom      Ennoo        Ennoomó

  Six     Ayshing       Asseeä      Isshin       Eghpah

  Seven   Assooa        Ashong      Isshennooh   Paghwooh

  Eight   Awotchay      Awotwee     Ettchee      Paghnue

  Nine    Awonna        Akoon       Assan        Nahoon

  Ten     Boonoo        Edoo        Eddoo        Nongmah

          11.           12.         13. _Yngwa_  14. _Hio_   15. _Mosee_
          _Kerrapay_    _Dagwumba_

  One     Eddee         Yahndo      Lakoo        Innee       Yimbo

  Two     Effee         Ayee        Ayee         Eygee       Ayeeboo

  Three   Eltong        Attah       Attah        Etta        Ataboo

  Four    Ennay         Nasee       Anāhee       Ernee       Annasee

  Five    Altong        Ennoon      Leerennoo    Aroon       Annoo

  Six     Adday         Yohbee      Ayoboo       Effa        Ayobee

  Seven   Adrinnee      Poice       Ayapaï       Eggay       Owhi

  Eight   Ennee         Nehenoo     Annee        Eggo        Ennee

  Nine    Indee         Wyhee       Awai         Essun       Aïhopoi

  Ten     Owoo          Edoo        Peä          Eywaw       Peega

          16.           17. _Gaman_ 18. _Kong_   19. _Fobee_ 20.
          _Kumsallahoo_                                      _Callana_

  One     Yumbo         Tah         Kiddee       Koroom      Kodoom

  Two     Yeebo         Noo         Filla        Nalay       Naboolla

  Three   Tabo          Sah         Sowa         Poompevarra Nawedazoo

  Four    Nasee         Nah         Nanoo        Leetaynalee Nabonaza

  Five    Annoo         Taw         Looroa       Kakwassee   Nabonoa

  Six     Yobo          Torata      Wora         Mannassa    Lodoo

  Seven   Poihee        Toorifeenoo Ooranfilla   Noottoosoo  Logwa

  Eight   Nehee         Toorifeessa Leeaygee     Borafay     Littaïzoo

  Nine    Wahee         Toorifeena  Konunto      Pirrifay    Nako

  Ten     Pega          Noonoo      Tah          Nanooa      Yewoo

          21.           22.         23.          24.         25.
          _Bambarra_    _Garangi_   _Mallowa_    _Kallaghee_ _Bornoo_

  One     Killi         Kerriminna  Daia         Gadee       Leskar

  Two     Foolla        Ferriminna  Beeyoo       Silill      Ahndee

  Three   Sabba         Sowaninna   Okoo         Quan        Yaskar

  Four    Nani          Firrima     Odoo         Foolloo     Deegah

  Five    Looroo        Fahtima     Beä          Vydee       Ooögoo

  Six     Wora          Tata        Seddah       Zoodoo      Araskoo

  Seven   Worroola      Mannima     Becquay      Etkassa     Tooloor

  Eight   Sagi          Pirima      Tacquass     Shiddowka   Woskoo

  Nine    Konunto       Missirima   Tarra        Woollaä     Likkar

  Ten     Ta            Gwahee      Gwoma        Woma        Meeägoo

          26. _Maïha_   _Quolla-    _Badaggry_   27.         28.
                        liffa_      by Mr.       _Sheekan_   _Kaylee_
                        by Mr.      Hutchison.
                        Hutchison.

  One     Lagen         Da          Soko         Ilwawtoe    Woto

  Two     Indë          Bue         Auwee        Ibba        Ibba

  Three   Eäska         Okoo        Atong        Bittach     Battach

  Four    Daäger        Hodoo       Inna         Binnay      Binnay

  Five    Ohoo          Bakwee      Ato          Bitta       Bittan

  Six     Araska        Shida       Trukoo

  Seven   Tooloor       Bockwa      Chauto

  Eight   Weska         Sidda       Quouie

  Nine    Lekar         Tarra       Kennee

  Ten     Inagoon       Goman       Owoo         Duëoom      Duëoom

  Twenty                                         Emboomebba

  Hundred                                        Kama

          29.           30.         31.
          _Oongoomo_    _Oongobaï_  _Empoöngwa._
                                    See p.
                                    439 for
                                    character.

