LETTER XVI.
In pursuance of my promise I still direct my pen towards you, notwithstanding the uncertainty when I may be able to send away my letters.
The period is critical and important. News from each shore of the Atlantic, to its opposite, is sought with the most lively anxiety. While you are looking to us for tidings of ourselves, of our scattered fleet, and of endangered islands; we, unable to relieve your suspense, are looking to you, with no less anxiety for intelligence of England and of Europe. The avidity for news, which, here, displays itself, is vivid beyond all I can express. Our anchor was not dropped, indeed we had scarcely entered the harbour before a variety of people came out, in boats, to meet us, and, scrambling on board, asked the news in such hurried solicitude as scarcely to wait for a reply, before each question was followed by another. What news? what news? what news of the fleet? what news of England? what news from the Continent? were all uttered in such rapid succession, that the only answer we could properly make, served as a general reply—“None! we have been nine weeks at sea, and have every intelligence to seek—none to give.”
Our abrupt visitors were extremely disappointed, when, instead of being able to satisfy them, they found that we were equally solicitous to demand news of our convoy, of the Islands, and of the sailing of the packet for England. We could impart nothing satisfactory; and the information we acquired was not very gratifying. The following were the leading circumstances which we collected at the moment. Grenada, we were told, was, almost wholly, in possession of the brigands: St. Vincent in imminent danger from the Charibs: and Guadaloupe, if not St. Lucie, so strengthened by reinforcements from France as to bid us defiance.
Two French frigates, and numbers of privateers had been cruising, with too much success, against our scattered transports and merchantmen. The frigates had lately been daring enough to look into the harbour of Carlisle Bay, and the Charon of 44 guns armed en flute, one of the earliest arrivals of the Spithead fleet, had been sent out, with La Pique frigate, in pursuit of them.
The Leda frigate, employed to convoy a fleet of victuallers from Cork, had been upset in a gale, and, unhappily, sunk to the bottom with all hands on board, seven only excepted. These had since arrived in one of the victuallers, at Barbadoes; but several of the convoy, left unprotected by this fatal accident, had been captured by the enemy’s cruisers.
The commander in chief was still unheard of; nor was there any accurate intelligence of the fleet, although a few straggling vessels had arrived.
This was the sum of the news that greeted our arrival at Barbadoes. But gloomy as it was, the distressful feelings it produced were, in some degree, alleviated by our learning, soon afterwards, that the Brunswick, which had been ordered to proceed with troops to the relief of St. Vincent, had arrived most opportunely to save the island; and that the Stanley, which had sailed with the first fleet in November, and was supposed to have been lost, during the disastrous storm which arose in the channel, had arrived safely in Carlisle Bay, on Christmas day, being the only ship of the November convoy that made good her passage; and, further, that nine or ten of the vessels of the December convoy had reached Barbadoes in safety, with upwards of two thousand troops on board.
The delight we felt on the glad occasion of setting our feet, again, upon terra firma was more exquisite than I can describe; and it was highly augmented by the novelty that surrounded us. The houses, the streets, the people, the fruit, fish, and vegetables, the trees, the fields, every thing before us, was new. The very means of labour and amusement were novel, and all combined to indicate the change we had made—all bespake our removal to a tropical latitude. We gazed on all we met, and all we passed. Objects which, at other moments, would have been trifling and unimportant, now called forth our attention. Chaos seemed to be renewed; and, without being able to discriminate, we contemplated, in anxious curiosity, this seeming change of worlds.
We took our umbrellas in our hands, by way of parasols, but found less occasion for them than we had been taught to expect; for notwithstanding that the heat was greater, by several degrees, in Bridge-town, than in the harbour, we did not feel any degree of languor or oppression. A pleasant breeze counteracted the ardent rays of the sun: and, at our first visit, we rambled about, for two hours, with far less inconvenience from heat, than I have often experienced in the close and sultry days of England.
