RECORDS OF AN EXPEDITION UP THE QUORRA WITH LANDER.*

BY COMMANDER WILLIAM ALLEN, R.N., F.R.G.S., &c.

JUNE 14, 1833.—After having been so long confined to the contemplation of the same scenery, which, however beautiful, excited the most painful recollections of the sufferings of myself and others, I hailed with delight an opportunity of changing it by making a little excursion to Kattam Karafi. My returning strength gave buoyancy and elasticity to my spirits, and I looked forward with hope to the prospect of making an agreeable as well as a profitable trip, since it would give me an opportunity of fixing the position of that place: there would, in fact, be advantage in any change from the monotonous life I had led for so many months. I embarked in the large boat, which had been fitted up for Mr. Laird's trip to Fandah, with a sort of house over the sternsheets, made of painted canvass, closed at the sides but open at each end. It was commodious, but during the calms in the middle of the day insufferably hot. The scenery I found very beautiful, the river studded with islands and sandbanks, which would soon be covered, as the water was steadily rising. The banks are bordered by magnificent woods, and backed by mountains, which at one place rise abruptly from the river. The vegetation was at this season so luxuriant, that the stratification of the rocks could not be perceived. The mountains, however, have a great sameness of form, and are all about the same height as Mount Pattèh-that is, about 1200 feet-with a sloping talus on all sides, surmounted by a perpendicular cliff about thirty or forty feet high, cresting them, as it were, with an immense fortification. It would indeed require no great stretch of imagination to form turrets and watch-towers without number-

"Buttress and rampire's circling bound,

And mighty keep and tower."

Although the distance was not more than twenty miles, we were obliged to pass a night on one of the sand-banks, where we had no intrusion to apprehend, unless, indeed, a Paul Pry of an alligator had popped in upon us; in which case he might have made choice among the Krumen, who lay snoring on the sand, not dreaming of such visitors.

We arrived at Adasàh, a village on the left bank of the Quorra, which is the port of Kattam Karafi, at ten o'clock the following morning. The inhabitants of this place appeared to be in great consternation, and many canoes from the opposite shore, filled with people, goods, &c., were paddling about in all directions. Everything denoted the presence of danger, but of what nature I could not imagine, until some of the fugitives told me that the Felatahs had marched from the upper countries, burning and destroying every town and village on the right bank of the river. They had arrived at the villages opposite to Adasàh this morning, and all the unfortunate inhabitants who could not make their escape were captured. Those who happily possessed canoes took refuge on the sandbanks in the middle of the river, where I saw crowds running about with frantic gestures, witnessing the destruction of their villages, five of

* Continued from No, 129, page 452.

which were burning at the same time within a short distance of each other. With my glass I could see a detachment of the invaders drawn up on the other shore. The poor people of Adasàh were quite cheered by our arrival, and placed more confidence in the presence of two white men, than even the interposition of an impassable river; for their enemies having an utter dislike to canoes and naval affairs, would not attempt to cross, if even they had the means, which the natives had made use of for their own flight. I found it necessary to point this out, in order that I might be relieved from their importunities to remain and protect them. I sent a messenger, as soon as I could procure one, to the king of Kattam Karafi, to apprise him of my intended visit, and to request that he would send me a horse, which he immediately complied with, and told the messenger to say he was very anxious to see me.

I left the village early in the afternoon to proceed to the capital. The road soon entered a beautiful wood, in which I rode two miles, and found it very pleasant, as the magnificent trees and thick underwood cast an impervious shade, and made it cool and delightful; but there was occasionally some difficulty in proceeding, by reason of the fallen trunks, which crossed the tortuous path, and the thorny branches of a kind of palm-tree, which frequently tore my clothes, and sometimes my skin. On emerging from the wood, I came upon a beautiful rising plain, on which, at about a mile farther, is situated the city of Kattam Karafi. The first part of the plain was cultivated with Indian corn, which was in a very forward state. A very small proportion of the land, however, bore marks of the industry of man, although the spontaneous and luxuriant vegetation indicated great richness of soil.

I rode for some distance by the side of walls in a woeful state of dilapidation, having been partly thrown down by the Felatahs last year, when they made a marauding incursion on this side of the river. The tooth of time, however, finds easy work in the destruction of walls built of mud, especially when the thatch, with which the battlements are usually crowned for their preservation, has been neglected. These rapidlymouldering bulwarks will not long remain to attest the valour by which they were defended, or the treachery that betrayed them into the hands of the enemy. Rank grass already hides a great part of the desolation caused by the ruthless invaders, when they took the town by surprise, burned the greater part of it, and carried off all the King's property, many of his wives and slaves, and a great number of his people. From a powerful prince they reduced him to such a defenceless state, that they will be able at any future time to renew their depredations, without fear of opposition. Such is their usual policy-to crush or paralyze their victims, so that even despair can hardly arouse them to further resistance. The nations thus prostrate around them become, as it were, storehouses of slaves, from which they do not fail to draw largely, when the desire of conquest or the spirit of adventure does not incite them to seek new paths of rapine and desolation.

