498 



APPEXDIX IIL 



amongst the houses, commonly under a tree, close to the 

 deceased person's former habitation, which presents to a 

 stranger the appearance of a churchyard, and it would be 

 well if the eye alone was the only organ offended. Though 

 the Arabs and wealthy are properly covered, and have 

 neat tombs erected over them, the poor are only wrapped 

 up in a mat, and have scarce sufficient sand thrown over 

 the corpse to hide it from the view ; indeed, some part of 

 it is generally to be seen sticking through, and as to the 

 slaves, they are often hiid out to putrefy on the beach,* not 

 a fiinjrle rajr of cloth or handful of earth beinn: hiid over 

 them. In consequence of tliis disgusting practice the 

 stench in and about the town is intolerable; and co- 

 operating with the noxious effluvia which arisrs from the 

 putrid vegetable matter during the rainy season, tends to 

 produce fever and fluxes, which, we learned, make annually 

 during that jxTiod dreadful ravages among the inhabitants. 



The English hav(» hitherto had very little communic^a- 

 tion with Zanzibar, though the French are frequcMitly in 

 the habit of coming there from the Mauritius for slaveH 

 and Mocha coffee. Previous to our arrival only one 

 EnMish vessel had touched at the island since Admiral 

 Blankett's scjuadron was there in 1700, on his passnge 

 up the coast to the Red Sea. Captain liissel, whos(» 

 account of that expedition is published by Dalrymple, says 

 they were told no British ships had been there previous 

 to tliat, within the memory of the oldest person then 

 living, and that they found the natives of the inferior 

 order so ignorant of the value of coin, as to prefer, in their 

 exchanges, a gilt button to a guinea. This might have 



' Every traveller down to mj own time has remarked this abomina- 

 tion at Zanzibar. 



