Captain Canot Part 29

Du Jean was nothing loth to commence his tender manipulation of the charming head, whose wicked mouth and teasing eyes shot glances of defiance at me. Several organs were disclosed and explained to the company; but then came others which he ventured to whisper in her ears alone, and, as he did so, I noticed that his mouth was pressed rather deeper than I thought needful among the folds of her heavy locks. I took the liberty to hint rather jestingly that the doctor "_cut quite too deep_ with his lips;" but the coquette at once saw my annoyance, and persisted with malicious delight in making Du Jean whisper--heaven knows what--in her ear. In fact, she insisted that some of the organs should be repeated to her three or four times over, while, at each rehearsal, the doctor grew bolder in his dives among the curls, and the lady louder and redder in her merriment.

At last, propriety required that the scene should be closed, and no one knew better than this arch coquette the precise limit of decency's bounds. Next came the lawyer's cranium; then followed the horse-jockey and tavern-keeper; and finally, it was _my_ turn to take the stool.

I made every objection I could think of against submitting to inspection, for I was sure the surgeon had wit enough not to lose so good a chance of quizzing or ridiculing me; but a whispered word from Madame forced an a.s.sent, with the stipulation that Du Jean should allow _me_ to examine his skull afterwards, pretending that if he had studied with Spurzheim, I had learned the science from Gall.

The doctor accepted the terms and began his lecture. First of all my Jealousy was enormous, and only equalled by my Conceit and Envy. I was altogether dest.i.tute of Love, Friendship, or the Moral sentiments. I was an immoderate wine-bibber; extremely avaricious; pa.s.sionate, revengeful, and blood-thirsty; in fine, I was a monstrous conglomerate of every thing devilish and dreadful. The first two or three essays of the doctor amused the company and brought down a round of laughter; but as he grew coa.r.s.er and coa.r.s.er, I saw the increasing disgust of our comrades by their silence, though I preserved my temper most admirably till he was done. Then I rose slowly from the seat, and pointing the doctor silently to the vacant chair,--for I could not speak with rage,--I took my stand immediately in front of him, gazing intently into his eyes. The company gathered eagerly round, expecting I would retaliate wittily, or pay him back in his coin of abuse.

After a minute's pause I regained my power of speech, and inquired whether the phrenologist was ready. He replied affirmatively; whereupon my right hand discovered the b.u.mp of impudence with a tremendous slap on his left cheek, while my left hand detected the organ of blackguardism with equal prominence on his right!

It was natural that this new mode of scientific investigation was as novel and surprising as it was disagreeable to poor Du Jean; for, in an instant, we were exchanging blows with intense zeal, and would probably have borrowed a couple of graves from the cholera, had not the boarders interfered. All hands, however, were unanimous in my favor, a.s.serting that Du Jean had provoked me beyond endurance; and, as _la belle Duprez_ joined heartily in the verdict, the doctor gave up the contest, and, ever after, "cut" the lady.

CHAPTER LI.

In the first lull of the pestilence, the French merchantman was despatched from Ma.r.s.eilles, and, in twenty-seven days, I had the pleasure to shake hands with the generous friends, who, two years before, labored so hard for my escape. The colonial government soon got wind of my presence notwithstanding my disguise, and warning me from Goree, cut short the joys of an African welcome.

I reached Sierra Leone in time to witness the arbitrary proceeding of the British government towards Spanish traders and coasters, by virtue of the treaty for the suppression of the slave-trade. _Six months_ after this compact was signed and ratified in London and Madrid, it was made known with the proverbial despatch of Spain, in the Islands of Cuba and Porto Rico. Its stipulations were such as to allow very considerable lat.i.tude of judgment in captures; and when prizes were once within the grasp of the British lion, that amiable animal was neither prompt to release nor anxious to acquit. Accordingly, when I reached Sierra Leone, I beheld at anchor under government guns, some thirty or forty vessels seized by cruisers, several of which I have reason to believe were captured in the "Middle Pa.s.sage," bound from Havana to Spain, but entirely free from the taint or design of slavery.

I was not so inquisitive or patriotic in regard to treaty rights and violations, as to dally from mere curiosity in Sierra Leone. My chief object was employment. At twenty-eight, after trials, hazards, and chances enough to have won half a dozen fortunes, I was utterly penniless. The Mongo of Kambia,--the Mahometan convert of Ahmah-de-Bellah,--the pet of the Ali-Mami of Footha-Yallon,--the leader of slave caravans,--the owner of barrac.o.o.ns,--and the bold master of clippers that defied the British flag, was reduced to the humble situation of coast-pilot and interpreter on board an American brig bound to the celebrated slave mart of Gallinas! We reached our destination safely; but I doubt exceedingly whether the "Reaper's"

captain knows to this day that his brig was guided by a marine adventurer, who knew nothing of the coast or port save the little he gleaned in half a dozen chats with a Spaniard, who was familiar with this notorious resort and its surroundings.

