Senegal and Gambia, namely, by the general pillage, robbery by individuals, stratagem, or deceit.

"The general pillage is executed by the king's troops armed, and on horseback, who seize the unwary. Parties were sent out for this purpose by King Barbessin, almost every day during the week,

"He was at Joal accompanying one of the Embassies, which the French Governor used to send every year, with presents to the black Kings to keep up the commerce. It is customary for the king to make a return for these presents, by a gift of Slaves; and though unwilling to pillage, he was excited to it by means of a constant intoxication. When sober, he always expressed a reluctance to harass his people; complained that the inhabitants of Goree, continually coming under pretence of Trade, took occasion to make him insignificant presents; that they then came upon him with long accounts, debts said to be due, and pretensions without end; that the Governor of Goree living among them thought little of the sufferings of the Negroes; and that he must have been imposed upon to suffer his name to be used on such occasions. This speech was interpreted on the spot, and put in a journal by witness, who also heard the King hold the same language on different days, and yet he afterwards ordered the pillage to be executed. Witness has no doubt but that he also pillages in other parts of his dominions.

66 King of Sallum practises the pillage. Witness saw twenty-seven Slaves from Sallum, twenty-three of whom were women and children thus taken. Was told by captains and merchants that this was the

usual practice.

"Was told by merchants at Goree that the King of Damel practises the pillage.

"Robbery, in which individuals seize on each other, was a general way of taking single slaves."

Mr. Rooke "always understood, that when he wanted Slaves for sale, he made war to procure them. He knew that kidnapping took place in the neighbourhood of Goree. It was spoken of as a common practice.

"He often asked Accra what he meant by prisoners of war. Found they were such as had been carried off by a set of marauders, who ravage the country for that purpose.

Captain T. B. Thomson, R. N. heard "that the word 'Panyer,' which is common on the coast, means kidnapping or seizing

of men."

OF THE MEANS

OF

Guarding Dwelling Houses,

BY THEIR CONSTRUCTION,

AGAINST

ACCIDENTS BY FIRE.

ORIGINAL.

ACCIDENTS BY FIRE.

IT is a singular instance of the inequality that marks the progress of society in its different pursuits, that although the dwellings of men have attained a considerable degree of perfection in their embellishments, they are no farther advanced in the means invented for domestic security, than they were in what we know of the first rude ages of the world. Fires consume, rats infest, damps corrupt, and thieves break through and steal. The first of these evils, as the first in its relation to the chances of human happiness, will occupy the following pages.

It would naturally occur to a mind unbiassed by the infatuation of fashion, that the first care of the builder should be to guard his work against every possibility, that could be obviated, of its destruction by fire: but so little has this precaution been observed in practice, that a declaimer against it might almost be excused, if he were to infer from it the contrary design of allowing that element a fair chance of exercising the functions assigned it by nature, on our habitations. A large portion of the fixed composition of

these is universally combustible, and so contrived by its continuity, as to aid the progress and expansion of the flames, when these have once fastened upon them. Their internal and moveable parts are still worse, consisting of substances, all combustible in themselves, and some rendered highly inflammable from their texture, levity and position.

Such are the receptacles, to which men commit their property, of which the houses themselves always constitute a considerable part, their persons, their lives, and the persons and lives of all that are sacred to them in trust, or endeared to them by the ties of social and domestic affinity. It may be truly affirmed, that no man lies down to rest, on any night of the year, without incurring the hazard of being destroyed by this merciless enemy, before the morning. The secret treachery of an incendiary, the negligence of a servant, the flaring of a candle, a spark ejected from a grate, besides many other variable chances, may in a moment give the first impulse to this calamity, and a few minutes place it beyond the power of stopping its extermina ting process. Yet because night after night has passed, without its having happened, with this argument alone to suppress his natural fears, or rather to prevent their excitement, he again lies down in security, till at length perhaps the dreadful, but undreaded catastrophe, which though not sure is always probable, falls upon him unprovided, and overwhelms him.

Few men have arrived at the age of forty, without having experienced the danger, or felt the alarm of fire, in their own persons. History abounds with instances of its effects in its larger masses: its transient occurrences are read, among the articles which the daily papers of intelligence present for our listless amusement; and if the spirits of all those, who from the first ages of the world, have