MISSION TO ASHANTEE. 
lOT 
measure not only valuable to commerce but to humanity, in avert- 
ing the renewal of a war, recorded by indehble marks of carnage 
and devastation. 
At the moment I expected the King to execute the treaty, a 
fresh design was disclosed, in a long speech from the chief linguist, 
setting forth the wrongs the King had just received from the 
people of Amissa, who had scourged his messengers, and couched 
their insulting defiance in the foulest language ; yet, he said, the 
King did not want to invade the Eantee country for the sake of 
one town, and therefore I must stay and assist him to settle that 
palaver; he would then readily swear to the treaty. I replied at 
length, declaring particularly that I could not, and would not 
recognize the Amissa palaver; that the King vitiated the compli- 
ments he had been pleased to pay me, in expecting me to be such 
a fool as to involve you in the palaver of a people, over whom you 
neither possessed nor desired authority; and that if I had not a 
right to think better of the King, I should view such a proposal as 
evasive of the treaty, and final to the hope of a thorough under- 
standing. 
The chief linguist rejoined, that I had declared in announcing 
the treaty, that it was the wish of the British Government to put an 
end to war, and for the King to have no occasion to trouble the 
Eantees ; whereas, if the people of Amissa were not persuaded to 
retract, the King must send a captain to destroy them, which could 
be done at a word, and this perhaps would make another war. I 
urged that the Eantee towns under the British forts must be con- 
sidered distinctly, and that those, and those only, were viewed by 
the Government and the treaty ; yet, for the cause of humanity, I 
would request you, for the King, to advise the people of Amissa 
better, through some medium, which I hoped might do good, but 
if disregarded, you could not even repeat it : that was all I could 