In the history of African servitude, no theatre of Spanish, Portuguese, British, or American action has been the scene of more touching, tragic, and _profitable_ incidents than the one to which fortune had now directed my feet.

Before the generous heart and far-seeing mind of America perceived _in Colonization_, the true secret of Africa's hope, the whole of its coast, from the Rio Gambia to Cape Palmas, without a break except at Sierra Leone, was the secure haunt of daring slavers. The first impression on this lawless disposal of full fifteen hundred miles of beach and continent, was made by the bold establishment of Liberia; and, little by little has its power extended, until treaty, purchase, negotiation, and influence, drove the trade from the entire region.

After the firm establishment of this colony, the slave-trade on the windward coast, north and west of Cape Palmas, was mainly confined to Portuguese settlements at Bissaos, on the Rios Grande, Nunez, and Pongo, at Grand and Little Ba.s.sa, New Sestros and Trade-town; but the lordly establishment at Gallinas was the heart of the slave marts, to which, in fact, Cape Mesurado was only second in importance.

Our concern is now with Gallinas. Nearly one hundred miles north-west of Monrovia, a short and sluggish river, hearing this well-known name, oozes lazily into the Atlantic; and, carrying down in the rainy season a rich alluvion from the interior, sinks the deposit where the tide meets the Atlantic, and forms an interminable mesh of spongy islands.

To one who approaches from sea, they loom up from its surface, covered with reeds and mangroves, like an immense field of _fungi_, betokening the damp and dismal field which death and slavery have selected for their grand metropolis. A spot like this, possessed, of course, no peculiar advantages for agriculture or commerce; but its dangerous bar, and its extreme desolation, fitted it for the haunt of the outlaw and slaver.

Such, in all likelihood, were the reasons that induced Don Pedro Blanco, a well-educated mariner from Malaga, to select Gallinas as the field of his operations. Don Pedro visited this place originally in command of a slaver; but failing to complete his cargo, sent his vessel back with one hundred negroes, whose value was barely sufficient to pay the mates and crew. Blanco, however, remained on the coast with a portion of the Conquistador's cargo, and, on its basis, began a trade with the natives and slaver-captains, till, four years after, he remitted his owners the product of their merchandise, and began to flourish on his own account. The honest return of an investment long given over as lost, was perhaps the most active stimulant of his success, and for many years he monopolized the traffic of the Vey country, reaping enormous profits from his enterprise.

Gallinas was not in its prime when I came thither, yet enough of its ancient power and influence remained to show the comprehensive mind of Pedro Blanco. As I entered the river, and wound along through the labyrinth of islands, I was struck, first of all, with the vigilance that made this Spaniard stud the field with look-out seats, protected from sun and rain, erected some seventy-five or hundred feet above the ground, either on poles or on isolated trees, from which the horizon was constantly swept by telescopes, to announce the approach of cruisers or slavers. These telegraphic operators were the keenest men on the islands, who were never at fault, in discriminating between friend and foe. About a mile from the river's mouth we found a group of islets, on each of which was erected the factory of some particular slave-merchant belonging to the grand confederacy.

Blanco's establishments were on several of these marshy flats. On one, near the mouth, he had his place of business or trade with foreign vessels, presided over by his princ.i.p.al clerk, an astute and clever gentleman. On another island, more remote, was his residence, where the only white person was a sister, who, for a while, shared with Don Pedro his solitary and penitential domain. Here this man of education and refined address surrounded himself with every luxury that could be purchased in Europe or the Indies, and dwelt in a sort of oriental but semi-barbarous splendor, that suited an African prince rather than a Spanish grandee. Further inland was another islet, devoted to his seraglio, within whose recesses each of his favorites inhabited her separate establishment, after the fashion of the natives. Independent of all these were other islands, devoted to the barrac.o.o.ns or slave-prisons, ten or twelve of which contained from one hundred to five hundred slaves in each. These barrac.o.o.ns were made of rough staves or poles of the hardest trees, four or six inches in diameter, driven five feet in the ground, and clamped together by double rows of iron bars. Their roofs were constructed of similar wood, strongly secured, and overlaid with a thick thatch of long and wiry gra.s.s, rendering the interior both dry and cool. At the ends, watch-houses--built near the entrance--were tenanted by sentinels, with loaded muskets. Each barrac.o.o.n was tended by two or four Spaniards or Portuguese; but I have rarely met a more wretched cla.s.s of human beings, upon whom fever and dropsy seemed to have emptied their vials.

