to him, Mr. Douglas, desired him to put her on board, which he did; the captain's orders were, when any body brought down slaves, instantly to put them off to the ship. When a ship arrives at Bonny, the king sends his war canoes up the rivers, where they surprise all they can lay hold of. They had a young man on board, who was thus captured, with his father, mother, and three sisters. The young man afterwards in Jamaica having learned English, told Mr. Douglas the story, and said it was a common practice. These war canoes are always armed. The king's canoes came with slaves openly in the day; others in the evening, with one or two slaves bound, lying in the boat's bottom, covered with mats.

Mr. Morley states, that in Old Calabar persons are sold as slaves for adultery and theft. On pretence of adultery, he remembers a woman sold. He has been told also by the natives at Calabar, that they took slaves in what they call war, which he found was putting the villages in confusion, and catching them as they could. A man on board the ship he was in, showed how he was taken at night by surprise, and said his wife and children were taken with him, but they were not in the same ship. Mr. Morley had reason to think, from the man's words, that they took nearly the whole village, that is, all those that could not get away.

Captain Hall says, when a ship arrives at Old Calabar, or the river DelRey, the traders always go up into the country for slaves. They go in their war canoes, and take with them some goods, which they get previously from the ships. He has seen from three to ten canoes in a fleet, each with from forty to sixty paddlers, and twenty to thirty traders and other people with muskets, suppose one to each man, with a three or four pounder lashed on the bow of the canoe. They are generally absent from ten days to three weeks, when they return with a number of slaves pinioned, or chained together. Captain Hall has often asked the mode of procuring slaves inland, and has been told by the traders, that they have been got in war, and sold by the persons taking them.

Mr. J. Parker says, he left the ship to which he belonged at Old Calabar, where being kindly received by the king's son, he staid with him on the continent for five months. During this time he was prevailed upon by the king's son, to accompany him to war.* Accordingly, having fitted out and armed the canoes, they went up the river Calabar. In the day time they lay under the bushes when they approached a village, but at night flew up to it, and took hold of every one they could see; these they handcuffed, brought down to the canoes, and so proceeded up the river till they got to the amount of forty-five, with whom they returned to Newtown, where, sending to the captains of the shipping, they divided them among the ships. About a fortnight after this expedition, they went again, and were ont eight or nine days, plundering other

* The reader is requested to take notice, that the word war, as adopted in the African language, means in general robbery, or a marauding expedition, for the purpose of get ting slaves.

villages higher up the river. They seized on much the same number as before, brought them to Newtown, gave the same notice, and disposed of them as before among the ships. They took man, woman and child, as they could catch them in the houses, and except sucking children, who went with their mothers, there was no care taken to prevent the separation of the children from the parents when sold. When sold to the English merchant they lamented, and cried that they were taken away by force. The king at Old Calabar was certainly not at war with the people up this river, nor had they made any attack upon him. It happened that slaves were very slack in the back country at that time, and were wanted when he went on these expeditions.

Mr. Falconbridge thinks crimes are falsely imputed, for the sake of selling the accused. On the second voyage at the river Ambris, among the slaves brought on board was one who had the craw craw, a kind of itch. He was told by one of the sailors, that this man was fishing in the river, when a king's officer, called Mambooka, wanted brandy and other goods in the boat, but having no slave to buy them with, accused this man of extortion in the sale of his fish, and after some kind of trial on the beach, condemned him to be sold. He was told by the boat's crew who were ashore, when it happened, who told it as of their own knowledge.

Beside the accounts just given, from what the above witnesses saw and heard on the coast of Africa, as to the different methods of making slaves, there are others contained in the evidence, which were learned from the mouths of the slaves themselves, after their arrival in the West Indies.

Dr. Trotter

The Moors, says Mr. Keirnan, have always a strong inducement to go to war with the negroes, most of the European goods they obtain, being got in exchange for slaves. Hence, desolation and waste. Mr. Town observes, that the intercourse of the Africans with the Europeans, has improved them in roguery, to plunder and steal, and pick up one another to sell. asking a black trader, what they made of their slaves when the French and English were at war, was answered, that when ships ceased to come, slaves ceased to be taken. Mr. Isaac Parker says, that the king of Old Calabar was certainly not at war with the people up that river, nor had they made any attack on him. It happened that slaves were very slack in the back country at this time, and were wanted when he went on the expeditions, described in a former page.