  One     Wootta        Rappeek     Hemoödee

  Two     Beeba         Ramboise    Mban

  Three   Bittach       Mittasee    Ntcharoo

  Four    Binnay        Binnay      Nahee

  Five    Bitten        Bittan      Nehanee

  Six                   Sambal      Oroöba

  Seven                 Bittooba    Ragginnoömoo

  Eight                 Bissamen    Ennanahee

  Nine                  Bwoi        Eno go öm

  Ten                   Deëoom      Hegoöm

(_a_) The words for the numeral one assimilate in the specimens 1, 2, 3,
4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9: again, but distinctly, in 14, 12, 15, 16: also in 26,
25, 13: in 21, 18, 20, 19: in 27, 28, 29, (making apparently five
roots), but they remain solitary in 11, 17, 22, 23, 24 30 and 31. The
numeral one in 14 is not unlike the two in 8, 9, 2, 3, and the one in
12, would, with the prefix of y, be precisely the same as the two of 25.
Excepting _Kakee_, _one_, the Inkran numerals seem to have been adopted
as those of Adampë, for the convenience of trade and intercourse, but I
will add a few words, to show that the languages are radically
different:

             _Adampë._     _Inkran._

  House       Aoosoo       Wheay.

  Fire        [160]Odja    Lla.

  Man         Ossa         Noon.

  Woman       Ossĕ         Yeo.

  Victuals    Odë          Neeaynee.

  Father      Attay        Tchay.

  Mother      Awoo         Nneay.

(_b_) The numeral _two_ is the most general word, and may be assimilated
in 2, 3, 8, 9, 4, 5, 1, 6, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17. There is little
difference between the numerals _two_ and _five_ in most of these, and
_five_ in 15 and 16, precisely answers to _two_ in 1 and 2.

(_c_) _Three_ may be assimilated in 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 14, 15,
16, 17. In 12, 13, 14, 16, it approaches to the Congo and Mozambique
_tatoo_ and _atatoo_.

(_d_) I have observed that in most African languages there is less
distinction in the words for four and five, than between any other of
the numerals and that frequently the word for _five_ in one language, is
identical with that for _four_ in another, geographically remote. _Four_
may be assimilated in 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 11, 6, 14, for the two latter
deviate only in the substitution of one liquid for another, which is as
common in the languages of Africa as in those of America. The words for
four in the above suite do not seem of a different root from those in
12, 13, 14, 15, 16, and 21, from which it only varies in 20 by the
prefix of _nabo_. With the difference of a single letter, the same word
for _four_ is found in the Yngwa (13) and the Empoöngwa (31) which are
1000 miles distant. Four in Congo is _m’na_, in Empoöngwa, _nahee_.
_Sanu_, the Kaffer _four_, is approached in 18.

(_e_) Five may be assimilated from 1 to 17, (11 excepted) one liquid
being substituted for another in 14, an _leer_ being prefixed in 13. It
is remarkable too that we again identify this numeral in the Malemba,
Embomma, and Empoöngwa languages, by removing the prefixes _t_, _to_,
and _neh_, from the words _tanoo_, _toanoo_, and _nehanee_. Below five,
the numerals in the Inkran lose all identity with those of the languages
with which it has been hitherto assimilated.

(_f_) _Six_ assimilates from 1 to 9, in 12 to 17 (14 excepted) in 20,
23, 24, in 17 and 22; but remains distinct in all the others. The Sanbal
of Oöngobai (30) approaches the Sambanoo of the Embomma.

(_g_) _Seven_ assimilates in 1 to 9; in 12, 13, 16, but in no others.

(_h_) _Eight_ assimilates in 2, 3, 6, 7; in 11 to 17, (14 excepted) all
of which, with 31, approximate to E’nana, the word for eight in the
Malemba.

(_i_) _Ten_ assimilates in 1, 2, 3, 7, 8, 12, in 4, 5, 6, in 17, 19, 25,
26, 29, in 13, 15, and in 14, 20, 22, 23, 24.