Such were the surroundings of Don Pedro in 1836, when I first saw his slender figure, swarthy face, and received the graceful welcome, which I hardly expected from one who had pa.s.sed fifteen years without crossing the bar of Gallinas! Three years after this interview, he left the coast for ever, with a fortune of near a million. For a while, he dwelt in Havana, engaged in commerce; but I understood that family difficulties induced him to retire altogether from trade; so that, if still alive, he is probably a resident of "Geneva la Superba," whither he went from the island of Cuba.

The power of this man among the natives is well-known; it far exceeded that of Cha-cha, of whom I have already spoken. Resolved as he was to be successful in traffic, he left no means untried, with blacks as well as whites, to secure prosperity. I have often been asked what was the character of a mind which could voluntarily isolate itself for near a lifetime amid the pestilential swamps of a burning climate, trafficking in human flesh, exciting wars, bribing and corrupting ignorant negroes; totally without society, amus.e.m.e.nt, excitement, or change; living, from year to year, the same dull round of seasons and faces; without companionship, save that of men at war with law; cut loose from all ties except those which avarice formed among European outcasts who were willing to become satellites to such a luminary as Don Pedro? I have always replied to the question, that this African enigma puzzled _me_ as well as those orderly and systematic persons, who would naturally be more shocked at the tastes and prolonged career of a resident slave-factor in the marshes of Gallinas.

I heard many tales on the coast of Blanco's cruelty, but I doubt them quite as much as I do the stories of his pride and arrogance. I have heard it said that he shot a sailor for daring to ask him for permission to light his cigar at the _puro_ of the Don. Upon another occasion, it is said that he was travelling the beach some distance from Gallinas, near the island of Sherbro, where he was unknown, when he approached a native hut for rest and refreshment. The owner was squatted at the door, and, on being requested by Don Pedro to hand him fire to light his cigar, deliberately refused. In an instant Blanco drew back, seized a carabine from one of his attendants, and slew the negro on the spot. It is true that the narrator apologized for Don Pedro, by saying, that to deny a Castilian _fire for his tobacco_ was the gravest insult that can be offered him; yet, from my knowledge of the person in question, I cannot believe that he carried etiquette to so frightful a pitch, even among a cla.s.s whose lives are considered of trifling value _except in market_. On several occasions, during our subsequent intimacy, I knew him to chastise with rods, even to the brink of death, servants who ventured to infringe the sacred limits of his _seraglio_. But, on the other hand, his generosity was proverbially ostentatious, not only among the natives, whom it was his interest to suborn, but to the whites who were in his employ, or needed his kindly succor. I have already alluded to his mental culture, which was decidedly _soigne_ for a Spaniard of his original grade and time. His memory was remarkable. I remember one night, while several of his _employes_ were striving unsuccessfully to repeat the Lord's prayer in Latin, upon which they had made a bet, that Don Pedro joined the party, and taking up the wager, went through the pet.i.tion without faltering. It was, indeed, a sad parody on prayer to hear its blessed accents fall perfectly from such lips on a bet; but when it was won, the slaver insisted on receiving _the slave which was the stake_, and immediately bestowed him in charity on a captain, who had fallen into the clutches of a British cruiser!

Such is a rude sketch of the great man merchant of Africa, the Rothschild of slavery, whose bills on England, France, or the United States, were as good as gold in Sierra Leone and Monrovia!

CHAPTER LII.

The day after our arrival within the realm of this great spider,--who, throned in the centre of his mesh, was able to catch almost every fly that flew athwart the web,--I landed at one of the minor factories, and sold a thousand quarter-kegs of powder to Don Jose Ramon. But, next day, when I proceeded in my capacity of interpreter to the establishment of Don Pedro, I found his Castilian plumage ruffled, and, though we were received with formal politeness, he declined to purchase, because we had failed to address _him_ in advance of any other factor on the river.

The folks at Sierra Leone dwelt so tenderly on the generous side of Blanco's character, that I was still not without hope that I might induce him to purchase a good deal of our rum and tobacco, which would be drugs on our hands unless he consented to relieve us. I did not think it altogether wrong, therefore, to concoct a little _ruse_ whereby I hoped to touch the pocket through the breast of the Don. In fact, I addressed him a note, in which I truly related my recent mishaps, adventures, and imprisonments; but I concluded the narrative with a hope that he would succor one so dest.i.tute and unhappy, by allowing him to win an honest _commission_ allowed by the American captain on any sales I could effect. The bait took; a prompt, laconic answer returned; I was bidden to come ash.o.r.e with the invoice of our cargo; and, _for my sake_, Don Pedro purchased from the Yankee brig $5000 worth of rum and tobacco, all of which was paid by drafts on London, _of which slaves were, of course, the original basis_! My imaginary commissions, however, remained in the purse of the owners.

