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 DANIEL KOLAK, SERIES EDITOR

Arthur Schopenhauer

The World as Will and Presentation

Volume One

TRANSLATED BY
RICHARD E. AQUILA
THE UNIVERSITY OF TENNESSEE

IN COLLABORATION WITH
DAVID CARUS
First published 2008 by Pearson Education, Inc.

Published 2016 by Routledge

2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN
711 Third Avenue, New York, NY, 10017, USA

Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business

Copyright © 2008 Taylor & Francis

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any
form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented,
including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system,
without permission in writing from the publishers.

Notice:
Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only
for identification and explanation without intent to infringe.

ISBN-13: 9780321355782 (pbk)

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Schopenhauer, Arthur, 1788-1860.
[Welt als Wille und Vorstellung. English]
Arthur Schopenhauer: the world as will and presentation / translated
by
Richard E. Aquila in collaboration with David Carus.
p. cm. – (Longman library of primary sources in philosophy)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 0-321-35578-4 (alk. paper)
1. Philosophy. 2. Will. 3. Idea (Philosophy) 4. Knowledge, Theory of.
I. Title.
B3138.E5A65 2008
193-dc 22

Library of Congress Control Number: 2007001262

 Contents

PREFACE TO THE TRANSLATION BY MATTHIAS KOSSLER

TRANSLATOR’S INTRODUCTION
A. Die Welt ist meine Vorstellung
B. Principle of Sufficient Ground and Principium
Individuationis
C. Der Wille
D. The Aufhebung of Will
E. The Text
F. The Present and Other Translations
G. Selective Notes on Some Terms
H. Selective Bibliography
I. Acknowledgments

THE WORLD AS WILL AND PRESENTATION VOLUME ONE

Schopenhauer’s Table of Contents Expanded
Preface to the First Edition (1818)
Preface to the Second Edition (1844)
Preface to the Third Edition (1859)

FIRST BOOK
The World as Presentation: First Consideration
Presentation as Subject to the Principle of Sufficient
Ground: The Object of Experience and Science

SECOND BOOK
 The World as Will: First Consideration The
Objectification of Will

THIRD BOOK
The World as Presentation: Second Consideration
Presentation Independent of the Principle of
Sufficient Ground The Platonic Idea: The Object of
Art

FOURTH BOOK
The World as Will: Second Consideration With the
Achievement of Self-Cognizance Affirmation and
Denial of the Will for Life

APPENDIX
Critique of Kantian Philosophy

TRANSLATOR’S APPENDIX
Schopenhauer’s Diagrams for Book One §9

ENDNOTES

INDEX
FOR MY GRANDCHILDREN

Megan
Sam
Emilio
 Preface to the
Translation

German editors of Schopenhauer’s works are confronted with a well

known “curse” that the author laid upon “everyone who in future printings
of my work will modify anything of them knowingly, be it a sentence or
just one word, a syllable, a letter, a punctuation mark.”i With this
unequivocal testimony in the background, there is a long-lasting and, as it
seems, never-ending discussion about the right approach to an edition. The
introduction to the following translation alludes to this problem. Now, if
even German editors are not able to follow Schopenhauer’s instruction in a
satisfying manner, how much more must this be the case regarding
translations of the editions of his works. For as Schopenhauer explains in
his essay “On Language and Words,” any translation is “necessarily
defective”; “We are hardly ever able to translate from one language into
another any characteristic, pregnant, and significant passage in such a way
that it would produce the same effect on the reader in a precise and
complete manner.”ii The reason for this lies in the fact that concepts often
do not correspond with each other in different languages (so, writing this, I
am aware that the concept of “concept” does not correspond exactly to the
German Begriff, and neither does “idea”). Thus even “the very best
translation will at most be related to the original as the transposition of a
given piece of music into another key is to the given piece itself; and as
Schopenhauer adds, “those who understand music know what that means.”
According to this estimation there are two ways to proceed, both of
them unsatisfying: either a translation “remains dead and its style is forced,
stiff and unnatural” or “it becomes free, in other words, is content with an à
peu prés and thus is incorrect.” Up to now, a translation of Die Welt als
Wille und Vorstellung has been available to Anglo-American scholars that
comes nearer to the first alternative. Even to one who, like me, has no great
competence in English, it is obvious that the translation of Eric F. J. Payne,
The World as Will and Representation, sounds like a German text written in
English words. This might be an advantage for German readers but not to
those to whom it is addressed. So much the more it is therefore to be
applauded that a translation is here presented with a main aim of providing
a readable English text. Such a new translation is not only able to draw
more attention to one of the most important European thinkers for the
Anglo-American sphere – all the more appropriate inasmuch as
Schopenhauer’s philosophy was first discovered and acknowledged in
England 153 years ago, even before he became known in his homeland. It
also contributes to a better understanding of Schopenhauer’s philosophy by
English readers. Any translation that is truly readable, and yet as accurate as
a translation could be, is necessarily the product of the effort to find a path
between the Scylla of an artificial, inanimate style and the Charybdis of free
transposition. From some discussions with the translators in which I have
marginally participated, I know how much care has been put into the best
translation of some of the main concepts, as well as in regard to the
meaning of the words in their use in common English. One may get an
impression of these discussions from the translator’s introduction.
It is always a difficult task to minimize the general disadvantages of
translations, with their necessary give and take, not to mention the danger
of mixing translation with interpretation, which is particularly high in the
case of Schopenhauer’s philosophy, because it is more in need of
interpretation than some others. As to how far the present translation
succeeds in this task has to be judged by the experts. In any case I am very
glad about this new translation, and I admire the courage and the work of
Richard Aquila and David Cams. The translations of Eric F. J. Payne have
been most important for the development of Anglo-American Schopenhauer
research. They have undeniable merits, and Payne has rightly been named
an honorary president of the Schopenhauer Society. But now-as indicated
by an increasing number of remarks from many sides in the last years – the
time has come for this new translation, which I welcome in the name of the
international Schopenhauer Society. I am sure that it will contribute to a
new era of occupation with Schopenhauer’s philosophy, not only in the
Anglo-American world, but no less in India, where Schopenhauer has
recently been discovered, and indeed all over the world.

MATTHIAS KOSSLER
University of Mainz
President, Schopenhauer-Gesellschaft
__________________________________________
Notes

i
Der handschriftliche Nachlass, ed. Arthur Hübscher (Frankfurt: W.
Kramer, 1966–1975), IV/2, p. 33.
ii
Parerga und Paralipomena, vol. II, Sämtliche Werke, ed. Arthur
Hübscher, vol. 6, p. 602.
 Translator’s
Introduction

In 1819 Arthur Schopenhauer (1788–1860) published his chief work,

Die Welt als Wille und Vorstellung.i In 1844, rather than subject the original
to a major revision, he supplemented it with a second volume:

for the reason that the twenty-five years that have passed… have
brought such a notable alteration in my manner of exposition and in
the tone of delivery that it just would not do to fuse the content of
the second volume into a whole with that of the first…I therefore
put forth the two works in separation, and have often changed
nothing in the earlier exposition even where I would now express
myself quite differently; for I wanted to guard against spoiling the
work of my younger years with the carping of old age.ii

The two-volume work then appeared in a third edition in 1859. The present
is a translation of the first volume of that edition. It has been produced in
collaboration with David Cams, whose translation of the second volume
reflects a reciprocal division of labor.iii

A. Die Welt ist meine Vorstellung

The world is a presentation to me. In this sentence, the first of the
book, Schopenhauer characterizes one of the two sides of die Welt, the
world, as he sees it. If there is such a thing as literal translation, the present
is, at least in one respect, decidedly non-literal. Why not: the world is my
(meine) presentation? On the other hand, the choice of ‘presentation’ as a
translation of Vorstellung may seem overly literal.
Etymologically, Vorstellung connotes placement in a position
(Stellung) before (vor) or as present to someone; the ‘pre’ in ‘present’ and
‘presentation’ captures this.i In ordinary usage, however, one’s Vorstellung
of something is simply one’s “idea” of it. And so, as we might put it: the
world is my idea.ii Furthermore, although it is an overstatement,
Schopenhauer says that “thorough acquaintance” with Kant is required for
this book.iii At least in philosophical contexts, Kant equates Vorstellung with
the Latin repraesentatio (A320/B376).iv And so, as we might also put it: the
world is my representationv I return to the notion of representation below. In
any event, as suggested, the case for “presentation” goes hand in hand with
the need to avoid the sense of possession generally attaching to possessive
pronouns. More positively, the point is to promote what we take to be the
central intention in Schopenhauer’s use of the term: not possession by, but
presentation of objects to, a cognizant subject.
With respect to this central sense, it may also be useful to note that the
term Vorstellung is commonly used to refer to theatrical presentations.
Several times, Schopenhauer in fact calls the side of the world that he calls
meine Vorstellung a Schauspiel, or a “show” (or “play”)i: a show that is
“mine” in the sense that I am its spectator. But as it turns out, it is also mine
in another sense. Just as with the corresponding English term, Vorstellung
can refer either to what is presented or to the process or action of presenting
it. Thus we may say that Hamlet is “our” presentation for the evening; but
we may of course also speak of the evening’s presentation of that play, and
of the doings of its various characters. It is just here, however, that a
decisive step is taken. For what we soon learn in Book One of this work is
that what always does the “presenting” – what actually sets (stellt) the
world as presentation before (vor) one – is just that very spectator, the
cognizant subject (erkennendes Subjekt) itself. And even this falls short of
fully capturing the radical character of Schopenhauer’s view. For one might
still suppose that, even if what does the “presenting” is the cognizant
subject itself, what is presented is at least normally an independently
existing reality. But for Schopenhauer: “No object without subject.”ii And
so, as it turns out, a still more apt analogy would be another upon which he
in fact dwells at greater length: what gets presented to one in a dream (§ 5).i
 This does not mean that the spectating subject spins its show or
“dream” out of nothing. The point of departure is always some particular
material state that, as Schopenhauer explains in § 4 and 6, is always some
portion of the subject’s own body and, to that extent, always in some sense
the subject’s “immediate object”; as he also explains, however, it is thereby
“presented,” and as such an “object” of cognizance, in only a loose sense of
these terms. (The presupposition of materiality by any sort of presentational
activity, which – to the extent that we regard matter as an object – might of
course seem to conflict with the principle “No object without subject,” is a
point to which I return in section D.) Most crucially, in any case,
Schopenhauer repeatedly draws a distinction between ordinary, individual
cognizant subjects and that “one” subject which is said to be “whole and
undivided in every being that is engaged in presentation” (§ 2, p. 34), a
subject that amounts to distinct individuals only by virtue of a “special
relation” to distinct bodies (§ 19, p. 141; cf. § 18, p. 137). Schopenhauer
describes this “subject”ii as the “world’s one eye that looks out from all
cognizant beings” (§ 38, p. 242; cf. § 36, p. 229; § 54, p. 334); as a subject
of which individual subjects are only the “bearer,” and that is itself in turn
the “bearer of the world” (§ 61, p. 387); and as a subject that, unlike any
individual subject, “is not in time, since time is only the more immediate
form belonging to all of its presentational activity.”iii I return to this point
below.
With their main point unchanged, a number of passages can be read
with Vorstellung taken either way: referring either to what is presented (qua
presented) or to the presentational activity involved. But this is of course
not the case when Schopenhauer describes the world as Vorstellung. (In
other cases, other sorts of presentations are presented, e.g., the abstract
objects of thinking and judging (concepts, Begriffe), to which Schopenhauer
gives special attention in § 9 of Book One, or those special objects that he
calls Platonic Ideas (Ideen), which are central to the theory of aesthetic
awareness in Book Three.) And Schopenhauer makes it sufficiently clear
that, in his own usage, the primary sense of Vorstellung is precisely that of
what is presented to a subject: the presented object (again, qua presented, as
opposed to whatever it may be “in itself). Thus in his essay On the Fourfold
Root of the Principle of Sufficient Ground:
 To be object for the subject and to be a presentation to us (unsere
Vorstellung) are the same thing. All presentations to us are the
subject’s objects (Objekte des Subjekts), and all the subject’s objects
are presentations to us.i

