Page:The History of Slavery and the Slave Trade.djvu/121

 a wish for some volunteers. A black pilot in the boat called two boys who were on shore, carrying baskets of shallots, and asked Captain Hills if they would do, in which case he would take them off, and bring them to him. This he declined. From the ease with which the pilot did it, he concludes this was customary. The black pilot said the merchantmen would not refuse such an offer, lie apprehends these two boys were free people, from the pilot's mode of speaking, and from his winking, implying that it was an illicit thing. A boy, whom he bought from the merchants in the same river, had been carried in the night from his father's house, where a skirmish had happened, in which he believes he saw both his parents, but he well remembers that one was killed. The boy said many were killed, and some taken.

Mr. Ellison spoke the Mandingo language, in consequence of which he has often conversed with slaves from the Gambia, to which river he made three voyages, and they universally informed him that they had been stolen and sold.

The natives up the river Scaffus informed Mr. Bowman that they had got two women and a girl, whom they then brought him, hi a small town which they had surprised in the night; that others had got off, but they expected the rest of the party would bring them in, in two or three days. When these arrived, they brought with them two men whom Mr. Bowman knew, and had traded with formerly; upon questioning them, he discovered the women he had bought to be their wives. Both men and women informed him that the war-men had taken them while asleep. The war-men used to go out, Mr. Bow man says, once or twice in eight or ten days, while he was at Scaffus. It was their constant way of getting slaves, he believed, because they always came to the factory before setting out, and demanded powder, ball, gunflints, and small shot; also, rum, tobacco, and a few other articles. When supplied, they blew the horn, made the war-cry, and set off. If they met with no slaves, they would bring him some ivory and camwood. Sometimes he accompanied them a mile or so, and once joined the party, anxious to know by what means they obtained the slaves. Having traveled all day, they came to a small river, when he was told they had but a little way farther to go. Having crossed the river, they stopped till dark. Here Mr. Bowman (it was about the middle of the night) was afraid to go farther, and prevailed on the king's son to leave him a guard of four men. In half an hour he heard the war cry, by which he understood they had reached a town. In about half an hour more they returned, bringing from twenty-five to thirty men, women and children, some of the latter at the breast. At this time he saw the town in flames. When they had recrossed the river, it was just daylight, and they reached Scaffus about midday. The prisoners were carried to different parts of the town. They are usually brought in with strings around their necks, and some have their hands tied across. He never saw any slaves there who had been convicted of crimes. He has been called up in the night to see fires, and told by the town's people that it was war carrying on.

Whatever rivers he traded in, such as Sierra Leone, Junk, and little Cape Mount, he has usually passed burnt and deserted villages, and learned from the