When cargoes of slaves are brought to Sierra Leone, they are placed in a receptacle called the Queen's Yard, where they remain until the constituted authorities have passed judgment on the ship. This seldom requires more than a week. The liberated slaves are then apprenticed for five, seven, or nine years; the Government requiring one pound ten shillings sterling from the person who takes them. Unless applicants come forward, these victims of British philanthropy are turned adrift, to be supported as they may, or, unless Providence take all the better care of them, to starve. For the sick, however, there is admittance to the Government Hospital; and the countrymen of the new-comers, belonging to the same tribe, lend them such aid as is in their power. Food, consisting principally of rice, cassadas, and plantains, or bananas, is extremely cheap; insomuch that a penny a day will supply a man with enough to eat. The market is plentifully supplied with meats, fowls, and vegetables, and likewise with other articles, which may be tidbits to an African stomach, but are not to be met with in our bills of fare. For instance, among other such delicacies, I saw several rats, each transfixed with a wooden skewer, and some large bats, looking as dry as if they had given up the ghost a month ago. Supporting themselves on food of this kind, it is not to be wondered at, that the working-classes find it possible to live at a very low rate of labor. The liberated slaves receive from four to six pence, and the Kroomen nine pence per diem; these wages constituting their sole support.
As may be supposed, so heterogeneous and wild a population as that of Sierra Leone requires the supervision of a strict and energetic police. Accordingly, the peace is preserved, and crimes prevented, by a whole army of constables, who, in a cheap uniform of blue cotton, with a white badge on the arm, and a short club as their baton of office, patrol the streets, day and night. Their number cannot be less than two or three hundred.
There is a desire, in some quarters, to destroy the colony of Sierra Leone; and one of the means for accomplishing this end is, of procuring the emigration of the colored colonists to the West Indies. For this purpose there are three different agencies. One has over its door:—"British Guiana Emigration Office;" another is for Trinidad; and a third for Jamaica.
Great promises are made to persons proposing to emigrate; such as a free passage to the West Indies, wages of from seventy-five cents to a dollar per day, and permission to return when they choose. Very few, however, of those who have been long resident here, can be induced to avail themselves of these offers, small as are the earnings of labor at Sierra Leone. They believe that the stipulations are not observed; that emigrants, on their arrival in the West Indies, will be called upon to pay their passages, and that it will not be at their option to return. In short, they suspect emigration to be only a more plausible name for the slave-trade. The Kroomen are the class most sought for as emigrants, although negroes of any tribe are greedily received. Even the Africans just re-captured are sent off, as the authorities are pleased to term it, "voluntarily." The last emigration, consisting of somewhat less than two hundred and fifty persons, included seventy-six slaves, almost that instant landed from a prize. A respectable merchant assured me, that these men were not permitted to communicate with their countrymen, but were hurried off to the vessel, without knowing whither they were bound. The acting governor, Dr. Fergusson, denied the truth of this, although he admitted that the seventy-six liberated slaves did emigrate to the West Indies, very soon after landing from the prize.
It is to be remarked, that the white inhabitants of Sierra Leone, as well as the colored people, entertain very unfavorable notions of this scheme of procuring laborers for the West Indies. The best defence of it, perhaps, is, that neither blacks nor whites can flourish in this settlement, and that a transportation from its poor soil and sickly climate, to any other region, may probably be for the better. But, undeniably, the British government is less scrupulous as to the methods of carrying out its philanthropic projects, than most other nations in their schemes of self-aggrandizement.
In Freetown, which is the residence of all the Europeans, are to be found what remains of the emigrants from Nova Scotia, and their descendants. The whole number transported hither at several periods, was about fifteen hundred. Not more than seventy or eighty of these people, or their progeny, now survive upon the spot. Our pilot is one of the number. He affirms, that his countrymen were promised fifty acres of land, each, in Sierra Leone, on condition of relinquishing the land already in their possession in Nova Scotia. With this understanding they emigrated to Africa; but, in more than half a century which has since elapsed, the government has never found it convenient to fulfil its obligations. Only two or three acres have been assigned to each individual. Meantime, the body of emigrants has dwindled away, until the standard six feet of earth by two, the natural inheritance of every human being, has sufficed for almost all of them, as well as fifty, or five thousand acres could have done. These emigrants were the colonial slaves, who were taken or ran away from the United States, during the Revolutionary war. Considered physically and statistically, their movement was anything but an advantageous one. It would be matter of curious speculation to inquire into the relative proportions now alive, of slaves who remained upon our southern soil, and of these freed men, together with the amount of their posterity. Not, of course, that it has been in any degree a fair experiment as to the result of emancipating and colonizing slaves. The trial of that experiment has been left to America; and it has been commenced in a manner that might induce England to mistrust her own beneficence, when she contrasts Liberia with Sierra Leone.
This settlement has been known as "The White Man's Grave;" and it is certainly a beautiful spot for a grave—as lovely as one of those ornamental cemeteries, now so fashionable, and on which so much of our taste is lavished; as if only the dead had leisure for the enjoyment of shrubbery and sculpture. Sierra Leone, however, is by no means the fatal spot that it once was. Formerly, a governor was expected to die every year, although a few held the reins of power, and enjoyed the pomp and dignity of office, twice or even thrice that period. Brave and excellent men have accepted the station, on this fearful tenure. Among them was Colonel Denham, the adventurous traveller in Africa. Very great mortality likewise prevailed among the merchants, military and civil officers, and soldiers. This was partly owing to the recklessness of their mode of life. The rich were in the habit of giving champagne-breakfasts at noon, and heavy and luxurious suppers at night. The continual neighborhood and near prospect of death made them gaily desperate; so that they grew familiar with him, and regarded him almost as a boon companion. And, besides, in a sickly climate, each individual is confident of his own personal immunity against the disease which, he is ready to allow, may be fatal to those around him. I have noticed this absurd hallucination in others, and been conscious of it in myself. In battle it is the same—the bullet is expected to strike any and every breast, except one's own—and here, perhaps, is the great secret of courage.
Latterly, the Europeans at Sierra Leone practise a more temperate life. Another circumstance that has conduced to render the settlement less insalubrious, is the clearing of lands in the vicinity, and conversion of the rank jungle into cultivated fields. The good effect of this change will be readily appreciated by those who have noticed the improved health of our Western settlers, as the forest falls before the axe; or who have seen the difference between the inhabitants of old and new lands, in any country.
It is said, by the old residents here, that they do not find it very sickly, except once in seven years, when an epidemic rages, and carries off many settlers. This has happened regularly since 1823, until the present year, when, in the proper order of things, the angel of death should have re-appeared. Several persons provided for their safety by quitting the place; and others made their arrangement to retreat, on the first symptoms of danger. But the year, thus far, seems to have been distinguished by no peculiar mortality.
Life, in a climate like this, must generally be much more brief than in temperate regions, even if it do not yield at once to the violence of disease. Yet there are circumstances of Europeans attaining a good and green old age at Sierra Leone. Mr. Hornell, a Scotch merchant of great wealth and probity—which latter virtue is rare enough, in this quarter, to deserve special mention—has resided here fifteen years, and twenty-seven years in the West Indies. He lives regularly, but generously imbibing ale, and brandy-and-water, in moderate quantities, every day of his life.