Sunday, 22d.—Clear and cold; north wind during the night; thermometer, 56°. The town of Leobadda is situated on the east side of a ridge of granite, the tops of which are broken into large masses, some of them forming the most grotesque figures imaginable; they run in a direction from north-east to south-west, and are from fifty to sixty feet above the plain, and join the hills to the south and east. Leobadda contains about one hundred and fifty houses, with from thirty to forty souls in each; it is walled; the inhabitants are poor, but civil; we were well supplied with provisions, as before, and in addition had milk. The caboceer told us that Kiama, the capital of Borgho, was only one day’s journey by a horse from his town; that these people were only a band of thieves; that their country was small, but independent; that they infested the roads of Youriba, and stole all they could catch.

At 7 A.M. started, accompanied by the caboceer and a great number of attendants. The country well cultivated for a little way outside the town. We met upwards of six hundred men, women, and children, carrying loads; they had travelled all night, and were guarded by men with bows and arrows and swords, ten or twelve armed men marching between each fifty; the road woody, but the trees low and stunted. Here, for the first time, I saw the small stunted accacia. The soil red clay. Passed several villages that had been destroyed by the Fellatahs, some very large. The shady trees are now desolate, the walls covered with weeds. After closing with the range of rocks we entered a beautiful valley in the midst of them, planted with large shady trees and bananas, having green plots, and sheets of water running through the centre, where the dingy beauties of Tshow were washing their well-formed limbs, while the sheep and goats were grazing around on the verdant banks. After passing this lovely valley we crossed another ridge of rocks, and at 9.15 arrived at the town of Tshow, where, after getting housed, we turned to and cleaned our arms, as they say the road is infested with robbers. We afterwards heard that the king of Eyeo was going to send an escort, and was quite rejoiced at our near approach. Got a specimen of the Tsheu fruit and leaves: the fruit is the size of a large pear, having a stone inside, covered with a pulpy cream-coloured substance, which is good to eat. The stone is said to be poisonous; the outer rind of the fruit is put into their soup.

After sunset a caboceer arrived from the king of Katunga or Eyeo. His attendants, horse and foot, were so numerous that every corner was filled with them, and they kept drumming, blowing, dancing, and singing all night. The caboceer waited on us, and after shaking hands with us, rubbed all his face and body over, that his hands, by touching ours, might impart our blessing to his face, head, and body. They were well dressed, and said the king of Eyeo was most anxious to see us: they had a great deal of natural good-breeding; and on my saying I had brought only a small present, they replied, if I had brought nothing the king of Eyeo would be glad to see us. Sent them a flask of rum. They kept firing all night.

Monday, 23d.—The town of Tshow was all bustle and hubbub with the great men and their attendants, the large grooms and their little horses. I left it early, being a poor place, with a good wall, and may contain four thousand inhabitants. Perhaps I might call them poor, as they had not fed us so well as we had been wont to be fed; but considering the ravenous host which came to escort us to Katunga, and who five pretty freely wherever they can, this deficiency on our side is easily accounted for. The road through which we passed was wide, though woody, and covered by men on horseback, and bowmen on foot. The horsemen armed with two or three long spears hurrying on as fast as they could get us to go; horns and country drums beating and blowing before and behind; some of the horsemen dressed in the most grotesque manner; others covered all over with charms. The bowmen also had their natty little hats and feathers, with the jebus, or leathern pouch, hanging by their side. These men always appeared to me to be the best troops in this country and Soudan, from their lightness and activity. The horsemen however are but ill mounted; the animals are small and badly dressed, their saddles so ill secured, and the rider sits so clumsily on his seat, that any Englishmen, who ever rode a horse with an English saddle, would upset one of them the first charge with a long stick.

We were also accompanied by great numbers of merchants or traders. At 9 A.M. halted to the southward of a village called Achoran, until the baggage should come up; but the heavy packages not coming soon, the caboceers thinking we would be too much exhausted before we got into Katunga, sent us off with a proper escort, waiting themselves for the baggage. At 9.30 left the shade, and went on as hard as the horses could possibly walk; the road winding and woody; clay iron-stone, resembling lava, in the spaces between the granite, great blocks of which appeared on each side of the ravines and low hills. We had from the top of one of the ridges some beautiful views to the east, of fine wooded valleys and low rugged bare hills in the back ground. At 10.20 crossed a stream running to the Quorra, which is only a journey of three days distant. Here we drank and gave our horses water; passed the ruins of two towns burned by the Fellatahs. At 11.30, from the top of a high ridge, on which were the ruins of a clay wall, we saw the city of Katunga or Eyeo. Between us and it lay a finely cultivated valley, extending as far as the eye could reach to the westward; our view intercepted to the eastward by a high rock, broken into larger blocks, with a singular top; the city lying, as it were, below us, surrounded and studded with green shady trees, forming a belt round the base of a rocky mountain, composed of granite, of about three miles in length, forming as beautiful a view as I ever saw.