An accident occurred in landing our merchandise, which will serve to ill.u.s.trate the character of Blanco. While the hogsheads of tobacco were discharging, our second mate, who suffered from _strabismus_ more painfully than almost any cross-eyed man I ever saw, became excessively provoked with one of the native boatmen who had been employed in the service. It is probable that the negro was insolent, which the mate thought proper to chastise by throwing staves at the Krooman's head. The negro fled, seeking refuge on the other side of his canoe; but the enraged officer continued the pursuit, and, in his double-sighted blundering, ran against an oar which the persecuted black suddenly lifted in self-defence. I know not whether it was rage or blindness, or both combined, that prevented the American from seeing the blade, but on he dashed, rushing impetuously against the implement, severing his lip with a frightful gash, and knocking four teeth from his upper jaw.

Of course, the luckless negro instantly fled to "the bush;" and, that night, in the agony of delirium, caused by fever and dreaded deformity, the mate terminated his existence by laudanum.

The African law condemns the man who _draws blood_ to a severe fine in slaves, proportioned to the harm that may have been inflicted.

Accordingly, the culprit Krooman, innocent as he was of premeditated evil, now lay heavily loaded with irons in Don Pedro's barrac.o.o.n, awaiting the sentence which the whites in his service already declared _should be death_. "He struck a white!" they said, and the wound he inflicted was reported to have caused that white man's ruin. But, luckily, before the sentence was executed, _I_ came ash.o.r.e, and, as the transaction occurred in my presence, I ventured to appeal from the verdict of public opinion to Don Pedro, with the hope that I might exculpate the Krooman. My simple and truthful story was sufficient.

An order was instantly given for the black's release, and, in spite of native chiefs and grumbling whites, who were savagely greedy for the fellow's blood, Don Pedro persisted in his judgment and sent him back on board the "Reaper."

The character manifested by Blanco on this occasion, and the admirable management of his factory, induced me to seize a favorable moment to offer my services to the mighty trader. They were promptly accepted, and in a short time I was employed as _princ.i.p.al_ in one of Don Pedro's branches.

The Vey natives on this river and its neighborhood were not numerous before the establishment of Spanish factories, but since 1813, the epoch of the arrival of several Cuban vessels with rich, merchandise, the neighboring tribes flocked to the swampy flats, and as there was much similarity in the language and habits of the natives and emigrants, they soon intermarried and mingled in ownership of the soil.

In proportion as these upstarts were educated in slave-trade under the influence of opulent factors, they greedily acquired the habit of hunting their own kind and abandoned all other occupations but war and kidnapping. As the country was prolific and the trade profitable, the thousands and tens of thousands annually sent abroad from Gallinas, soon began to exhaust the neighborhood; but the appet.i.te for plunder was neither satiated nor stopped by distance, when it became necessary for the neighboring natives to extend their forays and hunts far into the interior. In a few years war raged wherever the influence of this river extended. The slave factories supplied the huntsmen with powder, weapons, and enticing merchandise, so that they fearlessly advanced against ignorant mult.i.tudes, who, too silly to comprehend the benefit of alliance, fought the aggressors singly, and, of course, became their prey.

Still, however, the demand increased. Don Pedro and his satellites had struck a vein richer than the gold coast. His flush barrac.o.o.ns became proverbial throughout the Spanish and Portuguese colonies, and his look-outs were ceaseless in their signals of approaching vessels. New factories were established, as branches, north and south of the parent den. Mana Rock, Sherbro, Sugarei, Cape Mount, Little Cape Mount, and even Digby, at the door of Monrovia, all had depots and barrac.o.o.ns of slaves belonging to the whites of Gallinas.

But this prosperity did not endure. The torch of discord, in a civil war which was designed for revengeful murder rather than slavery, was kindled by a black Paris, who had deprived his uncle of an Ethiopian Helen. Every bush and hamlet contained its Achilles and Ulysses, and every town rose to the dignity of a Troy.

