Chapter VIII: Part II: Civilization and the African (1)

I.—The White Man’s Burden.
II.—Lightening the White Man’s Burden.
III.—Governments and Commerce.
IV.—The Liquor Traffic.
V.—The Educated Native.
VI.—Justice and the African.
VII.—Race Prejudice.

I

THE WHITE MAN’S BURDEN

There is a type of African traveller who, hurrying to the coast and back again, returns with all the assurance of a long experienced person to pontifically declare that the unhealthiness of West Africa is all moonshine, that if a man dies it is due to his excesses rather than to the climate. There is, of course, a grain of truth in this assertion; cocktails, midnight oil and habits of a worse type, undermine the constitution in a manner which leave little resistance to the climatic diseases. Yet after all, tropical Africa is a death-trap.

Some of these assertive and incredulous persons have themselves been badly punished for their advertised temerity. The story goes of one lady who, after having published much nonsense on this subject, was bundled off home in an ice pack! I know one man who, after a year or two of good health, gave rein to his opinion in the columns of the _Times_; this good man was no believer in short and effective service, followed by a well-earned period of leave; he advocated long terms of residence as the certain road to immunity; that man spent a single term in Africa, towards the close of which the climate made such inroads upon his constitution, that he was never allowed to return.

Those who feel inclined to trifle with and ridicule the dangers attendant upon life in Africa should spend a solid year in some lonely post directing a staff not always amenable to discipline; should live in that comfortless bungalow; should endeavour to tempt the appetite day after day with something from a tin which, no matter what it is called, invariably has the same taste. Then probably a fever intervenes and the lonely resident goes to bed with limbs racked with pain and a head throbbing like the puffing of an express train. By this time the supercilious writer would be brought to know that after all, the climate of West Africa is not that of the Swiss lakes or the Austrian Tyrol.

[Sidenote: THE STORY THE GRAVEYARDS TELL]

It may be a melancholy undertaking, but all whites going to West Africa should brace themselves to the duty of visiting the cemeteries. What a story the graveyards of West Africa tell! The fair young lives laid down for the comfort of posterity. Men of all walks in life are there—the official and the trader, pitiably aloof in daily life, now lying side by side; they are there from every profession and trade, the engineer and the miner, the planter and the doctor, the young wife and perhaps the new-born infant. Africa—always cruel—has taken them in the very flower of their manhood and womanhood.

On the Gold Coast I one day walked into the cemetery and standing in one spot recorded the ages inscribed on twenty-seven of the surrounding tombstones; the oldest amongst the deceased was only forty-six years, and amongst the youngest, two had succumbed at the early age of twenty-two. The average was exactly thirty-two years. Not a few had inscribed upon the tombs such information as, “After two days’ illness.” “After only three weeks in the colony.” “After three days’ illness.” “Died on the way to the coast,” and so forth.

One interesting feature about this cemetery is that it is enclosed with a stone wall, about four feet high, and all white men may be buried within the compound, as also respectable natives—respectability, so my native guide informed me, being determined by church-going. Natives, therefore, who were not attendants at church, were buried “outside the wall.” Looking over I could see some scores of graves of natives who, not having attended church in life, were divided in death from the church-goers by a foot of stone wall.

Merchants and missionaries would do well to watch more closely the mortality returns of Government publications, for there alone may be seen recorded the effect of furloughs on the health of Europeans. In the slow moving times of twenty years ago, men went to the coast for long periods, and many a missionary and merchant stayed until he died. Government officials, too, were kept at their posts until death carried them off, or they were invalided beyond the possibility of a return. It is instructive to note that mortality is much lower among Government officials, arising beyond question from the fact that they serve short periods, generally of one year only, and then take a furlough in Europe. For many reasons the figures for the years 1901 and 1910 may be regarded as average records. The death-rates among the whites in the two colonies of the Gold Coast and Southern Nigeria, showing a remarkable improvement, are as follows:—

Southern Nigeria. Gold Coast.
Death Rate. Death Rate.

