Paul Cuffe

“ There is an Englishman by the name of Hunter, who has a sugar plantation on this island, and employs seventy five hands, all natives of the country. He has about one hundred and seventy five acres under improvement. The sugar manufactured here is of good quality. There is a kind of root that grows here called tarrow, which resembles a potatoe. This is the only vegetable that I saw cultivated on the island. To raise these, the people burn over a spot during the dry season, and sow the seed, and get it in with sticks, where the land is not very mellow. ”

“ I think the people of this place are as industrious and respectable as in any place with which I have been acquainted. They are, in general, good livers, have fewer poor people among them, than most of the places which I have visited, and are very civil and courteous to strangers. They are principally emigrants from the New England States. The town is beautifully situated, having the Oneida Creek, running from south to north through its centre. ”

“ After going into the port from whence we last sailed I left the Charles and went on board the Golconda, of New Bedford. In this vessel I stayed about nine months, during which we fished in Panama bay with tolerable success. The Captain was a bad man and abused the crew very much.—From this bay we went to Payta, where I was paid off and left the ship.
The people of this place procure their water from springs that are nine miles off, which is brought in every morning on asses in what are called callabashes, that hold from fifteen to twenty gallons each. ”

“ These people have never permitted the missionaries to live among them, but they worship idols made of stone. They raise potatoes and oranges of the vegetable kind, and of the animal, hogs. Of these latter, we purchased a hog that would weigh two bundled pounds, for one whale tooth. What they do with the teeth I do not know. This the natives brought to us by swimming to the ship. From the last mentioned Islands we steered away west by north, about two thousand miles further, when we reached an island called Riotier, one of a group called the Society Islands. ”

“ Here I tarried with my family but four weeks before I again shipped aboard of the last named vessel for Lisbon, in Portugal, where we arrived after a rough passage of forty-five days. Our lading was 525 barrels of whale oil, which we sold at Lisbon. While at this place we heard the roar of the cannon in an engagement between a division of the army of the Great Napoleon and the English and Portuguese troops, and the night after this battle the writer saw five hundred wounded soldiers brought into Lisbon to have their wounds dressed. ”

“ We sailed from Boston with a crew of ten men, and twenty-five passengers, on a cruise to New Orleans, which we made in twenty days.
While Opposite Cape Florida, we fell in with a pirate schooner, which gave chase to us by coming down upon our larboard quarter, and giving us a gun which passed through our bulwark. Our Captain at this juncture advised a surrender of our vessel, but the mate declared he would not give up if the men would stand by him. The passengers told him they would fight as long as there was a man left. ”

“ We hoisted sail just at night, and steered away in an east northeast direction until we crossed the Grand banks, and then stood away for the Azores, where, after 20 days' sail, we made the Island of Carvo, one of that group of Islands. Here we stopped a few days and took in 500 bushels of potatoes and 100 bushels of onions. There was no harbor in this place; so we were obliged to go ashore in our boats. The people brought down the above articles on their backs. Men, women and children were all engaged in supplying us with the above articles. We paid them in oil, of which they were very fond. ”

“ We were fifty days sailing from Payta to the shore. Here we stayed five months, and took but two hundred barrels sperm. We then sailed again for Payta, where we recruited ship, staid a couple of weeks, and then sailed for Tombus, where we took in wood and water. When this was done, we sailed the for Gallipago Islands, where we went for Terrapin. The Terrapin very much resembles our large Turtle, only they live wholly on the land, and weigh from four to five hundred pounds. ”

“ While they are making the dirt oven ready, they have another large fire close by, where they heat small round stones. When these are sufficiently heated and the hole is also heated, they clear out the coals, and put a layer of the heated round stones upon the bottom, then they lay in the hog and cover it with large leaves, then over these a layer of the hot stones, then another of the leaves, and over all, they throw a layer of dirt. When the hog has become properly roasted, they take it out and lay it upon sticks prepared for that purpose, and the guests set round and eat. ”

“ Here my time being up, I left the ship and went among the natives, who were a very friendly, hospitable people. Here I staved five months, and learned much of the customs and manners of the country. The people generally go naked, and men, women and children live promiscuously together. ”

“ While on our homeward bound passage, we lost three men, by being struck by a whale.
After discharging our freight at Oldtown, on the Vineyard, I went home to New Bedford, where I stayed three months, when I again shipped aboard of a whaler called the Delight, Captain Philip Sanford. Our voyage was made to St. Domingo in twenty eight days. Here we commenced fishing, but catched nothing but black fish, which we sold for potatoes, oranges, squashes &c. We then went down upon the Jamaica coast, where we caught seven sperm whale ”

“ If the reader has ever been a long while absent from home, he can easily imagine my feelings on my arrival at the dear paternal mansion. Here I again saw my father and mother, brothers and sisters, where I remained but three weeks before I again left the fire side of my dear parents to launch out upon the broad Atlantic's briny bosom. At the expiration of the above term, I shipped aboard of the brig Traveller, Capt. Thomas Wainer, for Kennebec, state of Maine. On our passage to this place, our vessel capsized about 10 o'clock at night, which caused us much trouble to get her righted again ”

“ The people in this vicinity are Spaniards, and are very hospitable to strangers. Here the people live by raising sweet potatoes, corn, cotton and sugar cane. Here I stayed six months and enjoyed myself very well. The religion of this people is the Catholic.
The only man with whom I had formed an acquaintance who was from the United States, was a Cape-Cod man. This man and myself had lived together from the time I landed at Payta. ”

“ The people of this place, when they make a feast, which is often, roast a hog whole. This they do by digging a hole in the ground sufficiently large to put the animal in, then they build a large fire in it and heat it, as English people heat their ovens. ”

“ After the death of my friend I stayed about a week, and them left that place and went to Payta, which is a sea-port town.—Here I stayed but about one month before I again shipped on board a whaler called the Mechanic, of Newport, Rhode Island. ”

“ When we set sail, we had nine men sick with the yellow fever, six of whom died and were consigned to the vasty deep, after the usual ceremony of the reading of prayers, &c. We were off the east end of Cuba, when we discovered early in the morning, a large sail to the eastward, which we took to be an American man-of-war, but soon found we had been fatally deceived, for she was a large English sloop-of-war called the Sapho, Capt. ”

“ Their houses are very simple, being constructed by driving posts into the ground and then by fastening beams made of round sticks to the top of these posts, and smaller sticks, covered with grass wove very compactly together to the beams. ”