their arrival.  Here they stopped, and made their canoes fast to the trees, to take refreshment, such as it was, and half an hour’s rest; and here they were introduced to the renowned King Forday, who according to his own account is monarch of the whole country.  In one of the canoes sat old King Forday, in company with several fetish priests; the second canoe belonged to King Boy, and the third was Mr. Gun’s.  These canoes had come thus far for the purpose of escorting them into their country.

King Forday was a complaisant venerable-looking old man, but was rather shabbily dressed, partly in the European and partly in the native style.  Like most savages, his fondness for spirituous liquors was extreme, and he took large potations of rum in their presence, though it produced no visible effect upon his manner or conversation.  In the jollity of the moment, he attempted to sing, but his weak piping voice did not seem to second his inclination, and the sound died away from very feebleness.  His subjects, however, amounting to nearly two hundred individuals, testified their approbation of the effort by a tremendous “Yah!” shouted simultaneously by every voice, which sounded like the roar of a lion.

During the time that they had been at breakfast, the tide ebbed, and left their canoes lying on the mud.  Breakfast being over, the fetish priests commenced their avocations, by marking the person of King Boy from head to foot with chalk, in lines, circles, and a variety of fantastic figures, which so completely metamorphosed him, as to render his identity rather questionable, at the distance of only a few yards.  His usual dress had been thrown aside, and he was allowed to wear nothing but a narrow silk handkerchief tied round his waist; on his head a little close cap was placed, made of grass, and ornamented with large feathers.  These they found to be the wing feathers of a black and white buzzard, which is the fetish bird of Brass Town.  Two huge spears were also chalked and put into his hands, and thus equipped his appearance was wild and grotesque in the extreme.  The same operation was performed on the rest of the party, and the fetish priests were chalked in the same manner.  The people belonging to the Landers were merely marked on the forehead, and the Landers themselves, perhaps from being already white, although their faces were not a little tanned, were exempted from the ceremony.

They were now ordered into King Forday’s canoe, to sit down with him.  The old man asked them immediately in tolerably good English, to take a glass of rum with him; and having observed them wondering at the strange appearance of King Boy, and the rest of the party, gave them to understand that in consequence of no man having come down the river as they had done, the fetish ceremony was performed to prevent any thing happening to them.  They also understood from him, that a certain rite would be performed to Dju-dju, the fetish or domestic god of Brass Town, in honour of their coming.