In Will and Presentation, Schopenhauer also equates Vorstellung both

with Objekt des Subjekts (§ 24, p. 158; § 27, p. 194) – employing, again, an
obviously non-possessive genitive – and with Objekt für ein Subjekt (§ 30,
p. 211).ii
As for ‘represent’ and ‘representation,’ I have not found a need for the
noun here, and I use the verb for both vertreten and repräsentieren, never
vorstellen,iii By contrast, as already noted, ‘representation’ has become – but
not without exception – commonplace in connection with Kant, and also
familiar in translations of Schopenhauer. But in addition to failing to bring
out the dual notion of that which is “set before” a cognizant subject as its
object, and the presentational activity of the subject therein engaged, it
disguises the point by way of a misleading suggestion. Namely, it suggests
that what is in question is some sort of internal item (a “representation”),
internal to the state of the subject, and toward which its cognitive activity is
in the first instance directed. Whether or not this leads to the additional
supposition that such items function by representing something existing
independently of that activity, it misdirects us from the main idea.i

B. Principle of Sufficient Ground and Principium

Individuationis
The first and third of the four Books of The World as Will and
Presentation focus on the world as presentation. The subtitle of Book One –
titled “The World as Presentation: First Consideration” – is “Presentation as
Subject to the Principle of Sufficient Ground (Vorstellung unterworfen dem
Satze vom Grunde): The Object of Experience and Science.”i As it is here,
the word ‘sufficient’ (zureichender) is often omitted. But it is standardly
inserted in translations, and we follow this practice. We depart from
common practice, however, in that the principle is more usually called the
Principle of Sufficient Reason. I explain this point below. (Throughout, we
employ initial capitals to highlight the principle’s importance for
Schopenhauer.)
 In 1813, Schopenhauer published the first edition of the work to which
I referred in the preceding section, On the Fourfold Root of the Principle of
Sufficient Ground (Über die vierfache Wurzel des Satzes vom zureichenden
Grunde).ii Referring to that work in the Preface to the first edition of The
World as Will and Presentation, he calls it the latter’s “introduction,” and he
says that “Without acquaintance with this introduction and propaedeutic,
true understanding of the present work is altogether impossible.” He had, in
the first edition of Will and Presentation, in fact titled its preface “Preface
in Place of the Introduction.” At eight points, he also refers to the Fourfold
Root not by title, but simply as “the introductory treatise.” Nevertheless, it
is something of an exaggeration to describe it as absolutely prerequisite to
an understanding of his chief work. On the other hand, it will be useful to
have a brief overview of the principle with which it is concerned; some
further points will be added in endnotes to the translation.
The Principle of Sufficient Ground bears on all of the members of
what (with the need of a certain qualification) Schopenhauer calls the “four
classes” into which “everything can be divided that can become an object
for us, thus all our presentations.”i (In Will and Presentation, he simply
refers to these as “objects of the first,” second, etc., class.) Corresponding to
each of these classes of objects there is a distinct “mode” (Gestalt,
Gestaltung) of the Principle of Sufficient Ground. Corresponding to the
latter, in turn, there are four ways in which the concept of necessity applies
with respect to presentations.
(1) First class of objects: phenomena (Erscheinungen),ii or objects
perceptible (or imaginable) in space and time, insofar as such objects are
regarded as part of “empirical reality.” In § 17 of the Fourfold Root he calls
these “perceptual,iii complete, empirical presentations.” Here the principle
in question – in its mode as Principle of the Sufficient Ground of Becoming
(des Werdens) – concerns changes of state with respect to objects of this
class. According to this principle, all such changes have a ground in
antecedent changes with respect to objects of the same class; given the
ground in question, the consequent state is necessary in accordance with
causal laws. Although considerably expanded in the second edition of the
Fourfold Root, Schopenhauer’s treatment of this class of objects, and of the
concept of causality, occupies the largest portion of both editions of that
work. Where Will and Presentation goes further is in considering this class
of objects from two points of view: in Book One, as they are subject to
causal law (as well as in their relation to the second and third classes of
objects); in Book Two, as they are “objectifications” or manifestations of
“will.” But the concept of causality is also the focus of discussion in both
Books: most prominently, in Book One, § 4; in Book Two, § 17, 23–24, 26.
(2) Second class of objects: abstract objects, concepts (Begriffe). Here
the principle in question – in its mode as Principle of the Sufficient Ground
of Cognition (des Erkennens) – concerns those judgments that can be
formed by way of combinations of objects of this class. According to this
principle, the concept of the truth of a judgment is correlated with the
concept of necessity with respect to its adequately grounded justificationi In
Will and Presentation, Schopenhauer focuses on objects of this sort, on that
particular type of cognizance that is made possible by their means, i.e.,
knowledge and science (Wissen, Wissenschaft),ii and on the distinction
between the faculty of reason (Vernunft), to which concepts pertain, and the
faculty of understanding (Verstand) or intellect (Intellekt), whose province
involves a pre-conceptual (and in certain respects superior) grasp of causal
relations: esp., § 8–10, § 12, and § 14–15 of Book One. He further discusses
Wissenschaft (science) at various points in Book Two, e.g., in § 17, 24, 27.
In addition, at the end of § 54 in Book Four, he emphasizes the role of
abstract conceptual thought in a certain sort of “authentic” affirmation of
the will for life, and again at the end of § 55, in his discussion of “acquired
character.” In § 66 and 68, on the other hand, he emphasizes the intuitive
(intuitiv) and non-abstract character of the sort of cognizance that can
ultimately lead to true virtue – which consists precisely in a denial of the
will for life.i
(3) Third class of objects: space and time as objects of a special sort of
“pure perception” (reine Anschauung), characteristic of the mental activity
of pure mathematicians, but in some way implicated in all ordinary
empirical perception as well.ii Here the principle in question – in its mode
as Principle of the Sufficient Ground of Being (des Seins) – concerns
relative location within the two special objects of this class. According to
this principle, all such locations are themselves “determining”
(bestimmende) grounds with respect to all other possible locations.
Although Schopenhauer does not always put it with quite the same
emphasis as Kant, what he has in mind is what Kant had put, in the
“Transcendental Aesthetic” of the Critique of Pure Reason, in terms that
might incline us to speak of space and time themselves, rather than relative
locations within them, as the true “grounds of being.”iii Namely, as Kant
emphasizes and Schopenhauer presumably also holds, locations in space
and time are always apprehended precisely within a space and time that are
in their own turn holistically apprehended, in the special pure perception in
question, as antecedently given with respect to any such possible
determinations.i For both Kant and Schopenhauer, in any case, the pure
perception in question is what grounds insight into the necessities of
arithmetic and geometry. In the present work, Schopenhauer introduces this
mode of the Principle of Sufficient Ground in § 3, and he focuses on its
connection with mathematical knowledge in § 15 and 24.
(4) Fourth class of objects: with respect to each individual subject, that
very individual itself, insofar as it is perceptible to itself through a kind of
inner cognizance, not in any way directly referring to existence as a
physical object in space. Here the principle in question – in its mode as
Principle of the Sufficient Ground of Action (des Handelns), otherwise
known as the Law of Motivation (Gesetz der Motivation) – concerns willed
action on the part of objects of this class.ii According to this principle, every
action has a motive (a particular state of cognizance at the moment of the
action) with respect to which it constitutes a necessary response, given the
character of the subject in question.iii The role of “character” is treated in §
46 of the first edition of the Fourfold Root; the second edition only briefly
alludes to it, at the end of § 43, referring the reader instead to
Schopenhauer’s Prize Essay on the Freedom of the Will.i In Will and
Presentation, the relevant notions receive particular attention in § 20, 23,
26, and 28 of Book Three, and in § 55 of Book Four.
Now Schopenhauer equates the general principle whose four modes
bear on these four classes of objects with what is known in Latin as the
principium rationis sufficientis. But apart from the fact that we are
translating from German and not from Latin – and that ‘ground’ has the
advantage not only of an etymological connection with Grund, but with a
number of other terms whose translations standardly honor that connection
– Schopenhauer himself calls attention to the limitations of the Latin. As he
emphasizes in the following passage, the word ratio threatens to conflate a
distinction that is fundamental in his philosophy, namely, between the
faculties of reason (Vernunft) and understanding (Verstand). In commenting
on the Principle of the Sufficient Ground of Cognition, he first notes that,
since the Grund in question “is always something by which judgments are
supported, or on which they rest (darauf das Urteil sich stützt, oder beruht),
the German term Grund is fittingly chosen.” But then he adds:

In Latin and all the languages derived from it, the term for a
cognitive ground (der Name des Erkenntnisgrundes) coincides with
the term for reason (mit dem der Vernunft): thus both are called
ratio, la ragione, la razon, la raison, the reason. This testifies to
one’s recognition that cognizance of the grounds of judgments is the
most preeminent function of reason, its business .ii

