Niger

September, and still the Charlestown swung and
baked with fraying ropes and rotting sails in the
harbour of Goree. Mungo watched the months
fade with an exasperation that presently gave way
to a dull indifference. He had re-assumed his
armour, except when he descended between decks
at night to tend the ailing negroes. Two at least
of these had seen him as he passed through Bondou
in his wanderings long months before ; most were
prisoners from that series of wars into which he
had ventured his unwelcome presence in his search
for the Great River. He had volunteered to act as
surgeon, and he found the task arduous enough,
what of the sick and dispirited cargo the Charles¬
town had gathered to itself. By the end of Septem¬
ber eleven more of the slaves were dead. Another
month at Goree—
Goree at last had the requisite supplies of provi¬
sions. Early in October the Charlestown faced out
on its passage, and lurched and swayed away from
the bright glimmer of the African coast into long
weeks of sun-glister and sickness. Leaks were sprung
and stoppered. The winds failed and left them long
days becalmed on a glassy ocean, tideless, unmoving,
the stench from the hold a miasma upon the hot
waters. What with the number already dead, the
crew was weak, and the slaves were kept rigorously
chained until the third week at sea. Then the
Charlestown sprung such a leak that the crew could
not keep pace with the work at the pumps. Harris
descended to the hold and had the chains struck
247