The natives are generally favorable to the slave-trade. It brings them many comforts and luxuries, which the legitimate trade does not supply. Their argument is, that "if a man goes into the Bush and buys camwood, he must pay another to bring it to the beach. But if he buy a slave, this latter commodity will not only walk, but bring a load of camwood on his back." All slaves exported are Bushmen, many of whom are brought from two or three hundred miles in the interior. The Fishmen and Kroomen are the agents between the slave-traders and the interior tribes. They will not permit the latter to become acquainted with the white men, lest their own agency and its profits should cease. A slave, once sold, seldom returns to his home.
If transported to a foreign country, his case is of course hopeless; and even if recaptured on the coast, his return is almost impossible. His home, probably, is far distant from the sea. It can only be reached by traversing the territories of four or five nations, any one of whom would seize the hapless stranger, and either consign him to slavery among themselves, or send him again to a market on the coast. Hence, those recaptured by the English cruisers are either settled at Sierra Leone, or transported to some other of the colonies of Great Britain.
The price paid to the native agents for a full grown male slave, is about one musket, twelve pieces of romauls, one cutlass, a demijohn of rum, a bar of iron, a keg of powder, and ten bars of leaf-tobacco, the whole amounting to the value of thirty to thirty-five dollars. A female is sold for about a quarter less; and boys of twelve or thirteen command only a musket and two pieces of romauls. Slave-vessels go from Havana with nothing but dollars and doubloons. Other vessels go out with the above species of goods, and all others requisite for the trade. The slaver buys the goods on the coast, pays for them with specie, and lands them in payment for the slaves, money being but little used in traffic with the natives.
13.—The Decatur arrived this evening, after a passage of thirty days from Porto Praya. She left the Macedonian on the way, the winds being light, the current adverse, and the frigate sailing very badly.
17.—The Macedonian arrived.
Coming off from town, to-day, I took a canoe with a couple of Kroomen, who paddled down the river, till we arrived at a narrow part of the promontory. On touching the shallows, one of the Kroomen took me on his back to the dry land. The two then picked up the canoe, carried her across the cape, perhaps a hundred yards, and launched her, with myself on board, through the heavy surf.
21.—Sailed at daylight for Sinoe, leaving the Macedonian and Decatur, an American ship and barque, an English brig, and two Hamburg vessels, at anchor.
25.—Anchored at Sinoe at noon.
26.—Ashore. Visited Fishtown, a well-built native village, containing probably four hundred inhabitants. It is within about two hundred yards of the colonial dwellings. The people are said to have committed many depredations upon the colonists; and there is an evident intention of driving them off. This is the tribe with which we are to hold a palaver.
There are two grand divisions of native Africans on the Western Coast, the Fishmen and the Bushmen; the latter being inhabitants of the interior; and the former comprising all the tribes along the sea-shore, who gain a subsistence by fishing, trading between the Bushmen and foreign vessels, and laboring on shipboard. The Kroomen, so often mentioned, are in some respects a distinct and separate people; although a large proportion, probably nine-tenths of those bearing that name, are identical with the Fishmen. The latter are generally treacherous and deceitful; the Kroomen are much more honest, but still are not to be trusted without reserve and discrimination.