MR, HUTCHISON'S DIARY. 
413 
Thursday 25. This being Christmas day, I displayed the flag, 
and paid every attention to it that I possibly could ; many of the 
chiefs hearing of it, sent their comphments, expecting a present, 
but of course were disappointed, 
Friday 24. Baba called, and began an oration about Sam Brue, 
hinting that he should like if I could get Brue, the slave trader, back 
to Gape Coast. He was my good friend, I was his friend, the 
Governor was my friend, Brue was his friend, and a long genea- 
logy fit to puzzle a Scottish or Welch family herald. I told him 
no person must interfere in such affairs. He had that morning re- 
ceived from Brue, powder, guns, and cloth for slaves he had sent 
down ; he brought me a piece of the cloth to shew me, it was very 
coarse with large red figures on it. I told him when he washed it,, 
he would need to take his staff and put on his sandals to hunt after 
the colours ; he told me he had found that out ; for he had washed 
a piece, and he could not tell what, colour it was. He then began a 
dissertation on the good the slave trade did them, and what changes 
he had seen since he came here; he thought God intended to 
change the power of white men, and give it to the blacks and 
Moors. I told him he was going to make Mahomet a liar, as the 
Alkoran told them that the whites were to have so vereiii;n dominion 
to the end, because of Noah's sons' behaviour to him when drunk ; 
and if God was inclined to hide his face from white men, because 
of any ill they did, I did not think he would transfer it to Africans 
for any good they had done; he said I w^as right, and when they 
thought wrong the Christians could put them right. Seeing a 
Prayer Book on the table, he enquired if that was " Lingeel,'" the 
name they give the New Testament ; I replied it was the form of 
worshipping God in English Churches ; he wished me to read a 
little of it to him, as he had heard that white men prayed to God 
so— and muttered in a form, it must be allowed, too often resorted 
