June 11,1860.] GEOGRAPHICAL OBSERVATIONS ON WESTERN AFRICA. 221 



The popular deity in the Yoruba and Egba nations is Sango, 

 represented by a rani's head or a black ram ; being the god who 

 avenges by fire called from heaven. This is precisely typical of 

 Jupiter Ammon, the god of Egypt, represented with ram's horns, 

 seated on a throne of gold and ivory, attended by a phoenix (some 

 call it an eagle) with extended wings, grasping in his right hand 

 the thunderbolts of heaven and holding in his left the sceptre of 

 universal power. Sango is always represented as elevated and 

 being all powerful among the people. 



Dr. Delany finally mentioned that the adventure originated from 

 a large portion of the intelligent and educated descendants of the 

 Africans in the United States and the Canadas, who are anxiously 

 desirous by their own efforts and self-reliance to regenerate their 

 father-land. 



Lord A. Churchill, m.p., f.r.g.s., said he was interested in the movement 

 which had brought his friend Dr. Delany to this country, and he purposed 

 in a very few words to explain its object. There were some four millions of 

 slaves in the United States, and they were kept entirely for the production 

 of articles of commerce, of which England consumed a very large proportion. 

 There were also in the North and in Canada a great number of free men of 

 colour, and many of them were gentlemen of high and liberal education. The 

 object in which many of the coloured free men of America were now engaged 

 was to regenerate and civilise their own continent. The expedition up the 

 Niger, five-and- twenty years ago, failed in consequence of the climate being 

 too severe for European constitutions. An effort to open up the country was 

 about to be made again by these free men of colour in the United States. 

 Their constitutions were well able to stand the heats of the climate. The 

 head of the Society which had undertaken this movement was the Eev. H. 

 Garnett, a gentleman well known in the United States, and Mr. Barnes, a 

 commentator on the Scriptures. Mr. Campbell and Dr. Delany had been sent 

 over by the Society to endeavour to make terms with the native chiefs, and he 

 was happy to say they were on their way back after having concluded a most 

 satisfactory treaty with the King of Abeokuta, and also made amicable settle- 

 ments with the native chiefs of other districts, for the purpose of enabling men 

 of colour to return to that country and settle there, and enjoy all the rights of 

 citizenship. He believed that by this means a great and strong blow would 

 be struck at the slave-trade, and that it would at the same time lead to the 

 production of one of the great commodities which we required in this country 

 — that was cotton. Cotton was one of those materials, the growth of which 

 we ought to encourage in all parts of the world, for next to food it was of the 

 greatest possible importance to us. 



Mr. Hanson, H. M. Consul at the Sherboro (a gentleman of colour), said it 

 struck him that in speaking of the civilisation of the African race, we were 

 apt to overlook the fact that there were large populations in that country, and to 

 suppose that the first thing we had to do was to populate the country in order to 

 develope its resources. He believed the population of Africa was somewhere 

 about 90,000,000, and, theref#e, the 3,000,000 or 4,000,000 in the United 

 States would be but a drop in the bucket. There was an aspect, however, in 

 which the return of the negro population from America was to him of the greatest 

 importance. If, instead of going to Africa to constitute separate communities, 

 the people who came from America would incorporate themselves into the 



