Two days later, Olakunde himself was taken from my sight. Major Byrd wanted a drummer for actions up the river. Olakunde was plucked from our number. We have not seen him again.

Common report — which I cannot credit — even now, I cannot credit it — common report vows that Lord Dunmore, finished with our number, unable to discover any more utility in our Regiment, sent the other half of us down to the Sugar Isles, that they might be sold to the plantations there, so that there might be some profit from this profitless struggle. If he did so, betrayed them thus, perhaps Olakunde was among them; I still do not know his fate.

The misery which engulfed my senses — even now — Good God, if Dunmore hath committed this — if he hath — there is no pit in Hell too hot, no punishment too searing — my quill will not write of it — too pliant, not iron, not blood — the mind cannot receive the image — We shall make you proud to serve us, soldier, said he, proud to serve us — then so many of us lost — and yet there is no punishment, no outcome but the profit; and I lay in the dark of our deck; I could not sleep, I could not eat, and there was no room in which to move. I could not be roused, and was as a dirt-eater, a staring eye.

Black hold, the detonations fierce, floor puddled with wet sick; heaving; victory blotched by fog and rain, the wind meddling, ships luffing, stoving up as if careened; and I below. Upon Mr. Gitney’s desk: Defeat curls within the body as a mouse’s skeleton within the scum of fur and weed left by the owl; for it is infinitely light, and empty of all motivation, and longs in its posture for an impossible sleep.

Some time ago, I fought for the rebel, digging his trenches, mounding his earth; and found myself deceived; and so I fled to the only other power that might protect me, and I pledged myself among these staunch enemies of rebellion, and digged their trenches, and mounded their earth, and killed for them; and yet we were discarded when we were no longer of use.

Rebel or Redcoat, there were none who needed to use us sufficiently to save us.

What more to tell? There were skirmishes; and still we fled upon the ships, and could find no haven. We were pursued on every shore, hunted like foxes, coursed like hares. We were fired upon, and heard shots in the night, signals between rebels on opposite shores, but knew nothing of what these shots might mean, the language of ordnance spoken in the gloom. All were against us. We could not progress; and so we fled.

I prayed that the Lord should destroy utterly the children of men. It seemed to me that we were a race so poisoned in every motive that we should never find happiness; for should felicity appear in one nation, the others must sweep down upon it to destroy it; and it seemed to me that we must be obliterated with a new and profounder deluge, one deep enough to encompass all nations, so that Christ might begin again with a better creature. And as the ship heaved in a storm, I heard the wailing of an infant, which would not cease though the mother proffered her breast. The babe screaming, beating air, I looked upon it, a horror rising in me that there should be still another generation of this verminous race, this piebald mammal, this predator howling for something to batten upon. Its face was empurpled with rage at its limited dominion.

My instinct was to strike it in disgust; to stamp it out; but of course, I stayed my hand. I backed away from its bestial cry and prayed for gentleness, sank to my knees and prayed as best I could.

And so we sailed on.