84 
VOYAGE TO SENEGAL. 
These expences, however, greatly exceeded the idea which 
had been formed hy the company; they were occasioned by a 
concurrence of circumstances which it was impossible to foresee, 
but which are all properly explained in the different statements 
that have been pubhshed by the directors. 
The colonists arrived in the rainy season, which occasioned a 
general sickness and many deaths. Several of the principal offi* 
cers were taken ill, and obliged to return to England; and a 
great many of the subordinate agents fell sacrifices to the addi-f 
tional labour which they in consequence had to perform. It ap- 
peared that the air of Free-town, like that of all the positions 
on the coast, is bad, and even dangerous duripg the rainy an4 
stormy season ; but that it is good and agreeable for the rest of 
the year. 
The cultivation went on slowly, and experienced many difîî^ 
culties ; nevertheless the directors were of opinion that the soil of 
Africa might be managed by its native inhabitants. They were 
of this opinion from the apparent success of the plantations, 
which they had undertaken; but they adhered to their system of 
making the future progress of such plantations depend on the abo- 
lition of the slave trade. 
Under the article of civilization, the directors comprised a 
form of government for the colony: it is founded on the prin^ 
ciples of the Enghsli constitution. The trial by jury perfectly 
succeeded ; and the Africans appeared to incline to the measures 
adopted in the colony to introduce Christianity and civil régula^ 
tions. But the success of the enterprize was a subordinajte con- 
sideration compared with the grand object, the abolition of the 
slave trade. Yet to overcome the first difficulties was far more 
easy, than what they had afterwards to encounter: for they had 
some severe misfortunes to try their constancy. 
On the 27th of November, 1794, a French squadron enters 
ed the river of Sierre Leorje, and fired on Free-town. The 
inhabitants conceiving all resistance useless, begged to capitulate, 
but in vain : the French landed, plundered the houses and maga^ 
zines, and conducted themselves with extreme rigour. They 
were encouraged in their excesses by the captains of two Ameri- 
can ships employed in the slave trade. It was impossible to 
check the animosity of Arnaud, the commander of the expedi- 
tion : he protested that he would burn all the houses belonging to 
the English ; and he kept his word. The books of the company 
were seized and destroyed, and all the bibles and prayer-books 
were trampled under foot. The collection of the botanist Afze- 
lius was ravaged ; his plants, seeds, birds, insects, drawings, and 
memoranda v. ere dispersed and spoiled, and his mathematical in- 
stiuincnts and machines broken to pieces. Even the church was 
