6.—We sailed yesterday from Cape Coast Castle, and anchored to-day at Accra, abreast of the British and Dutch forts.
7.—Early this morning, we were surrounded with canoes, filled with articles for sale. The most remarkable were black monkey-skins. There are seven vessels at anchor here, including our own, and an English war-steamer. Three of the seven, a barque, brig, and schooner, are from the United States. Landing in a canoe, we were met on the beach by the Governor and some of his gentlemen, and escorted to the castle. Thence we went to the residence of Mr. Bannerman. He is the great man of Accra, wealthy, liberally educated in England, and a gentleman, although with a deep tinge of African blood in his cheeks. But when native blood is associated with gentlemanly characteristics and liberal acquirements, it becomes, instead of a stigma of dishonor, an additional title to the respect of the world; since it implies that many obstacles have been overcome, in order to place the man where we find him. This, however, is a view not often taken by those who labor under the misfortune (for such it is, if they so consider it) of having African blood in their veins.
8.—A missionary, on his way to the Gaboon, and two American merchant-captains, Hunt and Dayley, dined with us in the ward-room. The latter are respectable men. The missionary, Mr. Burchell, seems much depressed. He has had the fever at Cape Palmas, the effects of which still linger in his constitution; while his companion, the Rev. Mr. Campbell, although but recently from America, has already finished his earthly labors, and gone to his reward. We left them only a month ago at Cape Palmas, in perfect health.
9.—My impressions of Accra are more favorable than of any other place which I have yet seen in Africa. British and Dutch Accra are contiguous. The forts of the two nations are within a mile of each other, situated on ground which, at a little distance, appears not unlike the "bluffs" on our western rivers; level upon the summit, with a precipitous descent, as if the land had "caved in" from the action of the water. The country round is level, and nearly free from woods as far as the rise of the hills, some ten miles distant. About three miles to the eastward, Danish Accra shows its neat town and well-kept fortress. I did not visit the place, but learn that it is fully equal to its neighbors. Thus, within a circuit of three or four miles, the traveller may perform no inconsiderable portion of the grand tour, visiting the territory of three different countries of Europe, and observing their military and civil institutions, their modes of business, their national characteristics, and all assimilated by a general modification, resulting from the climate and position in which they are placed. There seems to be an exchange of courtesy and social kindness among the three settlements. Seven or eight Europeans reside in the different forts; so that, together with the captains of merchant-vessels in the roads, there are tolerable resources of society.
All the Europeans have native wives, who dress in a modest, but peculiar style, of which the lady of Mr. Bannerman may give an example. She wore a close-fitting muslin chemisette, buttoned to the throat with gold buttons, a black silk tunic extending to the thigh, a colored cotton cloth, fastened round the waist and falling as low as the ankles, black silk stockings and prunella shoes. This lady is jet black, of pleasing countenance, and is a princess of royal blood. In the last great battle between the Europeans on the coast and the powerful King of Ashantee (the same who defeated and slew Sir Charles McCarthy), the native army was put to total rout by the aid of Congreve rockets. The king's camp, with most of his women, fell into the hands of the victors. Three of his daughters were appropriated by the English merchants, here and at Cape Coast, and became their faithful and probably happy wives. One of the three fell to the lot of Mr. Bannerman, and is the lady whom I have described. These women are entrusted with all the property of their husbands, and are sometimes left for months in sole charge, while the merchants visit England. The acting governor of the British fort, Mr. Topp, departs for that country to-morrow, leaving his native wife at the head of affairs.
Mr. Bannerman is of Scottish blood by paternal descent, but African by the mother's side, and English by education, and is a gentleman in manner and feeling. He is the principal merchant here, and transacts a large business with the natives, who come from two or three hundred miles in the interior, and constantly crowd his yard. There they sit, in almost perfect silence, receiving their goods, and making payment in gold-dust and ivory. Towards us Mr. Bannerman showed himself most hospitable, yet in a perfectly unostentatious manner.
Accra is the land of plenty in Africa. Beef, mutton, turkeys and chickens abound; and its supply of European necessaries and luxuries is unequalled.
10.—We got under way, yesterday, for the "Islands," a term well understood to mean those of St. Thomas and Prince's. Mr. Bushnell (one of the two missionaries who proposed to take passage with us from Cape Palmas, a month since) is now on board as a passenger to Prince's Island. The other, Mr. Campbell, is dead. He was of a wealthy and influential family in Kentucky, and is said to have been a young man of extraordinary talent and promise.
Yesterday we fired seventeen minute-guns, in obedience to an order from the Navy-Department for the melancholy death of its chief, by the explosion of the Princeton's gun. At twelve o'clock to-day, we fired thirteen minute guns, as a tribute of respect to the memory of Commodore Kennon, who fell a victim to the same disastrous accident. Alone on the waters, months after the event, and five thousand miles from the scene of his fate, we gave a sailor's requiem to a brave and accomplished officer.
11.—Calm and sunny. Oh, how sunny!—and, alas, how calm!