1901.—Officials 24 per 1000 34.96 per 1000
Non Officials 47.1 ” ” 56.30 ” ”
1910.—Officials 6 ” ” 11.41 ” ”
Non-Officials (not available) 16.52 ” ”

Most merchants argue that they cannot afford to bring their men to Europe for short furloughs every year, but one or two good houses are making the experiment with not a little satisfaction to themselves in more than one direction. In the first place a better type of man offers for a short agreement, and then there is the consideration that by preserving the lives of those they have trained, merchants thus avoid the constant re-equipment of new men, the cost of which is very considerable. Nor is the financial aspect the only feature which is proving satisfactory. These merchants find that they reap great commercial advantages over their competitors by being able to hold more frequent consultations with their men. After all, the incidence of cost in connection with passages to and fro is comparatively insignificant on the whole expenditure of the far-reaching commercial enterprises of West Africa.

To preserve the white man’s life in Africa, other elements are equally essential. The dwelling-house, recreation and provisions are features sadly neglected by the majority of whites.

[Sidenote: AN AFRICAN HOME]

There is so much monotony, so much to irritate and to depress in West Africa, that everything Governments and merchants can do to brighten the lives of their employés should be done. The prettiest and happiest of homes are without doubt in German and Portuguese colonies. In both cases it is due, to a very large extent, to the fact that these nations give every encouragement to the taking out of white women, whose very presence, flitting to and fro in the essentially light garments of the tropics, give more than a touch of poetry to surroundings already anything but prosaic.

The Portuguese love of a garden adds to the attraction of their homes; grape vines are tastefully grown where the Englishman would throw sardine tins; there is a fernery in one corner of the garden, a rose bower in another, luscious fruits and tempting vegetables grow everywhere in exquisite profusion.

The Germans in Cameroons set aside a colonial fund called the “Widows and Orphans Fund,” and I am told it is from this capital account that men draw subsidies with which to take their wives to West Africa!

One of the prettiest incidents I ever saw in West Africa was at Victoria in the German Cameroons. The planter came galloping home from the plantation, and giving a whistle to announce his return, a daintily dressed little matron skipped out lightly to meet him, and arm in arm they walked into a charming little bungalow gay with fern and flower. A few minutes later I passed by the open door and caught a vision of a snowy table cloth, bright with polished silver and glass. I could not help contrasting this with the British factories with their more or less dilapidated dwelling-houses, most of them very dirty, and the general atmosphere in keeping with the slatternly black woman leaning against the cook-house door.

Recreation in some more healthy form than cocktails and billiards is of no less importance than the well-ordered house. In many colonies now there are golf and cricket clubs, but these are only possible in the more civilized towns where there is a considerable congregation of whites. The man who suffers most from fever and despondency is the one stationed at some isolated post of the hinterland. Happy, indeed, is the man with a knowledge of, and love for, a garden; it will keep his mind calm, provide him with healthy exercise, and a supply of fruits and vegetables which will keep him in good form for his daily routine.

Given a good home, sound mental and physical recreation, short periods of service with proportionately shortened furloughs to Europe, the white man’s burden in Africa, to which so many succumb to-day, would be materially lightened, and both white men and women could go forth with a fearlessness which, tempered with care, would largely remove from West Africa the stigma of “the white man’s grave.”

II

LIGHTENING THE WHITE MAN’S BURDEN

Thanks to Mr. Chamberlain, a great stimulus was given to the work of rendering the burden of West Africa somewhat lighter. At his inspiration men began to study more seriously the question of dwelling houses, the use of medicines, and the supply of fresh food.

Sir Alfred Jones, Messrs. John Holt and Messrs. Burroughs & Wellcome, have each in their respective spheres spent large sums of money experimenting in various directions, in the hope that science applied to the practical side of daily life and travel would ameliorate, if it did not remove, the distressing effects of malaria.

The trader of twenty years ago lived—but more frequently died—in a wattle and daub house. These I know from experience can be made comfortable, but more often than not they are so damp and insanitary that fever may be looked for every few months. Inside two and a half years, I experienced no less than seventeen fevers, the majority of which were I am convinced entirely due to the wretched habitation in which we lived.

