The Market Of This Place Is Supplied Abundantly With Indian Corn, Palm Oil, &C., Together With Trona, And Other Articles Brought Hither From The Borders Of The Great Desert, Through The Medium Of The Wandering Arabs.

According to the regulations of the fetish, neither a white man nor a horse is permitted to sleep at Wow during the night season:

As to the regulations respecting the horses, they knew not what had become of them; they were, according to the orders of Adooley, to have preceded them to this place, but they had not then arrived. With respect to themselves, they found it necessary, in conformity to the orders of the fetish, to walk to a neighbouring village, and there to spend the night. Their course to Wow, through this creek, was north-by-east; and Badagry, by the route they came, was about thirty miles distant.

A violent thunder-storm, which on the coast is called a tornado, visited them this afternoon, and confined them to the "worst hut's worse room" till it had subsided, and the weather become finer. At three p.m. they sallied forth, and were presently saluted by hootings, groanings, and hallooings from a multitude of people of all ages, from a child to its grandmother, and they followed closely at their heels, as they went along, filling the air with their laughter and raillery. A merry-andrew at a country town in England, during the Whitsuntide holidays, never excited so great a stir as did the departure of the travellers from the town of Wow. But it is "a fool's day," and, no doubt, some allowance ought to be made for that. They had not proceeded more than a dozen paces from the outskirts of the town, when they were visited by a pelting shower, which wetted them to the skin in a moment. A gutter or hollow, misnamed a pathway, was soon overflowed, and they had to wade in it up to their knees in water, and through a most melancholy-looking forest, before they entered a village. It was called Sagba, and was about eight miles from Wow. They were dripping wet on their arrival, and the weather still continuing unpleasant, it was some time before any one made his appearance to invite them into a hut. At length the chief came out to welcome them to his village, and immediately introduced them into a long, narrow apartment, wherein they were to take up their quarters for the night. It was built of clay, and furnished with two apertures, to admit light and air into the room. One end was occupied by a number of noisy goats, whilst the travellers took possession of the other. Pascoe and his wife lay on mats at their feet, and a native Toby Philpot, with his ruddy cheek and jug of ale, belonging to the chief, separated them from the goats. The remainder of the suite of the travellers had nowhere whatever to sleep. The walls of their apartment were ornamented with strings of dry, rattling, human bones, written charms, or fetishes, sheep skins, and bows and arrows. They did not repose nearly so comfortably as could have been desired, owing to the swarms of mosquitoes and black ants, which treated them very despitefully till the morning.

Between six and seven on the morning of the 2nd April, they continued their route through woods and large open patches of ground, and at about eleven in the forenoon, they arrived at the borders of a deep glen, more wild, romantic, and picturesque than can be conceived. It was enclosed and overhung on all sides by trees of amazing height and dimensions, which hid it in deep shadow. Fancy might picture a spot so silent and solemn as this, as the abode of genii and fairies, every thing conducing to render it grand, melancholy, and venerable, and the glen wanted only a dilapidated castle, a rock with a cave in it, or something of the kind, to render it the most interesting place in the universe. There was, however, one sight more beautiful than all the rest, and that was the incredible number of butterflies fluttering about like a swarm of bees, and they had no doubt chosen this glen as a place of refuge against the fury of the elements. They were variegated by the most brilliant tints and colourings imaginable: the wings of some of them were of a shining green, edged and sprinkled with gold; others were of a sky-blue and silver, others of purple and gold a lightfully blending into each other, and the wings of some were like dark silk velvet, trimmed and braided with lace.

The appearance of the travelling party was romantic in the extreme, as they winded down the paths of the glen; with their grotesque clothing and arms, bundles, and fierce black countenances, they might have been mistaken for a strange band of ruffians of the most fearful character. Besides their own immediate party, they had hired twenty men of Adooley, to carry the luggage, as there are not any beasts of burthen in the country, the natives carrying all their burthens upon their heads, and some of them of greater weight than are seen carried by the Irishwomen from the London markets. Being all assembled at the bottom of the glen, they found that a long and dangerous bog or swamp filled with putrid water, and the decayed remains of vegetable substances intersected their path, and must necessarily be crossed. Boughs of trees had been thrown into the swamp by some good-natured people to assist travellers in the attempt, so that their men, furnishing themselves with long poles which they used as walking sticks, with much difficulty and exertion, succeeded in getting over, and fewer accidents occurred to them, than could have been supposed possible, from the nature of the swamp. John Lander was taken on the back of a large and powerful man of amazing strength.

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