MISCELLANEOUS. Matacong.--This beautiful island, about fifty miles north of Freetown, abreast the Isles of De Loss, was formerly purchased or hired from the King of Soosoo, by a merchant of the Colony, as a location for trade with the surrounding natives, and is now in the possession of his son, Mr. William Gabbedon, whose guest I was. Its surrounding waters abound with fish, and game is found in all directions, with from three to four hundred head of wild cattle, which are shot as occasion requires. At low water the main land can be walked to, which leads to the Mandingo, Soosoo, and Bagga countries, from whence are procured those valuable articles of trade, gold, hides, ivory, palm oil, &c. Deer also abound, and the oyster beds are considerable. This island is inhabited by liberated Africans and their descendants, but the original proprietors have been thinned through want of enterprise and a commercial establishment. Canoes from the adjacent rivers and creeks, make it a place of call on their way to Freetown. It was at this island that the present possessor, under a charge of piracy, was arrested, and brought prisoner to Freetown, under a military guard, by the command of the late Governor Fergusson, where he was instantly acquitted, the bill being ignored when coming before the grand jury at the Court of Quarter Sessions. On leaving this delightful spot, in a canoe commanded by Mahommedoo Samo, and rowed by his sturdy grumatos (sailors), we rounded the western point, intending to make a sea passage to town, but being the rainy season (September), we were obliged to run through the creeks inland, arriving half way up the big Saukney, where landing and having dined, we turned to sleep whilst waiting the tide, from which enjoyment I was withheld by the amusing gambols of the numerous monkeys, and plunging and rolling about of the huge and unsightly alligators; two Kroomen passengers had well nigh become a lunch to these monsters, as both slipped overboard whilst getting on shore, and had a narrow escape, or perhaps guessing by some instinct what they were, they avoided them, one being named Bottle Beer, and the other Ben Coffee. We started from this rest at night, and made the little Saukney, which is so narrow that we had to douse the masts, and land to drag the canoe from the shore; the wood is so thick that it covered the creek from each side, forming a leafy canopy for some length. Our intrusion into this sacred grove was not very hospitably met, for we were attacked by innumerable hosts of sandflies and musquitos, through whose phalanxes we were obliged to fight our way and study cautiously where we placed a foot, lest it might be on the tail of a serpent, or claw of a scorpion. The passages of these creeks are startling and interesting to the European, from the circumstance of every canoe's company blowing a kind of ram's horn-for the same purpose as a locomotive whistle-to denote their approach. The unearthly sound, at first, is anything but agreeable to the stranger, from the consciousness of being surrounded in these Pagan wilds by snakes, reptiles, and ferocious beasts, whilst beneath, alligators, "not stuffed," but longing to be stuffed with your amiable person. Morning welcomed us into the noble river Mallicouri, which, like a Niger, penetrates into the interior, when down we dashed, until arriving at the mouth, where the captain and crew, with the exception of one grumato and myself, landed, and proceeding inward, leaving us in so dangerous a situation when the tide rose that I was obliged to sound the horn to summon them to the rescue; but we were obliged to manage as well as we could until their return, which was not till evening, and made me regret that, as the heat left me no superfluous breath, I had spent so many hours in wasting my sweet music on the unconscious waters. All on board, and away again," Row, brothers, row," until we entered the Scarcis River, where I slept at the hospitable factory of Mr. H. Weston. From this we set off early, hoping to reach town, but, owing to the tide, were obliged to bring up at Bullom, where we were entertained at the strangers' house at Madina. Alimammee Amarah Fendi Moodie, the king, was absent in the war between him and the Tim manees. Next morning we made town, drenched and worn out with a five days' run through the creeks and swamps of a Mahommedan country. And such was the superstition, that it was with difficulty that I got a passage at all, as I afterwards learned, from the supposed ill luck that would attend the canoe were a white man on board, and the question arose of landing me on some sequestered shore, or throwing me overboard; however, the good sense