To-day few men live on ground floors, for the mud or bamboo house has given place to the airy bungalow fashioned on brick piles, permitting a current of air to pass beneath which keeps the house dry and sanitary. It also has the not inconsiderable advantage that snakes and other reptiles which abound in the tropics do not so readily find a lodging as in the mud and sun-dried brick houses of the earlier days. Another improvement which is yearly growing in favour is that of gauze doors and windows which give some protection from the torment of mosquitos and tsetse flies.

On the island of Principe, the doors and windows of almost every house are fitted with gauze, the object of which is to prevent the spread of sleeping sickness which has of recent years overwhelmed that island. The germ-impregnated fly is nowhere in Africa so numerous and vicious as upon that wretched Portuguese island, where few of a ship’s passengers care to land, for the risk of becoming inoculated with sleeping sickness is a very real one. Whilst on that island we had to keep an extremely vigilant watch upon the terrible tsetse flies which gave us no peace, so anxious were they to taste our blood. The fly, which is found in most parts of West Africa, is most prevalent in the Bangalla region of the Congo and on Principe Island. In the latter place they literally swarm. There is no buzz to warn of their approach, and usually the first intimation the traveller has of their presence is the sharp stab, followed by acute irritation and swelling. In spite of the precautions taken on Principe, there seems very little hope that the population can be saved from this terrible scourge. In one month (June, 1910), out of a population of 4000 souls, no less than fifty-six perished from sleeping sickness; that is at the rate of 168 per 1000 per annum. No wonder the Portuguese population is leaving the doomed island.

[Sidenote: MOSQUITO-PROOF SHIPS]

An experiment which is being watched with keen interest is that recently made by Messrs. John Holt & Company. The directors of this enterprising firm have recently placed two insect proof ships on the West African sea and river journeys. The first of these, the “Jonathan Holt,” was launched in July, 1910. This vessel was constructed largely under the advice of the Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine, and the object was that of rendering the passengers and crew immune from the germ carrying mosquito. The “Jonathan Holt,” the first of the type ever built, is about 2500 tons and with a dead weight capacity of 2350 tons. She draws only 17 feet 6 inches of water, which permits navigation on the river Niger and also allows her to reach Dualla, the capital of German Cameroons.

The doorways, portholes, windows, skylights, ventilators and passages are all protected with mosquito gauze frames easily adjustable. Double awnings are provided and everything which human forethought can do to render the ship proof against the mosquito has been done.

To Messrs. Burroughs, Wellcome and Co., every African traveller owes a debt of gratitude. The excellence and portability of their tabloid-preparations have gone a long way to minimize the dangers of tropical adventure. During our travels of over 5000 miles we carried with us a medical outfit which left nothing wanting, either for ourselves or for our paddlers and carriers. For fever, for cuts or bruises, or other inevitable ailments of the tropics everything was at hand; nothing was lacking for the whole caravan and yet the total outfit weighed less than twenty pounds! How great a difference a Burroughs, Wellcome portable outfit would have made to Livingstone’s hard life. We carried another case of “tabloid” photographic materials, and with these developed nearly a thousand plates. The whole outfit, both medical and photographic, was easily carried by one boy.

It may seem strange to the European that African travellers and writers lay so much stress upon the question of food supply. West Africa for years exacted a terrible toll from her white residents, which might have been to a great extent minimized had they been able to provide themselves with palatable fare. The late Sir Alfred Jones determined to do something to make the life of the African merchants and officials more comfortable in this respect. He fitted out a few ships with refrigerators and began in a small way to send some of our staple articles of diet to the leading ports of the coast. Men and women too, sick almost unto death, unable to eat the coarse bread, the tasteless fish, or the tinned mixtures, were then cheered and in numberless cases restored by the timely arrival of an Elder Dempster boat with sterilized fresh milk, eggs, chicken and mutton.

