[23] I Am Informed That The Gold Mine, As It Is Called, In Wicklow, In Ireland, Which Was Discovered In The Year 1795, Is Near The Top, And Upon The Steep Slope Of A Mountain.

Here, pieces of gold of several ounces weight were frequently found.

What would have been gold dust two miles below was here golden gravel; that is, each grain was like a small pebble in size, and one piece was found which weighed near twenty-two ounces, troy.

Part of this gold is converted into ornaments for the women; but, in general, these ornaments are more to be admired for their weight than their workmanship. They are massy and inconvenient, particularly the ear rings, which are commonly so heavy as to pull down and lacerate the lobe of the ear; to avoid which, they are supported by a thong of red leather, which passes over the crown of the head from one ear to the other. The necklace displays greater fancy; and the proper arrangement of the different beads and plates of gold, is the great criterion of taste and elegance. When a lady of consequence is in full dress, her gold ornaments may be worth altogether from fifty to eighty pounds sterling.

A small quantity of gold is likewise employed by the Slatees, in defraying the expenses of their journies to and from the Coast; but by far the greater proportion is annually carried away by the Moors in exchange for salt and other merchandize. During my stay at Kamalia, the gold collected by the different traders at that place, for salt alone, was nearly equal to one hundred and ninety-eight pounds sterling; and as Kamalia is but a small town, and not much resorted to by the trading Moors, this quantity must have borne a very small proportion to the gold collected at Kancaba, Kancaree, and some other large towns.

The value of salt in this part of Africa is very great. One slab, about two feet and a half in length, fourteen inches in breadth, and two inches in thickness, will sometimes sell for about two pounds ten shillings sterling, and from one pound fifteen shillings to two pounds, may be considered as the common price. Four of these slabs are considered as a load for an ass, and six for a bullock. The value of European merchandize in Manding varies very much, according to the supply from the Coast, or the dread of war in the country; but the return for such articles is commonly made in slaves. The price of a prime slave, when I was at Kamalia, was from _nine_ to _twelve_ minkallies, and European commodities had then nearly the following value: -

18 gun flints, ) 48 leaves of tobacco, ) one minkalli. 20 charges of gunpowder, ) A cutlass, ) A musket from three to four minkallies.

The produce of the country, and the different necessaries of life when exchanged for gold, sold as follows: -

Common provisions for one day, the weight of one _teelee-kissi_, (a black bean, six of which make the weight of one minkalli;) a chicken, one teelee-kissi; a sheep, three teelee-kissi; a bullock, one minkalli; a horse, from ten to seventeen minkallies.

The Negroes weigh the gold in small balances, which they always carry about them. They make no difference, in point of value, between gold dust and wrought gold. In bartering one article for another, the person who receives the gold always weighs it with his own teelee-kissi. These beans are sometimes fraudulently soaked in Shea-butter, to make them heavy; and I once saw a pebble ground exactly into the form of one of them; but such practices are not very common.

Having now related the substance of what occurs to my recollection concerning the African mode of obtaining gold from the earth, and its value in barter, I proceed to the next article, of which I proposed to treat, namely, _ivory_.

Nothing creates a greater surprise among the Negroes on the sea coast, than the eagerness displayed by the European traders to procure elephants' teeth; it being exceedingly difficult to make them comprehend to what use it is applied. Although they are shown knives with ivory hafts, combs, and toys of the same material, and are convinced that the ivory thus manufactured was originally part of a tooth, they are not satisfied. They suspect that this commodity is more frequently converted in Europe to purposes of far greater importance, the true nature of which is studiously concealed from them, lest the price of ivory should be enhanced. They cannot, they say, easily persuade themselves, that ships would be built, and voyages undertaken, to procure an article, which had no other value than that of furnishing handles to knives, &c., when pieces of wood would answer the purpose equally well.

Elephants are very numerous in the interior of Africa, but they appear to be a distinct species from those found in Asia. Blumenbach, in his figures of objects of natural history, has given good drawings of a grinder of each; and the variation is evident. M. Cuvier also has given in the _Magazin Encyclopedique_ a clear account of the difference between them. As I never examined the Asiatic elephant, I have chosen rather to refer to those writers, than advance this as an opinion of my own. It has been said that the African elephant is of a less docile nature than the Asiatic, and incapable of being tamed. The Negroes certainly do not at present tame them; but when we consider that the Carthaginians had always tame elephants in their armies, and actually transported some of them to Italy in the course of the Punic wars, it seems more likely that they should have possessed the art of taming their own elephants, than have submitted to the expense of bringing such vast animals from Asia. Perhaps the barbarous practice of hunting the African elephants for the sake of their teeth, has rendered them more untractable and savage, than they were found to be in former times.

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