In Each Town Is A Large Stage Called The _Bentang_, Which Answers The
Purpose Of A Public Hall Or Townhouse; It Is Composed Of Interwoven
Canes, And Is Generally Sheltered From The Sun By Being Erected In The
Shade Of Some Large Tree.
It is here that all public affairs are
transacted and trials conducted; and here the lazy and indolent meet to
smoke their pipes, and hear the news of the day.
In most of the towns the
Mahomedans have also a _missura_, or mosque, in which they assemble and
offer up their daily prayers, according to the rules of the Koran.
In the account which I have thus given of the natives, the reader must
bear in mind, that my observations apply chiefly to persons of _free
condition_, who constitute, I suppose, not more than one-fourth part of
the inhabitants at large; the other three-fourths are in a state of
hopeless and hereditary slavery; and are employed in cultivating the
land, in the care of cattle, and in servile offices of all kinds, much in
the same manner as the slaves in the West Indies. I was told, however,
that the Mandingo master can neither deprive his slave of life, nor sell
him to a stranger, without first calling a palaver on his conduct; or, in
other words, bringing him to a public trial; but this degree of
protection is extended only to the native of domestic slave. Captives
taken in war, and those unfortunate victims who are condemned to slavery
for crimes or insolvency, and, in short, all those unhappy people who are
brought down from the interior countries for sale, have no security
whatever, but may be treated and disposed of in all respects as the owner
thinks proper.
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