[Sidenote: FISH, FLESH, AND FOWL]

Only too well do we remember those days, fifteen years ago, when once on board the ship at Liverpool, the travellers said good-bye to European diet. How different the case now! Directly the ship casts anchor, coloured messenger boys, and more often the white men, come on with orders for beef and mutton, eggs and milk, chicken and sausages, even game and fruit. It is a great day when Elder Dempster’s boats steam into port, hurried invitations go out for dinner and luncheon parties, and once a month at least the pale-faced commercial agent or the anæmic government official is able to enjoy a meal or two which puts new life into his tired body.

Over and above the provisions for the passengers on the steamer, each ship will now carry for sale—beef, lamb, mutton and kidneys; pheasants and other game; eggs, sausages, fresh butter and sterilized milk; potatoes, carrots and onions; kippers, bloaters and salmon; grapes, pears and apples—a veritable combination of shops, butcher, dairy, greengrocer, fishmonger and fruiterer!

Usually each ship will carry for sale from 1000 to 2000 lbs. of beef, a couple of thousand eggs, three or four hundred pounds of butter, five hundred blocks of ice and three hundred pints of milk. Festive seasons, too, are not forgotten and Christmas boats carry a large stock of turkeys and geese.

Think for a moment what a blessing the monthly visit of a ship like this is to such foodless places as Boma and Matadi in the Congo, the island of Fernando Po, the isolated merchant houses of Rio del Rey, or the ports of Spanish Guinea;—the drawn and sickly faces of the men who come off for provisions tell their own tale. They can not only buy all they want, but at a reasonable price. The Belgian in the Congo buys beef cheaper than he can in Antwerp, _i.e._, 10_d._ a pound. Lamb and steak he can get at 1_s._ per pound. The Scotch engineer running his steamer up and down the Ogowé can get a whole box of Aberdeen haddies for 5_s._, or salmon at 2_s._ a pound. Ice can be purchased at 2_s._ 6_d._ a half-hundredweight block. Potatoes and onions at 9_s._ a case.

This enterprise of Sir Alfred Jones has already developed into the creation of cold storage companies at ports like Lagos, Calabar and Seccondee, and the firm of Elder Dempster has now built chambers on some of their ships capable of carrying twenty tons of European provisions every week to Seccondee alone. The health of West Africa, bad though it is, has greatly improved within recent years, and though, of course, the medical profession has so largely contributed to the change, the house-builder, the merchant and the ship-owner have loyally co-operated in an endeavour to lighten the burden of the white man in West Africa.

III

GOVERNMENTS AND COMMERCE

Nothing in West Africa is more striking than the attitude adopted by the several colonizing Powers towards commerce. At present, Germany is easily in the front rank; her policy towards business men is the most enlightened of any Power, and it is therefore to be the more regretted that her treatment of the natives is not equally far-sighted. Were it so, all students of African questions could view with equanimity her gradual absorption of the whole of Equatorial Africa.

The British merchant knows with absolute certainty that he may rely on receiving a warm welcome and every assistance in German colonies. He knows, too, that none will be given a preference before him. He knows that if “public good”—the stick which governors so frequently wield—demands the removal of his factory, or that a road must be driven through his ground, the German Government will not quibble over doubtful legal points, but will look at the question on broad lines of common-sense policy.

Steam into a German port, and before you cast anchor you may see the customs and health-officers with their launches racing across the intervening stretch of sea. Promptly and smartly the doctor steps up the companion-way, and you begin unloading your cargo without further formalities. Your cargo finished, there is no delay about papers, no irritating objections about the closing time of the customs, or the doctor being at dinner or more likely, tennis. Contrast this with a visit to a French or Portuguese port—you may wait an hour before the health-officer comes on board. His visit over, the ship’s officers and native crew slave throughout the day to unload the cargo, so that they may have the valuable night watches for steaming to the next port, but if the Frenchman can by any quibble keep you tossing at anchor, you may rely upon his doing so.

