About seven leagues to the northward of Mattatanna, is Melancaro. Here is a river with eight feet of water on the bar, which divides the two kingdoms of Mattatanna and Tronghe. The inhabitants of the latter are numerous and obliging, but cannot trade for want of canoes. About ten leagues from Tronghe is Maninzarce; they would willingly trade with the English, but as they have no canoes, and it is a wild shore, where our boats cannot land, it is impracticable. About twenty leagues farther to the northward is Mungaro; the natives whereof are always at war with the inhabitants of Port St. Mary’s and the pirates. The king’s name is Maulaunza. They have no canoes here, but if a captain would take some with him from Mattatanna, they would gladly trade with him. St. Mary’s is an island three leagues off the main, in latitude 16 deg. 30 min. and has a good harbour. Here are about twenty white men, formerly pirates, who now live on their ill-gotten treasures.
Antogeal is in the latitude of 16 deg. 15 min. Here is a clear deep bay, keep the north shore on board. At the bottom of it, is a small island of two or three miles in circumference, in which is a good harbour. The Dutch had formerly a fort on it. Here are grampuses and whales, which the natives have the art of taking. Barimbass is in latitude 15 deg.: the inhabitants have canoes, and will come off at first sight of a ship. The king is very courteous to white men, and takes pleasure in trading with them.
Our next business was to go to Port Dauphine, where the death of their king was confirmed; we found the country in sad confusion, and in no condition for trading; so we took our men, slaves, and goods on board, and proceeded round the southernmost end of the island.
The country next adjoining to Port Dauphine, or Antenosa, is Anterndroea, where the Degrave was wrecked, and which was the melancholy scene of my captivity. Joining to this is Merfaughla, which lies a little to the southward, in latitude 26 deg. south. The want of canoes in both these countries renders them incapable of trading. The next port is St. Augustine-bay, in which is a fresh water river, with twelve feet of water at spring tides; it flows south-south-east, and north-north-west. Tulea lies seven leagues to the northward, and is a very good harbour.
As you sail from St. Augustine-bay to Yong-Owl, there are several little islands. The two first are in the latitude of 21 deg. about five leagues distant from the main island. A little farther is a single island with lofty trees on it; and still farther to the northward, there are three sandy islands, with breakers between them. A north-east course carries you clear and along shore, but keep in fifteen, sixteen, or seventeen fathoms’ water. On the banks are nine, ten, or twelve fathoms’ water. When you are past the sandy islands, the coast is clear to Yong-Owl. This is an open road in the latitude of 20 deg. 20 min. There is good anchoring in sixteen fathoms’ water, not above a mile from the shore. There is no high land near the shore on all this coast, but there are high mountains up the country. Munnonhaugher is a river which they call Manzerroy, in which is fourteen or fifteen fathoms’ water. It flows east and west twelve feet right up and down on spring tides: you go up the river six or seven leagues to the usual place where they traffic. A little to the southward of this is another river, called Luna, to which a ship comes from Arabia once a year. This place is called Masseleege, or the country of Munnongaro, whereof deaan Toke-offu is the sovereign, and of which I have already given a sufficient account.
Our business now was at Yong-Owl, where we arrived on the 16th of October; the captain went with me up the country to Moherbo, and took his musicians with us. As soon as I came on shore, I was informed that Rer Trimmonongarevo was dead, and Rer Moume succeeded him, and lived at Moherbo. I sent a messenger before me to acquaint him that I was coming to pay my duty to him, and had brought a ship to trade here pursuant to my promise; but as soon as we came to a town on this side Moherbo, we saw abundance of people pulling down a wooden house, in which the corpse of Rer Trimmonongarevo was interred; the reason whereof, as the natives told me, was as follows:—“That Rer Trimmonongarevo had appeared to Rer Moume in the night time, and asked him why he put him above his father Lohefutee? and he seemed to resent his son’s ill conduct, and ordered his body to be taken up, and put lower than his father’s, and his house likewise, which was erected for a monument to be levelled with his father’s.” When I came to Rer Moume, he did not know me in my new dress; I soon let him understand who I was, for I could not forbear to lick his knees. His generous and humane deportment towards me, made me esteem him as my father, and he was equally overjoyed to see me. His wives, likewise, expressed their pleasure. I went to review my cattle, for, according to his promise, he had kept them all for me; and as they were now considerably increased, I marked the young ones with a particular signet, for he insisted that they still are mine.
We got our whole complement of slaves here in ten weeks’ time, and sailed from hence January 7. We touched at St. Helena and at Barbadoes, from thence we proceeded to Rapphanick river in Virginia, where we sold our slaves, took in tobacco, and then set sail for England. On the 11th day of September, 1720, we arrived in the Downs.
Thus have I endeavoured to give a true and faithful narrative of what I thought most remarkable in this island. I have seen the “Atlas Geographicus,” which is, I presume, a collection of what has been written concerning this island. And though there are some things mentioned there, of which I give no account, I see no reason to depart from any particular herein contained, or to make any additions. I have related only what I saw, and know to be fact. There is an insect amongst them I have not mentioned, called the scorpion, a troublesome animal, and the only venomous creature I ever saw there. As to what is asserted in the “Atlas” before-mentioned, that the natives are Mahometans, I have read, since I came to England, some account of the Mahometan religion, but can find no conformity or similitude in it to this of Madagascar; on the contrary, Mahomet pretended to have familiar converse with God, but these people would be shocked to hear that deaan Unghorray, their Supreme God, ever conversed with the greatest monarch. There is one custom I have omitted, and that is, their abstaining from their women at certain times, as the Jews do. The Virzimbers, whom some imagine to be the first inhabitants of this island, I have said before, differ in some points of religion; but then it is to be understood in the forms and manner of their worship and ceremonies, for they have owleys as others have, and entertain the same notions of a Supreme God, the lords of the four quarters of the world, spirits, &c.
Robert Drury.
N.B. The author, for some years before his death, was to be spoken with every day at Old Tom’s coffeehouse in Birchin-lane; at which place several inquisitive gentlemen have received from his own mouth the confirmation of those particulars which seemed dubious, or carried with them the least air of a romance.