it to
the embraces of King Coffee and driven mad, while another committed
suicide to prevent a similar degradation. About eight hundred slaves
were missing, most of whom had been killed, as very few managed to
escape to the bush.

[Illustration: MARCH THROUGH A SWAMP.

(_From Stedman's "Surinam."_)]

Behind the coast of Guiana is a long stretch of swamp, which in slavery
times was the general resort of runaways. For miles extends a grassy
plain like a meadow, the sedges entirely covering the two to four feet
of water which would otherwise give it the appearance of a great lake.
Except through the various streams that drain it, access is almost
impossible during the rainy season, and even the Indians care little to
explore its recesses beyond fishing in the canal-like creeks. However,
here and there are little islands or sand reefs, and on these the
runaway slaves took refuge. First, perhaps, a murderer would escape and
hide himself for a time until the hue and cry had abated, returning now
and again to the plantation at night for the purpose of getting
provisions from his friends. Then others would follow, until a party of
twenty to a hundred, with their wives, had established a little village.
Towards the end of the last century a number of these communities of
bush negroes had been formed in Demerara, and their depredations became
so common that regular expeditions were sent against them, guided by
Indian trackers. In 1795 they joined with the slaves to raise a general
insurrection, but special measures were taken so that they were almost
suppressed for a time.

Before this they had formed a line of stations for seventy miles from
the river Demerara to the Berbice. Every camp was naturally surrounded
by water, and by driving pointed stakes in a circle, and leaving the
entrance to wind through a double line under water, they were made
almost impregnable. To reach them the attacking party had to wade up to
their middles through perhaps a mile of ooze and water, to be cut with
razor grass, and all the time at the mercy of the negroes. Only during
the dry season was anything like success possible, and even then the
negroes generally saved themselves by flight.

Many of the slaves were friendly with the runaways, but they were much
feared by the more timid. On one occasion a negro went to cut wood at
the back of a plantation in Demerara and came suddenly upon the outpost
of a camp, probably the entrance to the concea