Babo took by succession each Spaniard forward, and asked him whose
skeleton that was, and whether, from its whiteness, he should not think
it a white’s; that each Spaniard covered his face; that then to each
the negro Babo repeated the words in the first place said to the
deponent; * * * that they (the Spaniards), being then assembled aft,
the negro Babo harangued them, saying that he had now done all; that
the deponent (as navigator for the negroes) might pursue his course,
warning him and all of them that they should, soul and body, go the way
of Don Alexandro, if he saw them (the Spaniards) speak, or plot
anything against them (the negroes)—a threat which was repeated every
day; that, before the events last mentioned, they had tied the cook to
throw him overboard, for it is not known what thing they heard him
speak, but finally the negro Babo spared his life, at the request of
the deponent; that a few days after, the deponent, endeavoring not to
omit any means to preserve the lives of the remaining whites, spoke to
the negroes peace and tranquillity, and agreed to draw up a paper,
signed by the deponent and the sailors who could write, as also by the
negro Babo, for himself and all the blacks, in which the deponent
obliged himself to carry them to Senegal, and they not to kill any
more, and he formally to make over to them the ship, with the cargo,
with which they were for that time satisfied and quieted. * * But the
next day, the more surely to guard against the sailors’ escape, the
negro Babo commanded all the boats to be destroyed but the long-boat,
which was unseaworthy, and another, a cutter in good condition, which
knowing it would yet be wanted for towing the water casks, he had it
lowered down into the hold.
[_Various particulars of the prolonged and perplexed navigation ensuing
here follow, with incidents of a calamitous calm, from which portion
one passage is extracted, to wit_:]
—That on the fifth day of the calm, all on board suffering much from
the heat, and want of water, and five having died in fits, and mad, the
negroes became irritable, and for a chance gesture, which they deemed
suspicious—though it was harmless—made by the mate, Raneds, to the
deponent in the act of handing a quadrant, they killed him; but that
for this they afterwards were sorry, the mate being the only remaining
navigator on board, except the deponent.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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