Lander's Travels eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 1,054 pages of information about Lander's Travels.

Lander's Travels eBook

This eBook from the Gutenberg Project consists of approximately 1,054 pages of information about Lander's Travels.

A country finely cleared, and diversified with hill and dale, extends from Jannah to Tshow, distant two short stages.  The route then again entered upon a thickly-wooded tract, with only patches of corn land, and the roads were dreadfully bad, being partially flooded by heavy rains.  Captain Clapperton here caught a fresh cold, and all the patients became worse.  Dr. Morrison, after being carried in a hammock as far as Tshow, finding himself grow no better, was left behind, under the charge of Mr. Houston, who was to see him safe back to the coast.  He, however, expired at Jannah on the 27th.  On the same day, at a town called Engwa, Captain Pearce breathed his last.  On this occasion, Captain Clapperton says, “The death of Captain Pearce has caused me much concern; for, independently of his amiable qualities as a friend and companion, he was eminently fitted by his talents, perseverance, and fortitude, to be of singular service to the expedition, and on these accounts I deplore his loss, as the greatest I could have sustained, both as regards my private feelings and the public service.”

On the following morning, the remains of this lamented officer were interred, in the presence of all the principal people of the town.  The grave was staked round by the inhabitants, and a shed built over it.  An inscription was carved on a board, and placed at the head of the grave by Lander, Captain Clapperton being unable to sit up, or to assist in any manner in the mournful ceremony.  Thus did Captain Clapperton see himself bereft of his comrades, and left to pursue his journey in very painful and distressing circumstances, with only Richard Lander as his servant, who stood by him in all his fortunes, and Pascoe, not a very trusty African, whom he had hired at Badagry.  Two days after the interment of Captain Pearce, Mr. Houston joined Captain Clapperton from Jannah, bearing the intelligence of the death of Dr. Morrison.

These unfortunate officers had been conveyed thus far, about seventy miles, in hammocks, by the people of the country, every where experiencing the kindest attention, lodged in the best houses, and supplied with every thing that the country afforded.  The fear, however, that continually preyed upon the mind of Lander was excessive; for the general appearance of Captain Clapperton indicated that he would soon join his comrades in the grave; he was able occasionally to ride on horseback, and sometimes to walk, but he was greatly debilitated, and subject to a high degree of fever.  By anticipation, Lander saw himself a solitary wanderer in the interior of Africa, bereft of all those resources with which Clapperton was liberally supplied, and his only hope of deliverance resting on his being able to accomplish his return to Badagry, literally as a Christian mendicant.  Lander describes the country between Badagry and Jannah, the frontier town of the kingdom of Youriba, as abounding in population, well cultivated with plantations of Indian corn, different kinds of millet, yams, plantains, wherever the surface was open and free from the noxious influence of dense and unwholesome forests.

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Lander's Travels from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.