MARKET-DAY AT SAVANNA-LE-MAR. 57 



MARKET-DAY. 



Feb. \st. — Having occasion to visit Savanna-le- 

 Mar, I took the opportunity of crossing the Bay in a 

 negro's canoe. Saturday is market-day; and many 

 of the black and coloured people resort on that day 

 to the tow^ns from the country, some on horseback, 

 some on foot carrying their own loads, others driving 

 donkeys, and others by sea in canoes, with provisions 

 for sale. The concourse, the gossip, and the excite- 

 ment of the market present great charms to the 

 negro's mind ; I have known, repeatedly, a woman 

 to carry on her head a huge tray of yams to Savanna- 

 le-Mar, a journey of twelve miles, and return the 

 same evening ; when she had actually refused to sell 

 her produce at Bluefields-house, close to her own 

 door, for a price larger, actually larger, than she ex- 

 pected to get at the market. 



At sunrise I walked down to the beach, and 

 waited until the preparations were completed, much 

 amused at the busy scene presented by the shore, 

 usually so still and solitary. Three or four canoes 

 lay half-launched at the water's edge, around which 

 were congregated nearly a hundred persons ; and 

 more were continually arriving with trays or shal- 

 low baskets of provisions and fruit on their heads. 

 Heaps of yams, cocoes, sweet potatoes, plantains, 

 pumpkins, oranges, sugar-canes, and other produce, 

 calabashes of water, bottles, &c., were lying about, 

 which with much chunour were being deposited in 

 the canoes. The jabber was immense ; — a hundred 

 negroes, many of them women, all talking at once 