Having entered the town by an opening where once might have stood a gate, I traversed the greater part of the remains of the city, through narrow and tortuous streets, to the northern entrance; beyond which, in a lovely situation, is a little village inhabited only by Haussa people. Here a white man had been left by Mr. Laird for the purpose of trading, who, though quite alone, experienced good faith on the part of the

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natives. I was much fatigued with my little ride, which I made an excuse for not waiting on the King immediately on my arrival, but sent word that I would pay my respects on the following day. After having rested, however, I was tempted by the coolness of the evening and the beauty of the weather to take a little walk, and I was amply repaid for my exertion by the most enchanting scenery. Land is of so little value here, and at the same time so productive, that the naturally open spaces are quite sufficient for the purposes of agriculture. The husbandman, taking advantage of these, has little occasion to clear the ground, and thus does as much for the picturesque, in leaving the magnificent forests and little clumps of trees untouched, as if guided by the purest taste in landscape gardening: the efforts, indeed, of his art, especially in architecture, do but little to embellish the scenery. Although nature has here been in her most bountiful mood, and the soil appears so prolific, it is turned to small account by its listless possessors. Whether this ought to be charged as a reproach on a people whose wants are so few and so abundantly supplied, or mentioned as eulogy on their happy state of contentment, I will not say. It is manifest, however, that there can be no hopes of their regeneration until they are aroused from this state of apathy. While they neglect the sources of riches which are so lavishly conferred on them, they vainly seek it in preying on their own vitality—in what may be truly called the nation's self-immolation. The horrid practice of slave-catching for the foreign markets is the bane of this unhappy country, checking not only population, but every advance towards improvement, by blighting all the noble and generous feelings of human nature. It is not domestic slavery that weighs so heavily on the lower classes of the people, for that is extremely mild, perhaps more so than the treatment of servants in other countries. The only difference is that they are servants for life; and this very circumstance tends to make their condition more easy, since there is a stronger bond of affection between them and their masters. They well know that if they conduct themselves with propriety and fidelity, they will be treated with confidence and affection. They frequently rise to the highest offices of the state, and yet are not looked on with a jealous eye by freemen. Neither do the individuals thus exalted think it any degradation to be known as slaves, whom their masters might at any time strip of their dignities, and send bound to the slave-market. Such severity, however, is seldom practised, except as a punishment for the most flagrant abuse of confidence. While we continually asserted that we had no slaves in our country, and that we had the greatest horror of the slave-trade, which we were endeavouring to abolish throughout the world, it must have been considered by the natives as contradicted by the fact, of which they had ocular demonstration, that we had servants, which is, in the Haussa language, and perhaps in others, expressed by the same word that means slave, "bawa;" although a chief, in speaking of his attendants, generally says "Yarro ni" (my boys.) Domestic slavery is so completely the basis of the social system in the interior of Africa, that its abolition, and the substitution of free labour, cannot be looked for except very remotely, and then it must be worked out by the progressive advance towards civilization. The first step must be the total discontinuance of the practice of slave-catching for exportation. While the acquisition of slaves is considered the only source of

wealth, it is the most effectual bar to any improvement in the condition of society. The inhabitants, not only of large cities, but of the most insignificant villages, are kept in continual alarm lest some more powerful neighbour should pounce upon them unawares, and carry off their children or themselves to a hopeless slavery; the horrors of which, in their wild and superstitious imaginations, are perhaps greater than even the worst reality so deplored by the humane among us: yet they do not profit by their adversities, but carry on a system of mutual aggression and retaliation. In their bloodless wars both parties are sure to gain, if it can be so called; and it is even said, that when kings want to replenish their treasuries, or, what is the same thing, their slave-markets, they agree to go to war, each sacrificing as many of his subjects as the other can capture. This worst of treachery of rulers towards those committed by Providence to their care, startling though it may be to our present feelings, finds a parallel in the history of civilized countries*. The discontinuance of these practices can only date its commencement when a cordon of abolition encircles Africa, and when it shall be thoroughly understood in the interior, that there is no demand for slaves on the coast. Until the conviction, so desirable to the peace of Africa, of the impolicy and destructive tendency of these barbarities shall obtain, the sacrifice of human life will be enormous, as supplies will still be sent to the coast, where the chiefs who transmit the slaves to the white traders, will call in the aid of superstition to rid them of mouths they find inconvenient to feed. This is, indeed, the cause of the wholesale human sacrifices, called fetishes, which so frequently take place among the savage natives on the coast. Thus poor Africa, the oppressed of all nations, will have to wade through a sea of her best blood in order to make the first step towards a participation in the blessings enjoyed by her oppressors.