                               * * * * *

The following is the skeleton of a _Vocabulary_, of which the enlarged
or perfect copy was blown out of the cabin-window, in a sudden squall,
(with some specimens of music), during my voyage home.

 |_English._| _Ashantee._ |_Fantee_[161].| _Booroom._   |  _Various._
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Above     |wattefee     |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Advice    |matoorh      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Afraid    |osooroh      |              |efweedammee   |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Afternoon |inumirree    |ingubirh      |ennie         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Again     |impray       |              |meära         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Alike     |oninnisie    |              |minnamata     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Alive     |nannuwomie   |uannekan      |issaboobwaw   |n’chema
 |          |             |              |              |Malemba
 |          |             |              |              |Inchema a
 |          |             |              |              |fruit in
 |          |             |              |              |Empoöngwa.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |All       |nenarra      |              |inkaken       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Alone     |waunkoo      |              |ohwoorie      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Angry     |mōbwaf       |moboäf        |moobiaf       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Another   |ebissoo      |              |ekoo          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Arm       |wabow        |              |serrekoonkoo  |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Ashamed   |wennatoo     |              |woifarrie     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Asleep    |werda        |wadda         |awdirrie      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Awake     |waihen       |              |otinnie       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Back      |wakee        |              |atterra       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Bad       |omoo         |              |ohmara        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Bead      |aoonee       |              |aboroo[162]   |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Beard     |aboidwee     |              |annoque       |the same
 |          |             |              |              |as _chin_,
 |          |             |              |              |a frequent
 |          |             |              |              |surname.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Beat      |whaoonoo     |wabomë        |babeëm        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Bed       |empa         |              |kerray        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Before    |wawquoorasoo |waw_quan_     |oïyo          |ovetide
 |          |             |              |              |_quande_.
 |          |             |              |              |Malemba.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Beg       |ekkaydie     |_empoikeöw_   |dibbim        |_mpanou_.
 |          |             |              |              |Malemba.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Behind    |owakee       |              |odioterra     |the noun
 |          |             |              |              |_back_ with
 |          |             |              |              |_o_ & _odia_
 |          |             |              |              |prefixed
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Below     |asnadie      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Big       |kookrookoo   |              |otchwaw       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Bird      |anima        |              |abooree       |for names of
 |          |             |              |              |animals, see
 |          |             |              |              |p. 328.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Bite      |whakum       |              |inkadooa      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Black     |tintoom      |              |oboobie       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Blind     |frafoo       |              |atenna        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Blood     |mugga        |              |moogga        |menga. Mal.
 |          |             |              |              |Emb.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Boil      |woaroo       |wooworh       |ohfoo         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Bone      |ebiou        |              |ebou          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Boy       |afra         |              |ayebee        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Burn      |whahim       |              |ohwho         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Buy       |mekoto       |              |meashoor      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Call      |aferen       |afren         |ateëm         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Carry     |atooron      |              |dumta         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Catch     |makin        |              |mekeeram      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Change    |wahseesun    |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Cheeks    |wafoon       |              |afeehe        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Child     |ebbah        |              |obee          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Clean     |wafie        |              |aulay         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Cloth     |ettum        |entama        |_akim_mie     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Cold      |oiwoo        |              |afoo          |differs
 |          |             |              |              |little from
 |          |             |              |              |_boil_
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Come      |rraba        |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Cry       |oroosoor     |              |orissoo       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Cut       |witwa        |              |wawtung       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Dance     |saw          |              |attcha        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Dark      |oiheesoom    |              |mayoo         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Daughter  |mebăbā       |              |mebee         |_coomba_. Em.
 |          |             |              |              |which is a
 |          |             |              |              |common female
 |          |             |              |              |name in Fantee
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Day[163]  |             |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Dead      |wow          |              |ohoo          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Deaf      |nasheeasie   |teetĭfoo      |sinteelaboo   |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Deep      |eboonie      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Devil     |ayen[164]    |              |              |Amoonie a
 |          |             |              |              |proper name
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Dig       |amoonna      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Door      |aboo         |              |ebunabooná    |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Drink     |noom         |              |noo           |_noa_. Mal.
 |          |             |              |              |_noi_. Em.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Drop      |wawto        |awtarradi     |otore         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Drown     |eboon        |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Drunk     |wassoo       |wawboo        |hassoo        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Ear       |assoor       |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Eat       |edee         |              |              |_dea_. Mal.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Egg       |kessua       |kirrifooa     |akaddie       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Empty     |eppun        |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Enough    |ojëay        |              |obahrìe       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Eye       |wunnie       |ennua         |ennyass       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Eyebrow   |wunnĕwee     |entun         |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Face      |wynim        |              |anyasirra     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Far       |akirh’       |              |aterh’        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fat       |anggwa       |              |oomfoä        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Father    |aggáh        |              |missee        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fear      |sooroo       |              |efweedam      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Feather   |takirrie     |              |eetta         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Feel      |_soom_whay   |              |kirrada       |_seem_bede.
 |          |             |              |              |Mal.
 |          |             |              |              |Kirradee,
 |          |             |              |              |a river of
 |          |             |              |              |Booroom.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fetch     |ekkoon       |              |becquaw       |a town in
 |          |             |              |              |Booroom
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fifty     |edoonoom     |              |              |10. 5.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fight     |orrokoo      |              |obuquooa      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fill      |eënnama      |              |boorra        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Find      |maoo         |maoon         |maioom        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Finger    |insa         |              |eserrĭbee     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fire      |ogiäh        |egah          |ogha          |boogoom. Mosee
