This is their common Sustenance; the Gift of Providence, without their Care; they might abound, but prefer Ease and Indolence, he being greatest among them, who can afford to eat [18]Rice all the Year round. Kid and Fowl, they have a few, and were all the domestick Animals I saw.
Remark 4. On the Negroes here, their Clothing, Customs and Religion.
The Men are well-limbed, clean Fellows; flattish-nosed, and many with Exomphalos’s; the Effect of bad Midwifry, or straining in their Infancy to walk; for they are never taught, but creep upon a Matt on all Fours, till they have Strength to erect themselves; and notwithstanding this, are seldom distorted. These do not circumcise, but the Slaves brought from the Northward are frequently so; perhaps from bordering on Morocco.
The Women are not nigh so well shaped as the Men: Childing, and their Breasts always pendulous, stretches them to so unseemly a Length and Bigness, that some, like the Ægyptians, I believe, could suckle over their Shoulders. Their being imployed in all Labour, makes them robust; for such as are not Gromettas, work hard in Tillage, make Palm-Oil, or spin Cotton; and when they are free from such work, the idle Husbands put them upon breading and fetishing out their Wool, they being prodigious proud and curious in this sort of Ornament; and keep them every day, for many hours together, at it.
Their Houses are low, little Hutts, not quite so bad as many in Yorkshire, built with wooden Stockades set in the ground, in a round or square form, thatched with Straw; they are swept clean every day; and for Furniture, have a Matt or two to lie down upon; two or three earthen or wooden Dishes, and Stools, with a Spoon, all of their own making. They are idle, principally from want of Arts and domestick Employments: for as I observed, they are so cautious of planting too much, and wasting their Labour, that they are really improvident; smoaking all day in long Reed-Pipes together; unplagued with To-morrow, or the Politicks of Europe.
Whole Towns shift their Habitations, either when they do not like their Neighbours, or have more Conveniency somewhere else; soon clearing Ground enough for what Building and Culture they purpose. Seignior Joseph, a Christian Negro of this Place, has lately with his People left a clean, well-built Town, and removed further up the River. Their Huts are mostly orbicular, forming a spacious square Area in the middle, and in this, the doors paved with Cockle-Shells; two or three Crosses erected, and round about, Lime-trees, Papais, Plantanes, Pine-apples, and a few Bee-hives; the latter made out of pieces of old Trees, three foot long, hollowed and raised on two Poles.
In the middle of the Area was a great Curiosity, a large Tree with 500 hanging Nests at least upon it; this is a small familiar Bird, that builds thus about their Towns, upon the extreme slenderest Twigs, hanging like Fruit, and declares the Wisdom of Instinct, since it’s designed a Security for their Young, against Monkeys, Parrots, Squirrels, &c. Creatures of Prey, whose Weight cannot there be supported.
Anointing their Body and Limbs with Palm-Oil, is a daily Practice with both Sexes; some use [19]Civet, but all cast a strong, disagreeable Smell; this mending it much like as melted Tallow is by a Perfumer’s Shop.
Palaavers are their Courts of Judicature, where the principal or elderly Men amongst them meet in a Ring or under a Lodge, to settle the Differences that arise amongst themselves, or with the Factories; the frequentest are in relation to Trade. Each salutes the other at meeting, by a Bend of the Elbow, and raising his Hand to his Face. When they have heard what each Party has to say, they determine by Vote, who has the Reason of the thing on their side, and so punish, or acquit. For Fornication, the Party (whether Man or Woman) is sold for a Slave. If a white Man lies with another’s Slave, he is bound to redeem her at a current Price. On a Charge of Murder, Adultery, or if there can be any other more heinous Crime among them, the suspected Person must drink of a red Water his Judges prepare; which is called, purging the Criminal: that is, if the suspected be of ill Life, or had Envy to the deceased, so that the Surmizes against him are strong, though they want positive Evidence; they will give him so much of that Liquor as shall kill him; but if inclined to spare him, they politickly give less, or make it weaker, whereby his Innocence appears the better to the Friends and Relations of the deceased.
Panyarring, is a Term for Man-stealing along the whole Coast: Here it’s used also, for stealing any thing else; and by Custom (their Law) every Man has a right to seize of another at any Conveniency, so much as he can prove afterwards, at the Palaaver-Court, to have been defrauded of, by any body in the same place he was cheated.