Bulfinch Lambe worked for the Royal African Company at its factory in Jakin, the port of Allada, until the king of Allada seized him in 1722 as security against an unpaid debt. When Agaja of Dahomey conquered Allada in 1724, Lambe passed into his hands and was carried inland to Abomey.

Agaja soon formed the idea, perhaps at Lambe's prompting, of negotiating a commercial agreement with the Company. Writing that November to Jeremiah Tinker, who governed the Company's factory in neighboring Whydah, Lambe reported the king's interest in establishing a correspondence and in having Europeans come to him, and offered himself as intermediary, which doubled as a route out of captivity. His release in 1726 came with the expectation that he would come back: Agaja told the trader William Snelgrave the following year that Lambe had sworn to return with a ship.

Law builds on Marion Johnson's earlier account of the episode in this journal.