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fish      |enum         |              |eyay          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Flower    |nadjua       |              |ewooda        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fly       |watoo        |              |oqueshoo      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fool      |woigimmie    |_abooa_       |woigimmie     |booba. Mal.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Foot      |wannunsa     |              |aīah          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Forget    |moorafie     |              |sessĕro       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Forgive   |edimămoo     |              |inkawffinsow  |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fowl      |akoo         |              |karrabee      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Friend    |ankoo        |              |oonkoosĭba    |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Fruit     |quadiäteä    |impooa        |quadiateä     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Girl      |bisēä        |              |otchay        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Give      |fummum       |              |tāsămi        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Glad      |yam          |yamma         |amirra        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Go        |kaw          |              |narry         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |God       |yankoompon   |              |oodoobwarrie  |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Gold      |sikkă        |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Good      |oëyay        |              |obwārie       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Green     |boioöma      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Grow      |owynee       |oeen          |ohodan        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hair      |hewhee       |              |hemoonie      |Amoonie, a
 |          |             |              |              |proper name.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Half      |effeh        |              |baggah        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hand      |mensa        |              |assaddie      |Mensa, a
 |          |             |              |              |proper name.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Handsome  |oia          |              |obweefay      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hang      |osesan       |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hard      |oiătin       |              |oöqua         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Head      |tirrie       |              |egnoon        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hear      |matr’        |              |maynoon       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Heart     |akoomo       |              |akirrăbie     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Heavy     |oiadoor      |              |obodoor       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Here      |hah          |              |oomboh        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hide      |mōhoo        |              |manghoo       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |High      |essoor       |              |oskasoor      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hill      |cooqua       |              |iffoo         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hit       |aboor        |              |odum          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hold      |soom         |              |karrara       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hole      |watchoo      |              |osarrie       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Horn      |aben         |              |abay          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Horse     |panquaw      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hot       |oiayue       |              |owuegua       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |House     |efee         |odan          |eban          |paseebah,
 |          |             |              |              |Kumsallahoo.
 |          |             |              |              |deeo,
 |          |             |              |              |Dagwumba.
 |          |             |              |              |gidda,
 |          |             |              |              |Mallowa.
 |          |             |              |              |koopella,
 |          |             |              |              |Mosee.
 |          |             |              |              |Kokoopella,
 |          |             |              |              |capital of
 |          |             |              |              |ditto.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hundred   |ehha         |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Hungry    |oquandummie  |comagin       |aquandum      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Husband   |mookoon      |              |mookooddie    |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Idle      |nehuff       |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Iron      |dadee        |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Jump      |oroo         |              |fay           |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Keep      |intamaseea   |ysee          |afeeërra      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Kick      |chayche      |              |orraychum     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Kill      |coom         |              |bamoem        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |King      |ohennie      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Knot      |eppo         |              |ippo          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Know      |innim        |              |nayoom        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Lame      |opakkie      |              |ebbeä         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Land      |fum          |dadi          |sebooroo      |tenga. Mosee
 |          |             |              |              |kaisa Mallo.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Last      |naddou       |              |afoorinay     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Laugh     |sicroo       |sroo          |orroomuss     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Law       |widdooffoo   |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Lead      |soomwie      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Learn     |akirren      |              |ekērow        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Leg       |asirrie      |              |inwoonnie     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Lie (down)|daoo         |              |oyadee        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Lie       |etwapō       |              |afoorenie     |
 |(falsity) |             |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Little    |kakra        |kakrabi       |bahttee       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Long      |ohwar’       |              |ohbissay      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Look      |fway         |              |kaye          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Love      |poopa        |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Mad       |same as      |              |              |
 |          |‘fool’       |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Man       |binin        |              |oninnie       |pagga, Kums.
 |          |             |              |              |boodasa, Dag.
 |          |             |              |              |noon, Accra.
 |          |             |              |              |nedda, Mosee.
 |          |             |              |              |moottanee,
 |          |             |              |              |M. moontau,
 |          |             |              |              |Male. muntu,
 |          |             |              |              |Mozam.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Many      |peenarra     |              |otuä          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Market    |egwass       |egoom         |ebiass        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Mat       |keraw        |empa          |kerray        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Mend      |pam          |              |bărā          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Moon      |serrānee     |boossoom      |ofoorie       |wattacha,
 |          |             |              |              |Ku. marraga,
 |          |             |              |              |Dag. oöota
 |          |             |              |              |Mallowa.
 |          |             |              |              |choogoo, Mos.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |More      |mambissoo    |              |samoko        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Mother    |mna          |minna         |minnee        |nneay, Accra.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Mouth     |wannoom      |ennoom        |annoo         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Much      |dooroo       |              |otchoo        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Nails     |oomboiray    |              |ungwarrie     |‘_unguis_’
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Name      |             |dgin          |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Neck      |ekkone       |              |ekkoona       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Nest      |anĭmaboo     |              |              |anĭma,
 |          |             |              |              |a bird.
 |          |             |              |              |Annămāboo, a
 |          |             |              |              |Fantee town.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Net       |ebbwau       |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Never     |dabbiada     |              |as _no!_      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |New       |fofoor       |              |ofroofoo      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |No        |dabbi        |              |an            |
