of the inferiority of our force.  A schooner of 120 tons, with no more than twenty Europeans on board; the crew of the vessel being Africans (as the crews of most of the colonial vessels that navigate this coast are,) could have but a poor chance against five vessels, mustering not less than 150 white men of different nations, and reckoning 30 guns to our six.  The caution evinced by this step, however justified by circumstances, did not, I must confess, appear to me to be very creditable to our character, and must have made us look very foolish.  After having chased the slavers so far up the river, we ought to have brought the matter to an issue, particularly as we had the eyes of all the country upon us, and were regarded with great anxiety by the people of Old Calabar town, as well as by the crews of the British merchant-vessels in the river.  The affair gave the slavers an opportunity of exulting over our failure, and their own good fortune; which, I think, was to be regretted.  On going down the river, a large canoe came alongside with one of the great men of the country on board, named Eyo Eyo, a brother to King Eyo; when he asked for a present, and something to drink, the customary demand of the natives.  We presented him with a few leaves of tobacco, which appeared to amuse him exceedingly:  he held them up with a contemptuous sneer, and asked if that was a present?  This man was as shrewd a fellow as any we met with, in Old Calabar, and had long been accustomed to trade, and receive presents, from captains of slavers, and palm-oil vessels.

At nine, we arrived off Robin’s Town, where a canoe met us, with a note from Captain Cumings, of the Kent, informing us, that a Frenchman had entered his palm-oil house, and deliberately shot his second mate through the body.

There are two grand festivals here, which take place every eighth day in succession.  Old Calabar day, which was yesterday; and Duke’s day, which happens to-day.  The succession of these festivals is curious enough; that which takes place on Thursday in this week, will be on Friday in the next week; and the one on Friday this week, will be on Saturday in the following week, and so on.

Saturday, 26.—­We got under weigh, and dropped down with the ebb tide, abreast of Duke’s Town, a distance of three miles, where we anchored.  We had not been long here before the Duke, attended by a number of his black gentlemen, and followed by Captain Cumings, of the Kent, came on board to have a grand palaver with Lieutenant Badgeley, concerning the attempted assassination of Captain Cumings’ mate, on the preceding day.  The Frenchman’s name was Ferrard, and this monster was no less than the Captain of a slave-vessel.  The cause of this palaver, was an imperative demand, on the part of Captain Cumings, that the Duke should deliver the Frenchman into our hands, in order that he should be given up to justice in the event of the mate’s death:  but the Duke made great difficulties concerning