The Esperanza’s capture made it absolutely necessary that I should visit Cuba, so that, when the Feliz was preparing to depart, I began to put my factory and affairs in such order as would enable me to embark in her and leave me master of myself for a considerable time. I may as well record the fact here that the unlucky Esperanza was sent to Sierra Leone, where she was, of course, condemned as a slaver, while the officers and crew were despatched by order of the Admiralty, in irons, to Lisbon, where a tribunal condemned them to the galleys for five years. I understand they were subsequently released by the clemency of Don Pedro de Braganza when he arrived from Brazil.

Every thing was ready for our departure. My rice was stored and about to be sent on board; when, about three o’clock in the morning of the 25th of May, 1828, the voice of my servant roused me from pleasant dreams, to fly for life! I sprang from the cot with a bound to the door, where the flickering of a bright flame, reflected through the thick, misty air, gave token of fire. The roof of my house was in a blaze, and one hundred and fifty kegs of powder were close at hand beneath a thatch! They could not be removed, and a single spark from the frail and tinder-like materials might send the whole in an instant to the skies.

A rapid discharge from a double-barrelled gun brought my people to the spot with alacrity, and enabled me to rescue the two hundred and twenty slaves stowed in the barracoon, and march them to a neighboring wood, where they would be secure under a guard. In my haste to rescue the slaves I forgot to warn my body-servant of his peril from the powder. The faithful boy made several trips to the dwelling to save my personal effects, and after removing every thing he had strength to carry, returned to unchain the bloodhound that always slept beside my couch in Africa. But the dog was as ignorant of his danger as the youth. He knew no friend but myself, and tearing the hand that was exposed to save him, he forced his rescuer to fly. And well was it he did so. Within a minute, a tremendous blast shook the earth, and the prediction of the Matacan wizard was accomplished! Not even the red coals of my dwelling smouldered on the earth. Every thing was swept as by the breath of a whirlwind. My terrified boy, bleeding at nose and ears, was rescued from the ruins of a shallow well in which he fortunately fell. The bamboo sheds, barracoons, and hovels,—the adobe dwelling and the comfortable garden—could all spring up again in a short time, as if by enchantment,—but my rich stuffs, my cottons, my provisions, my arms, my ammunition, my capital, were dust.

In a few hours, friends crowded round me, according to African custom, with proffered services to rebuild my establishment; but the heaviest loss I experienced was that of the rice designed for the voyage, which I could not replace in consequence of the destruction of my merchandise. In my difficulty, I was finally obliged to swap some of my two hundred and twenty negroes for the desired commodity, which enabled me to despatch the Feliz, though I was, of course, obliged to abandon the voyage in her.

My mind was greatly exercised for some time in endeavors to discover the origin of this conflagration. The blaze was first observed at the top of one of the gable ends, which satisfied Ali-Ninpha as well as myself that it was the work of a malicious incendiary. We adopted a variety of methods to trace or trap the scoundrel, but our efforts were fruitless, until a strange negro exhibited one of my double-barrelled guns for sale at a neighboring village, whose chief happened to recognize it. When the seller was questioned about his possession of the weapon, he alleged that it was purchased from inland negroes in a distant town. His replies were so unsatisfactory to the inquisitive chief, that he arrested the suspected felon and sent him to Kambia.

I had but little remorse in adopting any means in my power to extort a confession from the negro, who very soon admitted that my gun was stolen by a runner from the wizard of Matacan, who was still hanging about the outskirts of our settlement. I offered a liberal reward and handsome bribes to get possession of the necromancer himself, but such was the superstitious awe surrounding his haunt, that no one dared venture to seize him in his sanctuary, or seduce him within reach of my revenge. This, however, was not the case in regard to his emissary. I was soon in possession of the actual thief, and had little difficulty in securing his execution on the ruins he had made. Before we launched him into eternity, I obtained his confession after an obstinate resistance, and found with considerable pain that a brother of Ormond, the suicide, was a principal mover in the affair. The last words of the Mongo had been reported to this fellow as an injunction of revenge against me, and he very soon learned from personal experience that Kambia was a serious rival, if not antagonist, to Bangalang. His African simplicity made him believe that the “red cock” on my roof-tree would expel me from the river. I was not in a position to pay him back at the moment, yet I made a vow to give the new Mongo a free passage in irons to Cuba before many moons. But this, like other rash promises, I never kept.

Sad as was the wreck of my property, the conflagration was fraught with a misfortune that affected my heart far more deeply than the loss of merchandise. Ever since the day of my landing at Ormond’s factory, a gentle form had flitted like a fairy among my fortunes, and always as the minister of kindness and hope. Skilled in the ways of her double blood, she was my discreet counsellor in many a peril; and, tender as a well-bred dame of civilized lands, she was ever disposed to promote my happiness by disinterested offices. But, when we came to number the survivors of the ruin, Esther was nowhere to be found, nor could I ever trace, among the scattered fragments, the slightest relic of the Pariah’s form!

Of course, I had very little beside my domestics to leave in charge of any one at Kambia, and intrusting them to the care of Ali-Ninpha, I went in my launch to Sierra Leone, where I purchased a schooner that had been condemned by the Mixed Commission.

In 1829, vessels were publicly sold, and, with very little trouble, equipped for the coast of Africa. The captures in that region were somewhat like playing a hand,—taking the tricks, reshuffling the same cards, and dealing again to take more tricks! Accordingly, I fitted the schooner to receive a cargo of negroes immediately on quitting port. My crew was made up of men from all nations, captured in prizes; but I guardedly selected my officers from Spaniards exclusively.

