ACCOUNT OF THE PURRAH. 97 
he who loses the cause pays the expences, for which he gives 
security before leaving the council. 
Their rules of justice are not^ however, so particularly ob* 
served in their intercourse with the Whites. It is of no use for 
the latter to gain the cause, as they never derive any advantage 
from their success ; for they never grant them their expences 
whether they be in the right or wrong. On asking them their 
motives for such conduct, they answer, the white men gain, 
plenty of money, and therefore cannot want it." 
A capital crime is punished either by death or slavery, though 
the former mode is scarcely at all resorted to, except by the 
Mandingos, who follow the Mussulman laws, and whose pro* 
ceedings are very short. Murder, however, is an exception. — • 
The punishment for sorcery is slavery ; but for adultery or any 
other crime, a pecuniary recompence is sufficient. 
The manner of causing debts to be paid, is founded on the 
earliest notions of equity. Debts are ordinarily contracted for 
a certain time ; if, when it has expired, the debtor hesitate or 
refuse to pay it, the creditor has recourse to the king or chief, 
who tells the defaulter to perform his promise ; but if the advice 
be not followed, the king permits the creditor to seize the debtor 
or some of his slaves; and if he live in another town, so that 
this measure cannot be resorted to, then the creditor arrests the 
first countrvman of the debtor with whom he meets, and detains 
him till the debt is discharged ; an act which the debtor is soon 
obliged to perform by the inhabitants of the town. The person 
who has been so detained never fails to obtain damages for his 
imprisonment. 
A law peculiar to Sherbro, and known through all the 
country by the name of Purrahy is the most singular of all the 
laws established in Africa : this wise and politic institution took 
its origin from a view to terminate the incessant wars which arose 
amongst the inhabitants, from their pride, jealousy, and irrita- 
bility. Every free man thirty years of age, may become a mem- 
ber of the purrah : at the time of his admission he undergoes 
various ceremonies, conformably to the secret law ; and on this 
point they are as scrupulous as are the Free-masons of Europe, 
with regard to their mysteries. Both these institutions have indeed 
many instances of resemblance, such in particular, as the ordi- 
nation of a grand master, and the exclusion of women. It is 
only at the last extremity that this institution is resorted to ; but 
it has the right of punishing murderers and uuigicians. 
When two nations, which are at war, become tired of hostilities 
and wish for peace, though each party be too proud to ask it of 
the other, they apply to a neighbouring kbig to get him loact as 
DURAND.] W 
