Akkrah and Adampe, Gold Coast, Africa. 301 



geny, upon the infliction of any act of injustice or cruelty; in the 

 latter case the reverse precisely applies. 



The women of Akkrah are not celebrated for their chastity, nor 

 is it comprised among the category of those national virtues to which 

 they conscientiously adhere, as its non-preservation constitutes no 

 impediment to any permanent connection they may subsequently 

 form. In the families of higher caste, indeed, it is somewhat dif- 

 ferent, but oven with these exceptions, its due appreciation can only 

 be referred to that judicious education and jealous vigilance bestowed 

 by the parents during childhood. Should, however, the results of 

 any illicit amour become palpable, abortion is secretly induced by 

 the assistance of powerful emmenagogues indigenous to the country, 

 or the offspring, by some connivance, is destroyed before it has at- 

 tained any development, since its birth at the regular period would 

 not only degrade the girl in the estimation of the public, but reflect 

 such an indelible stain as would cling to her reputation for life. In 

 these social communities, therefore, as might be inferred from the 

 previous remarks, adultery is by no means of rare occurrence. The 

 detection of these criminal liaisons is not punishable with death as 

 in other kingdoms in the Bights of Benin and Biafra, but by the im- 

 position of certain fines which are determined more by the rank of 

 the offender than from any extenuating circumstances. The pecu- 

 niary compensations awarded in these verdicts are mostly in accord- 

 ance with the legal usages of the place, and are founded on various 

 distinctive grades which the parties occupy in their local position. 

 Thus 12 dollars is the amount levied from an ordinary person, while 

 a caboceer is mulcted in a much larger sum, viz., 32 dollars, and 

 even more in many instances. These penalties are stringently ex- 

 acted, so that it is not an unusual event for the poorer people to 

 pawn one of their slaves or younger members of the family to raise 

 the necessary sum in quittance of the fine. These derelictions from / 

 the marriage contract on the part of the female are sometimes 

 visited by the sentence of severe corporal punishment, unless she 

 has become notoriously addicted to such sensual pursuits, when she 

 is, without farther warning summarily divorced. This ultimatum 

 does not appear to be often had recourse to, inasmuch as the husband 

 in the majority of cases cannot afford to lose the value of the services 

 he had hitherto purchased ; her family, under these peculiar condi- 

 tions not being compelled to refund the marriage dowry, unless she 

 refuses to remain with him ; and the man is frequently too poor to 

 obtain another wife. 



Other curious ordinances are also retained by these people, among 

 which may be embraced those regulating the intermarriages of dif- 

 ferent branches of the same family or tribe by particular degrees of^ 

 affinity. These social restrictions, however, are limited within a nar-. 

 row compass, and as it would seem, appertain more specially to the 

 female offspring. Their hereditary predominance and extensive dif- 

 fusion throughout several of the native races of Western Africa, point 