This is of course to grant that the Principle of Sufficient Ground does

indeed give expression to the preeminent business of the faculty of reason.
But the faculty of reason, for Schopenhauer, deals only in abstractions. It
deals only in the application of abstract concepts to something already pre-
conceptually understood. Thus in any instance of actually applying the
principle in question – and in particular therefore in applying it to that
“world as presentation” whose a priori formal structure is that of space,
time, and causality – one is applying one’s faculty of reason precisely to
certain structures, or “forms,” that belong as such to the faculty of
understanding (part of what Schopenhauer calls “intellect” [Intellekt]). That
to which the principle in question gives abstract expression is in the first
instance a fact about these formal structures. As one might even also note,
at least in the particular case of the formal structures of space and time, it is
plainly unnatural to speak of locations within them (as opposed to events
occurring at locations) as determining “reasons” with respect to one
another, but not unnatural to speak of them as mutually determining
“grounds.”
In any case, the special status of what Schopenhauer calls
understanding or intellect consists in the particular role that this faculty
plays in the very generation of the world as presentation. It achieves the
latter by accomplishing a kind of mental “projection,”i or “setting,” of
objects of perception into the space and time of the perceiver. Therein, as
objects now presented to one, they are themselves merely discriminable
portions of the perceiver’s perceptual field.ii In turn, this is accomplished by
way of a pre-conceptual response to sensation (Empfindung), as that which
is thereby always in a certain sense part of one’s body as “immediate
object.”
 Insofar as this cognitive accomplishment does not rest on the
possession of concepts, it of course does not presuppose the possession of
concepts relating to relative position in, or to causal laws bearing on the
occupation of, the perceiver’s space and time. Nevertheless, it rests on one’s
cognitive faculty bringing about, with respect to one’s perceptual field,
what one will necessarily be able to conceptualize in those terms, once
one’s faculty of reason has gone to work upon it. In this sense, space, time,
and causality – as a priori forms belonging to our cognitive faculty – play a
ground-level role in the constitution of the world as presentation. But there
is also a crucial distinction to be drawn among these forms. Space and time
– the only space and time of which we are able to conceive – concern the a
priori perceptible form of any perceptual field within which our faculty of
understanding is able to set objects before us (i.e., is able to present them to
us). Thus they are in an important respect a precondition for any causal
understanding with respect to the world as presentation.i But yet beyond
that, the central point of Book One is that, apart from our ability to conceive
of things within an at least conceivably possible perceptual field, we have
no ability so much as even to conceive of any individual thing in the first
place. For this reason, Schopenhauer singles out space and time as the
“principle of individuation,” principium individuationis.

C. Der Wille
Book Two, titled “The World as Will: First Consideration. The
Objedification (Objektivation)ii of Will,” tells us that der Wille is what the
world is “in itself,” its “inner essence.” It is, as Schopenhauer also
frequently puts it, the world’s “essence in itself,” as opposed to its being as
a mere presentation, i.e., as objectified either in the phenomena projected by
the faculty of understanding or in what Schopenhauer calls those Platonic
Ideas (Ideen) that, apprehended by way of a quite different manner of
cognizance, are apprehended as archetypes of which phenomena are mere
expressions or manifestations; these Ideas, he says, are what constitute the
“true” world as presentation.iii Apart from occasions where purely
grammatical considerations recommend other-wise, or where Schopenhauer
is referring to will in more specific terms (e.g., as the will for life [Wille
zum Leben]), or referring to a specific manifestation of will (e.g., to the will
of a particular individual),iv we generally omit the article. There is no
question, of course, with respect to the title of the book; the article is not
employed there. But Schopenhauer speaks of der Wille throughout the
book, and it has become commonplace to represent him as thereby speaking
of something called “the” will. At least as we read Schopenhauer, this
would be just as strange a procedure as if, upon being told by a philosopher,
or scientist, that the inner essence of matter is die Kraft (force or power),
we were to formulate this as the proposition that the inner essence of matter
is “the” force or “the” power. In any case, one thing needs to be clear, and
excessive talk about “the” will might tend to obscure it. Namely, the will
that Schopenhauer takes to be the inner essence of the world is not any sort
of “thing” that expresses itself in acts of willing; it is not any sort of
“subject” of such acts, but rather the inner essence of all subjects of such
acts. Willing subjects are only objectifications or manifestations of it.
When Schopenhauer says that der Wille is the inner essence of the
world, he is in fact saying that something that is at least like what we think
of as force or power (or energy) – as we, at least, might feel reasonably
comfortable using one or more of these terms – is the inner essence of the
world. (He explains his reason for choosing the term Wille over Kraft in §
22 of Book Two.) And, while he emphasizes the point more in the second
than in the first volume of Will and Presentation, he also holds that all
phenomena, as empirically real objects – including individual willing and
cognizant subjects – are made out of various configurations of matter, of
which the will in question is in turn the inner essence.i However, it would
be a mistake to suppose that the only limit to what is clearly some sort of
Schopenhauerian “materialism”ii – the only respect in which it is not the
case that everything is “material” for Schopenhauer – lies in the fact that,
while everything in the world is made out of matter, anything material in
nature is an objectification of something more fundamental, namely, will. A
further issue concerns the status of that very cognizance in relation to which
anything is an object in the first place.i
A number of things that Schopenhauer says suggest that der Wille is
not only supposed to be that inner essence which is expressing itself in or
through all cognizant subjects, just as through any thing in nature, but, at
least at a certain level of its objectification, also itself a cognizant subject,
dwelling within every individual cognizant subject. In other words, der
Wille would be that “one eye” which Schopenhauer describes as “looking
out” from any individual cognizant subject. Whatever may be said for or
against it, therefore, as a cosmic “subject” supposed to be engaged in acts of
willing, to the extent that der Wille has arrived at a certain level of
objectification – namely, at the level of animal life – it may seem to be at
least a cosmic subject engaged in cognition, and not simply the inner
essence of such a being, as of all others. For as Schopenhauer himself puts
it, “the world is [the] will’s self-cognizance.”ii And there are a number of
other passages in which he speaks of self-cognizance or self-consciousness
on the part of will itself, at least at a particular level of its objectification.iii
In the next section, I try to distinguish the senses in which it may or may
not in fact be helpful to put things in these terms.
Whether or not, or in whatever sense, we regard der Wille as itself
either a willing or a cognizant “subject,” the view just formulated seems
incoherent. Schopenhauer himself even highlights the fact. For as he
emphasizes, precisely as part of the world as presentation, animal life is
dependent upon presentation in the first place:

[A]nimals existed before human beings, fish before terrestrial

animals, plants still before these, the inorganic prior to anything
organic… a long series of alterations before the first eye could open.
And nonetheless it remains ever upon the first eye that opened, may
it have even belonged to an insect, that the existence of the entire
world depends with respect to the necessarily mediating element of
cognizance, for which and within which alone it exists and without
which it is not even thinkable; for it is simply a presentation, and as
such has need of the cognizant subject as bearer of its existence.i

The difficulty is of course not exclusively tied to an equation of the

cognizant subject with the will that is supposed to be the inner essence of all
subjects. For, however one views the cognizant subject, if it exists only as a
function of animal life, and the latter in turn only as presentation in the first
place, there is a problem. Furthermore, as already noted, presentational
activity presupposes matter. That is, it presupposes whatever portions of
matter are the relevant parts of animal bodies as “immediate” objects. But if
will is the inner essence even of matter itself, then the latter would seem to
be part of the world as presentation. In that case, it would presuppose, not
be presupposed by, presentational activity.
Quite apart from these difficulties, there is a major problem in the way
of identifying der Wille – even at a particular level of its objectification –
with the “one eye” of Schopenhauerian cognizance. This will be made clear
in the next section. But first I make a further point, not altogether
uncontroversial, on a matter of translation. It concerns the use of reflexive
constructions involving der Wille as grammatical subject. Here, we are
given a variety of ways to talk about the process whereby der Wille is made
or “becomes”ii a presentation. In straightforwardly reflexive terms: der
Wille expresses itself (sich äussert, s. ausspricht, s. ausdrückt), displays
itself (s. darstellt), manifests itself (s. manifestiert), objectifies itself (s.
objektiviert), reveals itself (s. offenbart), shows itself (s. zeigt) in various
ways. Given that der Wille is Schopenhauer’s term for something at least
importantly like force, power, or energy, these locutions are certainly apt in
most cases. Purely grammatically, on the other hand, it is not altogether out
of the question to consider at least some of them in terms of a “passive
reflexive” construction. In that case, for example, instead of saying that der
Wille “objectifies” or “displays” itself, one might simply say that it is (or
“gets”) objectified, or that it is (or “gets”) displayed. In the case of just
these two verbs, I have in fact adopted this alternative.
Undeniably, der Wille gets objectified, “becomes” a presentation, only
by way of cognitive activity in which it is itself crucially involved.i Still
more strongly, it is, just as it is of all beings in nature, the inner essence of
any cognizant subject. As already suggested, however, there is a major
problem in the way of that further step which would consist in actually
identifying, even at a particular level of its objectification, der Wille with
the cognizant subject. But this is what seems to be entailed when one
speaks of der Wille as objectifying, or making an object, of itself.ii To be
sure, this might simply be a way of expressing the fact that will is somehow
essentially involved in all cognitive activity, or that it is indeed the inner
essence of any cognizant subject. It need not be taken, in any further sense,
to entail its equation with the cognizant subject. In particular, it need not be
taken to entail its equation with the “one eye” of Schopenhauerian
cognizance. In order to avoid facilitating the latter suggestion, however, and
yet without thereby excluding it, I take Schopenhauer to be speaking, in
these particular passages, simply of will being objectified. In the next
section, I then attempt to say something in response to the question: what is
doing the objectifying? (In terms of the passive reflexive construction, I
adopt the same approach, but for a different reason, with respect to the verb
darstellen. Quite apart from the fact – relevant in German but avoidable in
translation – of its association with vorstellen,iii I do this simply to avoid
any suggestion of intention or purpose, which may have a tendency to
attach to talk about “self-display.”)i
Most crucially, der Wille is also self-affirming and – in special
circumstances – self-denying. I discuss the crucial notion of self-denial in
the next section. Whatever this might be supposed to involve, it includes at
least some sort of self-relation that would be unduly obscured by a passive
reflexive construction. Nevertheless, the reader is urged to continue to bear
in mind that when der Wille is so described, this is not to be regarded as
tantamount to reference to any sort of action on the part of a willing subject
as such. For again, the will in question is the inner essence of any willing
subject, not itself one. In any case, in particular connection with the notion
of will’s self-denial, we now need to consider the notion of some sort of
total “nullification” or “elimination” (Aufliebung) of the will of an
individual subject.

