122. . Account of Alexander Scott. [Feb. 



Article X. 



Account of Alexander Scott, who spent some Years in the Interior 



of Africa. 



In a note to the Narrative of Robert Adams, p. 140, a letter is 

 inserted from Mr. Brancker, of Liverpool, giving some particulars 

 of the Joss of the Montezuma. We are informed that this, vessel, 

 " belonging to Messrs. Theodore Koster and Co., and bound to 

 the Brazils, was wrecked on Nov. 2, 1810, between the Capes 

 de Noon and Baj adore, on the coast of Barbary; that the 

 master and crew were made prisoners by a party of Arabs, &c." 

 The letter concludes by the following statement : "It is also said 

 that the crew have obtained their liberty, except one boy." In 

 the course of the last spring this boy most unexpectedly found 

 his way back to Liverpool, after having been, as it seems, for a 

 period of nearly six years detained as a slave among the Arabs, 

 and having been conveyed by them some hundreds of miles into 

 the interior of Africa. From the unaffected simplicity of his 

 manner, and from the little disposition which he manifests to 

 magnify or exaggerate his adventures, there is great reason to 

 place confidence in his narrative. A full account of it is shortly to 

 be published, for the young man's benefit : in the mean time, we 

 have been favoured by a friend in Liverpool with the following 

 outline of his travels, which we hasten to lay before our readers. 

 The names are spelled, as nearly as possible, according to the 

 young man's pronunciation of them, without any attempt to 

 reconcile them to the descriptions of geographers or of former 

 travellers. 



" Alexander Scott was born in Liverpool ; and when 16 years 

 old sailed from thence in the ship Montezuma, Capt. Kimbley, 

 bound to the Brazils, on Oct. 26, 1810. On Nov. 22 the vessel 

 was wrecked on the coast of Africa, somewhere between Cape 

 Noon and Cape Bajadore. He fell into the hands of Arabs : 

 they sold him to one of a distant tribe, by whom he was taken 

 in a south direction for 15 days, travelling he supposes about 15 

 miles a day, when they came to a number of tents in the El 

 Gibbla district. Having remained there some months, his 

 master told him that his family, and others of the tribe, were 

 going a long journey to Hez el Hczh, that he must go with them, 

 and there change his religion or die. 



" The part of El Gibbla from whence they set out was about 

 20 miles from the sea coast, and the party consisted of about 20 

 families, with a great number of camels, sheep, and goats ; the 

 time of the year about the beginning of June. The direction in 

 which they went was to the southward of east, and with little 

 deviation from a direct course during the whole of the journey. 