The geographical configuration of the country, as I have described it, isolated almost every family of note on various branches of the river, so that nearly all were enabled to fortify themselves within their islands or marshy flats. The princ.i.p.al parties in this family feud were the Amarars and Shiakars. Amarar was a native of Shebar, and, through several generations, had Mandingo blood in his veins;--Shiakar, born on the river, considered himself a n.o.ble of the land, and being aggressor in this conflict, disputed his prize with the wildest ferocity of a savage. The whites, who are ever on the watch for native quarrels, wisely refrained from partisanship with either of the combatants, but continued to purchase the prisoners brought to their factories by both parties. Many a vessel bore across the Atlantic two inveterate enemies shackled to the same bolt, while others met on the same deck a long-lost child or brother who had been captured in the civil war.

I might fill a volume with the narrative of this horrid conflict before it was terminated by the death of Amarar. For several months this savage had been blockaded in his stockade by Shiakar's warriors.

At length a sortie became indispensable to obtain provisions, but the enemy were too numerous to justify the risk. Upon this, Amarar called his soothsayer, and required him to name a propitious moment for the sally. The oracle retired to his den, and, after suitable incantations, declared that the effort should be made as soon as the hands of Amarar were stained in the blood of his own son. It is said that the prophet intended the victim to be a youthful son of Amarar, who had joined his mother's family, and was then distant; but the impatient and superst.i.tious savage, seeing a child of his own, two years old, at hand, when the oracle announced the decree, s.n.a.t.c.hed the infant from his mother's arms, threw it into a rice mortar, and, with a pestle, mashed it to death!

The sacrifice over, a sortie was ordered. The infuriate and starving savages, roused by the oracle and inflamed by the b.l.o.o.d.y scene, rushed forth tumultuously. Amarar, armed with the pestle, still warm and reeking with his infant's blood, was foremost in the onset. The besiegers gave way and fled; the town was re-provisioned; the fortifications of the enemy demolished, and the soothsayer rewarded with a slave for his barbarous prediction!

At another time, Amarar was on the point of attacking a strongly fortified town, when doubts were intimated of success. Again the wizard was consulted, when the mysterious oracle declared that the chief "_could not conquer till he returned once more to his mother's womb_!" That night Amarar committed the blackest of incests; but his party was repulsed, and the false prophet stoned to death!

These are faint incidents of a savage drama which lasted several years, until Amarar, in his native town, became the prisoner of Shiakar's soldiery. Mana, his captor, caused him to be decapitated; and while the blood still streamed from the severed neck, the monster's head was thrust into the fresh-torn bowels of his mother!

CHAPTER LIII.

The first expedition upon which Don Pedro Blanco despatched me revealed a new phase of Africa to my astonished eyes. I was sent in a small Portuguese schooner to Liberia for tobacco; and here the trader who had never contemplated the negro on the sh.o.r.es of his parent country except as a slave or a catcher of slaves, first beheld the rudiments of an infant state, which in time may become the wedge of Ethiopian civilization. The comfortable government house, neat public warerooms, large emigration home, designed for the accommodation of the houseless; clean and s.p.a.cious streets, with brick stores and dwellings; the twin churches with their bells and comfortable surroundings; the genial welcome from well dressed negroes; the regular wharves and trim craft on the stocks, and last of all, a visit from a colored collector with a _printed_ bill for twelve dollars "anchor dues," all convinced me that there was, in truth, something more in these ebony frames than an article of commerce and labor. I paid the bill eagerly,--considering that a doc.u.ment _printed in Africa by Negroes_, under North American influence, would be a curiosity among the infidels of Gallinas!

My engagements with Blanco had been made on the basis of familiarity with the slave-trade in all its branches, but my independent spirit and impatient temper forbade, from the first, the acceptance of any subordinate position at Gallinas. Accordingly, as soon as I returned from the new Republic, Don Pedro desired me to prepare for the establishment of a branch factory, under my exclusive control, at New Sestros, an independent princ.i.p.ality in the hands of a Ba.s.sa chief.

I lost no time in setting forth on this career of comparative independence, and landed with the trading cargo provided for me, at the Kroomen's town, where I thought it best to dwell till a factory could be built.

An African, as well as a white man, must be drilled into the traffic.

It is one of those things that do not "come by nature:" yet its mysteries are acquired, like the mysteries of commerce generally, with much more facility by some tribes than others. I found this signally ill.u.s.trated by the prince and people of New Sestros, and very soon detected their great inferiority to the Soosoos, Mandingoes, and Veys.

For a time their conduct was so silly, arrogant, and trifling, that I closed my chests and broke off communication. Besides this, the slaves they offered were of an inferior character and held at exorbitant prices. Still, as I was commanded to purchase rapidly, I managed to collect about seventy-five negroes of medium grades, all of whom I designed sending to Gallinas in the schooner that was tugging at her anchor off the beach.