D. The Aufhebung of Will

To whatever extent der Wille might or might not be, at least on a
certain level of its objectification, a cosmically cognizant subject, all of our
ordinary cognitive processes are in some manner in its service.ii
Schopenhauer compares this relationship to that between a strong blind man
and a sighted invalid whom he carries about on his shoulders to find his
way.iii In more standard scholastic terms:

Will, as the thing in itself, constitutes the inner, true, and

indestructible essence of a person; yet in itself it is without
consciousness. For consciousness is determined by intellect, and the
latter is a mere accident with respect to our essence… we find will
as the enduring substance, the intellect by contrast, conditioned by
its organ [brain], the variable accident.iv

Yet equally central is the possibility of a certain sort of Aufhebung of will.

Although Schopenhauer uses the term Aufhebung more in connection
with issues discussed in Book Four, it is introduced in Book Three. Like the
first Book, the third focuses on the world as presentation. Its title: “The
World as Presentation: Second Consideration. Presentation Independent of
the Principle of Sufficient Ground. The Platonic Idea (Idee): The Object of
Art.” Book Four focuses on the world as will. Thus it complements Book
Two’s focus on will as that which is objectified in the world as presentation
in general. But it does so with more focus on the will for life (der Wille zum
Leben), and on various forms of the latter’s affirmation and denial
(Bejahung and Verneinung): “With the Achievement of Self-Cognizance:
Affirmation and Denial of the Will for Life.”
The Aufhebung of will in question in Book Three is at the heart of our
capacity for apprehension of that particular sort of presentation – that
particular sort of objectification or objectivizationi of will – which
Schopenhauer calls an Idea. Ideas are in one way like abstract concepts:
they are not either actual or possible spatiotemporal realities; rather, they
are the sort of thing that spatiotemporal realities can be regarded as
instantiating, exemplifying, or expressing.ii But Ideas differ from concepts
in that their apprehension is nonetheless perceptual (anschaulich).iii In Book
Three, Schopenhauer argues that the apprehension of Ideas, as afforded by
works of art, is, with the exception of the art of music, what constitutes the
properly aesthetic element in the appreciation of art.i
Inasmuch as Ideas are not apprehended as occupying spatiotemporal
locations, and yet are apprehended in an immediately perceptual way (and
not merely, like concepts, as abstract presentations of aspects of
spatiotemporal reality), Schopenhauer regards their apprehension as at least
for a time removing the perceiver from the domain of the principles of
sufficient ground and individuation. For, as he claims, “this can only occur
with the nullification (Aufhebung) of individuality in the cognizant
subject.”ii In such a state, the individual is “at the same time no longer an
individual – for the individual has lost itself precisely in this perception –
but is pure, will-less, painless, timeless, subject of cognition.”iii Insofar as
the cognizant subject is wholly absorbed in the object in such a case,
Schopenhauer also describes the state in question as one of pure
“objectivity.”
The Aufhebung of will depicted in Book Four goes further than this.iv
Here it alters one’s life as a whole, and involves an alteration in the
perception of one’s world as a whole. For its expression is the life of the
ascetic saint, the fullest embodiment of removal from the will for life, even
beyond the act of suicide.v Schopenhauer emphasizes the dependence of
this removal from will on the attainment of a cognitive state that, like the
apprehension of Ideas, is not a case of abstract knowledge. He even
characterizes it as a kind of extension of the apprehension of Ideas. For a
person in such a state, namely, “one’s entire cognizance of the essence of
the world that mirrors the will, having grown out of apprehension of Ideas,
becomes a quieter of the will, and so the will freely nullifies itself (frei sich
selbst aufhebt)”i
As suggested, it remains a question how to translate auflaeben. In
some contexts, it may be appropriate to use such terms as “eliminate” or
“abolish.” Shortly, I explain why I think it is preferable to speak, in the case
of the Aufhebung of will, only of a kind of “nullification.” Either way, a
problem is bound to occur to the reader. Subservience to will, for
Schopenhauer, is at least the original state of any cognizant and willing
individual. So how is it even possible for such subservience to be nullified?
The following might occur to one. One might suppose that any ordinary
willing subject is really a complex of two distinct subjects, a willing one
and a cognizant one, originally conjoined or intertwined in such a way that
the latter is subservient to the former; but in certain special cases, the
cognizant subject can get the better of the willing one. But Schopenhauer
emphatically rejects this sort of dualism:

Every individual is on the one hand the subject of cognition… and

on the other hand an individual phenomenon of will, of the same
will that is objectified in every thing. But this double-sided character
of our essence does not rest in a self-subsistent unity.ii

And in any case he speaks, in the passage quoted earlier, precisely of

will nullifying itself. Of course, the problem is only exacerbated if we
regard the cognizant subject as will, at least on a certain level of the latter’s
objectification.
Now we earlier noted Schopenhauer’s distinction between cognizant
individuals and some sort of single cognizant “subject,” which he describes
as that “one eye that looks out from all cognizant beings.” In Book Three,
he says that we in some sense become this one eye in the apprehension of
Ideas (§ 38, p. 242), and he describes it throughout Book Three as a “pure”
and “eternal” subject of cognition, a subject that is pure precisely by virtue
of being purified of will. Or as he puts it in a supplementary chapter in the
second volume:
 With the disappearances of will from consciousness, individuality,
and with the latter its suffering and its hardship, is nullified.
Therefore, I have described the pure subject of cognition which then
remains over (das dann übrig bleibende reine Subjekt des
Erkennens) as the eternal eye of the world that, albeit with very
diverse degrees of clarity, looks out from all living beings…and
thus, as self-identical, as always One and The Same, is the bearer of
the world of persisting Ideas…i

So there is of course something other than will at play. But as has just
been emphasized, there is also in some sense no cognizant subject distinct
from a subject of willing. This is to such an extent the case that, as also
emphasized earlier, Schopenhauer himself frequently goes so far as to
present himself as a materialist – and more so even in the second volume
than in the first – and speaks as if it is simply a material organ (the brain)
that is the ultimate cognizant subject. And of course, as a material organ, the
“inner essence” of the brain is precisely will.
It would be in at least one way presumptuous to attempt to resolve the
difficulties raised by these points, or at least to do so in the name of
Schopenhauer. For they turn on the relation between the cognizant subject
and the subject of willing, by virtue of which “they” are, in any individual
subject, somehow a single subject. And Schopenhauer repeatedly
characterizes the latter precisely as an inexplicable puzzle, as the unsolvable
“knot of the world,” “the miracle par excellence.”ii Nonetheless, I venture
to offer a proposal as to what might be in question, and might thus be the
sort of “self-contradiction” that Schopenhauer sees in the life of ascetic
saints.iii
In this regard, one cannot help but tum to a perhaps somewhat
surprising formulation in the first chapter of the second volume of Will and
Presentation. There, after again emphasizing that the world as presentation
is a function of activities of the brain, and after reminding the reader that it
exists only as a kind of “projection” on the part of the faculty of
understanding or intellect, through a process whereby one’s own body is
always the “immediate object,”i Schopenhauer characterizes the world as
presentation by reference to a fundamental polarity, one of the two poles of
which is a cognizant subject that is identifiable with no individual subject.
What may be surprising at first is that he does not then characterize the
other pole as will. He characterizes it rather as matter, and indeed as matter
described in a somewhat strange way:

The world as presentation, the objective world, thus has as it were

two poles, namely, the cognizant subject as such (das erkennende
Subjekt schlechthin), apart from its cognitive forms, and then crude
(rohe) matter apart from form and quality. Both of them are
altogether uncognizable: the subject because it is that which is
engaged in cognition, matter because, apart from form and quality, it
cannot be perceived. Nonetheless, they are both the fundamental
conditions of all empirical perception. Thus crude, formless, entirely
inert (i.e., will-less) matter, which can be given in no experience but
is presupposed in all of them, stands over against the cognizant
subject merely as such, which is likewise a presupposition of all
experience. This subject is not in time, for time is only the more
particular form belonging to all of its presentational activity (die
nähere Form alles seines Vorstellens)…ii

