Page:Abstract of the evidence for the abolition of the slave-trade 1791.djvu/63

( 33 ) Methods of confining, airing, feeding, and exercising them.

The foregoing description as far as relates to their dejection when brought on board, and the cause of it is confirmed by Hall, Wilson, Claxton, Ellison, Towne, and Falconbridge, the latter of whom relates an instance of a young woman who cried and pined away after being brought on board, who recovered when put on shore, and who hung herself when informed she was to be sent again to the ship.

Captain Hall says, after the first eight or ten of them come on board, the men are put into irons. They are linked two and two together by the hands and feet, in which situation they continue till they arrive in the West Indies, except such as may be sick, whose irons are then taken off. The women however, he says, are always loose.

On being brought up in a morning, says Surgeon Wilson, an additional mode of securing them takes place, for to the shackles of each pair of them there is a ring, through which is reeved a large chain, which locks them all in a body to ring-bolts fastened to the deck.

The time of their coming up in the morning, if fair, is described by Mr Towne to be between eight and nine, and the time of their remaining there to be till four in the afternoon, when they are again put below till the next morning. In the interval of being upon deck they are fed twice. They have also a pint of water allowed to each of them a day, which being divided is served out to them at two different times, namely, after their meals.

These meals, says Mr. Falconbridge, consist of rice, yams, and horse-beans, with now and then a little beef and bread. After meals they are made to jump in their irons. This is called dancing by the slave-dealers. In every ship he has been desired to flog such as would not jump. He had generally a cat of nine tails in his hand among the women, and the chief mate, he believes, another among the men.

TheE