FROM ZEGZEG TO BADAGRY. 
325 
having behaved remarkably well to us. The country traversed 
was swampy, and full of water the greatest part of the way, which 
rendered travelling tedious and unpleasant. 
The king was glad to see me, gave me his own house, con- 
structed of bamboo, whilst he himself, much against my inclination, 
resided in a small miserable mud hut. Like every other prince 
on the road, he was grieved to learn the decease of my master. 1 
gave him my little horse, which I had brought the whole of the 
way from Soccatoo, and all the articles for presents that were left, 
consisting of two yards of light blue damask, and the same quantity 
of scarlet ditto, two yards of scarlet and blue silk, and two dozen 
pair of stockings. 
On the 28th I waited on captain Morrison, a Portuguese slave- 
merchant, and obtained from him goods amounting to ninety-four 
dollars ; and a barrel of gunpowder, which cost a doubloon, I paid 
for myself. 
Three of the Portuguese slave-merchants residing at Badagry, 
went to the king one day, and told him and his principal men that 
I was a spy sent by the English government, and if suffered to 
leave, would soon return with an army and conquer their country. 
This the credulous people believed, and I was treated with cold- 
ness and distrust by the king and his subjects, who seldom came to 
see me. All the chief men at length assembled at the fetish hut, 
and having come to a resolution that I was to drink a fetish, sent 
for me to appear before them. On my way five or six hundred 
people gathered round me, and I could proceed with difficulty. A 
great number of them were armed with hatchets, bows and arrows, 
and spears ; and waited outside the hut till I came out. On en- 
tering one of the men presenting me with a bowl, in which was 
about a quart of a liquid much resembling water, commanded me 
to drink it, saying, “If you come to do bad, it will kill you ; but if 
