The African Trader | Page 5

masts, to give a loud
flap, while here and there the surface was broken by the fin or snout of
some monster of the deep swimming round us. Our monkey, Quako,
who had been turned out of his usual resting-place, was exhibiting
more than his ordinary agility-- springing about the rigging, and
chattering loudly, now making his way aloft, whence he looked
eastwards, and now returning to the caboose, as if to communicate his
ideas to his sable friend.
"What makes Quako so frisky this morning?" I asked of Dick Radforth,
the boatswain, a sturdy broad shouldered man of iron frame, who, with
trousers tucked up, and bare arms brawny as those of Hercules, was
standing, bucket in hand, near me, deluging the deck with water.
"He smells his native land, Harry," he answered, "and thinks he is
going to pay a visit to his kith and kindred. We shall have to keep him
moored pretty fast, or he will be off into the woods to find them. I have
a notion you will get a sight of it before long, when the sea breeze sets
in and sends the old barky through the water."
"What! the coast of Africa!" I exclaimed, and thoughts of that
wonderful region, with its unexplored rivers, its gloomy forests, and its
black skinned inhabitants, with their barbarous customs and
superstitious rites, rose in my mind.
"Aye, sure and it will be a pleasant day when we take our departure
from the land, and see the last of it," observed Dick. "If those niggers
would trade like other people we might make quick work of it, and be
away home again in a few weeks, but we may thank our stars if we get
a full cargo by this time next year, without leaving some of our number
behind."

"What? I should not fancy that any of our fellows were likely to
desert," I observed.
"No; but they are likely to get pressed by a chap who won't let go his
gripe of them again," answered Dick.
"Who is that?" I asked.
"Yellow-fingered Jack we call him sometimes, the coast fever," said
Dick. "If they would but take better care of themselves and not drink
those poisonous spirits and sleep on shore at night, they might keep out
of his clutches. I give this as a hint to you, Harry. I have been there a
score of times, and am pretty well seasoned, but I have felt his gripe,
though I do not fear him now." I thanked the boatswain for his advice.
It was given, I suspected, for others' benefit as well as mine.
As the bright hot red sun rose in the sky, casting his beams down on
our heads, and making the pitch bubble up from the seams in the
deck--as it had done not unfrequently during the voyage--a few cats'
paws were seen playing over the mirror-like deep. The sails bulged out
occasionally, again to hang down as before; then once more they
swelled out with the gentle breeze, and the brigantine glided through
the water, gradually increasing her speed. I was eagerly looking out for
the coast; at length it came in sight--its distant outline rendered
indistinct by the misty pall which hung over it. As we drew nearer, its
forest covered heights had a particularly gloomy and sombre
appearance, which made me think of the cruelties I had heard were
practised on those shores, of the barbarous slave trade, of the fearful
idolatries of its dark-skinned children, of its wild beasts, and of its
deadly fevers. There was nothing exhilarating, nothing to give promise
of pleasure or amusement. As our gallant brigantine glided gaily on,
sending the sparkling foam from her bows through the tiny wavelets of
the ocean, which glittered in the radiance of a blue and cloudless sky,
and her sails filled with the fresh sea breeze, these feelings rapidly wore
off. Now, on either side, appeared a fleet of fishing canoes, the wild
songs of their naked crews coming across the water, as with rugged
sails of matting lolling at their ease, they steered towards the shore. We
overtook some of them, and such a loud jabber as they set up, talking to

each other, or hailing us, I had never heard.
Being near enough to the dangerous coast, we hove-to, and watched
them as they fearlessly made their way to shore on the summits of a
succession of rollers which burst in fearful breakers on the beach. With
our glasses we could see hundreds of dingy figures like black ants,
hurrying down to meet them, and to assist in hauling up their canoes.
As I cast my eye along the coast I could see many a bay and headland
bordered with a rim of glittering white sand,