short cut and went three or four miles out of the way, so that we never arrived at Agbamiya until about six in the afternoon. Arriving there, by a little more trouble and the offer of good pay on condition of leaving that night, I procured another canoe, and away we went at last.
There is always trouble travelling in Africa with luggage, but it is far less in the interior than among the semi-civilized, neither Christian nor heathen, natives of the coast, who acquiring all the vices of the white man, know little and practise still less of his virtues.
I never experienced real hardship until in this little journey between Abbeokuta and the coast. No sooner had we fairly started than it began to rain heavily, and it continued raining more or less until we reached Lagos, so that, sleeping and waking, I was wet the whole time, forty-eight hours; but I warded off the effects by helping the canoe-man with a paddle the entire way, by which means we also arrived at Lagos earlier. One more unpleasant incident, and I shall relieve the reader. It seemed that the canoe in which we travelled was purchased from an Ijebu, and not paid for. When two thirds down the river, the canoe-man stopped at a small market-village, not expecting to meet there his creditor, but did unfortunately. Some altercation ensued,
6*