We were slowly wafting along the sea, a day or two out of the British colony, when the mate fell into chat with a clever lad, who was hanging lazily over the helm. They spoke of voyages and mishaps, and this led the sailor to declare his recent escape from a vessel, then in the Rio Nunez, whose mate had poisoned the commander to get possession of the craft. She had been fitted, he said, at St. Thomas with the feigned design of coasting; but, when she sailed for Africa, her register was sent back to the island in a boat to serve some other vessel, while she ventured to the continent without papers.

I have cause to believe that the slave-trade was rarely conducted upon the honorable principles between man and man, which, of course, are the only security betwixt owners, commanders and consignees whose commerce is exclusively contraband. There were men, it is true, engaged in it, with whom the “point of honor” was more omnipotent than the dread of law in regular trade. But innumerable cases have occurred in which the spendthrifts who appropriated their owners’ property on the coast of Africa, availed themselves of such superior force as they happened to control, in order to escape detection, or assure a favorable reception in the West Indies. In fact, the slaver sometimes ripened into something very like a pirate!

In 1828 and 1829, severe engagements took place between Spanish slavers and this class of contrabandists. Spaniards would assail Portuguese when the occasion was tempting and propitious. Many a vessel has been fitted in Cuba for these adventures, and returned to port with a living cargo, purchased by cannon-balls and boarding-pikes exclusively.

Now, I confess that my notions had become at this epoch somewhat relaxed by my traffic on the coast, so that I grew to be no better than folks of my cloth. I was fond of excitement; my craft was sadly in want of a cargo; and, as the mate narrated the helmsman’s story, the Quixotic idea naturally got control of my brain that I was destined to become the avenger of the poisoned captain. I will not say that I was altogether stimulated by the noble spirit of justice; for it is quite possible I would never have thought of the dead man had not the sailor apprised us that his vessel was half full of negroes!

As we drifted slowly by the mouth of my old river, I slipped over the bar, and, while I fitted the schooner with a splendid nine-pounder amidships, I despatched a spy to the Rio Nunez to report the facts about the poisoning, as well as the armament of the unregistered slaver. In ten days the runner verified the tale. She was still in the stream, with one hundred and eighty-five human beings in her hold, but would soon be off with an entire cargo of two hundred and twenty-five.

The time was extraordinarily propitious. Every thing favored my enterprise. The number of slaves would exactly fit my schooner. Such a windfall could not be neglected; and, on the fourth day, I was entering the Rio Nunez under the Portuguese flag, which I unfurled by virtue of a pass from Sierra Leone to the Cape de Verd Islands.

I cannot tell whether my spy had been faithless, but when I reached Furcaria, I perceived that my game had taken wing from her anchorage. Here was a sad disappointment. The schooner drew too much water to allow a further ascent, and, moreover, I was unacquainted with the river.

As it was important that I should keep aloof from strangers, I anchored in a quiet spot, and seizing the first canoe that passed, learned, for a small reward, that the object of my search was hidden in a bend of the river at the king’s town of Kakundy, which I could not reach without the pilotage of a certain mulatto, who was alone fit for the enterprise.

I knew this half-breed as soon as his person was described, but I had little hope of securing his services, either by fair means or promised recompense. He owed me five slaves for dealings that took place between us at Kambia, and had always refused so strenuously to pay, that I felt sure he would be off to the woods as soon as he knew my presence on the river. Accordingly, I kept my canoemen on the schooner by an abundant supply of “bitters,” and at midnight landed half a dozen, who proceeded to the mulatto’s cabin, where he was seized sans ceremonie. The terror of this ruffian was indescribable when he found himself in my presence,—a captive, as he supposed, for the debt of flesh. But I soon relieved him, and offered a liberal reward for his prompt, secret and safe pilotage, to Kakundy. The mulatto was willing, but the stream was too shallow for my keel. He argued the point so convincingly, that in half an hour, I relinquished the attempt, and resolved to make “Mahomet come to the mountain.”

The two boats were quickly manned, armed, and supplied with lanterns; and, with muffled oars, guided by our pilot,—whose skull was kept constantly under the lee of my pistols—we fell like vampyres on our prey in the darkness.

With a wild hurrah and a blaze of our pistols in the air, we leaped on board, driving every soul under hatches without striking a blow! Sentries were placed at the cabin door, forecastle and hatchway. The cable was slipped, my launch took her in tow, the pilot and myself took charge of the helm, and, before daylight, the prize was alongside my schooner, transhipping one hundred and ninety-seven of her slaves, with their necessary supplies. Great was the surprise of the captured crew when they saw their fate; and great was the agony of the poisoner, when he returned next morning to the vacant anchorage, after a night of debauch with the king of Kakundy. First of all, he imagined we were regular cruisers, and that the captain’s death was about to be avenged. But when it was discovered that they had fallen into the grasp of friendly slavers, five of his seamen abandoned their craft and shipped with me.

We had capital stomachs for breakfast after the night’s romance. Hardly was it swallowed, however, when three canoes came blustering down the stream, filled with negroes and headed by his majesty. I did not wait for a salutation, but, giving the warriors a dose of bellicose grape, tripped my anchor, sheeted home my sails, and was off like an albatross!

The feat was cleverly achieved; but, since then, I have very often been taxed by my conscience with doubts as to its strict morality! The African slave-trade produces singular notions of meum and tuum in the minds and hearts of those who dwell for any length of time on that blighting coast; and it is not unlikely that I was quite as prone to the infection as better men, who perished under the malady, while I escaped!