circumstances made such warlike preparations necessary on these excursions.
To this they replied readily. The people in the canoes, said they, pass
through the territories of different petty princes; to each of whom, on
entering his territory, they pay a tribute or toll. This tribute has been
long fixed; but attempts frequently have been made to raise it. They who
follow the trade cannot afford to submit to these unreasonable demands; and
therefore they arm themselves in case of any determination on the part of
these petty princes to enforce them.

This answer we never judged to be satisfactory. We tried therefore to throw
light upon the subject, by inquiring if the natives, who went up on these
expeditions, usually took with them as many goods, as would amount to the
number of the slaves they were accustomed to bring back with them. But we
could get no direct answer, from any actual knowledge, to this question.
All had seen the canoes go out and return; but no one had seen them loaded,
or had been on board them. It appeared, however, from circumstantial
evidence, that, though the natives on these occasions might take some
articles of trade with them, it was impossible from appearances, that they
could take them in the proportion mentioned. We maintained then our
inference as before; but it was still uniformly denied.

How then were we to decide this important question? for it was said, that
no white man was ever permitted by the natives to go up in these canoes. On
mentioning accidentally the circumstances of the case, as I have now stated
them, to a friend, immediately on my return from my last journey, he
informed me, that he himself had been in company, about a year before, with
a sailor, a very respectable-looking man, who had been up these rivers. He
had spent half an hour with him at an inn. He described his person to me.
But he knew nothing of his name, or of the place of his abode. All he knew
was, that he was either going, or that he belonged to, some ship of war in