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Updated: June 17, 2025
Moore informed me that sixteen Kroomen were employed on the premises, at three dollars per month, and twenty-five colonists at sixty-two and a half cents a day, besides their food. The cane, now in process of manufacture, is very small and unprofitable, all of the larger kind having been already ground.
All day Tom stood at the hatchway of the Black Eagle, checking the cargo as it was hoisted out of her, while McPherson and his motley assistants, dock labourers, seamen, and black Kroomen from the coast, worked and toiled in the depths below. The engine rattled and snorted, and the great chain clanked as it was lowered into the hold. "Make fast there!" cries the mate. "Aye, aye, sir!"
"They'll do it," cried the doctor; but he was mistaken. The canoe dashed into the surf, and the next instant appeared bottom uppermost, rolling over and over. "The fine fellows are lost!" he exclaimed. A time of anxious suspense passed by; now the canoe could be seen in the surf, now she disappeared; but the gallant Kroomen could not be discovered, though many an eye was looking out for them.
The brutal Arab could then have disposed of the expedition at his leisure. But the Golden Eagle II was too closely guarded for the two spies to be able to harm it. The Kroomen porters attached to the camp had, as old Sikaso had forecast, fled into the jungle at the first attack of the Arab's followers and they did not put in an appearance till long after the marauders had left the camp.
They were navigated by Kroomen or Krooboys as they are sometimes called and who are a superior race to most of the natives of Africa. Some of the paddlers and oarsmen in the boats that surrounded the Admiral Dupont were almost six feet in height and splendidly built.
There have occasionally been upwards of 2000 of these people at one time in Freetown; but, shortly before our arrival, an order in council was issued to restrict the resident Kroomen to 600, for the purpose of throwing open the labour market to the free blacks, as well as to prevent in some measure the drain of profit which the Kroomen caused by their frequent immigration and departure.
As it is, it is little better than the mainland. There was not much to see in the town of Clarence, whose population consists entirely of traders from Sierra Leone, Kroomen, etc. The natives, whose tribal name is Adiza, live in little villages in the interior. They are an extremely primitive people, and for the most part dispense altogether with clothing.
We built a tent and fortification, traded off most of our clothes for something to eat, and slept unpleasantly near several hundred yelling savages. All this while the ship could render no assistance; but on the third day the Kroomen came on shore with some oars, and, after trying all one day, we managed, just at night, to get through the surf and back to the ship.
The pirates on discovering her hurried on board their own craft, carrying away two of my Kroomen, and casting off the grapplings with which they had made her fast alongside, got out their long sweeps and pulled away for their lives. As soon as the remaining Kroomen had set me and the other white men free, we ran out our guns and began firing at her.
At Sierra Leone we had shipped a dozen Kroomen, to get wood and water for the ship, a work which Europeans in that climate are unable to perform without great risk. At length Captain Idle began to grow impatient. One day he sent for Waller, who had been on the coast before with him, and was a very clever, active fellow.
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