The German neither likes nor dislikes the British merchant: he is concerned with one thing only—that British capital and British brains are good for his colony; therefore, without any sentimental nonsense, he gives the Britisher a warm welcome, and sees to it that no preference is given to the German merchant, which might make the British firm hesitate to invest further capital in a German colony.

Of course the regulations in German colonies are numerous and enforced with military precision and sternness. The native, centuries behind the white man, does not bear the strain very well. The Britisher, after a time, learns that such regulations are for his good and accepts them. No merchant at first takes kindly to keeping his back-yard free from refuse; if he is in Togoland he resents the first instance upon which he is fined twenty marks for leaving old tins, half-filled up with rain water, lying about the rear of his store, but when in the process of time he is still without fever, he sees the advantage of this anti-mosquito regulation.

[Sidenote: MODEL TRANSPORT]

In Lome the Germans have an extremely interesting and unique system of transport enterprise. The surf, as in many parts of West Africa, is extremely bad, and for years constituted a source of perpetual loss, not only of valuable cargoes, but of human life. With characteristic thoroughness the German, at great cost, ran a pier out to sea, built a railway line on it and extended this line along the front of the merchant houses—a distance of about 1½ to 2 miles. On the pier the Government erected seven powerful steam cranes. Having laid down this plant, they took the next truly Teutonic step and compelled all the merchants to accept Government transport.

An outward-bound steamer is sighted at sea, cranes are prepared, the health-officer leaves before the ship comes to anchor, papers are examined, cargo is rapidly placed in the surf boats which are towed across to the pier where, in an almost incredibly short space of time, fifty tons of cargo are hauled up on to the pier, put on the train and delivered at the merchants’ doors. A similar method is adopted with a steamer from the south—homeward bound. The moment the look-out ascertains her name and destination, he signals or telephones to the merchants, and shortly afterwards trains are in motion collecting the cargo already prepared for the expected vessel. When she comes to anchor, her surf boats are despatched to the pier, where they are promptly loaded and sent back to the ship.

There is a scientific air about the whole transaction; an absence of fuss; an attention to business quite refreshing in tropical Africa, and above all, there is a sort of “hey presto” promptness in the way these tons of pots and pans, bales of cotton, barrels of oil and bags of corn are handled.

All merchants, of whatever nationality, must accept this transport and pay a fixed rate of 11_s._ a ton, which covers all costs and insurance against every risk. In return they are saved the expense and trouble which attaches to the upkeep of boats, boat-boys and a large staff of men for handling cargo. I was assured by the merchants that the system works extremely well, saves them much annoyance, and, on the whole, does not work out at much greater expense than the rough-and-ready methods of other colonial ports.

The administration of German colonies is decidedly autocratic, although not more so than in British Crown colonies. In German Cameroons, however, all interests are consulted in a manner which demonstrates the eagerness of the German Government to keep on good terms with the merchant. Twice, sometimes three times a year, the Governor holds an enlarged “Colonial Council,” to the deliberations of which he invites not only the principal merchants, but the leading missionaries. I was informed that at these meetings the Governor welcomed criticism of existing or projected enactments, no matter from what quarter they came, and that the result was that everyone felt himself to be an integral part of the colony.

[Sidenote: THE FRENCH ATTITUDE]

How different the French Administration! The _Entente Cordiale_ may be all right in the Banqueting Hall, and as a pin-prick for Germany, but it is time the British people questioned its value in things that count. The truth is that in French colonies, merchants of other nationality are not wanted. Wherever you go in French West Africa, the merchant is full of grievances with regard to the petty annoyances of the Government and the officials. Nor does this apply to West Africa alone; the same story is told in Madagascar and the New Hebrides, in both of which places, not only is the merchant entirely _de trop_, but the _Entente Cordiale_ has not even secured decent treatment for the devoted missionaries. The _Entente Cordiale_ was not brought about for selfish ends by Great Britain, and considering the much advertised generosity of our partner, we have a right to expect at least ordinary civilities in her colonies. The French are so absorbed in themselves that they would have none but Frenchmen on the face of the earth. As Napoleon failed to accomplish this end, the present-day Frenchman will not, if he can help it, have any but his own nationality in French colonies.