Then he goes on to say that the two poles are “really one and the same
thing regarded from two opposing points of view,” and that the one thing
that they “are” is not will, but rather a phenomenon whose inner being is
will.
This is not the place to attempt to explain all of the wrinkles in this
passage, although I return shortly to what might be involved in this
particular way of characterizing “matter.” But in light of what we have seen
so far, the particular emphasis on matter in this context,i and
Schopenhauer’s general orientation in terms of a Kantian distinction
between form and matter, the following strikes me as a plausible way of
attempting to speak to the issue.
We may suppose, first of all, that Schopenhauer uses the expression
“pure subject of cognition” in two ways. Sometimes he uses it to refer to
individual subjects, but precisely insofar as their state of cognizance has
been in some manner purified of will; of course, it remains to ask what this
involves. (On these occasions he also sometimes, but not generally, uses the
term rein, “pure,” in its adverbial form.) But sometimes, we might suppose,
he is rather referring to what might be called a purely “formal” element in
any cognitive state, over and above any of the matter, or arrangements of
the matter, of which that state might be composed. As we have just seen,
Schopenhauer emphasizes such an element precisely in that context where
he describes the pure subject and matter as two poles of any concrete
cognitive phenomenon, namely, in emphasizing the projective action
whereby there is any sort of world as presentation for subjects in the first
place. It simply remains to see, first, how this formal element might be
more specifically regarded, and in what sense it might be regarded as
something “over and above” the matter of which a cognitive state is
composed; and second, how it might be regarded as the seat of at least the
possibility of a “pure subject” in the other of the two senses just
distinguished.
We need to allow that, in a significant sense, a cognitive state is always
made out of matter and nothing else besides. Otherwise, we could not
account for Schopenhauer’s tendency to put his view in materialist terms,
even if he at other times formulates it in opposition to materialism. On the
other hand, and just for the latter reason, there must be something about a
cognitive state “over and above” whatever matter is in question. How are
we supposed to think about this? Without going so far as to claim that this is
how Schopenhauer himself thought about it, we might at least appeal to the
following analogy. Consider any sort of situation or “state of affairs.” It
always involves certain constituents or ingredients. For example, take a
being to the left of b relative to c: a, b, and c are the constituents of this
situation. Yet clearly, the situation is something more than, or over and
above, those constituents. So first, we might at least use the term ‘form’ to
refer to that factor by virtue of which any situation or state of affairs is
something “over and above” the body of matter of which it is composed.
But suppose that Schopenhauer also intends something like the following
distinction. The particular situation in our example, although involving
something over and above the body of matter of which it is composed,
nonetheless consists in nothing more than a certain relation (or set of
relations) that holds between portions of that body of matter. It is reasonable
to suppose that any ordinary situation is in fact of this sort. But now
suppose that, in Schopenhauer’s thinking, this is precisely what
distinguishes a state of cognizance from any other sort of situation or state
of affairs.
While a state of cognizance is wholly composed of some body of
matter, it is, like any situation or state of affairs, possessed of some “form”
whereby it is something more than that body of matter. But as opposed to
any other sort of situtation, for Schopenhauer, the “more” in question does
not simply consist in relations holding between portions of the body of
matter in question. So of what does it consist? All that we have, of course,
is Schopenhauer’s description in terms of what such a situation amounts to,
that is, in terms of the “total” situation or state of affairs. In those terms, it
simply consists in whatever is involved in the projection of a world as
presentation, and of the various types of presentation, precisely through the
medium of such bodies of matter. It is just this, we might then suppose, and
any “more particular form belonging to all of its presentational activity,”
that is the pure subject in the sense that is now in question.
Now insofar as a state of cognizance is always a wholly material affair,
it should follow that its inner being is always and inevitably will. Or at
least, its inner being is will to the extent that will is the inner being of the
matter of which it is composed, just as it is the inner being of the individual
subject as a whole. But then, in what sense could there possibly be such
states purified of will, that is, a “pure subject” in the first of the two senses
now distinguished? At least a possible answer lies in our characterization of
the second of the senses in question. Ordinarily, in projecting a world as
presentation,i one’s cognitive process does not simply project, say, an array
of sensory quality into a perceiver’s perceptual field. Ordinarily, at least, it
also projects some portion of the very will for life that is the perceiver’s
inner being. More specifically, this amounts, as we might put it, not simply
to “coloring” one’s world in terms of various arrays of sensory quality, but
also to the fact that, phenomenologically, various parts of that world “refer”
to one as an individual subject with particular motivations and drives (and
to one another in terms of those motivations and drives). Various parts of
one’s world thus refer, we might say, precisely in a sense that has to do with
the very meaning, for the subject, of that which is apprehended by that
particular subject, i.e., apprehended through that particular body of matter.
Such meanings are not simply products of some cognitive or affective
process distinct from that of perception itself. At least ordinarily, they are
part of the projective act that constitutes perception in the first place.i
What we need to suppose, then, is that the sort of alteration in an
individual subject that Schopenhauer describes as Aufhebung of its will
does not consist in an actual (or at least in a total) elimination of the will for
life within that subject. Indeed, Schopenhauer more than once states or
Another random document with
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sometimes educated with those of the owner, but this is not generally
the case.
The male and female children of the better sort of the Fellatas are
all taught to read and write Arabic, but are instructed separately. The
male children of the great are generally sent to another town, at
some distance from that where their parents reside, to receive their
education; in which case they usually reside in the house of a friend,
and a malem or man of learning attends them. Those of the middle
and lower classes generally send their children to the schools, which
they attend for an hour at day-break, and another at sunset, reading
their Arabic lessons aloud and simultaneously. They are required to
get their lessons by heart before the writing is washed off the board
on which it is written. The ink thus diluted is drank by the scholars,
when their master writes a new lesson on the board.
The government of the Fellatas in Soudan is in its infancy; but, as
it now exists, and is likely to continue, is a perfect despotism. It was
left by will to Mahomed Bello, who was the eldest of Sheik Othman’s
sons, and is meant to descend to his eldest son at his death. The
governors of the different provinces are appointed during pleasure,
as, in the event of any improper conduct, they are displaced; and all
their property, at their death or removal, falls to the sultan. The
appointment to a vacancy is then sold to the highest bidder, who is
generally a near relation, provided his property is sufficient to bid up
to the mark. All the inferior offices in the towns of the provinces are
sold in like manner by the governors, who also succeed to the
property of those petty officers at their death or removal.
Of their revenues I can say very little. I only know that in the
province of Kano they have no regular system of taxation. A great
deal of marketable property is claimed by the governor, such as two-
thirds of the produce of all the date and other fruit trees, the
proprietor being allowed only the remaining third. A small duty is also
levied on every article sold in the market; or, in lieu thereof, a certain
rent is paid for the stall or shed: a duty is also fixed on every tobe
that is dyed blue and sold. On grain there is no duty. Kano produces
the greatest revenue which the sultan receives, and is paid monthly
in horses, cowries, and cloth. Adamawa pays yearly in slaves;
Jackoba, in slaves and lead ore; Zegzeg, in slaves and cowries;
Zamfra, the same; Hadiga and Katagum, and Zaonima, in horses,
bullocks, and slaves; Kashna, in slaves, cowries, and cloth; Ader or
Tadela, in bullocks, sheep, camels, and a coarse kind of cloth of
cotton, like what is called by us a counterpane. Every town, on being
visited by the governor or other public functionaries, must contribute
to the support of these officers, and bear the expense of travelling,
and feed all his servants and his cattle.
Their agriculture is simple enough. They begin clearing the
ground of weeds, and burning them after the first fall of rain, which in
Houssa is in the month of May; and when a person wishes to
enclose a piece of ground for his own use, he first gets permission
from the governor. He then sets his slaves, if he has any, to cut down
the smaller trees and brushwood, leaving the micadonia or butter
trees, if there be any, standing on the ground: the wood, brushwood,
and weeds are then gathered together in heaps and burnt. After the
first rains have fallen, the male and female slaves go to work, each
male having a hoe with a long handle, and each female a basket,
dish, or gourd, filled with the grain intended to be sown: the male
goes on in a straight line crossing the field, striking as it were with his
hoe on each side, and raising a little earth each blow in the line
about two or three feet, or broad enough for a man to walk; the
females follow with their baskets of grain, dropping the seeds into
the holes made by the hoe, which they then cover over with earth,
and give it a slight pressure with the foot. When the dourra or other
grain has risen above the ground three or four inches, the weeds are
hoed off, and the earth loosened around the stalks; when the dourra
has got to the height of three or four feet, they hoe around it a
second time, leaving the weeds in the middle of the rows. This is
cleared away, when small millet or calavances are to be sown
between the rows of doura, which is frequently the case. The third
operation is to draw the weeds and earth towards the roots of the
doura a little before it ripens. When ripe, the slaves go into the field
or plantation, pull it up by the roots, and lay it in rows between each
row of millet which is left to ripen: it lies in this state four or five days,
when they cut the heads off, tie them up in bundles, and carry it
home; where, after lying upon sheds made of the branches of trees
for a few days to dry, what is not wanted for use is stowed away in
their granary. As the seeds of the doura begin to ripen, it must be
constantly watched by the slaves, who are perched on trees, or on
raised platforms, with dried gourds, which they shake to make a
noise, at the same time shouting and hallooing to frighten away the
flocks of small birds which come to devour the grain, and which at
this season fly in myriads, making a whirring noise with their wings
when they rise. The doura is very subject to blight, caused by a kind
of winged insect, of a black colour, something like the bugs on a
camel; its smell is most offensive, and if killed by the fingers, the
stench can hardly be borne, and is not easily washed off. The millet
and calavances remain a month on the ground after the doura.
The stalks of the doura grow to the height of nine and ten feet; the
thunder storms, accompanied with rain and wind, often bend these
stalks when near ripe, so that the roots are raised above ground, and
the plant dies if the slaves the next day are not sent in to hoe the
earth up to the roots of such as are broken down. The stalks of this
grain are frequently used for fences and the rafters of their houses.
Sometimes they tie the bean and millet straw into bundles, and carry
them home for their camels. Their granaries are made in the form of
a large urn or pitcher, raised from the ground about three feet by
stones. They are made of clay and chopped straw, and are raised to
the height of eleven or twelve feet. The thickness of the sides is not
above four inches, though in any part it will bear a man’s weight: the
diameter in the widest part may be from seven to eight feet, at the
top about three or four feet, and is overlapped at the mouth like a
wide-mouthed earthen jar. When the grain is put in, a conical cap of
thatch is put over to keep out birds, insects, wet and moisture. The
doura and millet will keep well in these jars for two or three years;
