A Narrow Escape 
more secure on account of the presence of the 
soldiers, and retired that night, as we did in 
Abeokuta, utterly unsuspicious of the sword that 
was at their throats. During the night the rest 
of the enemy surrounded the doomed city, the 
gates were opened and the slaughter began. Ex¬ 
cepting a few hundred spared to be offered in 
sacrifice, everybody but one man perished. This 
man jumped over the walls but was found and 
left for dead. Though terribly hacked up, he 
succeeded in getting to Abeokuta that afternoon 
and in giving the alarm. But it would have been 
too late to save the city, if the Dahomians had 
carried out their original plan. The deserter de¬ 
clared that the king was so well satisfied with the 
slaughter he had made among the Egbars and was 
so suspicious that the king of Abeokuta knew of 
his presence at Eshagga, that he decided to re¬ 
turn to Abomey until another season. When he 
reached this decision, we did not know that 
there was a Dahomian within a hundred miles of 
us. God put into his heart to wait until Abeokuta 
was ready to defend itself. He returned next dry 
season but there was no surprise this time, and he 
received a repulse even more bloody than the first. 
What a benefit the French conferred on man¬ 
kind by destroying this cruel power, the follow- 
235 
