oftheirconduct.no complete justification can be offered, because theft is a crime in their own estimation ; and it must be observed, that they are not habitually and generally guilty of it towards each other. This, however, is an important circumstance in mitigation; and, before we pronounce them a more depraved people than any other, it were well to consider whether the lower order of people in any part of Europe, would have acted, under similar circumstances, with greater honesty towards a stranger, than the Negroes acted towards me. It must not be forgotten, that the laws of the country afforded me no protection ; that every one was at liberty to rob me with impunity ; and finally, that some part of my effects were of as great value, in the estimation of the Negroes, as pearls and diamonds would have been in the eyes of a European. Let us suppose, a black merchant of Hindostán to have found his way into the centre of England, with a box of jewels at his back; and that the laws of the kingdom afforded him no security ; in such a case, the wonder would be, not that the stranger was robbed of any part of his riches, but that any part was' left for a second depredator. Such, on-sober reflection, is the judgment I have formed concerning the pilfering disposition of the Mandingo Negroes towards myself. Notwithstanding I was so great a sufferer by it, I do not consider that their natural sense of justice was perverted or extinguished: it was overpowered only, for the moment, by the strength of a témptation which it required no common virtue to resist. On the other hand, as some counterbalance to this depravity in their nature, allowing it to be such, it is impossible for me to forget the disinterested charity, and tender solicitude, with which many of these poor heathens (from the sovereign of Sego, to the poor women who received me at different times into their cottages, when I was perishing of hunger) sympathized with me in my sufferings ; relieved my distresses ; and contibuted to my safety. This acknowledgment, however, is perhaps more particularly due to the female part of the nation. Among the men, as the reader must have seen, my reception, though generally kind, was sometimes otherwise. It varied according to the various tempers of those to whom I made application. The hardness of avarice in some, and the blindness of bigotry in others, had closed up the avenues to compassion: but I do not recollect a single instance of hardheartedness towards me in the women. In all my wanderings and wretchedness, I found them uniformly kind and compassionate ; and I can truly say, as my predecessor Mr. Ledyard, has eloquently said.before me; “ T o a woman, I never ad- “ dressed myself in the language o f decency and friendship, “ without receiving a decent and friendly answer. If I was “ hungry, or thirsty, wet, or sick, they did not hesitate, like 4 the men, to perform a generous action. In so free, and so “ kind a manner did they contribute to my relief; that if I “ was dry, I drank the sweetest draught, and if hungry, I eat I the coarsest morsel with a double relish." It is surely reasonable to suppose, that the soft and amiable sympathy of nature, which was thus spontaneously manifested towards me, in my distress, is displayed by these poor people as occasion requires, much more strongly towards persons of
27f 60
To see the actual publication please follow the link above