After permission has been obtained for breaking trade, as it is termed, the captains go ashore, from time to time, to examine the negroes that are exposed to sale, and to make their purchases.  The unhappy wretches thus disposed of, are bought by the black traders at fairs, which are held for that purpose, at the distance of upwards of two hundred miles from the sea coast; and these fairs are said to be supplied from an interior part of the country.  Many negroes, upon being questioned relative to the places of their nativity have asserted, that they have travelled during the revolution of several moons, (their usual method of calculating time) before they have reached the places where they were purchased by the black traders.  At these fairs, which are held at uncertain periods, but generally every fix weeks, several thousands are frequently exposed to sale, who had been collected from all parts of the country for a very considerable distance round.  While I was upon the coast, during one of the voyages I made, the black traders brought down, in different canoes, from twelve to fifteen hundred negroes, which had been purchased at one fair.  They consisted chiefly of men and boys, the women seldom exceeding a third of the whole number.  From forty to two hundred negroes are generally purchased at a time by the black traders, according to the opulence of the buyer;

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consist of those of all ages, from a month, to sixty years and upwards.  Scarce any age or situation is deemed an exception, the price being proportionable.  Women sometimes form a part of them, who happen to be so far advanced in their pregnancy, as to be delivered during their journey from the fairs to the coast; and I have frequently seen instances of deliveries on board ship.  The slaves purchased at these fairs are only for the supply of the markets at Bonny, and Old and New Calabar.
     There is great reason to believe, that most of the negroes shipped off from the coast of Africa, are kidnapped.  But the extreme care taken by the black traders to prevent the Europeans from gaining any intelligence of their modes of proceeding; the great distance inland from whence the negroes are brought; and our ignorance of their language, (with which, very frequently, the black traders themselves are equally unacquainted) prevent our obtaining such information on this head as we could wish.  I have, however, by means of occasional inquiries, made through interpreters, procured some intelligence relative to the point, and such, as I think, puts the matter beyond a doubt.
     From these I shall select the following striking instances: - While I was in employ on board one of the slave ships, a negroe informed me, that being one evening invited to drink with some of the black traders, upon his going away, they attempted to seize him.  As he was very active, he evaded their design, and got out of their hands.  He was however prevented from effecting his escape by a large dog, which laid hold of him, and compelled him to submit.  These creatures are kept by many of the traders for that purpose;

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and being trained to the inhuman sport, they appear to be much pleased with it.
     I was likewise told by a negroe woman, that as she was on her return home, one evening, from some neighbours, to whom she had been making a visit by invitation, she was kidnapped; and, notwithstanding she was big with child, sold for a slave.  This transaction happened a considerable way up the country, and she had passed through the hands of several purchasers before the reached the ship.  A man and his son, according to their own information, were seized by professed kidnappers, while they were planting yams, and sold for slaves.  This likewise happened in the interior parts of the country, and after passing through several hands, they were purchased for the ship to which I belonged.
     It frequently happens, that those who kidnap others, are themselves, in their turns, seized and fold.  A negroe in the Weft- Indies informed me, that after having been employed in kidnapping others, he had experienced this reverse.  And he assured me, that it was a common incident among his countrymen.
     Continual enmity is thus fostered among the negroes of Africa, and all social intercourse between them destroyed; which most assuredly would not be the case, had they not these opportunities of finding a ready sale for each other.
     During my stay on the coast of Africa, I was an eye-witness of the following transaction: - A black trader invited a negroe, who resided a little way of the country, to come and see him.  After the entertainment was over, the trader proposed to his guest, to treat him with a fight of one of the ships lying in the river.  The unsuspicious countryman readily consented, and ac-

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companied the trader in a canoe to the side of the hip, which he viewed with pleasure and astonishment.  While he was thus employed, some black traders on board, who appeared to be in the secret, leaped into the canoe, seized the unfortunate man, and dragging him into the ship, immediately sold him.
     Previous to my being in this employ, I entertained a belief, as many others have done, that the kings and principal men breed negroes for sale, as we do cattle.  During the different times I was in the country, I took no little pains to satisfy myself in this particular; but notwithstanding I made many inquiries, I was not able to obtain the least intelligence of this being the case, which it is more than probable I should have done, had fuch a practice prevailed.  All the information I could procure, confirms me in the belief, that to kidnapping, and to crimes, (and many of these fabricated as a pretext) the slave trade owes its chief support.
     The following instance tends to prove, that the last mentioned artifice is often made use of.  Several black traders, one of whom was a person of consequence, and exercised an authority somewhat similar to that of our magistrates, being in want of some particular kind of merchandize, and not having a slave to barter for it, they accused a fisherman, at the river Ambris, with extortion in the sale of his fish; and as they were interested in the decision, they immediately adjudged the poor fellow guilty, and condemned him to be sold.  He was accordingly purchased by the ship to which I belonged, and brought on board.
     As an additional proof that kidnapping is not only the general, but almost the sole mode, by which slaves are procured, the black traders, in

