They Have Frequent Wars With Their Southern And Eastern Neighbours, Though Without Any Important Results; The Sterility Of The Soil Throughout The Whole Of The Region Of Sand, Affording Little Temptation To Its Inhabitants To Dispossess Each Other Of Their Territorial Possessions.

CHAPTER XII.

Wadinoon or Wednoon, was the first place at which Adams had seen houses after he quitted Tudenny. It is a small town, consisting of about forty houses and some tents. The former are built chiefly of clay, intermixed with stone in some parts, and several of them have a story above the ground-floor. The soil in the neighbourhood of the town was better cultivated than any he had yet seen in Africa, and appeared to produce plenty of corn and tobacco. There were also date and fig trees in the vicinity, as well as a few grapes, apples, pears, and pomegranates. Prickly pears flourished in great abundance.

The Christians whom Adams had heard of, whilst residing at Hieta Mouessa Ali, and whom he found at Wadinoon, proved to be, to his great satisfaction, his old companions, Stephen Dolbie the mate, and James Davison and Thomas Williams, two of the seamen of the Charles. They informed him, that they had been in that town upwards of twelve months, and that they were the property of the sons of the governor.

Soon after the arrival of Adams at Wadinoon, Abdallah offered him for sale to the governor or sheik, called Amedallah Salem, who consented to take him upon trial; but after remaining a week at the governor's house, Adams was returned to his old master, as the parties could not agree upon the price. He was at length, however, sold to Belcassam Abdallah for seventy dollars in trade, payable in blankets, gunpowder, and dates.

The only other white resident at Wadinoon was a Frenchman, who informed Adams that he had been wrecked about twelve years before on the neighbouring coast, and that the whole of the crew, except himself, had been redeemed. This man had turned Mahommedan, and was named Absalom; he had a wife and child and three slaves, and gained a good living by the manufacture of gunpowder. He lived in the same house as the person who had been his master, and who, upon his renouncing his religion, gave him his liberty.

Among the negro slaves at Wadinoon was a woman, who said she came from a place called Kanno, (Cano?) a long way across the desert, and that she had seen in her own country white men, as white as "bather," meaning the wall, and in a large boat, with two high sticks in it, with cloth upon them, and that they rowed this boat in a manner different from the custom of the negroes, who use paddles; in stating this, she made the motion of rowing with oars, so as to leave no doubt that she had seen a vessel in the European fashion, manned by white people.

The work in which Adams was employed at Wadinoon, was building walls, cutting down shrubs to make fences, or working on the corn lands, or on the plantations of tobacco, of which a great quantity is grown in the neighbourhood. It was in the month of August that he arrived there, as he was told by the Frenchman before spoken of; the grain had been gathered, but the tobacco was then getting in, at which he was required to assist. His labour at this place was extremely severe. On the moorish sabbath, which was also their market-day, the Christian slaves were not required to labour, unless on extraordinary occasions, when there was any particular work to do, which could not be delayed. In these intervals of repose, they had opportunity of meeting and conversing together, and Adams had the melancholy consolation of finding that the lot of his companions had been even more severe than his own. It appeared that, on their arrival, the Frenchman before mentioned, from some unexplained motive, had advised them to refuse to work, and the consequence was, that they had been cruelly beaten and punished, and had been made to work and live hard, their only scanty food being barley flour and indian corn flour. However, on extraordinary occasions, and as a great indulgence, they sometimes obtained a few dates.

In this wretched manner Adams and his fellow-captives lived until the June following, when a circumstance occurred, which had nearly cost the former his life. His master's son, Hameda Bel Cossim, having one sabbath-day ordered Adams to take the horse and go to plough, the latter refused to obey him, urging that it was not the custom of any slaves to work on the sabbath-day, and that he was entitled to the same indulgence as the rest. Upon which Hameda went into the house and fetched a cutlass, and then demanded of Adams, whether he would go to plough or not. Upon his replying that he would not, Hameda struck him on the forehead with the cutlass, and gave him a severe wound over the right eye, and immediately knocked him down with his fist. This was no sooner done, than Adams was set upon by a number of Moors, who beat him with sticks in so violent a manner, that the blood came out of his mouth, two of his double teeth were knocked out, and he was almost killed; it was his opinion that they would have entirely killed him, had it not been for the interference of Boadick, the sheik's son, who reproached them for their cruelty, declaring that they had no right to compel Adams to work on a market-day. The next day Hameda's mother, named Moghtari, came to him, and asked him how he dared to lift his hand against a Moor? To which Adams, driven to desperation by the ill treatment he had received, replied, that he would even take his life, if it were in his power.

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