DISPOSITIONS OF SAVAGE NATIONS. 



185 



c rmed, propitiated the v &amp;lt;ath of the adverse god.&quot; 

 The same king, when he returned, having dis 

 covered a conspiracy, decreed, that seventeen 

 if his wives, along with his own sister, should 

 5)e strangled and beheaded. His sister s para 

 mour, and all those of his party, were doomed to 

 the most cruel deaths, at the grave of the king s 

 mother. While these butcheries were transact 

 ing, the king prepared to enter the palace; and 

 in the act of crossing the threshold of the outer 

 gate, was met by several of his wives, whose 

 anxiety to embrace their sovereign lord impelled 

 them thus to overstep the boundary of female 

 decorum in Ashantee ; for it happened that the 

 king was accompanied by a number of his cap 

 tains, who, accordingly, were compelled to cover 

 their faces with both their hands, and fly from 

 the spot. This is said to have angered the mo 

 narch, although his resentment proceeded no 

 farther than words, and he returned tho embraces 

 of his wives. But another cause of anger soon 

 after occurred, and he was inflamed to the highest 

 pitch of indignation, and, in a paroxysm of an 

 ger, caused these unhappy beings to be cut in 

 pieces before his face, giving orders, at the same 

 time, to cast the fragments into the forest, to be 

 devoured by birds and beasts of prey. Nor did 

 the atonement rest here ; for six more unhappy 

 females were impeached of inconstancy, and 

 they also expiated their faults with their lives. 

 Like another Ulysses, his majesty then devoted 

 himself to the purification of his palace, when, 

 to sum up the full horrors of these bloody deeds, 

 two thousand wretches, selected from the Gaman 

 prisoners of war, were slaughtered over the royal 

 death-stool, in honour of the shades of departed 

 kings and heroes.&quot;* 



Such are a few specimens of the ferocious dis 

 positions of the petty tyrants of Africa. But 

 we are not to imagine, that such dispositions are 

 confined to kings, and to the higher ranks of 

 society. Wherever such malevolent passions 

 are displayed among barbarous chieftains, they 

 pervade, in a greater or less degree, the whole 

 mass of the people, and almost everyone, in pro- 

 po/tion to the power with which he is invested, 

 perpetrates similar barbarities. The following 

 instance will corroborate this position, and, at the 

 same time, show, for how many cruelties and 

 acts of injustice the abettors of the infamous 

 traffic in slaves, are accountable. It is extract 

 ed from Major Gray s &quot; Travels in Africa, in 

 1824.&quot; 



The Kaartan force which the Major accom 

 panied, had made 107 prisoners, chiefly women 

 and children, in a predatory excursion into Bon- 

 doo, for the purpose of supply ing themselves with 

 slaves. The following is an account of the man 

 ner in which they were dragged along. &quot; The 

 men were tied in pairs by the necks, their hands 



Dtipuls Mission to Ashantee, in 1323 



secured behind their backs ; the women by the 

 necks only ; but their hands were not left free, 

 from any sense of feeling for them, but in order 

 to enable them to balance the immense loads of 

 corn or rice which they were obliged to carry on 

 their heads, and their children on their backs.&quot; 

 &quot;I had an opportunity,&quot; says Major Gray, 

 &quot; of witnessing, during this short march, the 

 new-made slaves, and the sufferings to whicn 

 they are subjected in their first state of bondage. 

 They were hurried along (tied) at a pace little 

 short of running, to enable them to keep up with 

 the horsemen, who drove them on, as Srnithfield 

 drovers do fatigued bullocks. Many of the wo 

 men were old, and by no means able to endure 

 such treatment. One, in particular, would not 

 have failed to excite the tenderest feelings of 

 compassion in the breast of any, save a savage 

 African. She was at least sixty years old, in 

 the most miserable state of emaciation and debi 

 lity, nearly doubled together, and with difficulty 

 dragging her tottering limbs along. To crown 

 the heart-rending picture, she was naked, save 

 from her waist, to about halfway to the knees. 

 All this did not prevent her inhuman captor from 

 making her carry & heavy load of water, while, 

 with a rope about her neck, he drove her before 

 his horse ; and whenever she showed the least 

 inclination to stop, he beat her in the most un 

 merciful manner with a stick.&quot; 



Were we to travel through the whole interior of 

 Africa, and round its northern, eastern, and 

 western coasts, we should find, among almost 

 every tribe, numerous displays of the most inhu 

 man and depraved dispositions. The Algerines 

 are characterized as the most cruel and dangerous 

 pirates base, perfidious, and rapacious, to the 

 last degree. No oaths, nor ties, human or di 

 vine, will avail to bind them, when their interest 

 interferes. Whatever respect they may pretend 

 to pay to their prophet Mahomet, gold is the only 

 true idol which they worship. The emperors ol 

 Morocco are well known as a set of rapacious 

 and blood-thirsty tyrants, who have lived in a 

 state of habitual warfare with Christian nations, 

 and in the perpetration of deeds of injustice and 

 cruelty. The Gattas, on the borders of Abyssi 

 nia, are a barbarous and warlike nation. They 

 are hardy, and of a ferocious disposition ; they 

 are trained to the love of desperate achievements, 

 taught to believe that conquest entitles them to 

 the possession of whatever they desire, and to 

 look upon death with the utmost contempt ; and, 

 therefore, in their wars, they fight with the most 

 desperate resolution, and neither give nor take 

 any quarter. The inhabitants oFAdel, too. are 

 of a warlike disposition, and most frequently live 

 in enmity and hoMihty with those around them. 

 The Feloops are gloomy and unforgiving in their 

 tempers, thirsting for vengeance even in the hour 

 of dissolution, and leaving their children to avenge 

 their quarrels. The inhabitants of the Grain 



