DAHOMEY. 345 



but is less gorgeous in its vegetation, less abundant in 

 its life. 



Farther yet to the south, and a brighter land ap- 

 pears. We now enter the Portuguese province of 

 Angola. The land, far into the interior, is covered 

 with farm-houses and coffee plantations, and smiling 

 fields of maize. San Paolo de Loanda is still a great 

 city, though the colony has decayed ; though the con- 

 vents have fallen into ruin, though oxen are stalled in 

 the college of the Jesuits. Below Angola, to the Cape 

 of Good Hope, is a waterless beach of sand. The West 

 Coast of Africa begins with a desert inhabited by 

 Moors ; it ends with a desert inhabited by Hottentots. 



In the last century, a trifling trade was done in 

 ivory and gold ; but these were only accessories ; the 

 Guinea trade signified the trade in slaves. At first 

 the Europeans kidnapped the negroes whom they met 

 on the beach, or who came off to the ships in their 

 canoes; but the "treacherous natives" made reprisals ; 

 the practice was, therefore, given up, and the trade 

 was conducted upon equitable principles. It was found 

 that honesty was the best policy, and that it was 

 cheaper to buy men than to steal them. Besides the 

 settlements which were made by Europeans, there were 

 many native ports upon the Slave Coast, and of these, 

 Whydah, the seaport of Dahomey, was the most im- 

 portant. When a slave vessel entered the roads, it 

 fired a gun, the people crowded down to the beach, 

 the ship's boat landed through an ugly surf, and the 

 skipper made his way to a large tree in the vicinity of 

 the landing-place, where the governor of the town re- 

 ceived him in state, and regaled him with trade-gin, 

 by no means the most agreeable of all compounds. The 

 capital was situated at a distance of sixty miles, and 



