A voyage to Senegal : $b or, Historical, philosophical, and political memoirs, relative to the discoveries, establishments and commerce of Europeans in the Atlantic Ocean, from Cape Blanco to the river of Sierra Leone — John Shaqi
A voyage to Senegal : $b or, Historical, philosophical, and political memoirs, relative to the discoveries, establishments and commerce of Europeans in the Atlantic Ocean, from Cape Blanco to the river of Sierra LeoneDurand, Jean Baptiste Léonard
History
A voyage to Senegal : $b or, Historical, philosophical, and political memoirs, relative to the discoveries, establishments and commerce of Europeans in the Atlantic Ocean, from Cape Blanco to the river of Sierra Leone
Durand, Jean Baptiste Léonard
Africa, Northwest; Senegal -- Description and travel
The shipwrecked mariners, while sitting beneath the bushes, perceived
some arrangements which made them tremble with horror. The Moors
put a quantity of stones in a brasier, and made them red hot;
they then lifted up a lage stone, and dug a hole in the ground,
occasionally making shouts of laughter, and repeating the name of
Brisson. At length they called him to them, and made him approach
to the hole which they had dug; but what was his surprise when he
saw them draw from the hole which they had just dug, and in which
he thought they were going to bury him, a large skin full of water,
a sack of barley-flour, and a newly-killed goat. His fear subsided,
and the sight of the provisions gave him a new life; he saw them
fill a large wooden bowl with water in which they put a quantity of
flour, and then, by throwing into it the red-hot stones, they made it
boil. By this means they produced a sort of gruel which they kneaded
in their hands, and ate without chewing. The slaves had for their
repast the same steeped flour, and a very small quantity of brackish
water: the goat was reserved for the next day. The guide who went
before them had procured those provisions in a neighbouring village,
and had concealed them under the stone. M. de Brisson observed,
that the resentment of the Moor whom he had struck was converted into
acts of kindness and complaisance: for this man brought him a larger
share of provisions than was allotted to the others. The meal being
finished, each man laid himself down to sleep behind the bushes.
The next morning as soon as day appeared, a signal was given
for their departure; and M. de Brisson, with the other slaves,
were ordered to collect the camels and load them; after which the
troop set off, and at noon stopped in a plain where there was not a
single tree to shade them from the rays of the sun. Having unloaded
the camels, the slaves were employed in digging up roots to make
a fire; a labour which, in this country, is the more troublesome,
as all the trees, roots, and grasses, are thorny. As soon as the
fire had imparted a sufficient heat to the sand, they covered the
goat entirely with it; and while the slaves were keeping up the fire,
their masters regaled themselves with the raw fat of the animal, for
which they seemed to have a great relish. When the goat was dressed,
the Moors, without taking the trouble to knock off the sand, ate
it with a most incredible voracity, gnawing it to the very bones,
and pulling off the skin which remained on them with their nails:
they then threw the bones to the slaves, telling them to make haste
and get their dinner, that they might reload the camels.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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