with crowns on their heads, palms in their hands, and golden harps to sing praises withal.

There were also of them that had wings, and they answered one another without intermission, saying, "Holy, holy, holy is the Lord" (Rev. iv. 8). And after that they shut up the gates; which, when I had seen, I wished myself among them.

Ignorance

comes up

river.

Vain-hope

him over.

Now while I was gazing upon all these things, I turned my head to look back, and saw Ignorance come up to the river side; but he soon got over, and that without half that difficulty which the other two men met with. For it happened that there was then in that place, one to the Vain-hope, a ferryman, that with his boat helped him over; so he, as the other I saw, did ascend the hill, to come up to the gate, only he came alone; neither did any man meet him. with the least encouragement. When he was come up to the gate, he looked up to the writing that was does ferry above, and then began to knock, supposing that entrance should have been quickly administered to him; but he was asked by the men that looked over the top of the gate, Whence came you? and what would you have? He answered, I have eat and drank in the presence of the King, and he has taught in our streets. Then they asked him for his certificate, that they might go in and show it to the King; so he fumbled in his bosom for one, and found none. Then said they, Have you none? But the man answered never a word. So they told the King, but he would not come down to see him, but commanded the two Shining Ones that conducted Christian and Hopeful to the City, to go out and take Ignorance, and bind him hand and foot, and have him away. Then they took him up, and carried him through the air, to the door that I saw in the side of the hill, and put him in there. Then I saw that there was a way to hell, even from the gates of heaven, as well as from the City of Destruction! So I awoke, and behold it was a dream.

OROONOKO: OR, THE ROYAL SLAVE

MRS. APHRA BEHN

I Do not pretend, in giving you the history of this Royal Slave, to entertain my Reader with the adventures of a feigned hero, whose life and fortunes fancy may manage at the poet's pleasure; nor, in relating the truth, design to adorn it with any accidents, but such as arrived in earnest to him: and it shall come simply into the world, recommended by its own proper merits, and natural intrigues; there being enough of reality to support it, and to render it diverting without the addition of invention.

I was myself an eye-witness to a greater part of what you will find here set down; and what I could not be witness of, I received from the mouth of the chief actor in this history, the hero himself, who gave us the whole transactions of his youth: and I shall omit, for brevity's sake, a thousand little accidents of his life, which, however pleasant to us, where history was scarce, and adventures very rare, yet might prove tedious and heavy to my reader, in a world where he finds diversions for every minute, new and strange. But we who were perfectly charmed with the character of this great man, were curious to gather every circumstance of his life.

The scene of the last part of his adventures lies in a colony in America, called Surinam, in the West Indies.

But before I give you the story of this gallant slave, it is fit that I tell you the manner of bringing them to these new colonies; those they make use of there, not being natives of the place for those we live with in perfect amity, without daring to command them; but, on the contrary, caress them with all the brotherly and friendly affection in the world; trading with them for their fish, venison, buffaloes' skins, and little rarities; as marmosets, a sort of monkey, as big as a rat or weasel, but of

a marvelous and delicate shape, having face and hands like a human creature; and cousheries, a little beast in the form and fashion of a lion, as big as a kitten, but so exactly made in all parts like that noble beast, that it is it in miniature: then for the little parrakeets, great parrots, mackaws, and a thousand other birds and beasts of wonderful and surprising forms, shapes, and colours. . . . We dealt with them with beads of all colours, knives, axes, pins, and needles, which they used only as tools to drill holes with in their ears, noses, and lips, where they hang a great many little things; as long beads, bits of tin, brass or silver beat thin, and any shining trinket. The beads they weave into aprons about a quarter of an ell long, and of the same breadth; working them very prettily in flowers of several colours; which apron they wear just before them, as Adam and Eve did the figleaves; the men wearing a long strip of linen, which they deal with us for. They thread these beads also on long cotton-threads, and make girdles to tie their aprons to, which come twenty times or more, about the waist, and then cross, like a shoulder-belt both ways and round their necks, arms and legs. This adornment, with their long black hair, and the face painted in little specks or flowers here and there, makes them a wonderful figure to behold. Some of the beauties, which indeed are finely shaped, as almost all are, and who have pretty features, are charming and novel; for they have all that is called beauty, except the colour, which is a reddish yellow; or after a new oiling, which they often use to themselves they are of the colour of a new brick, but smooth, soft and sleek. And these people represented to me an absolute idea of the first state of innocence, before man knew how to sin: And 'tis most evident and plain, that simple Nature is the most harmless, inoffensive and virtuous mistress. It is she alone, if she were permitted, that better instructs the world, than all the inventions of man: religion here would but destroy that tranquillity they possess by ignorance; and laws would but teach them to know offences, of which now they have no notion. They once made mourning and fasting for the death of the English Governor, who had given his hand to come on such a day to them, and neither came nor sent; believing, when a man's word was past, nothing but death could or should pre

