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DUNCAN, JOHN.—Of all the
enterprises of travel, none perhaps are so dangerous or difficult as the
exploration of that vast and mysterious terra incognita, the
interior of Africa, and none have been more tempting to Scottish
perseverance and intrepidity. The names of Bruce, Park, Clapperton, and
others who either perished in the journey, or returned home only to die,
after their expectations had been crushed and their constitutions broken,
will here occur to the memory of the reader. One of this intrepid,
self-devoted forlorn hope, was Mr. John Duncan.
This African traveller was
born in humble circumstances, being the son of a small farmer in
Wigtonshire; but the precise date of his birth we have been unable to
ascertain. At an early period he enlisted in the 1st regiment of Life
Guards, where he served eighteen years with an excellent character, and
was discharged about the year 1840, with the highest testimonials of good
conduct. After having left the army, he was attached as armourer to the
unfortunate expedition sent out to explore the Niger in 1842. His office
on this occasion was one peculiarly trying under a vertical African sun;
for in all the treaties made with the native chiefs, he marched at the
head of the English party, encumbered with the heavy uniform of a
Life-Guardsman, and burning within the polished plates of a
tightly-buckled cuirass. He was thus made an imposing pageant, to strike
the eyes of the astonished Africans, and impress them with a full sense of
the grandeur and military power of Britain. But it was a delusive show;
for in such a climate all this glittering harness was an intolerable
burden, and the wearer would in reality have been more formidable in the
linen-quilted armour of the soldiers of Cortez, or even in a tanned
sheepskin. He survived to return to England with such of his companions as
remained, but with a shattered constitution, and a frightful wound in his
leg, under which he was long a sufferer.
After John Duncan had
recovered from the effects of such a journey, instead of being daunted by
the toils and dangers he had so narrowly escaped, he only felt a keener
desire than ever to attempt new discoveries in the African interior. The
excitement of peril had become his chief pleasure, while the do-or-die
determination to resume his half-finished adventure, and prosecute it to
the close, must be gratified at whatever price. It is of such stuff that
the hearts of our African travellers are composed, and how seldom
therefore are they satisfied with one expedition, however dangerous
it may have been? Duncan announced his desire to Mr. Shillinglaw, then
librarian to the Geographical Society, and the latter, delighted to find
one so well qualified for such a journey, introduced him to the council.
The arrangements were soon made, and in the summer of 1844, Duncan set off
upon his pilgrimage, under the auspices of the Society, and liberally
furnished with everything that could minister to his comfort or facilitate
his means of exploration. On reaching Africa, his first attempt was to
explore the kingdom of Dahomey, the wealthiest and most civilized—or,
perhaps, we should say, the least savage—of all those marvellous African
realms which Europeans have as yet reached; and of this country he
traversed a large portion, laying open sources of information concerning
it which had hitherto been inaccessible to our travellers. But the
sufferings he underwent in this journey were excruciating, chiefly owing
to the old wound in his leg, that broke out afresh under the burning
climate that had first occasioned it; and so serious at one time were his
apprehensions of a mortification supervening; that in the absence of all
medical aid, he had actually made preparations for cutting off the limb
with his own hand. Happily, a favourable turn made such a desperate
resource unnecessary; but the mere resolution shows of what sacrifices he
was capable in the prosecution of his purpose. On returning to Cape Coast,
much impaired in constitution, he resolved to start afresh on a new
journey to Timbuctoo, but continuing ill health obliged him to forego his
purpose, and return to England.
Our admiration of Duncan’s
persevering intrepidity is heightened by the fact, that he was neither a
man of science, nor even a tolerable scholar, his early education having
been both brief and defective; and thus he was deprived of those sources
of enthusiasm which cheered onward such travellers as Bruce and Park to
the source of the Nile or the parent streams of the Niger. But he had keen
observation and solid sound sense, by which he was enabled materially to
enrich our African geography, without the parade of learning; and as such,
his communications were so justly appreciated, that after his return to
England, her Majesty’s Government appointed him to the office of British
vice-consul at Whydah, in the kingdom of Dahomey. Nothing could be more
grateful to his feelings, for besides being an honourable attestation to
his services in behalf of science and humaniity, the
appointment furnished him with ample means for a third African expedition,
in which all his previous attempts as a traveller might be perfected. He
set sail accordingly, in H.M.S. Kingfisher, but was not destined to reach
the expected port; for he sickened during the voyage, and died when the
vessel had reached the Bight of Benin, on the 3d of November, 1849. |
