object falls a victim to her
jealousy. Celibacy is a state almost unknown in Africa; and when it does
occur, it is considered as a degradation.

The Negroe's existence is almost a gratuitous gift of nature; his wants are
supplied without laborious exertion, his desires are gratified without
restraint, his soul remains in peaceful indolence and tranquillity, and his
life glides on in voluptuous apathy and tranquil calm: he has few
solicitudes or apprehensions, and he meets the stroke of fate with perfect
resignation.

In the countries which I have visited, and, as I understand from others,
every principal village or town has its _bantaba_, or _palaver-house_,
which I have before described. In this house, or under the shade of some
venerable tree, all ranks occasionally assemble in groups, from sun-rising
to sun-set, and pass the time in chit-chat, or in conversation on public
affairs. Their subjects are inexhaustible, and their tittle-tattle is
carried on with surprising volubility, gaiety, and delight; their time thus
occupied is so seducing, that they separate with great reluctance,
sometimes passing the entire day in this, pratling, smoaking, and
diversion: night, however, terminates these amusements: They assemble in
the open air during the dry season, and under the palaver-houses in the
wet, where they form themselves into dancing companies, generally during
half the night, and not unfrequently the whole of it. Their instruments of
music are upon a very rude construction, consisting of a _tabila_, or drum,
hollowed out from a piece of wood, and covered at each end with a bull's
hide, producing a most barbarous noise, accompanied by a _baba_, or rattle,
loud shouts, palaver, songs, and violent gesticulations, forming a system
of confused uproar, unmusical, and ungraceful. Their motions are irregular,
sometimes in violent contortion, and at others voluptuous and slow. Nothing
can be done without a palaver; and at the change of every dance, he from
whom the proposition originates, makes a solemn harangue over the musical
instruments, which is generally descriptive of some warlike action or
exploit, when they again give themselves up with rapture to the pleasures
of the dance, the females in particular, whose actions and shew of
luxuriant pleasure are highly offensive to delicacy, exhibiting all the
gradations of lascivious attitude and indecency. At this period of unusual
delight, they are applauded by the men with ra