Mr. Wadstrom says, the king Barbesin, while he, Mr. Wadstrom, was at Joal, was unwilling to pillage his subjects, but he was excited to it by means of a constant intoxication, kept up by the French and mulattoes of the embassy, who generally agreed every morning on taking this method to effect their purpose. When sober, he always expressed a reluctance to harrass his people. Mr. Wadstrom also heard the king hold the same language on different days, and yet he afterwards ordered the pillage to be executed. Mr. Wadstrom has no doubt, but that he also pillages in other parts of his dominions, since it is the custom of the mulatto merchants (as both they and the French officers declare) when they want slaves, to go to the kings, and excite them to pillages

which are usually practiced on all that part of the coast.

The French Sene

gal company, also, in order to obtain their complement of slaves, had recourse to their usual method on similar occasions, namely, of bribing the Moors, and supplying them with arms and ammunition, to seize king Dalmammy's subjects. By January 12th, 1788, when Mr. Wadstrom arrived at Senegal, fifty had been taken, whom the king desired to ransom, but they had all been dispatched to Cayenne. Some were brought in every day afterwards, and put in the company's slave-hold, in a miserable state, the greater part being badly wounded by sabres and musket balls. The director of the company conducted Mr. Wadstrom there, with Dr. Spaarman, whom he consulted as a medical man in their behalf. Mr. Wadstrom particularly remembers one lying in his blood, which flowed from a wound made by a ball in his shoulder.

Mr. Dalrymple understood it common for European traders to advance goods to chiefs, to induce them to seize their subjects or neighbors. Not one of the mulatto traders at Goree ever thought of denying it.

Mr. Bowman having settled at the head of Scassus river, informed the king, and others, that he was come to reside as a trader, and that his orders were, to supply them with powder and ball, and encourage them to go to war. They answered, they would go to war in two or three days. By this time they came to the factory, said they were going to war, and wanted powder, ball, rum and tobacco. When these were given them, they went off to the number of from twenty-five to thirty, and in six or seven days, a part of them returned with three slaves.

In 1769, (says Lieut. Storey,) Captain Paterson, of a Liverpool ship, lying off Bristol town, set two villages at variance, and bought prisoners, near a dozen, from both sides.

Mr. Morley owns, with shame, that he has made the natives drunk, in order to buy a good man or woman slave, to whom he found them attached. He has seen this done by others. Captain Hildebrand, commanding a sloop of Mr. Brue's, bought one of the wives of a man, whom he had previously made drunk, and who wished to redeem her, when sober next day, as did the person he (Mr. Morley) bought the man of, but neither of them was given up. He supposes they would have given a third more than the price paid, to have redeemed them.

Sir George Young says, that when at Annamaboe, at Mr. Brue's, (a very great merchant there,) Mr. Brue had two hostages, kings' sons, for payment for arms, and all kinds of military stores, which he had supplied to the two kings, who were at war with each other, to procure slaves for at least six or seven ships, then lying in the road. The prisoners on both sides were brought down to Mr. Brue, and sent to the ships.

Mr. J. Parker has known presents made by the captains, to the black traders, to induce them to bring slaves. Captain Colley in particular gave them some pieces of cannon, which he himself saw landed.

On the subject of Europeans attempting to carry off the natives, General Rooke says that it was proposed to him by three captains of English slave

He said this mode of kidnapping was common in his country. In the same voyage, two black traders came in a canoe, and stated that there was trade a little lower down. The captain went there, and finding no trade, said he would not be made a fool, and therefore detained one of the canoe-men. In about two hours afterwards a very fine man was brought on board, and sold, and the canoe-man was released. He was informed by the black pilot, that this man had been surrounded and seized on the beach, from whence he had been brought to the ship and sold.

If a

Lieutenant Simpson says, from what he saw, he believes the slave trade is the occasion of wars among the natives. From the natives of the Windward Coast he understood that the villages were always at war; and the black traders and others gave as a reason for it, that the kings wanted slaves. trading canoe, alongside Mr. Simpson's ship, saw a larger canoe coming from a village they were at war with, they instantly fled; and sometimes without receiving the value of their goods. On inquiry, he learned their reasons to be, that if taken, they would have been made slaves.

