Publisher's Synopsis
This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1864 edition. Excerpt: ... CHAPTER IV. A WALK ROUND VVHYDAH. The three following days enabled us to study the topography of Whydah. The present town stands about 1"50--2 direct miles north of the sea; separated from the shore by a broad leek-green swamp, by a narrow lagoon, and by a high sandbank, whose tufted palms and palmyras, of a deep invisible green approaching black, form a hogsback, over which the masts of shipping only can be seen from the houses. The site wears the tricolor of S'a Leone, --light and milky-blue sky, verdigris grass, and bright red argillaceous soil, with a blending shade of grey. The "ferruginous-looking clay/' which in India and China has been suspected of emitting a "pestiferous mineral gas," and of causing the "cachexia loci? seems here to lose part of its injurious power. The town is not exceedingly unhealthy, despite its extreme filth, and although the deep holes from which the building material has been extracted are as great a nuisance as in Abeokuta and Sokoto. Indeed, as a rule, it is less deadly than other places on the Slave Coast, especially Lagos and Badagry. The nights are cool, and the daybreeze is, if anything, somewhat too strong for safety. At this season the people do not suffer from mosquitos, "much provoking the exercise of a man's nails," as the old traveller has it. Beneath the surface soil there is a substratum of pure white sand overlying argil deeply tinctured with iron oxide from the northern hills; and another bed of pure sand is supported by white clay to a depth of thirty-five feet: it is supposed that below this figure marine deposits would occur. The highest part of the town, that is to say the west end, is not more than forty feet above the sea, and this we may assume to be the height of the first floor of...