after that period it perishes, and is destroyed by worms and insects.
The jar itself will last seven or eight years, if taken care of, by matting
round the lower part with straw during the rainy season; if not, two or
three years is the period it will stand unimpaired.
The time of putting the sweet potatoes in the ground is at the
commencement of the rains, the ground being first well cleared of
weeds, well hoed into furrows, the clods all broken, and the soil a
good strong clay or mould. The branches or stems, in slips, are then
planted by the dibble, and are two months before they have potatoes
at the roots.
The gaza, though differing in taste, shape, name, and size, is not
unlike a small quince: it is more watery than a gourd, of a reddish
white inside, and by no means a pleasant taste; its stem is as thick
as that of a gourd, with large rough leaves like those of a gourd. It is
planted like the sweet potatoes, and is perpetuated in the same
manner, by joints, and sown in furrows, at the same time, in a good
soil of clay or mould.
Wheat, of which they raise enough to supply all who make use of
it in this country, is sown after the rains, when the cold weather has
set in. It is always met with by the side of a small lake or river, where
they are able to water it by irrigation every day. It is ripe in three
months after it is put into the ground: the grain is small. It is not much
relished by the Arabs, who say that it injures the spleen, in whatever
shape it may be eaten. The bread made of it is black and coarse; but
that may arise from the imperfect manner in which it is ground and
cleaned. Barley they also have; but this grain is only used in very
small quantity. The rice is sown in long beds; and they have it in
great abundance from the Surano, near Magaria: the rice of
Soccatoo is considered the best in Houssa. Melons, pappa apples,
the great . . . . ., a few fig and pomegranate trees are grown in
gardens. They have not been able to make the date tree grow at
Soccatoo; whenever it gets a little above ground it rots and dies.
They have a great many wild fruit trees, the principal of which is
the butter tree. Onions are brought forth at the side of the rivers or
lakes, and the place on which they are growing is watered afternoon
and morning, the water being drawn by a bucket and a rope fixed to
a long pole, over an upright post which serves as a pivot; the water
being poured into hollowed trees, conducts it to the entrance of the
little squares where the onions are growing. The onions are large
and good, much like the Portuguese onion. The leaves of the kuka
tree, or adansonia, are carefully gathered after the rains, dried, and
used in all their soups and gravies, giving to them a slimy gelatinous
consistence. The sauce, or cake which makes a sauce, from the
beans of the nitta tree, is in great request. The beans, when taken
out of the shell, are then broken in a wooden mortar, and put into a
pot with water, and kept on a good fire from sunrise to sunset, when
the pot is taken off: they are allowed to stand in it until they begin to
ferment and smell. They are then taken to the river, pond, or well,
where they are washed thoroughly with clean water: when they are
considered as perfectly clean, they are spread on mats in the sun,
and carefully covered up at night. When a second fermentation takes
place, or they begin to smell, they are taken and bruised fine in their
mortars, until it becomes like paste. It is then made into small circular
cakes, which are dried in the sun before they are put by for use.
This, when prepared, looks like chocolate. To me it had always a
very disagreeable smell; but the taste was rather pleasant than
otherwise when put on roast meat or fowls. Of this the people are
very fond, and go so far as to eat it alone, and without being cooked.
When they wish to plant indigo, the place chosen is one of a good
strong clay or mould, and in a situation where there is moisture
through the heat of the summer. After enclosing the ground, they
clear it entirely of weeds, and burn them. The ground is well worked
up by the hoe (they have no spade or pickaxe), and laid out in
furrows, with a flat top, about a foot high, two broad, and six or seven
inches between each furrow. The indigo seeds are then planted by
the dibble, and just as the rains have begun: they cut it every year
during the rainy season. A plantation will last four or five years
without renewing the seeds. They crop it about three or four inches
above the ground. The leaves are then stripped from the stems, and
laid in a heap, exposed to the rains and weather for a month, until
they ferment, when they are beaten in wooden troughs of a round
form, and about two feet deep, and two feet in diameter; here they
remain until dry, and are then considered as fit for use. One of these
troughs of indigo, in the spring, costs three hundred cowries; in the
summer, the price rises to six or seven hundred.
The cotton is here planted in low situations, where the ground is
partially covered with water during the rains, or else in a good clay
that has moisture in it through the dry season. The ground, or
plantation, is generally only surrounded by thorny branches stuck in
the ground as a fence, then hoed well, and the clods, if any remain,
broken. A hole is made with the hoe, and the seed is put in and
lightly covered. If the season be abundant in rain, the cotton is
plenty; if not, the crop is bad. The time of pulling is in the months of
December and January. When worked, it is done by the women,
clearing it of the seeds by two small iron pins, between which the
cotton passes over a flat stone lying on the ground; the seeds are
thrown behind them, the cotton before. The seeds they give to
bullocks and camels, and are considered as very fattening. The
cotton being prepared, is put on a distaff, which is short, light, neat,
and small, great pains being taken in shaping and ornamenting it.
The females who spin it have generally small looking-glasses in their
baskets of cotton, with which they often survey their teeth and eyes.
A piece of chalk, or pipe-clay, is in constant use, to rub the spinning
thumb and finger. The occupation of spinning is generally assigned
to married women, or some old female slave that is a favourite:
weaving and sowing is left to the men. They have three different
kinds of hoes: one with a handle of about five feet in length, and a
small head stuck into the end of the staff; this is used in sowing the
grain: one with a handle of about three feet in length, with a small
iron head stuck into the end of the staff: the third, called gilma, has a
short bent handle, with a large head, and is used in all the heavy
work instead of a spade.
Their manufactures are confined to a very few articles, the
principal of which is the dying of tanned goat skins red and yellow.
The red skins are dyed with the leaves of a red millet, which is
pounded in water mixed with natron; when thick enough, the skin is
put on the stretch, and the dye rubbed in. The yellow is with the root
of a tree called raurya, which is also pounded in water mixed with
natron, and laid on the skin in the same manner as the red. The
latter are considered as superior to all the other skins dyed of the
same colour in any part of Houssa. A number both of the red and
yellow skins are carried to Kano and Kashna almost monthly, where
they are made into cushions, bags, boots, and shoes, &c.
The next article is the white cotton cloth of the country, of which
they make a considerable quantity, both for the home consumption
and for exportation to Kano and Nyffé: what they export is principally
made into tobes and large shirts before it leaves Soccatoo. They
have also a cloth called naroo, which is something like our
counterpanes; a few checked and red striped cloths, used as tobes,
and some as wrappers or zinnies for the women. The weavers of the
latter are mostly natives of Nyffé, as are also all their blacksmiths.
They have shoe, boot, saddle, and bridle-makers. Another article of
export is the civet; the animals that produce it are kept in wooden
cages, and fed on pounded fish and corn. A few slaves are also sold
out of the province to the merchants of Kano, Kashna, Ghadamis,
and Tripoli. A young male slave, from thirteen to twenty years of age,
will bring from 10,000 to 20,000 cowries; a female slave, if very
handsome, from 40,000 to 50,000; the common price is about
30,000 for a virgin about fourteen or fifteen. The articles brought to
Soccatoo for sale by the Arabs are the same as what are brought to
other parts of Houssa, and are mentioned in another place. Salt is
brought by the Tuaricks from Billma, and also by the Tuaricks of the
west. The salt from the latter quarter is much better, being more
pure, and in large pieces like ice. Ostriches alive and ostrich skins
are brought by these people, but little is given for a skin, only from
4000 to 5000 cowries for the finest. They also bring horses which
fetch a good price here; dates from Billma, and a small quantity of
goods which they buy from the Arabs at Aghadiz. The articles they
could export in considerable quantities, if there were buyers, would
be elephants’ teeth, bullocks’ hides, which, when tanned, only cost
five hundred cowries, equal to sixpence of our money. Goat skins,
and the skins of antelopes, and other wild animals, might be
procured in abundance, but, of course, would rise much in price if
there was a great demand. Gum-arabic might also be procured in
abundance. What they would take from us in exchange would be
coarse scarlet cloths, which in all parts of the interior bring a good
price, say 10,000 cowries a yard; coarse yellow and green cloth; red
tape; unwrought silk, of glowing colours; sewing needles, of the
commonest kind; looking-glasses, no matter however small, at a
penny or twopence each in England; earthenware with figures, plain
ware would not pay; the coarsest kind of red camlet scarfs; jugs and
hardware of the most common description, but stout; foolscap paper
of the coarsest kind, if it did not let the ink through: beads, I think, are
sold as cheap here by the Arabs as they are in England; sheets of
tin; tin pots and cups; brass gilt rings for the fingers, arms, and
ankles; as also ear-rings; copper and brass pots, the more figures
the better; paper and wooden snuff-boxes of the commonest sort.
These Africans keep up the appearance of religion. They pray five
times a day. They seldom take the trouble to wash before prayers,
except in the morning; but they go through the motions of washing,
clapping their hands on the ground as if in water, and muttering a
prayer. This done, as if they had washed, they untie their breeches
and let them fall off; then, facing the east, let the sleeves of their
larger shirt, or tobe, fall over their hands, and assuming at the same
time a grave countenance, begin by calling out, in an audible voice,
“Allahu Akber!” &c. kneeling down and touching the ground with the
forehead. When they have finished repeating this prayer, they sit
down, leaning over on the left thigh and leg, and count or pass the
beads through their fingers. All their prayers and religious
expressions are in Arabic; and I may say without exaggeration,
taking Negroes and Fellatas together, that not one in a thousand
know what they are saying. All they know of their religion is to repeat
their prayers by rote in Arabic, first from sunrise to sunset in the
Rhamadan, and a firm belief that the goods and chattels, wives and
children of all people differing with them in faith, belong to them; and
that it is quite lawful in any way to abuse, rob, or kill an unbeliever.
Of the Fellatas, I should suppose about one in ten are able to read
and write. They believe, they say, in predestination; but it is all a
farce; they show not the least of such belief in any of their actions.
They believe, however, in divination by the book, in dreams, and
in good and bad omens.
Wednesday, Nov. 29th.—This morning the Gadado sent to inform
me that in the course of two days the sultan was going a short
distance to the south of Soccatoo, to found a new town, and asked
me to accompany him. At noon a fire broke out in the west quarter of
the town, which consumed nearly 200 houses, and a great quantity
of grain. At 3 P.M. another fire broke out in the adjoining house to
that in which I was living. I had my baggage put out in the open
square, in my enclosure, and placed a servant over it as sentry, and
went with my two other servants to assist the wives and concubines
of my friend Malam Moodie, who was out of town. They were busy in
removing the household goods into the street. This I stopped, and
had them put into my square; as I saw that the fire was nearly put
down by the removal of the roofs of the huts in the adjoining house,
and by applying wet mats. Thieves were in abundance, and a great
quantity of articles were stolen belonging to the people whose house
was on fire. There was fortunately little wind, or several other houses
would have been burnt. As it was, the light and burning thatch was
carried to a great distance. My servant, Mohamed Allah Sirkie, got
great praise from the Gadado for his activity in putting a stop to the
flames: after all was over, the principal wife of Malam Moodie sent
her compliments and thanks to me for taking care of her husband’s
house and property. There have been three fires in the town in the
course of the day; they say they were done by the agents of the
rebels, who tie a burning cotton thread to the tail of a large species
