s, the soil rich; and if the people were industrious, they
might, of their own produce, carry on a very advantageous trade with
strangers; there being but few things in which they could be excelled;
_but_ (he adds) _it is to be hoped, the Europeans will never let them
into the secret._" A remark unbecoming humanity, much more
christianity!]

[Footnote C: This inhuman practice is particularly described by Brue, in
collect. vol. 2. page 98, where he says, "That some of the natives are,
on all occasions, endeavouring to surprize and carry off their country
people. They land (says he) without noise, and if they find a lone
cottage, without defence, they surround it, and carry off all the people
and effects to their boat, and immediately reimbark." This seems to be
mostly practised by some Negroes who dwell on the sea coast.]

[Footnote D: Bosman, p. 155.]

CHAP. XI.

An account of the shocking inhumanity, used in the carrying on of the
slave-trade, as described by factors of different nations, viz. by
Francis Moor, on the river Gambia; and by John Barbot, A. Brue, and
William Bosman, through the coast of Guinea. _Note_. Of the large
revenues arising to the Kings of Guinea from the slave-trade.

First, Francis Moor, factor for the English African company, on the
river Gambia,[A] writes, "That there are a number of Negro traders,
called joncoes, or merchants, who follow the slave-trade as a business;
their place of residence is so high up in the country as to be six weeks
travel from James Fort, which is situate at the mouth of that river.
These merchants bring down elephants teeth, and in some years two
thousand slaves, most of which, they say, are prisoners taken in war.
They buy them from the different Princes who take them; many of them are
Bumbrongs and Petcharies; nations, who each of them have different
languages, and are brought from a vast way inland. Their way of bringing
them is tying them by the neck with leather thongs, at about a yard
distant from each other, thirty or forty in a string, having generally a
bundle of corn or elephants teeth upon each of their heads. In their way
from the mountains, they travel thro' very great woods, where they
cannot for some days get water; so they carry in skin bags enough to
support them for a time. I cannot (adds Moor) be certain of the number
of merchants who follow this trade, but there may, perhaps, be about an
hundred, who go up into the inland country