(jQ EARLY ENGLISH DISCOVERIES. 



the falls of Barraconda. As the boats approached that fatal 

 bouiulary, the Africans came in a body, and stated their 

 iirm determination on no account to proceed any farther. 

 No one, they said, had ever gone beyond Barraconda, — 

 Barraconda was the end of the world, — or if there existed 

 any thing beyond, it was a frightful and barbarous region 

 where life would be in continual danger. A long palaver 

 and a bottle of Stibbs's very best brandy were necessary ere 

 they would agree to accompany him beyond this dreaded 

 boundary of the habitable universe. 



The falls of Barraconda were not found so formidable as 

 rumour had represented ; they were narrows rather than 

 falls, the channel being confined by rocky ledges and frag- 

 ments, between which there was only one passage, where 

 the canoes rubbed against the rock on each side. In this 

 region of the Upper Gambia, the natives, belying all slan- 

 derous rumours, proved to be a harmless, good-humoured 

 people, who, wherever the crew landed, met them with pre- 

 sents of fowls and provisions. 



Tlie severest exertion now became necessary in order to 

 pass'the flats and quicksands, which multiplied in proportion 

 as they ascended, and over which the boats in some instances 

 could only be dragged by main force. The wild and huge 

 animals that occupy these regions appeared still more dan- 

 gerous to the present adventurers than to their predecessors. 

 The elephants, which had fled precipitately before Jobson, 

 struck the greatest terror into this party ; one of them on a 

 certain occasion putting to flight the whole crew. They 

 were even seen in bands crossing from one side of the water 

 to the other. The river-horses also presented themselves 

 every where in numerous herds ; and though this animal 

 generally moved in a sluggish and harmless manner, yet in 

 the shallow places, when walking along the bottom of the 

 river, he occasionally came into collision with the boat ; in- 

 censed at which, he was apt to strike a hole through it with 

 his huge teeth, so as to endanger its sinking. If the cou- 

 rage of the crew against these mighty animals was not very 

 conspicuous, their exertions in dragging the boat over the 

 flats and shallows appear to have been most strenuous ; yet 

 so extremely unfavourable was the season, that at the end 

 of two months Stibbs found himself, on the 22d February, 

 when he had reached fifty-nine miles above Barraconda, 