The Portuguese want British capital, but they don’t want British merchants; they kill the commerce of British firms by every form of preferential treatment. Their right to do so is, of course, equal to that of a man to cut his own throat. The only British enterprises in Portuguese West Africa are the Lobito-Katanga Railway, the Angola Coaling Company and some electrical works at Catumbella. The first named is the well-known Robert Williams’ project for reaching the Katanga and Northern Rhodesia from the West Coast. The local Portuguese would probably like to strangle this valuable undertaking in its infancy, but they see already how much capital is finding its way into Angola. When Robert Williams gets his railway through to Katanga, the Angola colony will become an asset of considerable value to the Republic.

[Sidenote: THE BELGIAN ATTITUDE]

The attitude of the Belgian Government towards commerce is again different from that of any other colonial administration. Theoretically, the Belgians are anxious to persuade capital to enter the colony, but the principles of King Leopold’s rule have taken such firm root that in practice the presence of any commercial agents, particularly those of any other nationality, is gall and wormwood to the local Belgians. Nothing, for example, irritates them so much as a reminder that by the Berlin Act they are bound to keep the country open to the free commerce of the world.

Even Belgian merchants complain of the treatment they receive at the hands of the officials of the administration. Recently, when calling at Stanley Pool on board a merchant steamer, we had to pass the customs official. We put our anchor ashore in front of the customs house, where the official himself was standing on the beach smoking a cigar, and, as we thought, waiting to examine our papers. He knew the captain (a Belgian) was pressed for time, yet he deliberately kept the ship at anchor for twenty minutes whilst he finished his cigar! No doubt this conduct was meant to—and, of course, did—impress the crew, but, as the captain remarked, the reason at the back of such action is the desire of Belgian officialdom to monopolize transport, and their hatred of any form of free commerce.

I was present on another occasion which instanced Belgian desire to secure trade in principle, whilst unwilling to put their advertised desires into practice by exhibiting a readiness to render real assistance. There came into Boma a British ship, whose captain was of higher rank than those usually visiting this port; it was in fact the first time this officer had called at a port so insignificant as Boma. He ran his ship alongside the pier, but was amazed to find none of the ordinary preparations for unloading cargo. Instead of sending a ship’s officer for an explanation, he went himself to see the quasi-Government Railway Company.

“Where,” he asked, “are the railway trucks for unloading cargo?”

“There they are,” laconically replied the official.

“But I want them at the ship,” said the captain.

“Well,” answered the official, with genuine courtesy, “you can take them, I don’t object.”

That it was in any sense the man’s responsibility to send these trucks along did not occur to him, and upon the captain asking how he was to get them over the intervening half mile of line to the pier, he was told, again with every courtesy, “send your crew to push them!”

Then might be seen the spectacle of a ship’s officer and a gang of Kroo boys spending hours under a tropical sun straining and tugging at these unwieldy railway trucks, all of which could have been shunted in a few minutes with ease by any one of the idle engines in the sheds. That a ship of 5000 tons was delayed for twenty-four hours by this stupidity was immaterial to the Belgian official. How differently the German would have acted! The empty trucks would have been ready on the pier, a shunting engine with steam up standing by directly the steamer began making her way alongside, but the Belgian is not cast in that mould.

[Sidenote: THE BRITISH ATTITUDE]

In British West African colonies the relations between Government and Commerce are unique. Alone among the Powers she has developed a caste attitude, until to-day the distinction is not a little embarrassing. The British official is quite a good fellow when you get him alone, but, as a class, they form a distinctly objectionable “set.” This is apparent the first day on board ship, when the “sorting out” commences, and if the weather is good this process provides not a little amusement to an observant passenger. Usually there are but three groups of travellers on a “coast” steamer—the official, the merchant and the missionary. As we have travelled a good deal in these ships, many occasions have presented themselves for watching the arranging and rearranging of this little floating town. The last time we set out from Liverpool was the most entertaining of any. Running down the channel, a youth, who had apparently never travelled before, wished me “Good day,” with the apparent intention of pacing the deck, but upon his discovering that I was neither an official, nor a missionary, he inwardly argued “a trader,” and promptly made off!

