Captain Canot; Or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver
chest, bedding, and arms, aboard, committed my fate to the African
continent. _A half-hour turned and decided my fate!_
Mr. Ormond received me very cordially, and, installing me in my new
secretaryship, promised a private establishment, a seat at his table,
and a negro per month,--or its value at the rate of forty
dollars,--for my services.
When the runners returned from the interior with the slaves required
to complete the Areostatico's cargo, I considered it my duty to the
Italian grocer of Regla to dispatch his vessel personally.
Accordingly, I returned on board to aid in stowing _one hundred and
eight boys and girls, the eldest of whom did not exceed fifteen
years_! As I crawled between decks, I confess I could not imagine how
this little army was to be packed or draw breath in a hold but
_twenty-two inches high_! Yet the experiment was promptly made,
inasmuch as it was necessary to secure them below in descending the
river, in order to prevent their leaping overboard and swimming
ashore. I found it impossible to adjust the whole in a sitting
posture; but we made them lie down in each other's laps, like
_sardines_ in a can, and in this way obtained space for the entire
cargo. Strange to tell, when the Areostatico reached Havana, but
_three_ of these "passengers" had paid the debt of nature.
As I left the schooner a few miles outside the bar, I crossed her side
without an adieu save for the English cabin-boy, whose fate I was
pained to intrust to these stupid Spaniards. Indeed, the youth almost
belonged to me, for I may say he owed his life to my interference.
Previous to the voyage, while waiting in the harbor of Havana for a
crew, our vessel was anchored near the wharves, next to an English
merchantman. One afternoon I heard a scream from the neighboring
craft, and perceived a boy rush from the cabin with his face dyed in
blood. He was instantly pursued by a burly seaman, inflicting blows
with his fist. I implored the brute to desist, but my interference
seemed to augment his choler to such a degree, that he seized a
handspike to knock the stripling down. Upon this I called the child to
leap overboard, at the same time commanding a hand to lower my boat
and scull in the direction of his fall. The boy obeyed my voice; and
in a few minutes I had him on board blessing me for his safety. But
the drunken Briton vented his rage in the most indecent language; and
had his boat been aboard, I doubt not a summary visit would have
terminated in a fight on my deck.
However, as good luck would have it, his skiff was at the landing, so
that there was ample time, before he could reach the Areostatico, to
tie up the bruised face and broken rib of the child, and to conceal
him in the house of a Spanish crone in Havana, who cured the maladies
of credulous seamen by witchcraft!
After nightfall the master of the British vessel came aboard to claim
his boy; but as he was petulant and seemed disposed to carry matters
with a high hand, my temper rose in resistance, and I refused to
release the child until he sealed with an oath his promise to treat
him better in future. But the cruel scoundrel insisted on
_unconditional_ surrender; and to end the controversy, I was compelled
to order him off the schooner.
British pluck of course would not allow a captain to be deprived so
easily of his property, so the British consul was invoked to appeal
to the captain of the port. This personage summoned me before him,
and listened calmly to a story which added no honor to English
mariners. In my last interview with the boy he implored my continued
protection and concealment; so that when the Spanish official
declared--notwithstanding the officer's conduct--that the vessel was
entitled to her crew, and that I must surrender the child, I excused
myself from complying by pleading utter ignorance of his whereabout.
In view of this contingency, I directed the woman to hide him in a
place of which I should be ignorant. So I told no lie, and saved the
boy from his tyrant.
The inquiry was dropped at this stage of proceedings. When the British
vessel sailed a few days after, I caused the youth to be brought from
his concealment; and, with our captain's consent, brought him aboard
to serve in our cabin.
I have narrated this little episode in consequence of my love for the
boy, and because _he was the only English subject I ever knew to ship
in a slaver_.
I requested the Areostatico's owners to pay him liberally for his
fidelity when he got back to Havana; and I was happy to learn next
year, that they not only complied with my request, but sent him home
to his friends in Liverpool.
CHAPTER VIII.
When I got back to Bangalang, my first movement was to take possession
of the quarters assigned me by the Mongo, and to make myself as
comfortable as possible in a land whose chief requirements are shade
and shelter. My house, built of cane plastered with mud, consisted of
two earthen-floored rooms and a broad verandah. The thatched roof was
rather leaky, while my furniture comprised two arm-chests covered with
mats, a deal table, a bamboo settle, a tin-pan with palm-oil for a
lamp, and a German looking-glass mounted in a paper frame. I augmented
these comforts by the addition of a trunk, mattress, hammock and pair
of blankets; yet, after all this embellishment, I confess my household
was rather a sorry affair.
It is time I should make the reader acquainted with the individual who
was the presiding genius of the scene, and, in some degree, a type of
his peculiar class in Africa.
