In contracting to furnish this slaver with a craft and the necessary apparatus for his cargo, it would be folly for me to deny that I was dipping once more into my ancient trade; yet, on reflection, I concluded that in covering the vessel for a moment with my name, I was no more amenable to rebuke, than the respectable merchants of Sierra Leone and elsewhere who passed hardly a day without selling, to notorious slavers, such merchandise as could be used alone in slave-wars or slave-trade. It is probable that the sophism soothed my conscience at the moment, though I could never escape the promise that sealed my agreement with Lieutenant Seagram.
The appointed day arrived, and my smoking semaphores announced the brigantine’s approach to Sugarei, three miles from Cape Mount. The same evening the vessel was surrendered to me by the American captain, who landed his crew and handed over his flag and papers. As soon as I was in charge, no delay was made to prepare for the reception of freight; and by sunrise I resigned her to the Spaniard, who immediately embarked seven hundred negroes, and landed them in Cuba in twenty-seven days.
Till now the British cruisers had made Cape Mount their friendly rendezvous, but the noise of this shipment in my neighborhood, and my refusal to explain or converse on the subject, gave umbrage to officers who had never failed to supply themselves from my grounds and larder. In fact I was soon marked as an enemy of the squadron, while our intercourse dwindled to the merest shadow. In the course of a week, the Commander on the African station, himself, hove to off the Cape, and summoning me on board, concluded a petulant conversation by remarking that “a couple of men like Monsieur Canot would make work enough in Africa for the whole British squadron!”
I answered the compliment with a profound salaam, and went over the Penelope’s side satisfied that my friendship was at an end with her Majesty’s cruisers.
The portion of Cape Mount whereon I pitched my tent, had been so long depopulated by the early wars against Fana-Toro, that the wild beasts reasserted their original dominion over the territory. The forest was full of leopards, wild cats, cavallis or wild boars, and ourang-outangs.
Very soon after my arrival, a native youth in my employ had been severely chastised for misconduct, and in fear of repetition, fled to the mount after supplying himself with a basket of cassava. As his food was sufficient for a couple of days, we thought he might linger in the wood till the roots were exhausted, and then return to duty. But three days elapsed without tidings from the truant. On the fourth, a diligent search disclosed his corpse in the forest, every limb dislocated and covered with bites apparently made by human teeth. It was the opinion of the natives that the child had been killed by ourang-outangs, nor can I doubt their correctness, for when I visited the scene of the murder, the earth for a large space around, was covered with the footprints of the beast and scattered with the skins of its favorite esculent.
I was more annoyed, however, at first, by leopards than any other animal. My cattle could not stray beyond the fences, nor could my laborers venture abroad at any time without weapons. I made use of spring-traps, pit-fall, and various expedients to purify the forest; but such was the cunning or agility of our nimble foes that they all escaped. The only mode by which I succeeded in freeing the homestead of their ravages, was by arming the muzzle of a musket with a slice of meat which was attached by a string to the trigger, so that the load and the food were discharged into the leopard’s mouth at the same moment. Thus, by degrees as my settlement grew, the beasts receded from the promontory and its adjacent grounds; and in a couple of years, the herds were able to roam where they pleased without danger.
Cape Mount had long been deserted by elephants, but about forty miles from my dwelling, on the upper forests of the lake, the noble animal might still be hunted; and whenever the natives were fortunate enough to “bag” a specimen, I was sure to be remembered in its division. If the prize proved a male, I received the feet and trunk, but if it turned out of the gentler gender, I was honored with the udder, as a royal bonne-bouche.