These reflections were naturally suggested in my solitary walk, by the contemplation of the neglected state of this beautiful country, and the evidence of devastation left by the unprovoked invaders, in the ruins of so large a portion of the city, which, from its position, ought to become very flourishing. It is situated on an elevated plain, beautifully wooded, and at the entrance of a fine valley, between two buttresses of the table range which terminates at the confluence of the two rivers. Half-way up these are cliffs of a reddish stone, similar in appearance to those in the same situation on Mount Victoria, nearly opposite, on the right bank of the Quorra. In the plain were large boulders of ironstone. Through the little valley, no doubt, flows a small stream I crossed in coming hither, and which is said to communicate with the Quorra near Adasah. From this elevated plain there is a splendid view both up and down the river, backed in every direction by mountains, that would, if more varied in form and elevation, make the scene perfectly beautiful. The Quorra,† Jòliba, or Niger, rolling grandly on in its long hidden course, and seen through many an opening in the lovely wood glittering in the rays of the evening sun," and more than twice as broad as the Thames at Westminster," excited in me the most powerful and

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In a clause of a treaty between the Kings of Granada and the Christian Kings of Castile, each party was allowed on make inroads on the other's dominions, for the avowed purpose of carrying off captives and booty, without it being considered as an infraction of the existing peace.

+ More correctly spelt Kwara.

varied sensations. While I contemplated the majesty of this mysterious river, my thoughts naturally reverted to the gallant spirit who, in spite of the most appalling difficulties and dangers, broke the charm which had for so many ages concealed its course. His untimely fate gave me gloomy forebodings of that of my amiable companion Lander, who, with equal intrepidity and under circumstances of as great difficulty, accompanied only by his brother, solved the interesting geographical problem of its termination. His protracted absence gave me the most serious apprehensions for his safety, since I believed his generous undertaking to convey poor despairing Hill to the sea-side as likely to expose him to very great danger; but I also felt perfectly confident that while he had life, he would not abandon the friends he had left behind in such a critical situation as we were, but would make the most strenuous efforts to return and bring us some relief.

The king's interpreter came at an early hour on the following day to conduct me to the palaver. I had passed a miserable night, for which I was indebted to the persecution of hosts of mosquitoes. I felt very far from well; and, in expectation that the audience might prove a long one, I was determined to fortify my "inward man" with breakfast: it was also a favourable morning for making observations for the longitude. During these operations the interpreter came several times, by which it appeared that his Majesty was impatiently waiting for me. His curiosity was much excited, and he appeared at a loss which to admire most-the dexterity with which I wielded the knife and fork, or the sextant. However, although both were equally strange and incomprehensible, he was more surprised at the latter, than at the awkward expedients which I substituted for the more primitive and natural use of my fingers. He evidently regarded my sextant with awe, thinking, no doubt, that I was making Fetish or Dju-dju. When I had completed my performances, he had the satisfaction of strutting before me with a slow and consequential step, more in accordance with the ideas of his own and my dignity than with the haste he had before exhibited. Thus, as befitted my exalted rank, I was paraded with solemn step and slow, in a broiling sun, when I was anxious to reach the king's shady bower with all decent speed. He made, however, an admonitory wave of his staff whenever I attempted to mend my pace, and cheat the open-mouthed and shouting multitude of their gaze.

Having passed the remains of two circular inclosures that formerly surrounded the palace till they were destroyed by the Felatahs, I was, to my great relief, told that I might repose under the shade of a beautiful tree. Here I had leisure to contemplate the scene of ruin and desolation around me, although there the eye might in vain search for the vestiges of former magnificence, or even of any habitations of man. The greater part of the stately palace was reduced to a few hillocks of mud, on which flocks of goats browsed in undisturbed possession, and rank grass was growing abundantly in the courts. "The thistle shook there its lonely head: the moss whistled to the wind. The fox looked out from the window, the rank grass of the wall waved around its head."

A great number of chief officers and courtiers were assembled under the tree, who also were busy with the work of observation, examining me from head to foot, and appearing much amused at my strange and outlandish garb. Whether they were moved to admiration or contempt