 |          |             |              |inarticulate  |
 |          |             |              |noise with    |
 |          |             |              |the lips      |
 |          |             |              |closed        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Noise     |deddie       |              |boolāo        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Nose      |ewhin        |              |ewhoonie      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Oil       |engoo        |              |oomfwaie      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Old       |quodda       |              |aquŏdā        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Open      |boi          |              |booë          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Owe       |mintēka      |dinnekow      |indāqua       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Pay       |tchamkou     |              |kamëquow      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Play      |agoor’       |              |feearee       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Poison    |otoowādoo    |              |otoowādoo     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Poor      |haynil       |              |ohēä          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Pot       |quonsun      |              |adinna        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Pregnant  |orrŏhoo      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Present   |wahoo        |              |okōë          |
 |(gift)    |             |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Pull      |twin         |              |sheeay        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Quarrel   |irriquaw     |orriyow       |batōë         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Quick     |tetimrĭka    |              |serrie        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Quiet     |gyaë         |yafoo         |yaië          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Rain      |osoorăba     |yankoom       |bwārie        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Rat       |quissie      |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Red       |memmia       |betcheä       |okooquaw      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Ring      |inkaä        |              |apateä        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |River     |bāk          |              |oboom         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Rob       |odomādi      |              |odoiyā        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Round     |kandinginnŭma|              |koorookooddie |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Run       |gwan         |              |serrie        |as ‘_quick_,’
 |          |             |              |              |B. sirr, run,
 |          |             |              |              |Arabic.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Salt      |inkkim       |              |imfoorie      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sand      |aghweä       |              |issay         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Say       |assie        |ass           |aberrie       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sea       |eppoo        |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |See       |aweeh        |              |akayh         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sell      |tum          |              |fah           |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Send      |wahsmum      |              |ocheow        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Shake     |wosoo        |              |ediddie       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Shell     |oorabba      |              |owoora        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Short     |takoteä      |tchaba        |akoteä        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Shut      |toom         |              |toroo         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sick      |yirrie       |yarrie        |mimmielal     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Silver    |gwettay      |              |odume         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sing      |enyoom       |              |ennum         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sister    |akirrawa     |akirrăba      |moofwa        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sit       |tinnahoe     |kooaugh       |tchinna       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sleep     |waughda      |              |oädie         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Smell     |gwooa        |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Smoke     |wishshue     |              |djessie       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Soft      |mirrou       |              |omooqua       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Son       |ebba         |              |ebee          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sorry     |oimiyow      |              |boomega       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Speak     |akas         |              |osasin        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Stand     |ginnaoh      |ginnah        |yerrie        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Steal     |wawwoo       |weyweädie     |oëwee         |windega, Kum.
 |          |             |              |              |wintanga,
 |          |             |              |              |Dag. lana,
 |          |             |              |              |Mallowa.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Strong    |waginna      |ohwidein      |oshoneyöo     |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sun       |ayowea       |              |oöe           |As an
 |          |             |              |              |exclamation
 |          |             |              |              |of wonder.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Swear     |shua         |              |              |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Sweet     |oiaday       |oiadow        |obooding      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Swim      |abhoorh      |              |abboor        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Soil      |afoonna      |              |affung        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Tail      |dooah        |              |odoo          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Take      |afwa         |              |maytah        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Tell      |abim         |              |aiyow         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Thief     |krumfoe      |aiwee         |ohwie         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Throat    |komen        |              |ekoonnie      |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Throw     |too          |              |ohtoo         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Tie       |tittieh      |kikhieh       |keay          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |To-morrow |otchinna     |akinna        |otchay        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Tongue    |takramma     |              |dannoo        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Tooth     |essie        |              |engyie        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Touch     |kah          |              |tah           |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Town      |croom        |              |eban          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Tree      |dooa         |              |assah         |dawgo, Kums.
 |          |             |              |              |dawro, Dagw.
 |          |             |              |              |rahoo, Mosee.
 |          |             |              |              |ittachee,
 |          |             |              |              |Mall. chee,
 |          |             |              |              |Embom.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |True      |umpa         |              |kerram        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Turn      |dahen        |              |darie         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Twenty    |eddooän      |              |edooh         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Wake      |wyen         |              |otinnie       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |[165]Walk |nanchoo      |              |narree        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Warm      |oyahue       |              |obiguh        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Wash      |gwarr        |              |orrohooroo    |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Water     |inshoo       |insoo         |inta          |kome, Kumsal.
 |          |             |              |              |looa,
 |          |             |              |              |Mallowa.
 |          |             |              |              |quom, Mosee.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Weep      |oroosoo      |oroosoo       |oreesh        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |White     |foofoo       |              |intoofoofoorie|Intiffa, a
 |          |             |              |              |proper name.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Wife      |ayerh        |              |mekkah        |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Wild      |wadoohem     |wadoohem      |dooafay       |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Wind      |ooframma     |              |affoo         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Wing      |ataban       |              |ittay         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Woman     |bisea        |              |tchee         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Work      |adjooma      |              |orilaloo      |adawwah, Ku.
 |          |             |              |              |matah, Mallow.
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Year      |affrieyay    |              |otee          |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Yes       |yeö          |              |matee         |
 |          |             |              |              |
 |Yesterday |endodra      |ennida        |indeay        |