Mr. How states, that when at Secundee, some order came from Cape Coast Castle. The same afternoon several parties went out armed, and returned the same night with a number of slaves, which were put into the repository of the factory. Next morning he saw people, who came to see the captives, and to request Mr. Marsh, the resident, to release some of their children and relations. Some were released and part sent off to Cape Coast Castle. He had every reason to believe they had been obtained unfairly, as they came at an unseasonable time of the night, and from their parents and friends crying and begging their release. He was told as much from Mr. Marsh himself, who said, he did not mind how they got them, for he purchased them fairly. He cannot tell whether this practice subsisted before; but when he has gone into the woods he has met thirty or forty natives, who fled always at his appearance, although they were armed. Mr. Marsh said, they were afraid of his taking them prisoners.

The same Mr. Marsh made no scruple also of shewing him the stores of the factory. They consisted of different kinds of chains made of iron, as likewise an instrument made of wood, about five inches long, of an inch in diameter, or less, which he was told by Mr. Marsh was thrust into a man's mouth horizontally, and tied behind to prevent him from crying out, when transported at night along the country.

Dr. Trotter says, that the natives of these parts are sometimes slaves from crimes, but the greater part of the slaves are what are called prisoners of war. Of his whole cargo he recollects only three criminals: two sold for adultery, and one for witchcraft, whose whole family shared his fate. One of the first said he had been decoyed by a woman who had told her husband, and he was sentenced to pay a slave; but being poor, was sold himself. Such stratagems are frequent the fourth mate of Dr. Trotter's ship was so decoyed, and obliged to pay a slave, under the threat of stopping trade. The last said he had had

a quarrel with a Cabosheer (or great man) who in revenge accused him of witchcraft, and sold him and his family for slaves.

Dr. Trotter having often asked Accra, a principal trader at Le Hou, what he meant by prisoners of war, found they were such as were carried off by a set of marauders, who ravage the country for that purpose. The bush-men making war to make trade (that is to make slaves) was a common way of speaking among the traders. The practice was also confirmed by the slaves on board, who showed by gestures how the robbers had come upon them; ard during their passage from Africa to the West Indies, some of the boy-slaves played a game, which they called slave-taking, or bush-fighting; showing the different manœuvres thereof in leaping, sallying, and retreating. Inquiries of this nature put to women, were answered only by violent bursts of sorrow. He once saw a black trader send his canoe to take three fishermen employed in the offing, who were immediately brought on board, and put in irons, and about a week afterwards he was paid for them. He remembers another man taken in the same way from on board a canoe alongside. The same trader very frequently sent slaves on board in the night, which, from their own information, he found were every one of them taken in the neighborhood of Annamaboe. He remarked, that slaves sent off in the night, were not paid for till they had been some time on board, lest, he thinks, they should be claimed; for some were really restored, one in particular, a boy, was carried on shore by some near relations, which boy told him he had lived in the neighborhood of Annamaboe, and was kidnapped. There were many boys and girls on board Dr. Trotter's ship, who had no relations on board. Many of them told him they had been kidnapped in the neighborhood of Annamaboe, particularly a girl of about eight years old, who said she had been carried off from her mother by the man who sold her to the ship.

Mr. Falconbridge was assured by the Rev. Philip Quakoo, chaplain at Cape Coast Castle, on the Gold Coast, that the greatest number of slaves were made by kidnapping. He has heard that the men on this part of the coast, dress up and employ women, to entice young men, that they may be convicted of adultery and sold.

Lieutenant Simpson heard at Cape Coast Castle, and other parts of the Gold Coast, repeatedly from the black traders, that the slave trade made wars and palavers. Mr. Quakoo, chaplain at Cape Coast Castle, informed him that wars were made in the interior parts, for the sole purpose of getting slaves. There are two crimes on the Gold Coast, which seem made on purpose to procure slaves: adultery and the removal of fetiches.* As to adultery, he was warned against any woman not pointed out to him, for that the kings kept several who were sent out to allure the unwary. As to fetiches, consisting of pieces of wood, old pitchers, kettles, and the like, laid in the path-ways, he was warned to avoid displacing them, for if he should, the natives who were

* Certain things of various sorts, to which the superstition of the country has ordered, for various reasons, an attention to be paid.