“We try, Ma,” came a humble murmur from the boys, and I got in once more and we staggered along.
How I hated it all, and what a brute I felt. I thought to offer a little encouragement, so I said after a little time, when I thought the light was getting appreciably larger: “Grant, which of these men carry me best?” and thought I would offer a suitable reward.
“They all carry you very badly, Ma,” came back Grant's stern reply; “that one,” and he pointed to the unfortunate who bore the lefthand front end of the hammock, “carry you worst.”
Now, here was a dilemma. The light wasn't very far away now, and I could see against the sky the loom of a great building.
“Very well,” I said, “each of the other three shall have threepence extra,” and the lefthand front man dropped his end of the hammock with something very like a sob, and left the other three to struggle on as best they might. We were close to Elmina now. There was a row of palms on our right between us and the surf, and I could see houses with tiny lights in them, and so could the men.
“I will walk,” I said.
But the three remaining were very eager. “No, Ma; no, Ma, we carry you.”
Then there appeared a man in European clothes, and him I stopped and interviewed.
“Is that the Castle of Elmina?”
“Yes,” said he, evidently mightily surprised at being interviewed by a white woman.