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Updated: June 3, 2025
Lat. 1°. 0'. N. On getting into the open sea, we found the weather much colder than it was at Fernando Po, notwithstanding we were 3°. nearer the equinoctial line, than at the former place, while the thermometer for the last twenty-four hours, has only ranged from 74°. to 78°. F. Indeed, it is very commonly remarked, that the poor slaves brought from the Bights of Benin and Biafra, for the Brazils, suffer dreadfully from the cold, when they get into the open sea, and approach the line.
And, wallowing as if she meant to turn over with us, the barque, her decks full of water, her gear flying in bights, ran at some ten knots an hour.
They appeared small and effeminate after the burly negroes of the Bights, and their black but not comely persons were clad in red and white raiment. It is a tribe of bumboat men, speaking a few words of English, French, and Portuguese, and dealing in mats and pumpkins, parrots, and poultry, cages, and Fetish dolls called "idols."
"Woh woh" you will find, among all the natives in the Bights, to mean extremely bad. I think it is native, having some connection with the root Wo meaning power, etc.; but Mr. Hutchinson may be right, and it may mean "a capacity to bring double woe." "Amtrang Boboh" is not the name of some uncivilised savage, as the uninitiated may think; far from it.
Moreover, being discovered on the starboard bow, reaching out from the direction wherein land was known to be, with her yards artfully ill braced, her canvas badly set, her running gear hanging all in bights, and her speed retarded by a topmast studding- sail being dropped overboard and towed from her lee quarter less than that of the veriest Noah's ark of a north-country collier, she was at once set down as a harmless coaster, and no further notice taken of her.
Now then, Bill, you stand by to haul Mr Lascelles out of the thick of these bights and turns whilst I holds 'em up. Now then haul! Is that better, sir?" "Very much better, thank you," said I, as they dragged me out clear of the thickest of the raffia. "If you are seated firmly enough for me to put my arm round your neck I think I can work myself free altogether. That's it, capital!
Then we bent ropes to each end of three thwarts, and thrust an oar through the bights of each pair of ropes. Thus, with one of us at each end of an oar, holding it in the crooks of his elbows, we made out to lift the boat and drag it along till we got it safely hidden in the bushes with the oars tucked away under it.
Now, she passed out to sea with her fore and main-topgallant-masts and mizen- topmast hanging over the side, the fore-topsail-yard down on the cap, the spankerboom shot away in the jaws, the flying-jib-stay and halliards cut through and the sail towing alongside, her canvas riddled with shot- holes, ends and bights of ropes streaming out in the wind everywhere aloft, and two 36-pound shot in her side.
The balance of better and worse will be variously estimated by various minds. The magnificent scenery of Rio remains, and must remain, short of earthquake; the Sugar Loaf, the distant Organ mountains, the near, high, surrounding hills, the numerous bights and diversified bluffs, which impart continuous novelty to the prospect.
She had also a quantity of merchandise on board, without having any Custom-house certificate of clearance from the Havannah, or indeed any other account of it, which circumstances led us to believe that it had been plundered from some American vessel. It was evident that she had been along the Gold Coast, and round the Bights of Benin and Biafra.
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