of buzzard, with yellow head and reddish-yellow tail, and blue body,
common in this country, which flies to the thatch of the house when
set adrift.
Friday, Dec. 1st.—At 4 P.M. left Soccatoo by the southern gate,
with a camel carrying my tent and bed, with a small quantity of
provisions. After leaving the gate, the road was over what had been
plantations of millet, doura, and beans; the soil a stiff red clay,
covered with a thin layer of sand, with blocks of clay iron-stone,
which is often mixed with white pebbles; sometimes it would cover a
space of a quarter of a mile, like a crust, of about from two feet to
two and a half feet in thickness; the face of the country almost bare
of trees, but studded with villages; the herds of horned cattle were to
be seen in great numbers every where, returning to their night’s
quarters, feeding as they went along. The country hilly, with very
steep and slippery ravines in many places.
At 8 P.M. halted at the camp of the sultan, which was in a valley of
about three miles wide, and close to the bed of a small stream
passing the east of Soccatoo, which was distant about two miles and
a half to the north-east. After my tent was pitched, the Gadado sent
me a sheep, and I had my share of a bullock that was killed. There
were very few people with the sultan, and the Gadado had only three
servants with him.
Saturday, 2d.—Morning clear and cool at day-light. Rode out with
the sultan and Gadado to mark out the site of the new town. I took
my gun with me, intending to shoot: we rode to the eastward about
two miles, and halted within a short distance of the river, on the side
of a low hill, sloping to the river by a gradual and easy descent. This
was the place fixed on for the new town, which I left them to settle,
and went to shoot; but was never more unsuccessful. I saw several
antelopes and some bustards, but could not get within shot. At noon
I returned to the camp. The reason of founding this town is, that the
woods on the banks of the river are the resort and hiding-place of the
rebels, who come and plunder the herds, and set fire to the villages
before they can have information; and in Soccatoo the rebels are hid
with their prey in the woods. In the evening, as it was also last night,
the cryer went round the camp, calling every one to look well after
their horses, camels, and baggage; to pretend to sleep, but not to
sleep, as the place was full of robbers; and that every one seen
outside the camp after this notice, whether Fellata or not, was to be
secured. I set off three rockets at the request of the sultan; for
though I have shown them several times, they are still afraid to try
them, and the wonder and alarm is still as strong in their favour as
ever.
At 11 P.M. a courier arrived from Magaria, bringing information
that the rebels of Goobur had encamped a little to the eastward of
that place in great force. The order to march was given, and the
camp was cleared in a few minutes. I first saw my camel and
baggage well forward on the road to Soccatoo. Before I took the
road for Magaria, which was across the country, the alarm was
spread from village to village, by a cry not unlike the Indian
warwhoop, with a clear shrill voice; and bands of horse and foot
were pressing forward every where at day-break. We met large
parties of women, children, old men, bullocks, sheep, and asses, all
flying towards Soccatoo.
 At 10 A.M. I arrived at Magaria, where all was now quiet; and put
up at the house of my friend the Gadado, who had gone to rest,
having arrived an hour before me. Maalem Moodie, his brother, told
me that all the rebel army turned out to be only a few robbers come
to steal bullocks, one of which, on their not being able to drive them
away, they had killed, carried away its flesh, and fled. On my asking
one of his female slaves, who had the charge of his house at
Magaria, why they had been so much frightened by only a few
thieves, she replied, “What could we do? only a parcel of women to
be seen: there were two or three fellows within hearing of the noises,
but they were good for nothing; they were just as much afraid as we
were. All night (pointing to the highest point of ground in the town,
which is unoccupied, and kept for a market-place) did we stand there
with what things we could carry on our heads, our mouths open, no
one thought of eating or sitting down until the men came from
Soccatoo and the camp. This world,” continued she, “is nothing
without the men after all. If three of the thieves had only come, they
might have taken the town and all that was in it, for the gates were
all open, and we had not sense to shut them.”—After breakfast and a
good sleep, I waited on the Gadado, and told him that, as all was
happily quiet, I should return to Soccatoo at day-break to-morrow, as
I had neither bed nor baggage with me. He thanked me very much
for coming to their assistance, and said he should also return to the
capital in the course of the next day, and the sultan intended
returning to the camp.
Sunday, 3d.—At day-break mounted and rode to Soccatoo,
accompanied by my freedman, Mohamed Allah Sirkie, who
accompanies me on all enterprises of danger. At noon arrived at
Soccatoo, and the Gadado arrived at midnight.
Wednesday, 6th.—The eunuchs of the sultan came to-day,
wishing me to go to the sultan’s house to wind up the time-piece.
Though I taught a man how it should be done, and to do it every
eight days, they have always neglected to do it: only for such an
excellent time-piece, the present of his majesty, and my having
brought it so far without injury, I would not have put a finger to it
again; but the Gadado coming, and asking me to go with him, I
showed another how to wind it up.
Saturday, 9th.—News from Magaria this day arrived, that the
people of Goobur had formed a camp outside the walls of their
capital, and there elected a new sultan or chief, in the room of the
one killed at our attack on Coonia; that he must go on some
expedition against their enemies before he returns to his house,
such being their custom: but at what part he is going against they do
not as yet know. The custom of the Gooburites is at first that, when
they elect a chief, which they do outside the walls of the capital,
where they sacrifice a bullock, a sheep, and a goat, under a tree,
they must go on some expedition against their enemies before they
return to their house.
Tuesday, 12th.—Part of the tribe of Killgris, Tuaricks, or Berbers,
who inhabit that part of the desert between Timbuctoo and Tuat, and
to the north of Tadela, and Ader, come on their annual summer or
dry season visit to Soccatoo; also part of the tribe of Etassan, from
that part called Anbur, which lies to the north of Kashna and Zinder
in Bornou. The latter brought the sultan a present of a fine Tuarick
horse from their sultan, who has not come this year to pay his yearly
respects to Bello, as is the custom. The Tuaricks, or Berbers,
inhabiting the south part of the desert, consist of the tribes of
Etassan, Killgris, Killaway, and Timsgeda. Ajudiz is the capital, and
they jointly depose their sultan and elect another when they think fit,
which is generally once every two or three years. They do not kill the
old one; he only retires from his office, and remains as a common
man.
They yearly, after the grain has been cut and got in, arrive in
Houssa with salt, which they visit in the latter end of harvest, or in
the months of October or November, to exchange for grain, blue
tobes or large shirts, mugabs or blue turban dresses for their
women, and swords; they also lay in a sufficient quantity of millet
and doura to last them through the season, until they return to their
own country, as they neither sow nor reap. During the whole of the
dry season they remain in Houssa, principally in the provinces of
Kano, Kashna, Zamfra, and Soccatoo. The latter mostly Killgris; and
Kashna and Kano are the principal resort of the Etassan and
Killaway: they do not live, except a few, in houses in the town; but
build temporary huts in the woods, not far distant from them, where
they have their wives, their bullocks, horses, and camels, the men
only visiting the town: in this way they live until the month in which
the rains commence, when they retire north to the desert. They are a
fine manly looking race of men, but extremely dirty in their persons,
not even washing before prayers, but going through the form with
sand, as if washing. The poorest amongst them are armed with a
sword and spear, which are their constant companions.
Wednesday, 13th.—The sultan sent me a present of a sheep and
four Guinea fowls and some rice, from the Sanson, apologizing for
his long absence in the camp, as the Tuaricks were very unsettled,
and they had not as yet determined what party to side with.
Thursday, 14th.—I to-day employed Hadji Omar and Malam
Mohamed, the latter to give me a route, noting the northing and
southing of the road, between Massina, the country in which he was
born, to Soccatoo; the other, who has just returned from Mecca, to
give me an account between this and Sennar, with a description of
the countries, towns, and rivers: his route is from Kano to Adamowa,
Bagermie, Runza, Kaffins, Darfoor, and Kordofan: he says the Bahr-
el-Abiad is only about four feet deep in the summer, as is also the
Shari above Logan, before it is joined by the river Asha, which
comes from the south-east, through Bagermie, and falls into the
Shari above Logan. This is the only river not fordable in the summer
between the Quorra and the Bahr-el Azrek.
Monday, 18th.—I was not a little surprised to-day with the arrival
of a messenger from Kano, who had left, he said, my servants and
baggage at the border town, or, as they call it, the Sanson, of
Zamfra, with Hadji Salah, my agent; all of which he said had been
sent for by the sultan’s order: he also said that Pascoe had been
taken and brought back by Richard, after his having got as far as
Roma, in Zegzeg, and that he had twice run away since, and had
been taken, committing a fresh robbery each time; the last time was
at the Sanson. The only construction I put on this strange proceeding
was, that the sultan had done it, thinking that my things would be
safer with me than at Kano; and, as my health was not very good,
the account of Pascoe’s repeated robberies would make me worse;
and he, I thought, had judged that it would be time enough to tell me
when all my things had arrived.
Tuesday, 19th.—I was visited by Sidi Sheik, who is one of the
sultan’s Arab secretaries and confidential friends, who, after a little
conversation on the affairs of other people, asked me if I was not
glad my things were coming, and my servants. I said it would put me
to an expense I could ill afford, and I thought it a very strange
proceeding of the sultan.
Wednesday, 20th.—I was very ill all day, and in the evening I had
a visit from Mohamed Ben Haja Gumso and Sidi Sheik, who said
they had been sent to me by the sultan, to tell me not to consider it
strange that he had sent for my servants and baggage; and to tell
me, that there were three roads by which I could return, one of which
I must choose; also to speak the truth, had I come as a messenger
from the king of England to Bello, or only to seek out a road? that
one of the paths was through Yourriba, the way I had come; the
other by Timbuctoo; and another by way of Aghadez, Tuat, and
Morzuk. I said that, after such a message, and such unwarranted
proceeding on the part of the sultan, I could have no further
communication with them; that they might act as they thought fit, all
was the same to me. They went off, saying I was a very difficult man;
had I nothing to say to the sultan? I said that my business with the
sultan was now finished, and I would have no more to say.
Thursday, 21st.—In the morning I sent to the sultan to take
possession of my baggage, as it now appeared from Sidi Sheik, who
early visited me, that they considered I was conveying guns and
warlike stores to the sheik of Bornou. He sent to say that no one
should touch my baggage; he only wanted to see the letter of Lord
Bathurst to the sheik. I answered, they must take it if they pleased,
but that I would not give it. At noon the Gadado arrived, and a short
while after Hadji Hat Salah; the latter called on me as he went to his
house. He declared that he knew not on what business they had
sent for him; that he did not fear them, he had done nothing amiss.
As there were too many persons around, I did not ask him any
further questions, and instantly went to the Gadado, whom I found
alone, sitting by a warm fire. After the usual compliments were over, I
asked him for what reason the sultan had sent for my baggage. He
said of that he had not the least knowledge, until my servants and
baggage had arrived at Magaria; but the sultan had told him, since
his return, that all he wanted was to see the letter to the sheik of
Bornou. I told him that to give up the letter was more than my head
was worth. He said they did not want to open the letter, they only
wanted to see the direction, and if it was really from Lord Bathurst. I
told him of the strange conversation of Ben Gumso and Sidi Sheik.
He said, certainly such was not the message of the sultan, but an
addition of their own; the sultan never sent to ask if I was really a
messenger of the king of England.
At 3 P.M. my servant Richard arrived with my baggage and
Pascoe. Richard had been very ill on the road, but had received
every attention from the people in the different towns in which he had
halted, and also from the messenger which the sultan of Kano had