vent his keeping it: and when they saw he was not dead, they asked him what name they had for a man who promised a thing he did not do? The Governor told them such a man was a liar, which was a word of infamy to a gentleman. Then one of them replied, "Governor, you are a liar, and guilty of that infamy." They have a native justice, which knows no fraud; and they understand no vice, or cunning, but when they are taught by the white men.

With these people, as I said, we live in perfect tranquillity, and good understanding, as it behooves us to do; they knowing all the places where to seek the best food of the country, and the means of getting it; and for very small and invaluable trifles, supplying us with what it is almost impossible for us to get. Those then whom we make use of to work in our plantations of sugar, are Negroes, black-slaves altogether, who are transported thither.

Coramantien, a country of blacks so called, was one of those places in which they found the most advantageous trading for these slaves; for that nation is very warlike and brave. The king of Coramantien was of himself a man an hundred and odd years old, and had no son, though he had many beautiful black wives: for most certainly there are beauties that can charm of that colour. In his younger years he had had many gallant men to his sons, thirteen of whom died in battle, conquering where they fell; and he had only left him for his successor, one grandchild, son to one of these dead victors, who, as soon as he could bear a bow in his hand, and a quiver at his back, was sent into the field, to be trained up by one of the oldest Generals to war; where, from his natural inclination to arms, and the occasions given him, with the good conduct of the old General, he became, at the age of seventeen, one of the most expert Captains, that ever saw the field of Mars: so that he was adored as the wonder of all that world, and the darling of the soldiers. Besides, he was adorned with a native beauty, so transcending all those of his gloomy race, that he struck an awe and reverence, even into those that knew not his quality; as he did into me, who beheld him with surprise and wonder, when afterwards he arrived in our world. He had scarce arrived at his seventeenth year, when,

fighting by his side, the General was killed with an arrow in his eye, which the prince Oroonoko (for so was this gallant Moor called) very narrowly avoided; nor had he, if the General who saw the arrow shot, and perceiving it aimed at the Prince, had not bowed his head between, on purpose to receive it in his own body, rather than it should touch that of the Prince, and so saved him.

It was then, afflicted as Oroonoko was, that he was proclaimed General in the old man's place: and then it was, at the finishing of that war, which had continued for two years, that the Prince came to Court, where he had hardly been a month together, from the time of his fifth year to that of seventeen: and it was amazing to imagine where it was he learned so much humanity; or to give his accomplishments a juster name, where it was he got that real greatness of soul, those refined notions of true honour, that absolute generosity, and that softness that was capable of the highest passions of love and gallantry, whose objects were almost continually fighting men, or those mangled or dead, who heard no sounds but those of war and groans. Some part of it we may attribute to the care of a Frenchman of wit and learning, who finding it turn to very good account to be a sort of royal tutor to this young black, and perceiving him very ready, apt, and quick of apprehension, took a great pleasure to teach him morals, language and science; and was for it extremely beloved and valued by him. Another reason was, he loved when he came from war, to see all the English gentlemen that traded thither; and did not only learn their language, but that of the Spaniard also, with whom he traded afterwards for slaves.

I have often seen and conversed with this great man, and been a witness to many of his mighty actions, and do assure my reader, the most illustrious Courts could not have produced a braver man, both for greatness of courage and mind, a judgment more solid, a wit more quick, and a conversation more sweet and diverting. He knew almost as much as if he had read much: he had heard of and admired the Romans: he had heard of the late Civil Wars in England, and the deplorable death of our great Monarch; and would discourse of it with all the sense of abhorrence of the injustice imaginable. He had an extreme good and graceful