The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano

incident so trifling that does not afford some profit, while to others the experience of ages seems of no use; and even to pour out to them the treasures of wisdom is throwing the jewels of instruction away.

Endnotes

1. See Benezet’s Account of Guinea throughout. ↩

2. When I was in Smyrna I have frequently seen the Greeks dance after this manner. ↩

3. The bowl is earthen, curiously figured, to which a long reed is fixed as a tube. This tube is sometimes so long as to be born by one, and frequently out of grandeur by two boys. ↩

4. When I was in Smyrna I saw the same kind of earth, and brought some of it with me to England; it resembles musk in strength, but is more delicious in scent, and is not unlike the smell of a rose. ↩

5. See Benezet’s Account of Africa throughout. ↩

6. See also Lieut. Matthew’s Voyage, p. 123. ↩

7. An instance of this kind happened at Montserrat in the West Indies in the year 1763. I then belonged to the Charming Sally, Capt. Doran.⁠—The chief mate, Mr. Mansfield, and some of the crew being one day on shore, were present at the burying of a poisoned negro girl. Though they had often heard of the circumstance of the running in such cases, and had even seen it, they imagined it to be a trick of the corpse-bearers. The mate therefore desired two of the sailors to take up the coffin, and carry it to the grave. The sailors, who were all of the same opinion, readily obeyed; but they had scarcely raised it to their shoulders, before they began to run furiously about, quite unable to direct themselves, till, at last, without intention, they came to the hut of him who had poisoned the girl. The coffin then immediately fell from their shoulders against the hut, and damaged part of the wall. The owner of the hut was taken into custody on this, and confessed the poisoning.⁠—I give this story as it was related by the mate and crew on their return to the ship. The credit which is due to it I leave with the reader. ↩

8. “Essay on the Slavery and Commerce of the Human Species”. Page 178 to 216. ↩

9. Philos. Trans. No. 476, Sect. 4, cited by Mr. Clarkson, p. 205. ↩

10. Same page. ↩

11. Acts 7:26. ↩

12. He had drowned himself in endeavouring to desert. ↩

13. Among others whom we brought from Bayonne, two gentlemen, who had been in the West Indies, where they sold slaves; and they confessed they had made at one time a false bill of sale, and sold two Portuguese white men among a lot of slaves. ↩

14. Some people have it, that sometimes shortly before persons die their ward has been seen; that is, some spirit exactly in their likeness, though they are themselves at other places at the same time. One day while we were at Bayonne Mr. Mondle saw one of our men, as he thought, in the gun-room; and a little after, coming on the quarterdeck, he spoke of some circumstances of this man to some of the officers. They told him that the man was then out of the ship, in one of the boats with the Lieutenant: but Mr. Mondle would not believe it, and we searched the ship, when he found the man was actually out of her; and when the boat returned some time afterwards, we found the man had been drowned at the very time Mr. Mondle thought he saw him. ↩

15. Thus was I sacrificed to the envy and resentment of this woman for knowing that the lady whom she had succeeded in my master’s good graces designed to take me into her service; which, had I once got on shore, she would not have been able to prevent. She felt her pride alarmed at the superiority of her rival in being attended by a black servant: it was not less to prevent this than to be revenged on me, that she caused the captain to treat me thus cruelly. ↩

16. “The Dying Negro,” a poem originally published in 1773. Perhaps it may not be deemed impertinent here to add, that this elegant and pathetic little poem was occasioned, as appears by the advertisement prefixed to it, by the following incident. “A black, who, a few days before had ran away from his master, and got himself christened, with intent to marry a white woman his fellow-servant, being taken and sent on board a ship in the Thames, took an opportunity of shooting himself through the head.” ↩

17. These pisterines are of the value of a shilling. ↩

18. Mr. Dubury, and many others, Montserrat. ↩

19. Sir Philip Gibbes, Baronet, Barbados. ↩

20. Benezet’s Account of Guinea, p. 16. ↩

21. Acts 12:9. ↩

22. John 16:13, 14, etc. ↩

23. Acts 4:12. ↩

24. See the Public Advertiser, July 14, 1787. ↩

25. At the request of some of my most particular friends, I take the liberty of inserting it here. ↩

26. Grenville Sharp, Esq.; the Reverend Thomas Clarkson; the Reverend James Ramsay; our approved friends, men of virtue, are an honour to their country, ornamental to human nature, happy in themselves, and benefactors to mankind! ↩

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The Interesting Narrative of the Life of Olaudah Equiano
was published in 1789 by
Olaudah Equiano.

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