sent to accompany him, who had also given him five bullocks, and
four men to accompany him and carry the baggage, and a camel
which Hadji Salah had bought for me, for 60,000 cowries. The price
of the bullocks was 12,000 each, and the pay of the men 4,000
cowries each. Richard’s account of Pascoe was as follows:—The
second day after Pascoe’s first desertion, he, though very ill, secured
all my baggage and goods in a secure room in the house, and went
and gave Hadji Salah the key, declaring he must be answerable to
me if any thing was lost, as he was going to bring Pascoe back.
Hadji Salah advised him much not to go; but Richard, with the Arab
servant whom I had left sick, and who was now recovered, mounting
the two horses, took the road to Quorra, the capital of Zegzeg. When
they arrived at the town of Aushur, in Zegzeg, they were informed by
a person who had just arrived that Pascoe had been firing a pistol in
the market-place in the town of Roma, a day’s journey ahead. They
arrived at Roma, where the people informed them that Pascoe had
been there, but had gone away. Richard stopped there that night, as
the horses were unable to proceed. A short time after halting, some
people came and informed him that he (Pascoe) was stopping in a
woman’s house near the market-place. Richard immediately sent
people to the gates of the town to stop him, if he attempted to depart.
Richard was too ill to go to the house, but sent Abdulfitha, the Arab,
and some other people to secure him, and bring him to the house,
which they did, and he promised faithfully to behave well for the
future; and Richard had him put inside of the hut, he and the Arab
sleeping at the door. Next day they departed with their prisoner for
Kano; but when within half a day’s journey of Kano, where they
halted for the night, during the time Richard was asleep, Pascoe
slipped out of the hut, taking with him all the arms and money
Richard had. He immediately mounted, and as he had now neither
money nor arms, he started for Kano, where he arrived early in the
morning, and told Hadji Salah to send instantly after him, which he
did, and Pascoe was brought back in two days after, and put in irons
in a house in Richard’s charge until the arrival of the governor of
Kano, when Richard set him at large, after his taking an oath before
the governor that he would not run away, or misbehave, until he
joined me: this was the day before Richard’s departure from Kano.
After leaving Kano, Richard was nearly dead with fatigue, weakness,
and watching; but the fourth day he got better. Ten days after
Richard arrived at the Sanson, or town, called Fofin Birnee,
bordering on Goobur and the territory of the rebels of Zamfra. Here
he was waiting for an escort to take him through the part of the road
infested by the rebels of Goobur and Zamfra, when Pascoe, the third
night after their arrival at the Sanson, took an opportunity, when
Richard was asleep, of breaking open one of my trunks and a gun-
box, taking a double-barrelled gun, five gilt chains, two dozen and a
half pairs of scissors, all my money, a brace of pistols, seven
hundred needles, one dozen of penknives, and a large quantity of
beads. Richard immediately gave the alarm, and the people of the
town were sent after him directly: they returned with him the next
night. He having taken the road towards Goobur, and the hyænas
being numerous, and following him, he got up into a tree, and fired
his newly-acquired gun at them, the report of which brought those in
search of him to the place, when they brought him back, and
pinioned him to the ground, and abused him very much. When
Richard asked what the Fellatas were saying, he said they were
cursing Richard for having him pinioned to the ground, but Richard
would not have him let loose. On his arrival here, the Gadado asked
me to forgive him: I told him that was impossible. They allow him to
go at large, and he stops in the house of the Gadado’s master of the
camels. When I saw him, he appeared as if nothing had been the
matter. I forbad my servants holding any communication with him.
Friday, 22d.—In the morning the Gadado sent for Allah Sirkie to
tell me the sultan wished to see Richard my servant, as he had
never seen another Christian besides myself; and he also wished to
see me, and I was to bring the sheik’s letter, which he by no means
wished to take from me, or to open; he only wished to see how we
addressed him, and if it was in a tin case like his. I went after the
mid-day prayers with the Gadado, taking with me my servant
Richard, whom they all called Insurah Coramina, or the little
Christian, and Allah Sirkie, to the sultan’s, where we found him
sitting in an inner room, better dressed than usual, and Mohamed
Ben Hadji Gumso and Sidi Sheik sitting on his left: the Gadado sat
down on his right, I with my servants in front. After his asking
Richard and I how we were, and a few other questions, he then said
he had sent Ben Hadji Gumso and Sidi Sheik to me, to inform me
that he had sent for my people and baggage. Before he had not
informed me, but now he would tell me how matters stood. The king
of England had sent me to him, but I wished to go to the Sheik of
Bornou: that between him and the sheik there was war; and
therefore, though I had come from the king of England, he would not
allow me to go: that there were three roads, out of which I must
choose one; and he would send people with me; one road was the
way I had come, the second by way of Timbuctoo, and the third by
way of Aghadiz and Fezzan. I answered, that by the way I had come
he could not send me, nor was it safe I should attempt it, as all
Yourriba and the other countries at war with the Fellatas were now
well acquainted with my having come here as a messenger, with
presents from the king of England to him, for the purpose of putting a
stop to the slave trade. That the way by Timbuctoo was almost
impassable, for the Fellatas from Foota-Torra and Foota-Bonda, &c.
who had arrived here a short while ago, had with the greatest
difficulty been allowed to come here with nothing but a staff and a
shirt, and had been twelve months on the road, owing to the war;
and that, were I to go, all the country would hear of me, and his
enemies would have me and all my baggage before I had been two
months on the road. That the road by Aghadiz would require a
number of camels, more than I could afford to buy at present, also a
great deal of provisions, water-skins, &c. as there was no place for
seven days’ journey that supplied either wood or water: that the
Tuaricks were a people without either law or government; and if they
did allow me to go, I should have to pay very dear for their
permission, at least two camel-loads of blue tobes and turbans; but if
he would allow me to go by the way of Baghermi, Darfoor, and
Egypt, I would go at all risks. He replied that was just going by way
of Bornou, as I must pass through from Adamawa to Logan. “With
truth,” said old Ben Gumso with great earnestness to Sidi Sheik, and
loud enough for the sultan to hear, “do you hear how that man talks
before the prince of the faithful?” He, the sultan, then asked to see
the sheik’s letter; I showed it to him, as also the Arabic list of
medicines which I had brought as far as Badagry for the sheik, but
had sent them back. He asked me to open the sheik’s letter, after he
had read the list of medicines. I said, it was more than my head was
worth to do such a thing; that I had come to him with a letter and
presents from the king of England, on the faith of his own letter the
preceding year, and I hoped he would not break his promises and his
word for the sake of seeing the contents of that letter which he had
now lying beside him. He then made a motion with his hand for me
to go, and I accordingly rose, made my bow, and went out: I saw
Pascoe at the door, ready to have his audience, the Gadado
accompanying me as far as the door. Instead of going to my house, I
went to see Hadji Salah, who certainly was but poorly lodged by the
Fellatas. I asked him, as there was none present but the son of the
former sultan of Fezzan, and whom he had brought from Kano with
him, what had brought him to Soccatoo? He said, they had not yet
told him, but he did not care for them. The house, as soon as it was
known that I was there, was soon filled with Fellatas, and I left him.
Saturday, 23d.—Hadji Salah to-day saw the sultan, and I was
informed by the master of my house that he was to return to Kano in
four days after this. In the evening, Hadji Salah, having asked the
Gadado’s permission to pay me a visit, came about eight P.M.: he
was not watched, that I could see. He informed me that he had seen
the sultan to-day, who had desired him to tell the truth, whether I had
given him the sheik’s present, or any thing for the sheik before I left
Kano. He said he certainly never received any thing from me for the
sheik, neither letter, nor goods, nor any thing else. After answering to
this effect, as also the two friends that had come with him, the sultan
told him it was well; he would allow him to return to his family in four
days. He said, with respect to me, he would advise me, as a friend
and a man of peace, to give up to them the present I had for the
sheik, and return home by the way of Aghadiz, which they had
proposed to me; that there was not a Fellata, from the sultan to the
meanest man amongst them, that could bear the sheik of Bornou, or
any one who had ever been friends with him; that, thank God! I had
put nothing into his hands for the sheik, or he would have lost his
head; that he would (most earnestly repeating it again) advise me to
give up the sheik’s present to them, as I could not keep it. I observed
that it was the same thing as forcing the letter from me; it would be
the last injury they could do me; that they had broken all faith with
me; I could have no more to say to them: after their cheating or
robbing me of the letter, they might take what they pleased. I was
only one man, I could not fight against a nation: they could not, even
by taking away my life, do worse with me than they had done.
Sunday, 24th.—I saw the Gadado this morning, who complained
that he had got a bad cold: I recommended him to take a dose of
senna. He said he had to ride out of town a short distance, to meet
Mohamed Ben Abdullahir, Bello’s first cousin by the father’s side: he
is the Fellata king or sultan of Nyffé, and is coming here to get
permission to go down this year, as before he had sent only a
relation or head chief to command there, which was Omar Zurmie,
whom I had seen when there. He asked me to go with him to meet
Abdullahir. I told him no; my affairs with them were now at an end:
after the manner in which the sultan had behaved to me, it was
impossible for them to put a greater affront on me than what they
had done. He said that when I came here before, I had come with
letters from the Bashaw of Tripoli and the Sheik of Bornou, and that
at that time they were all at peace; now they were at war, and the
sultan neither held, nor allowed others to hold, any communication
with the sheik or his people: that I had come then with a letter and
presents from the king, and delivered them; that I had a letter and
presents from the king of England’s vizier; that when I sent the sword
from Katagum to Bello, from the king of England, the Sheik of
Bornou had seized the letter that came with it, and they had now
done the same by him; and that, if I would give up the present, they
would send it by Hadji Salah. I said there was no letter whatever
came with the sword and box I had sent from Katagum. I observed to
him, that the conduct of Bello was not like that of a prince of the
faithful, who, in defiance of his letter requesting the king of England
to send a consul out, had broken all faith between us; that they had
done every evil to me they could. The Gadado pleaded the letters
sent from the Sheik and the two Hadjis of Tripoli, saying that I was a
spy, and that we wanted to take this country, as we had done India.
He was very sorry for what the sultan had done, he said—as sore at
heart as I could be: that they had sent for Hadji Salah, who had been
fourteen years in this country, and all that time transacting the
business of the Sheik, to tell him, if he chose to go to Bornou, to go;
if he remained, he must not interfere any more for the Sheik. I said,
what had I to do with the Sheik or Hadji Salah’s affairs? he was my
agent before, and that was the reason I had employed him a second
time. I then took leave of the Gadado, after repeating to him what I
had said above, two or three times, till he perfectly understood what I
had said; and adding, that I never wished to see the sultan again,
and I must insist on the Gadado to repeat to him what I had said;
and also that I must for the future consider every part of his
dominions as a prison, for he had broken his word in every thing.
Notwithstanding all this, the Gadado and his brother Moodie still
send me milk and food the same as usual; there is not the least
difference in their conduct. The common conversation of the town
now is, that the English intend to take Houssa.
Monday, 25th.—Being Christmas-day, I gave my servant Richard
one sovereign out of six I have left, as a Christmas gift; for he is well
deserving, and has never once shown a want of courage or
enterprise unworthy an Englishman. The Gadado early sent to know
how I was, and desired my servant to tell me he had acquainted the
sultan with all I had said; and he inquired if my heart was difficult as