I had too much reason soon afterwards to know that Paul was right in his conjectures.
The next day we came in sight of a large vessel. Signals were exchanged, and we hove-to near each other. The boats were then actively engaged in bringing numerous articles on board the schooner—arms and ammunition, and cutlery, and Manchester goods, and farinha (the meal on which slaves on board ship are fed), and cases which I found contained slave shackles. There was no secret indeed made about the matter.
The schooner having taken her cargo on board, the other vessel sailed away while we stood towards the coast. The carpenters were busily employed in fitting an additional deck in the hold, and Paul told me that it was called the slave deck, and that the slaves we were to take on board would be seated along it, packed close together side by side, and that they would thus be kept during the whole run to the Brazils, or wherever the schooner was bound with her hapless freight.
“You see what this vessel is,” said the officer who had spoken to me in English. “We have saved your life, and must exact a promise from you not to appear as a witness against any one on board should you at any future period be called on to do so. Let me advise you indeed not to take notice of anything that occurs on board and it will be the better for you. We do not wish to harm you, but there are those among us who hold human life very cheap, and they are not likely to stand on ceremony should you interfere with their proceedings.”
I replied that I was very grateful to him and the other officers for treating me kindly, and that I only desired to be put on board an English trader, in which I could work a passage home, “and I hope,” I added, “that my black companion will be allowed to accompany me.”
“As to that I can make no promise,” he answered. “The captain will decide the matter; but, I have no doubt, that if we fall in with an English trader you will be allowed to go on board her.”
A bright look-out was kept from the mast-head, and twice the schooner altered her course to avoid a sail seen in the distance. At length we came off the mouth of a river. A signal was made from the shore. With a fair breeze we ran in, and proceeding up some distance, dropped anchor in a creek, where the schooner lay concealed by the tall trees which grew on its banks.