At 12.15 we entered the north gate of Katunga; there was a small Fetish house outside the gate, and a few others inside. We halted, and went into one of the caboceer’s houses until the baggage and escort came up. Here we got accassan; and Abaco’s wife was cooking a little country soup for us, but the pot broke on the fire just as it was ready, and the house was in an uproar in an instant; only for my interference they would have come to blows. Abaco was ready to cry that he had disappointed us.

At 2 P.M. the baggage having all arrived, a message came from the king to say that he wanted to see us. A band of music accompanied us and the escort, with an immense multitude of men, women, and children. As there was much open and cultivated ground, the dust they caused almost suffocated us, though the escort tried all gentle means to keep them off. At last after riding one hour, which was full five miles, we came to the place where the king was sitting under the verandah of his house, marked by two red and blue cloth umbrellas, supported by large poles held by slaves, with the staff resting on the ground. After the head caboceers had held some conversation with the king, they came back to us, and I thought they were talking about our prostrations. I told them if any such thing was proposed, I should instantly go back; that all the ceremony I would submit to should be to take off my hat, make a bow, and shake hands with his majesty, if he pleased. They went and informed the king, and came back and said I should make only the ceremony I had proposed. We accordingly went forwards: the king’s people had a great deal to do to make way amongst the crowd, and allow us to go in regular order. Sticks and whips were used, though generally in a good-natured manner; and I cannot help remarking on this, as on all other occasions of this kind, that the Youribas appear to be a mild and kind people, kind to their wives and children and to one another, and that the government, though absolute, is conducted with the greatest mildness. After we got as far as the two umbrellas in front, the space was all clear before the king, and for about twenty yards on each side. We walked up to the verandah with our hats on, until we came into the shade, when we took off our hats, made a bow, and shook hands; he lifting our hands up three times, repeating “Ako, Ako,” (how do you do?) the women behind him standing up and cheering us, calling out “Oh, oh, oh!” (hurrah!) the men on the outside joining. It was impossible to count the number of his ladies, they were so densely packed and so very numerous. If I might judge by their smiles, they appeared as glad to see us as their master. The king was dressed in a white tobe, or large shirt, with a blue one under; round his neck some three strings of large blue cut-glass beads; and on his head the imitation of an European crown of blue cotton covered over pasteboard, made apparently by some European, and sent up to him from the coast. We waited about half an hour until all inquiries had been made respecting our health and the fatigues of our journey. We were then conducted by his chief eunuch and confidents to apartments in the king’s house, and asked if we liked them. They certainly were very good; but our servants would have been too far removed from us. We looked out for one in which we could be more comfortably stowed, and one by which both servants and baggage would be under our own eyes; which is an important matter, in this country especially, and never to be neglected, however good the servants may be. After this we had dinner and tea, to which we had good new milk; and when it got fairly dark we had a visit from the king in person: he was attended by his favourite eunuch, the ladies remaining outside. He was very plainly dressed, so that he would not have been known outside but as one of the people, with a long staff in his hand. He said he could not sleep until he saw us, but that we should only talk about our health, and not about business now. After a short stay he went away. We requested before he went that we should be left undisturbed for two days, that we might rest from the fatigues of our journey.

CHAPTER II.
RESIDENCE AT EYEO, OR KATUNGA, THE CAPITAL OF YOURIBA.

Tuesday, January 24th.—Early this morning the king paid us a visit, accompanied by his favourite eunuch and Abaco the messenger. He had received previous information that he wished to have the presents intended for him this night; and such is the crooked policy of these petty sovereigns of Africa, that no present can be given, no business or transaction of importance can be done openly: all must be conducted under the cover of night, and with the greatest secrecy, from the highest to the lowest. We first began inquiring after his health. I then told him that I was the king of England’s servant, sent by his majesty to beg his acceptance of a present, which then lay before me; that we had heard his (the king of Youriba’s) name mentioned in England as a great king; that we now experienced the truth of the report; that three white men, two of them my companions, and one a servant, had died on the road; that another of my companions was at Dahomey, to ask the king of that country to allow him a passage through his dominions. I told him that all the Youriba people had behaved well to us; that the caboceers of the different towns through which we had passed supplied us with every thing we wanted, especially the chief of Jannah, his friend, who had shown the greatest attention to us, and had given us a good man for a messenger, who had conducted us with safety and attention to his majesty’s capital. Upon this the messenger was ordered to make his prostrations, and his majesty rubbed his shoulders with his hand. I then told him that the king of England would be glad to make him his friend, and that whatever he, the king of Youriba, might have occasion for would be sent from England by one of the king’s ships to Badagry.