’Donald Stewart, or rather Daaga, {170} was the adopted son of Madershee, the old and childless king of the tribe called Paupaus, a race that inhabit a tract of country bordering on that of the Yarrabas.  These races are constantly at war with each other.

’Daaga was just the man whom a savage, warlike, and depredatory tribe would select for their chieftain, as the African Negroes choose their leaders with reference to their personal prowess.  Daaga stood six feet six inches without shoes.  Although scarcely muscular in proportion, yet his frame indicated in a singular degree the union of irresistible strength and activity.  His head was large; his features had all the peculiar traits which distinguish the Negro in a remarkable degree; his jaw was long, eyes large and protruded, high cheek-bones, and flat nose; his teeth were large and regular.  He had a singular cast in his eyes, not quite amounting to that obliquity of the visual organs denominated a squint, but sufficient to give his features a peculiarly forbidding appearance;- -his forehead, however, although small in proportion to his enormous head, was remarkably compact and well formed.  The whole head was disproportioned, having the greater part of the brain behind the ears; but the greatest peculiarity of this singular being was his voice.  In the course of my life I never heard such sounds uttered by human organs as those formed by Daaga.  In ordinary conversation he appeared to me to endeavour to soften his voice—­it was a deep tenor; but when a little excited by any passion (and this savage was the child of passion) his voice sounded like the low growl of a lion, but when much excited it could be compared to nothing so aptly as the notes of a gigantic brazen trumpet.

’I repeatedly questioned this man respecting the religion of his tribe.  The result of his answers led me to infer that the Paupaus believed in the existence of a future state; that they have a confused notion of several powers, good and evil, but these are ruled by one supreme being called Holloloo.  This account of the religion of Daaga was confirmed by the military chaplain who attended him in his last moments.  He also informed me that he believed in predestination;—­at least he said that Holloloo, he knew, had ordained that he should come to white man’s country and be shot.

’Daaga, having made a successful predatory expedition into the country of the Yarrabas, returned with a number of prisoners of that nation.  These he, as usual, took, bound and guarded, towards the coast to sell to the Portuguese.  The interpreter, his countryman, called these Portuguese white gentlemen.  The white gentlemen proved themselves more than a match for the black gentlemen; and the whole transaction between the Portuguese and Paupaus does credit to all concerned in this gentlemanly traffic in human flesh.

’Daaga sold his prisoners; and under pretence of paying him, he and his Paupau guards were enticed on board a Portuguese vessel;—­they were treacherously overpowered by the Christians, who bound them beside their late prisoners, and the vessel sailed over “the great salt water.”