CHAPTER IV
ABBEOKUTA.
Introduction to the "Alake"—Royal attire—Wives, over one hundred—Ogboni Elders—Native Game, Wari—Visit to the Chiefs.
ACTING-CONSUL Lieut. Lodder had furnished me with a letter of introduction to his Majesty Okukenu, Alake of Abbeokuta, which I was anxious to present. The Reverend Henry Townsend of the Church Missionary Society kindly accompanied me. My reception by the King was very cordial. I explained to him the object of my visit to the country, which he was pleased to hear. He observed that for people coming with such purposes, and for missionaries, he had great "sympathy," and would afford every encouragement; but that some of the people (emigrants from the Brazils, Cuba, and Sierra Leone) who were now coming into his dominion, especially traders, gave him much trouble. His body above the loins was nude; otherwise his attire consisted of a handsome velvet cap trimmed with gold, a costly necklace of coral, and a double strand of the same ornament about his loins, with a velvet cloth thrown gracefully about the rest
