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Guinea comprises an expanse about a thousand miles wide lying behind three undulating stretches of coast, the first reaching from Cape Verde southeastward nine hundred miles to Cape Palmas in four degrees north latitude, the second running thence almost parallel to the equator a thousand miles to Old Calabar at the head of "the terrible bight of Biafra," the third turning abruptly south and extending some fourteen hundred miles to a short distance below Benguela where the southern desert begins.
CHARLES. "I shall be rejoiced at your interference, sir, if it always have the effect of bringing out your stores; and, now I am pilot for a short time, I beg to state that I shall not require any apology, should you interrupt me in the discharge of my duty, but be thankful for the same. "Fernando Po. It is in the Bight of Biafra, the coast of which bight is thus described by Dr.
In the first place, the convenient situation of the island, at the distance of only twenty miles from the main-land of Africa, and in the immediate neighbourhood of the mouths of the many large rivers which pour their waters into the Gulf of Biafra, appeared to afford a most eligible point for checking the slave-trade, of which this position may be considered the very centre.
After Widah our cruise took on a different aspect. We had come to that part of the coast called the Bights, consisting of the Gulfs of Biafra and Benin, between which lies the huge Niger Delta. The weather, which continued as scorching as ever, became excessively oppressive. The sky was always dark and the rain never ceased.
He saw her first in the northwest, coming from some port in the Bight of Biafra probably, and the odds were she was heading south along the Coast. Presently he picked up her red port light. Yes, he admitted to himself with a sigh, she was making for one of the ports to southward, for Sette Camma perhaps, or Loango, or Landana, or Kabenda, and he calmed himself down with the discovery.
Paul de Loando, for the purpose of visiting different parts of Angola, and in which view I had prepared myself with a letter of introduction to the Viceroy of that country, from a distinguished person in England: but although I had been about seven months at Fernando Po, and other parts of the Bight of Biafra, I had never met with an opportunity for proceeding to Angola; I was therefore obliged to leave that place out of my plan, and to make the Brazils the next point in my route; with this intention I thought it most desirable to return to Sierra Leone with Captain Owen, where I might meet with a captured slave-vessel, that had been bought up by the agents, to be sent to some part of the Brazils, from whence there would be no difficulty in my ultimately reaching Rio de Janeiro.
These English and German lines, having come to a friendly understanding regarding freights, work the Bights of Benin, Biafra, and Panavia, without any rivals, save now and again the vessels chartered by the African Association to bring out a big cargo, and the four sailing vessels belonging to the Association which give an eighteenth-century look to the Rivers, and have great adventures on the bars of Opobo and Bonny.
A considerable advance, therefore, had been made since the lamented death of the illustrious Don Henry; which comprehended the whole coast of Guinea, with its two gulfs, usually named the Bights of Benin and Biafra, with the adjacent islands, and extending to the northern frontier of the kingdom of Congo . If the following assertion of de Barros could be relied on, we might conclude that some nameless Portuguese navigators had crossed the line even before the death of Don Henry; but the high probability is, that the naval pupils of that illustrious prince continued to use his impress upon their discoveries, long after his decease, and that the limits of discovery in his time was confined to Cape Vergas.
Next day, however, the land was out of sight, and Burns, the mate, explained to me that we should see no more until we came to our port in the Gulf of Biafra. Every day we flew south with a favouring wind, and always at noon the pin upon the chart was moved nearer and nearer to the African coast.
Our breakfast this morning consisted of smoked and dried herrings, corned mackerel, fresh prawns, beef steaks, cold roast beef, cold ham, roast and boiled yams, eggs, and toast: a supply that will not be thought despicable for the passengers of a merchant schooner, in the Bight of Biafra, where the sun was so powerful, that our anchor was hot enough to serve the purposes of a heated oven.
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