              * * * * *
  London: Printed by W. Bulmer and Co.
     Cleveland-row, St. James’s.


[Footnote 159: _Inkran_, an _ant_, is the native name of the country
Europeans call _Accra_, which name was probably given by the Portuguese
to their settlement there (the earliest they made according to the
traditions of the natives) to commemorate the voyage of Hanno; Accra
being one of the five cities raised by him between the Soloe Promontory,
or Cape Bojador, and the River Lixus or Ouro.]

[Footnote 160: This word approximates to _ogha_, _ogiah_, and _egah_,
the words for _fire_ in the Booroom, Ashantee, and Fantee: but all the
other Adampë words I have ever heard, cannot be assimilated to those
which denote the same objects in any other African language.]

[Footnote 161: Where there is no word in the Fantee column, it is the
same as the Ashantee.]

[Footnote 162: I have before stated (Superstitions, p. 270.) that
_aggry_ is a generic name, probably exotic, of the derivation of which
the Negroes are wholly ignorant. It is remarkable that the Boorooms call
these beads _sikka koonkoorie_, and never use the common word for _bead_
(aboroo,) when they speak of them: this name imports their value
(_sikka_ being _gold_) and one would fancy something connected with
their locality, _Koonkoorie_ being a range of hills seven days northward
of Kong, (see p. 182.) but I never could obtain the least explanation on
this subject from the natives.]

[Footnote 163: They distinguish different times of the day, thus

  Morning, or before 12.    napa.