of Mahommedoo silenced these kind intentions, and two years afterwards I had the pleasure of meeting him in Freetown, where I was happy to learn that he had been so successful in trade as to have gained the national soubriquet of a big man-which is tantamount to saying that he dances, ad libitum, to the tune of "money in both pockets." OBITUARY OF OFFICIAL MEN, ECT., FROM THE YEAR 1840 TO 1845 (FROM THE AUTHOR'S NOTE BOOK). Europeans. Mr. Pine, Civil Engineer, old resident, 1840. Mr. Robinson, Acting Clerk, Secretary's Office, 1840. Mr. Tegg, Ordnance Clerk, 1840. Mr. Stowe, Assistant Commissary General, old resident, 3rd Feb., 1841. Mr. Wood, Civil Engineer, new resident, 27th May, 1841. Sir John Jeremie, Governor, a four months' resident, 23rd April, 1841. Mrs. Morgan, the Colonial Chaplain's lady, October, 1841. Mr. Hoseason, Acting Colonial Secretary, July, 1841, whose wife died 22nd same month previously; short residents. A West Indian. Mr. C. B. Jones, Assistant Superintendent of the L. A. Department, an old resident, 6th January, 1842. Europeans. Walter W. Lewis, H. M. Commissary Judge, an old resident, 23rd January, 1842. The lady of Mr. St. George, Ordnance Storekeeper, short resident, 1842. J. R. Jeremie, son of Governor Sir John Jeremie, short resident, 18 months or two years, 1843. Rev. Mr. Illingworth, Colonial Chaplain (European); George Abbot, barrister; Charles Cathcart, merchant; B. Scott, Esq.. Civil Engineer (West Indians); and an American seaman, drowned by the upsetting of a pleasure-boat, off the Carpenter Rock, Bay of Sierra Leone, 4th July, 1844. Mr. Stephenson, Assistant Surgeon at Kissey. Matt. Squires, do. do. do., 1845. Mr. Knowles, Clerk in the Commissariat, 1845. Mr. Hughes, Manager of the Western District, old resident, a West Indian. Governor William Fergusson, off the Island of Madeira, on his passage to England, 19th February, 1846; a native West Indian (coloured), formerly Staff Surgeon, and a very old resident-25 years and upwards. DEATHS IN MERCHANT SERVICE. Europeans. The house of A. Lemon lost two European clerks ; Kidd and Dawson, two or more (Mr. John Dawson died at the Gambia, on his passage home); Heddee and Co., three, and the leaving of four or five dissatisfied with their service; Effenhausen and Nagal, German Consulate, two to four clerks, and Mr. Nagal's father-in-law. The wife of Mr. Oldfield, short resident. The loss of two wives of the Rev. Mr. Bultman, Church Missionary. (For more particulars see Missionary Records.) To detail all (which is not in the author's power), would be to make this a catalogue of deaths, at which the mind would stand appalled. "Another, and another, will they extend on to the crack of doom"the mortality in the navy, army, merchant service, slave captains, their crews, and native Africans, &c. Well may this devoted place be termed a "painted sepulchre-the white man's grave;" and, no doubt, even whilst I write, death is making his usual ravages amongst the population-fresh mounds of earth are daily raised as mementos of mortality! In bringing to a conclusion these brief pages on the Colony of Sierra Leone, it is a matter of the deepest regret to think that after so many years of exertion how little in reality have our humane and benevolent efforts for the welfare of the African race succeeded, or answered the desired end of the projectors of them; for when we come to reflect upon the immense expenditure which has been lavished with an unsparing hand to destroy that inhuman traffic in man, the maintenance of a naval squadron to guard the coast, the costly civil expenditure, the magnificent salaries of its officers, the sickness and the mortality which has removed so many excellent men from the scene, our hopes almost languish and the heart seems to sink in despair of ever effecting any real or permanent good in the retention of this ill-starred settlement. As for the Colony ever having been a profitable settlement to the British Crown, is entirely out of the question; its revenue being far short of an equality with its expenditure—" A mole-hill to a mountain, an ossa to a wart;" nay, at the present day, it cannot pay the salaries of the officers by which it is governed; indeed this expectation has, I believe, never been entertained. The cause of humanity in the behalf of the benighted African, alone the primary object sought for, and to accomplish this immense sacrifices. of life and wealth have been the consequence, but with success truly disheartening. Its government has from time to time been subject to so many changes, the policy of each governor so varied, acting governor merely holding the reins of office until a successor arrived from home, |