Travels Of Richard And John Lander Into The Interior Of Africa For The Discovery Of The Course And Termination Of The Niger By Robert Huish
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A Custom Very
Similar To This Prevails At Yarriba, At Badagry, Cape Coast Castle,
And Along The Western Coast Generally;
The natives of those places
never take a glass of spirits without spilling a quantity of it on
the ground
As "a fetish." In the morning, they observed a branch of
the river running off in a westerly direction, the course of the main
body being southwest.
They stopped awhile at various little villages during the day, to
purchase yams, bananas, and cocoa-nuts, and the curiosity of their
poor inhabitants at their appearance was intense. They were chiefly
fishermen or husbandmen, and notwithstanding the uncouth and
remarkable dress of the Landers, they behaved to them without
rudeness and even with civility, so that their inquisitiveness was
not disagreeable. Speaking trumpets, it was imagined, were quite a
novelty with the men at Brass, by the extraordinary rapture which
they displayed for their music, which certainly was anything but
melodious. It has been already stated that two of these instruments
were in the canoe, for the convenience of issuing orders, and during
the whole of the day, they were not ten minutes together from the
mouths of the officers, so great was the desire of all of them to
breathe through them, and which adds considerably to the deafening
noises made by their constant quarrelling with each other. This was a
great annoyance to the Landers, but they were constrained to submit
to it in silence; besides, it was entirely superfluous, for the
voices of the people were of themselves loud and powerful enough for
all the common purposes of life; and when they have a mind to strain
their brazen lungs, no speaking trumpet that has ever been made, be
it ever so large, could match the quantity of horrid sound which they
made; it would, in fact, drown the roaring of the sea.
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