  Mid-day, or 12.           aweeabillee    aweeabil    emfass.

  Afternoon, 4.             ingubee                    noobwawss.

  Evening, 6.               adiasa         adjasa      eybeen.

  Night                     noofa                      aniaberra.
]

[Footnote 164: This reminds me that I ought to have noticed, in the
Superstitions of Ashantee, that they believe the devil to be a wandering
evil spirit, occasionally entering into a human being, immediately to be
destroyed for the safety of mankind.]

[Footnote 165: It is curious that in both these radically distinct
languages, the verb _walk_ should assimilate so closely to the noun
_cow_.]




Transcriber's note:


  The changes in the ERRATA regarding the text have been made.

  Inconsistent chapter numbering between Contents and Part I of the text
  has been left as is.

  pg 19, Changed: "place 1° 46′ 30′ W. and" to: "30″"

  pg 22, Changed: "The courses N. ½ N. N. W. ¼ N. b W. ⅛." to: "N.½,
  N.N.W.¼, N.bW.⅛."

  pg 23, Changed: "the courses N. ⅓ N. b W. ⅕." to: "N.⅓, N.bW.⅕."

  pg 36, Changed: "their long Danish mukets" to: "muskets"

  pg 40, Changed: "minors, or young caboceeers" to: "caboceers"

  pg 45, Changed: "and again,) “that he thanked" to: "and again,) that
  he thanked"

  pg 49, Changed: "my captains. “The Dutch" to: "my captains. The Dutch"

  pg 63, Changed: "an ouline of the Fantee war" to: "outline"

  pg 94, Changed: "inauspicious circumstance has been unvoidable" to:
  "unavoidable"

  pg 98, Added ” after: "he will do you good:"

  pg 108, Changed: "I sent a cane to Adooçee" to: "Adocee"

  pg 110, Changed: "promised that I shoul hear from him" to: "should"

  pg 132, Changed: "into every trivial occurrrence" to: "occurrence"

  pg 145, Changed: "have more to-morrow ”" to: "have more to-morrow;”"

  pg 151, Changed: "I had exeprienced whilst" to: "experienced"

  pg 196, footnote 37, Added “ before "The Chaymas"

  pg 204, footnote 47, Changed: "of Arabs) “Wadie." to: "of Arabs)
  Wadie."

  pg 253, Changed: "exercising his judical authority" to: "judicial"

  pg 256, Changed: "accused against arbitary judgment" to: "arbitrary"

  pg 268 (270), footnote 83, Changed: "inlaid, at it were, in the body"
  to: "as it were"

  pg 268 (271), footnote 83, Added ” after "ignorant of their origin."

  pg 279, Changed: "the tribatary chiefs who pay but" to: "tributary"

  pg 288, Changed: "discharge of muketry, proportionate" to: "musketry"

  pg 322, Changed: "with 1000 mukets you could not" to: "muskets"

  pg 333, Changed: "as a corrective to the unplatable" to: "unpalatable"

  pg 345 (346), footnote 112, Changed: "we are asily mistaken" to:
  "easily"

  pg 348, footnote 113, Added “ at the start.

  pg 352, Changed: "corsespond exactly in meaning" to: "correspond"

  pg 419, Changed: "wow!” “death! “death" to: "wow!” “death! death"

  pg 433, footnote 132, Changed: "spoke to agreeing tha after" to:
  "that"

  pg 451, Changed: "and phrenzy of the perfomer" to: "performer"

  pg 469, Changed: "clompletely blockaded on the land-side" to:
  "completely"

  pg 473, Changed: "bring future good conse-sequences" to:
  "consequences"

  pg 479, footnote 149, Changed: "or ship, “adding, that" to: "or ship,
  adding, that"

  pg 479-480, The footnote 152 referred to in the text is missing.

  pg 484, footnote 157, Changed: "had the advanage of correcting" to:
  "advantage"

  pg 487, Changed: "Shagho — شَيْعُ" to: "شَيْغُ"

  pg 487, Changed: "Rakka — رَافَا" to: "رَاقَا"

  pg 491, Changed: "Yajoury (doubtlels Yawoorie)" to: "doubtless"

  pg 492, Changed: "Massir — سصر" to: "مصر"

  Minor changes in punctuation have been done silently.

  Other spelling inconsistencies have been left unchanged.

*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 77375 ***