As Adams was now the only remaining Christian at Wadinoon, he became in a more especial manner an object of the derision and persecution of the Moors, who were constantly upbraiding and reviling him, and telling him that his soul would be lost, unless he became a Mahommedan, insomuch that his life was becoming intolerable.
Mr. Dupuis, speaking of the conduct which Adams received from the Moors, says, "I can easily believe Adams' statement of the brutal treatment he experienced at Wadinoon. It is consistent with the accounts I have always heard of the people of that country, who I believe to be more bigoted and cruel than even the remoter inhabitants of the desert. In the frequent instances which have come under my observation, the general effect of the treatment of the Arabs on the minds of the Christian captives, has been most deplorable. On the first arrival of these unfortunate men at Mogadore, if they have been any considerable time in slavery, they appear lost to reason and feeling, their spirits broken, and their whole faculties sunk in a species of stupor, which I am unable adequately to describe. Habited like the meanest Arabs of the desert, they appear degraded even below the negro slave. The succession of hardships, which they endure, from the caprice and tyranny of their purchasers, without any protecting law to which they can appeal for alleviation or redress, seems to destroy every spring of exertion or hope in their minds; they appear indifferent to every thing around them; abject, servile, and brutified."
"Adams alone was, in some respects, an exception from this description. I do not recollect any ransomed Christian slave, who discovered a greater elasticity of spirit, or who sooner recovered from the indifference and stupor here described."
It is to be remarked, that the Christian captives are invariably worse treated than the idolatrous or pagan slaves, whom the Arabs, either by theft or purchase, bring from the interior of Africa, and that religious bigotry is the chief cause of this distinction. The zealous disciples of Mahomet consider the negroes merely as ignorant, unconverted beings, upon whom, by the act of enslaving them, they are conferring a benefit, by placing them within reach of instruction in "the true belief;" and the negroes, having no hopes of ransom, and being often enslaved when children, are in general, soon converted to the Mahommedan faith. The Christians, on the contrary, are looked upon as hardened infidels, and as deliberate despisers of the prophet's call; and as they in general steadfastly reject the Mahommedan creed, and at least never embrace it, whilst they have hopes of ransom; the Moslim, consistently with the spirit of many passages in the Koran, views them with the bitterest hatred, and treats them with every insult and cruelty which a merciless bigotry can suggest.
It is not to be understood that the Christian slaves, though generally ill treated and inhumanly worked by their Arab owners, are persecuted by them ostensibly on account of their religion. They, on the contrary, often encourage the Christians to resist the importunities of those who wish to convert them; for, by embracing Islamism, the Christian slave obtains his freedom, and however ardent may be the zeal of the Arab to make proselytes, it seldom blinds him to the calculations of self-interest.
Three days after Williams and Davison had renounced their religion, a letter was received from Mr. Dupuis, addressed to the Christian prisoners at Wadinoon, under cover to the governor, in which the consul, after exhorting them most earnestly not to give up their religion, whatever might befal them, assured them that within a month, he should be able to procure their liberty. Davison heard the letter read, apparently without emotion, but Williams became so agitated that he let it drop out of his hands, and burst into a flood of tears.
From this time, Adams experienced no particular ill treatment, but he was required to work as usual. About a month more elapsed, when the man who brought the letter, and who was a servant of the British consul, disguised as a trader, made known to Adams that he had succeeded in procuring his release, and the next day they set out together for Mogadore.
On quitting Wadinoon, they proceeded in a northerly direction, travelling on mules at the rate of thirty miles a day, and in fifteen days arrived at Mogadore. Here Adams remained eight months with Mr. Dupuis. America and England being then at war, it was found difficult to procure for Adams a conveyance to his native country; he therefore obtained a passage on board a vessel bound to Cadiz, where he remained about fourteen months as servant or groom, in the service of Mr. Hall, an English merchant there. Peace having been in the mean time restored, Adams was informed by the American consul, that he had now an opportunity of returning to his native country with a cartel, or transport of American seamen, which was on the point of sailing from Gibraltar. He accordingly proceeded thither, but arrived two days after the vessel had sailed. Soon afterwards he engaged himself on board a Welsh brig, lying at Gibraltar, in which he sailed to Bilboa, whence the brig took a cargo of wool to Bristol, and after discharging it there, was proceeding in ballast to Liverpool; but having been driven into Holyhead by contrary winds, Adams there fell sick, and was put on shore. From this place he begged his way up to London, where he arrived completely destitute. He had slept two or three nights in the open streets, when he was accidentally met by a gentleman, who had seen him in Mr. Hall's service at Cadiz, and was acquainted with his history, by whom he was directed to the office of the African Association, through whose means his adventures were made known to the public.
Adams may be said to have been the first Christian, who ever reached the far-famed city of Timbuctoo, and it must be admitted that many attempts were made to throw a positive degree of discredit upon his narrative, and to consider it more the work of deep contrivance than of actual experience. It is certain that many difficulties present themselves in the narrative of Adams, which cannot be reconciled with the discoveries subsequently made, but that cannot be argued as a reason for invalidating the whole of his narrative; especially when it is so amply and circumstantially confirmed by the inquiries which were set on foot by Mr. Dupuis, at the instigation of the African Association, and the result of which was, a complete confirmation of all the circumstances, which Adams