It will be quite within your recollection how long, and how much I have wished to visit the ships trading to Africa, and to witness personally, the manner of treating those poor beings, who are torn from their native home, by the iron hand of commerce, to be transported to a land of slavery. In this wish, I have had an early opportunity of being gratified. A slave-ship, belonging to North America, and bound to Savanna in Georgia, had arrived from the coast of Guinea just before we came into harbour, and was lying very near to us, with a cargo of negroes on board. Fearing she might sail for America, and being unwilling to lose the first occasion that offered, of indulging our curiosity, Drs. Master, Cleghorn, and myself took off a boat, the morning after we came to anchor, and went to visit the Guinea-man. We found both the master and mate of the ship disposed to show us every civility, and to oblige us by freely replying to our questions.
A little before they made Carlisle Bay, the captain and his mate had been taken out of their ship, and detained a whole night, on board an English frigate, while their papers were examined, under the suspicion that the vessel and cargo were Dutch property: but the property being proved to be American, they were released, and the ship is now taking in water, preparatory to pursuing her voyage to the state of Georgia.
The cargo consisted of a hundred and thirty slaves, of whom two-thirds were males, and one third females. The two sexes were kept separate by a partition, or bulk-head, built from side to side, across the ship; allotting the waist to the men, and to the women, the quarter-deck. A great majority of them were very young, being from ten to eighteen years of age. We were pleased to observe that an air of cheerfulness and contentment prevailed among them. In a few only we remarked despondency, and dejection of countenance. Both sexes were without apparel, having only a narrow band of blue cloth put round the waist, and brought from the back to fasten before. Many of them had marks upon the skin which appeared to have been made with a cutting instrument. These, we learned, were distinctive of the nation to which they had belonged. Some had their teeth cut, or filed to sharp points, giving them a very hideous, and canine appearance. They looked well fed and healthy, although some of them had an eruption, called the cra-cra, upon the skin.
Their sleeping berths were the naked boards. Divided into two crowded parties, they reposed, during the night, upon the bare planks below—the males on the main-deck—the females upon the deck of the aft cabin. In the daytime they were not allowed to remain in the place where they had slept, but were kept mostly upon the open deck, where they were made to exercise, and encouraged, by the music of their loved banjar, to dancing and cheerfulness.
We saw them dance, and heard them sing. In dancing they scarcely moved their feet, but threw about their arms, and twisted and writhed their bodies into a multitude of disgusting and indecent attitudes. Their song was a wild yell, devoid of all softness and harmony, and loudly chanted in harsh monotony.
Their food is chiefly rice, which they prepare by plain boiling. At the time of messing they squat round the bowl in large bodies, upon their heels and haunches, like monkies, each putting his paws into the platter to claw out the rice with his fingers. We saw several of them employed in beating the red husks off the rice, which was done by pounding the grain in wooden mortars, with wooden pestles, sufficiently long to allow them to stand upright while beating in mortars placed at their feet. This appeared to be a labour of cheerfulness. They beat the pestle in tune to the song, and seemed happy; yet nothing of industry marked their toil, for the pounding was performed by, indolently, raising the pestle, and then leaving it to fall by its own weight.
I am most happy to conclude my report of this visit by informing you that we discovered no marks of those horrors and cruelties, said to be practised on board the ships occupied in this sad traffic of human flesh; and which are represented as so frightfully augmenting the manifold ills of slavery. Chains, stripes, and severities did not seem to have been in the catalogue of means employed on conveying these poor Africans to their American masters. Our minds, necessarily, suffered in contemplating the degrading practices of civilized beings towards the less cultivated brethren of their species: but the eye was not shocked by the abuses of tyranny and inhumanity. The comfort and health of the slaves were promoted with every care. Being fond of washing in cold water, they were encouraged to the free use of it; and their persons, as well as the ship, were kept remarkably clean. They were plentifully fed; and, in the daytime, were dispersed about the vessel, so as to be prevented, as much as possible, from assembling together, in close unwholesome crowds. Mirth and gaiety were promoted among them: they were roused to bodily exercise, and care was used to divert their minds from dwelling upon their change of state, and loss of home: and I may truly say, that a more general air of contentment reigned among them than could have been expected. While many were dancing and singing, and playing together, others were giving their assistance in working the ship; and we learned that several of them had made themselves highly useful on the passage, and were already becoming expert sailors.
