Captain Canot; Or, Twenty Years of an African Slaver
reinforcement. By neglect or mishap, the powder and ball never reached
us; so that when the towns were destroyed, no one dreamed of
penetrating the forest to unearth its vermin with the remnant of
cartridges in our chest and boxes. I never was able to discover the
cause of this unpardonable neglect, or the officer who permitted it to
occur in such an exigency; but it was forthwith deemed advisable to
waste no time in retreating after our partial revenge.
Till now, the Africans had kept strictly on the defensive, but when
they saw our faces turned towards the beach, or colony, every bush and
thicket became alive again with aggressive foes. For a while, the
cannon kept them at bay, but its grape soon gave out; and, while I was
in the act of superintending a fair division of the remaining ball
cartridges, I was shot in the right foot with an iron slug. At the
moment of injury I scarcely felt the wound, and did not halt, but, as
I trudged along in the sand and salt water, my wound grew painful, and
the loss of blood which tracked my steps, soon obliged me to seek
refuge in the canoe of my Kroomen.
The sight of my bleeding body borne to the skiff, was hailed with
shouts and gestures of joy and contempt by the savages. As I crossed
the last breaker and dropped into smooth water, my eyes reverted to
the beach, where I heard the exultant war-drum and war bells, while
the colonists were beheld in full flight, leaving their artillery in
the hands of our foe! It was subsequently reported that the commander
of the party had been panic struck by the perilous aspect of affairs,
and ordered the precipitate and fatal retreat, which that very night
emboldened the negroes to revenge the loss of their towns by the
conflagration of Bassa-Cove.
Next day, my own men, and the volunteers from our Spanish, Portuguese
and American vessels, were sent on board, eight of them bearing marks
of the fray, which fortunately proved neither fatal nor dangerous. The
shameful flight of my comrades not only gave heart to the blacks, but
spread its cowardly panic among the resident colonists. The
settlement, they told me, was in danger of attack, and although my
wound and the disaster both contributed to excite me against the
fugitives, I did not quit the San Juan without reinforcing Governor
Johnson with twenty muskets and some kegs of powder.
I have dwelt rather tediously perhaps on this sad occurrence--but I
have a reason. Governor Findley's memory was, at this time, much
vilified on the coast, because that functionary had accepted the boon
of a passage in the Brilliant, which was falsely declared to be "a
Spanish slaver." There were some among the overrighteous who even went
so far as to proclaim his death "a judgment for venturing on the deck
of such a vessel!"
As no one took the trouble to investigate the facts and contradict the
malicious lie, I have thought it but justice to tell the entire story,
and exculpate a gentleman who met a terrible death in the bold
prosecution of his duty.
CHAPTER LVII.
I took the earliest opportunity to apprise Don Pedro Blanco of the
mishap that had befallen his factor's limb, so that I might receive
the prompt aid of an additional clerk to attend the more active part
of our business. Don Pedro's answer was extremely characteristic. The
letter opened with a draft for five hundred dollars, which he
authorized me to bestow on the widow and orphans of Governor Findley,
if he left a family. The slaver of Gallinas then proceeded to comment
upon my Quixotic expedition; and, in gentle terms, intimated a decided
censure for my immature attempt to chastise the negroes. He did not
disapprove my _motives_; but considered any revengeful assault on the
natives unwise, unless every precaution had previously been taken to
insure complete success. Don Pedro hoped that, henceforth, I would
take things more coolly, so as not to hazard either my life or his
property; and concluded the epistle by superscribing it:
"To
"_Senor_ POWDER,
"_at his Magazine_,
"NEW SESTROS."
* * * * *
The slug that struck the upper part of my foot, near the ankle joint,
tore my flesh and tendons with a painfully dangerous wound, which, for
nine months, kept me a prisoner on crutches. During the long and
wearying confinement which almost broke my restless heart, I had
little to do save to superintend the general fortunes of our factory.
Now and then, an incident occurred to relieve the monotony of my sick
chair, and make me forget, for a moment, the pangs of my crippled
limb. One of these events flashes across my memory as I write, in the
shape of a letter which was mysteriously delivered at my landing by a
coaster, and came from poor Joseph, my ancient partner on the Rio
Pongo. Coomba's spouse was in trouble! and the ungrateful scamp,
though forgetful of my own appeals from the _Chateau of Brest_, did
not hesitate to claim my brotherly aid. Captured in a Spanish slaver,
and compromised beyond salvation, Joseph had been taken into Sierra
Leone, where he was now under sentence of transportation. The letter
hinted that a liberal sum might purchase his escape, even from the
tenacious jaws of the British lion; and when I thought of old times,
the laughable marriage ceremony, and the merry hours we enjoyed at
Kambia, I forgave his neglect. A draft on Don Pedro was readily cashed
at Sierra Leone, notwithstanding the paymaster was a slaver and the
jurisdiction that of St. George and his Cross. The transaction, of
course, was "purely commercial," and, therefore, sinless; so that, in
less than a month, Joseph and the bribed turnkey were on their way to
the Rio Pongo.