Mr. Ormond was the son of an opulent slave-trader from Liverpool, and
owed his birth to the daughter of a native chief on the Rio Pongo. His
father seems to have been rather proud of his mulatto stripling, and
dispatched him to England to be educated. But Master John had made
little progress in belles-lettres, when news of the trader's death was
brought to the British agent, who refused the youth further supplies
of money. The poor boy soon became an outcast in a land which had not
yet become fashionably addicted to philanthropy; and, after drifting
about awhile in England, he shipped on board a merchantman. The
press-gang soon got possession of the likely mulatto for the service
of his Britannic Majesty. Sometimes he played the part of dandy waiter
in the cabin; sometimes he swung a hammock with the hands in the
forecastle. Thus, five years slipped by, during which the wanderer
visited most of the West Indian and Mediterranean stations.
At length the prolonged cruise was terminated, and Ormond paid off. He
immediately determined to employ his hoarded cash in a voyage to
Africa, where he might claim his father's property. The project was
executed; his mother was still found alive; and, fortunately for the
manly youth, she recognized him at once as her first-born.
The reader will recollect that these things occurred on the west coast
of Africa in the early part of the present century, and that the
tenure of property, and the interests of foreign traders, were
controlled entirely by such _customary_ laws as prevailed on the spot.
Accordingly, a "grand palaver" was appointed, and all Mr. Ormond's
brothers, sisters, uncles, and cousins,--many of whom were in
possession of his father's slaves or their descendants,--were summoned
to attend. The "talk" took plate at the appointed time. The African
mother stood forth stanchly to assert the identity and rights of her
first-born, and, in the end, all of the Liverpool trader's property,
in houses, lands, and negroes, that could be ascertained, was handed
over, according to coast-law, to the returned heir.
When the mulatto youth was thus suddenly elevated into comfort, if not
opulence, in his own country, he resolved to augment his wealth by
pursuing his father's business. But the whole country was then
desolated by a civil war, occasioned, as most of them are, by family
disputes, which it was necessary to terminate before trade could be
comfortably established.
To this task Ormond steadfastly devoted his first year. His efforts
were seconded by the opportune death of one of the warring chiefs. A
tame opponent,--a brother of Ormond's mother,--was quickly brought to
terms by a trifling present; so that the sailor boy soon concentrated
the family influence, and declared himself "MONGO," or, Chief of the
River.
Bangalang had long been a noted factory among the English traders.
When war was over, Ormond selected this post as his permanent
residence, while he sent runners to Sierra Leone and Goree with notice
that he would shortly be prepared with ample cargoes. Trade, which had
been so long interrupted by hostilities, poured from the interior.
Vessels from Goree and Sierra Leone were seen in the offing,
responding to his invitation. His stores were packed with British,
French, and American fabrics; while hides, wax, palm-oil, ivory, gold,
and slaves, were the native products for which Spaniards and
Portuguese hurried to proffer their doubloons and bills.
It will be readily conjectured that a very few years sufficed to make
Jack Ormond not only a wealthy merchant, but a popular Mongo among the
great interior tribes of Foulahs and Mandingoes. The petty chiefs,
whose territory bordered the sea, flattered him with the title of
king; and, knowing his _Mormon taste_, stocked his _harem_ with their
choicest children as the most valuable tokens of friendship and
fidelity.
When I was summoned to act as secretary or clerk of such a personage,
I saw immediately that it would be well not only to understand my
duties promptly, but to possess a clear estimate of the property I was
to administer and account for. Ormond's easy habits satisfied me that
he was not a man of business originally, or had become sadly negligent
under the debasing influence of wealth and voluptuousness. My earliest
task, therefore, was to make out a _minute inventory_ of his
possessions, while I kept a watchful eye on his stores, never allowing
any one to enter them unattended. When I presented this document,
which exhibited a large deficiency, the Mongo received it with
indifference, begging me not to "annoy him with accounts." His manner
indicated so much petulant fretfulness, that I augured from it the
conscious decline or disorder of his affairs.
As I was returning to the warehouse from this mortifying interview, I
encountered an ancient hag,--a sort of superintendent Cerberus or
manager of the Mongo's _harem_,--who, by signs, intimated that she
wanted the key to the "cloth-chest," whence she immediately helped
herself to several fathoms of calico. The crone could not speak
English, and, as I did not understand the Soosoo dialect, we attempted
no oral argument about the propriety of her conduct; but, taking a
pencil and paper, and making signs that she should go to the Mongo,
who would write an order for the raiment, I led her quietly to the
door. The wrath of the virago was instantly kindled, while her horrid
face gleamed with that devilish ferocity, which, in some degree is
lost by Africans who dwell on our continent. During the reign of my
predecessors, it seems that she had been allowed to control the store
keys, and to help herself unstintedly. I knew not, of course, what she
_said_ on this occasion; but the violence of her gestures, the nervous
spasms of her limbs, the flashing of her eyes, the scream of her
voluble tongue, gave token that she swelled with a rage which was
augmented by my imperturbable quietness. At dinner, I apprised Mr.
Ormond of the negro's conduct; but he received the announcement with
the same laugh of indifference that greeted the account of his
deficient inventory.
That night I had just stretched myself on my hard pallet, and was