After clearing Tasso we advanced merrily, and at the end of two hours' and a half actual sailing and pulling we landed upon Bance, which some call Bence's Island. A ruined jetty with two rusty guns, buried like posts, projected from the sand-strip; and a battery, where nine cannon still linger, defended the approach. There is a similar beach to the north-east, with admirable bathing in the tepid, brackish waves and a fine view of the long leonine Sierra. The outlying rocks, capped with guano, look like moored boats and awnings. The sea-breeze was delicious; the lapping, dazzling stream made sweet music, and the huge cotton-trees with laminar buttresses gave most grateful shade.
The island resembles Gambian James multiplied by four or five. Behind the battery are the ruins of a huge building, like the palaces of old Goa, vast rooms, magazines, barracoons, underground vaults, and all manner of contrivances for the good comfort and entertainment of the slaver and the slave. A fine promenade of laterite, which everywhere about Sá Leone builds the best of roads, and a strip of jungle rich in the Guilandina Bonduc, whose medicinal properties are well known to the people, leads to the long-deserted graveyard. We pass an old well with water thirty-five feet deep, and enter the enceinte, that contains four tombs; the marble tablets, which would soon disappear in India for the benefit of curry-stuffs, here remain intact. One long home was tenanted by 'Thomas Knight, Esquire, born in the county of Surrey, who acted eighteen years as agent for the proprietors of this island, and who died on August 27 of 1785,' beloved, of course, by everybody. Second came the 'honourable sea-Captain Hiort, born in 1746, married in 1771 to the virtuous lady Catherine Schive, and died in 1783, leaving two good-natured daughters, which his soul is in the hands of God.' The third was Mr. John Tittle, who departed life in 1776; and the last was Captain Josiah Dory, a 'man of upright character,' who migrated to the many in 1765.
Barbot (ii. 1) describes Bance's Island as defended by a small fort on a steep rock of difficult access, ascended only by a sort of stairs cut in the stone, and acting as the store-house of the Royal African Company. The low walls of lime and ashlar had a round 'flanker' with five guns, a curtain with embrasures for four large cannon, and a platform just before it for six guns, all well mounted. The only good buildings were the slave-booths. Winterbottom, who places it over eighteen miles above St. George's Bay (Baie de France) and north of Tasso Island, thus describes Bance: 'This is a small barren island considerably elevated, with a dry, gravelly soil; but being placed as it were in the midst of an archipelago of low marshy islands, the breeze, from whatever quarter it blows, is impregnated with moisture and marsh effluvia, which render it sickly. The air also is very much heated, and the thermometer generally stands 4° or 5° higher on this island than it does at Freetown.'
We regained the steamer shortly after dark, delighted with our picnic and resolved always to take the same advantage of all halts. In those days the interior was most interesting. The rivers Scarcies, Nunez, and Ponga were unknown; the equestrian Susu tribe had never been visited; and, the Timbo country, the great centre whence arise the Niger, the Rokel, and the Senegal, awaited exploration.