They all seemed to regard the master of the vessel more in affection than fear; and, although strictly obedient, they did not appear to be at all under the influence of terror. Crowded they, necessarily, must be, particularly in the place where they slept; but every attention was paid to prevent the injury which might derive from it; and to keep them in health.
We went down below to see their place of repose, where the hard planks formed one common bed, each individual employing his arm as his pillow. The men could not stand between decks, without stooping; and when they lay down, the boards were so closely covered, that that it was scarcely possible to set a foot between their naked bodies. They were always taken upon deck early in the morning, and the sleeping birth was thoroughly cleaned and washed: still it was highly offensive to European olfactories; and plainly indicated, that if it were not for the great attention paid to cleanliness and ventilation, disease must inevitably be generated. Their nakedness is, perhaps, their best security; for although they had neither bedclothes, nor personal covering, nor any kind of baggage, or furniture in the place, we perceived that all the cleaning and airing which were employed could not subdue the stench caused by their sleeping together in such crowded heaps.
Although they are fond of washing, and seem to have a sense of personal cleanliness, they have none of cleanliness of place, nor of common decency: for, notwithstanding the strictest prohibition against it, they cannot always be prevented from the filthy habit of depositing their natural excretions upon the spot where they sleep.
The wool of their heads forms a thick cover for vermin, of which they have, commonly, a swarming abundance; therefore to prevent this, and to further the rules of cleanliness, all their heads had been shaved: but this, we were told, had deprived them of a great source of occupation and amusement; it being a singular pleasure to them to sit down in pairs, for hours together, to enjoy the social feast of picking each other’s heads, and afterwards twisting and plaiting the wool into a variety of forms.
The pleasure we had experienced from finding these poor blacks in a state of apparent contentment, and, with respect to the reported cruelty, enjoying a degree of comparative comfort, was succeeded by feelings of horror, on hearing the relation of an insurrection which had taken place, on board the ship, previous to their sailing from the coast of Africa. Many of the negroes being detained on board for a considerable time while the cargo was completing, and lying, during this period, within sight of their native shore, from which, and, perhaps, from their wives and families, they were about to be torn for ever, had grown indignant even to desperation, and rising upon the ship’s company, murdered the master and mate, who then belonged to the vessel, and wounded several of the men: nor was it until after a very severe and bloody contest that they were overcome; when the ringleaders were put to death, as an example to deter others from revolting. One of the sailors showed us three desperate wounds which he had received on the face, the breast, and the arm, from the stroke of an axe, with which one of the blacks had, just before, struck off the captain’s head.
The next day, after our visit to the American slave-ship, an opportunity offered of seeing one of our own nation—a Liverpool Guinea-man; a ship of much greater burden, fitted out expressly for the trade, with a sufficient number of hands and of guns on board to protect her against the enemy’s privateers; and calculated for a cargo of five hundred slaves.
We were taught to believe that we should find the negroes much better accommodated in this, than in the American ship; but we could not observe any great superiority. Although the vessel was larger, the number of slaves was more than proportionally greater. In other respects the accommodations were nearly equal. The Liverpool ship was kept remarkably clean; but the other was not less so; and, between the decks, the American vessel was the most commodious, being higher, and having more room in proportion to the cargo, from which the slaves had the advantage of being less close and confined during the night.
In the sleeping-place of the English vessel we could not stand up without stooping almost double: in each, the men and women were kept separate; in both, their food was rice; and in both they slept naked upon the bare planks, crowded together like sheep in a fold.
The most striking difference that occurred to our observation was, that the slaves of the Liverpool ship were of blacker and smoother skin than the others, and all of them free from that dirty eruption, the cra-cra; but upon our noticing this better appearance of one cargo than the other, the apparent superiority was instantly explained to us, by the remark that the Liverpool vessel had reached her destined port, and that her cargo had been made up for market, by having their skins dressed over three or four times with a compound of gunpowder, lime-juice, and oil—a preparation which not only destroys the cra-cra, and gives the skin a smooth, black, and polished appearance, but likewise renders it sleek and fine: and it was further observed, that the American cargo would be made to look as well, before they reached the port where they were to be exposed for sale.