By this time the sub-factory of New Sestros was somewhat renowned in
Cuba and Porto Rico. Our dealings with commanders, the character of my
cargoes, and the rapidity with which I despatched a customer and his
craft were proverbial in the islands. Indeed, the third year of my
lodgment had not rolled over, before the slave-demand was so great,
that in spite of rum, cottons, muskets, powder, kidnapping and Prince
Freeman's wars, the country could not supply our demand.
To aid New Sestros, I had established several _nurseries_, or junior
factories, at Little Bassa and Digby; points a few miles from the
limits of Liberia. These "chapels of ease" furnished my parent
_barracoons_ with young and small negroes, mostly kidnapped, I
suppose, in the neighborhood of the beach.
When I was perfectly cured of the injury I sustained in my first
philanthropic fight, I loaded my spacious cutter with a choice
collection of trade-goods, and set sail one fine morning for this
outpost at Digby. I designed, also, if advisable, to erect another
receiving _barracoon_ under the lee of Cape Mount.
But my call at Digby was unsatisfactory. The pens were vacant, and our
merchandise squandered _on credit_. This put me in a very
uncomfortable passion, which would have rendered an interview between
"Mr. Powder" and his agent any thing but pleasant or profitable, had
that personage been at his post. Fortunately, however, for both of us,
he was abroad carousing with "a _king_;" so that I refused landing a
single yard of merchandise, and hoisted sail for the next village.
There I transacted business in regular "ship-shape." Our rum was
plenteously distributed and established an _entente cordiale_ which
would have charmed a diplomatist at his first dinner in a new capital.
The naked blackguards flocked round me like crows, and I clothed their
loins in parti-colored calicoes that enriched them with a plumage
worthy of parrots. I was the prince of good fellows in "every body's"
opinion; and, in five days, nineteen newly-"_conveyed_" darkies were
exchanged for London muskets, Yankee grog, and Manchester cottons!
My cutter, though but twenty-seven feet long, was large enough to stow
my gang, considering that the voyage was short, and the slaves but
boys and girls; so I turned my prow homeward with contented spirit and
promising skies. Yet, before night, all was changed. Wind and sea rose
together. The sun sank in a long streak of blood. After a while, it
rained in terrible squalls; till, finally, darkness caught me in a
perfect gale. So high was the surf and so shelterless the coast, that
it became utterly impossible to make a lee of any headland where we
might ride out the storm in safety. Our best hope was in the cutter's
ability to keep the open sea without swamping; and, accordingly, under
the merest patch of sail, I coasted the perilous breakers, guided by
their roar, till day-dawn. But, when the sun lifted over the
horizon,--peering for an instant through a rent in the storm-cloud,
and then disappearing behind the gray vapor,--I saw at once that the
coast offered no chance of landing our blacks at some friendly town.
Every where the bellowing shore was lashed by surf, impracticable even
for the boats and skill of Kroomen. On I dashed, therefore, driving
and almost burying the cutter, with loosened reef, till we came
opposite Monrovia; where, safe in the absence of cruisers, I crept at
dark under the lee of the cape, veiling my cargo with our useless
sails.
Sunset "killed the wind," enabling us to be off again at dawn; yet
hardly were we clear of the cape, when both gale and current freshened
from the old quarter, holding us completely in check. Nevertheless, I
kept at sea till evening, and then sneaked back to my protecting
anchorage.
By this time, my people and slaves were well-nigh famished, for their
sole food had been a scant allowance of raw _cassava_. Anxiety, toil,
rain, and drenching spray, broke their spirits. The blacks, from the
hot interior, and now for the first time off their mother earth,
suffered not only from the inclement weather, but groaned with the
terrible pangs of sea-sickness. I resolved, therefore, if possible, to
refresh the drooping gang by a hot meal; and, beneath the shelter of a
tarpaulin, contrived to cook a mess of rice. Warm food comforted us
astonishingly; but, alas! the next day was a picture of the past! A
slave--cramped and smothered amid the crowd that soaked so long in the
salt water at our boat's bottom--died during the darkness. Next
morning, the same low, leaden, coffin-lid sky, hung like a pall over
sea and shore. Wind in terrific blasts, and rain in deluging squalls,
howled and beat on us. Come what might, I resolved not to stir! All
day I kept my people beneath the sails, with orders to move their
limbs as much as possible, in order to overcome the benumbing effect
of moisture and packed confinement. The incessant drenching from sea
and sky to which they had been so long subjected, chilled their
slackened circulation to such a degree, that death from torpor seemed
rapidly supervening. Motion, motion, motion, was my constant command;
but I hoarded my alcohol for the last resource.
I saw that no time was to be lost, and that nothing but a bold
encounter of hazard would save either lives or property. Before dark
my mind was made up as to the enterprise. I would land in the
neighborhood of the colony, and cross its territory during the shadow
of night!
I do not suppose that the process by which I threw my stiffened crew
on the beach, and revived them with copious draughts of brandy, would
interest the reader; _but midnight did not strike before my cargo,
under the escort of Kroo guides, was boldly marched through the
colonial town, and safe on its way to New Sestros!_ Fortunately for my
dare-devil adventure, the tropical rain poured down in ceaseless
torrents, compelling the unsuspicious colonists to keep beneath their
roofs. Indeed, no one dreamed of a forced march by human beings on
that dreadful night of tempest, else it might have gone hard had I