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purchasing them, chuse those which are the roughest and most hardy; alleging, that the smooth negroes have been gentlemen.  By this observation we may conclude they mean that nothing but fraud or force could have reduced these smooth-skinned gentlemen to a state of slavery.
     It may not be here unworthy of remark, in order to prove that the wars among the Africans do not furnish the number of slaves they are supposed to do, that I never saw any negroes with recent wounds; which must have been the consequence, at least with some of them, had they been taken in battle.  And it being the particular province of the surgeon to examine the slaves when they are purchased, such a circumstance could not have escaped my observation.  As a farther corroboration, it might be remarked, that on the Gold and Windward Coasts, where fairs are not held, the number of slaves procured at a time are usually very small.
     the preparations made at Bonny by the black traders, upon setting out for the fairs which are held up the country, are very considerable.  From twenty to thirty canoes, capable of containing thirty or forty negroes each, are assembled for this purpose; and such goods put on board them as they expect will be wanted for the purchase of the number of slaves they intend to buy.  When their loading is completed, they commence their voyage, with colours flying and musick playing; and in about ten or eleven days, they generally return to Bonny with full cargoes.  As soon as the canoes arrive at the trader's landing-place, the purchased negroes are cleaned, and oiled with palm oil; and on the following day they are exposed for sale to the captains.

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     The black traders do not always purchase their naves at the same rate.  The speed with which the information of the arrival of ships upon the coast is conveyed to the fairs, considering it is the interest of the traders to keep them ignorant, is really surprising.  In a very short time after any ships arrive upon the coast, especially if several make their appearance together, those who dispose of the negroes at the fairs are frequently known to increase the price of them.
     These fairs are not the only means, though they are the chief, by which the black traders on the coast are supplied with negroes.  Small parties of them, from five to ten, are frequently brought to the houses of the traders, by those who make a practice of kidnapping; and who are constantly employed in procuring a supply, while purchasers are to be found .
     When the negroes, whom the black traders have to dispose of, are shewn to the European purchasers, they first examine them relative to their age.  They then minutely inspect their persons, and inquire into the state of their health; if they are afflicted with any infirmity, or are deformed, or have bad eyes or teeth; if they are lame, or weak in the joints, or distorted in the back, or of a slender make, or are narrow in the chest; in short, if they have been, or are afflicted in any manner, so as to render them incapable of much labour; if any of the foregoing defects are discovered in them, they are rejected.  But if approved of, they are generally taken on board the ship the same evening.  The purchaser has liberty to return on the following morning, but not afterwards, such as upon re-examination are found exceptionable.

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     The traders frequently beat those negroes which are objected to by the captains, and use them with great severity.  It matters not whether they are refused on account of age, illness, deformity, or for any other reason.  At New Calabar, in particular, the traders have frequently been known to put them to death.  Instances have happened at that place, that the traders, when any of their negroes have been objected to, have dropped their canoes under the stern of the vessel, and instantly beheaded them, in fight of the captain.
     Upon the Windward Coast, another mode of procuring slaves is pursued; which is, by what they term boating; a mode that is very pernicious and destructive to the crews of the ships.  The sailors, who are employed upon this trade, go in boats up the rivers, seeking for negroes, among the villages situated on the banks of them.  But this method is very slow, and not always effectual.  For, after being absent from the ship during the fortnight or three weeks, they sometimes return with only from eight to twelve negroes.  Numbers of these are procured in consequence of alleged crimes, which, as before observed, whenever any ships are upon the coast, are more productive than at any other period.  Kidnapping, however, prevails here.
     I have good reason to believe, that of one hundred and twenty negroes, which were purchased for the ship to which I then belonged, then lying at the river Ambris, by far the greater part, if not the whole, were kidnapped.  This, with various other instances, confirms me in the belief that kidnapping is the fund which supplies the thousands of negroes annually fold off these extensive Windward, and other Coasts, where boating prevails.

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