Another and yet another pursued the same tactics, until by a process of elimination they “discovered” the officials. “Steward” was then called and all the “official chairs” were placed in a semi-circle in the best part of the deck. That this monopolized the only comfortable section of the upper deck did not appear to concern these gentlemanly youths.

In the dining-saloon the chief steward had placed us at one of the lower tables, but learning from the captain of certain instructions given him by one of the Directors, with whom I was on friendly terms, this man came forward and with profuse apologies asked me to accept an entirely different place in the saloon, saying that he “thought I was a trader!”

Once I met a young Sierra Leone merchant, who told me that a certain official in the Protectorate had been taken ill with a bad fever at his factory; that he had nursed him through it with all the care of a relative; that this official, when he was at last able to leave, appeared deeply grateful for all that had been done for him, and the merchant believed he had made a lifelong friend. A few months afterwards business called him to Freetown, and passing along one of the streets, he met two or three officials, one of whom was the friend whom he had so carefully nursed. To his amazement, he only received a curt nod and a plain intimation that further intercourse was undesirable. It is to be hoped that such conduct is rare, but the general attitude of the younger British officials is becoming almost intolerable.

This treatment of the merchant class finds no place in any other colony of West Africa. It is of quite recent growth and monstrously unjust to the merchants, for it should never be forgotten that it is almost entirely to the merchant and missionary communities that Great Britain primarily owes her presence in West Africa. There is another fact our officials would do well to remember, namely, that the natives and the merchants together pay their salaries and pensions.

The younger officials make themselves far more objectionable than the older men, but probably this is due to their inexperience. It is, however, regrettable that the older officials do not set a more pronounced example in the other direction. Within recent years, the British Colonial Office has been sending out, in the capacity of Assistant District Commissioners, many youths of necessarily immature judgment and totally lacking in experience. These lads are by far the worst specimens in their attitude towards the native and merchant communities. Recently, this feature has been impressing itself upon travellers in East as well as in West Africa. Mr. E. N. Bennet, in his book on the Turks in Tripoli, says:—

“Amongst our fellow passengers to Marseilles were eight young
men who were on their way to Uganda. Few, if any of them, had
ever crossed the Channel before; they wore school colours and
did not know an olive tree when they saw one. Nevertheless,
they held, and expressed, very decided views—the ideas of the
College Debating Society and the London Club—that the ‘man on
the spot’ must be the sole arbiter on matters colonial and that
kindness was absolutely wasted on black men; the one ethical
quality necessary in a representative of Great Britain was
firmness.... They also viewed with disfavour the deportation
of Mr. Galbraith Cole. One could only hope that when these
inexperienced youths grew older they would grow wiser. As
it is, an immense amount of harm is done all over our vast
Empire by some of our younger soldiers and civil servants, who,
utterly devoid of _cosmopolitanisme gracieux_, treat their
non-English fellow subjects with a contempt which would be
ridiculous if it were not dangerous.”

The merchant seeking a new field for commerce in West Africa will find the warmest welcome and the fairest treatment in German colonies, and next to Germany, in this respect, the British colonies; there is not much to choose between the Belgian and the Portuguese. None but Frenchmen should go to the colonies of “Liberty, Equality and Fraternity,” for there is little Liberty, less Equality and no Fraternity in the French colonies for white or black.

IV

THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC

It is useless to close our eyes to the fact that an evil of fearful potentiality is being introduced and fostered all down the West Coast of Africa. I have not always found it possible to agree with the much-criticized Native Races and Liquor Traffic United Committee, but it must not be overlooked that some of their critics have made errors, in judgment at least, not one whit less extraordinary than those which have been brought against that Committee of highminded and unselfish men.

The greatest mistake made by people in Europe upon this question is that of comparing it with the European consumption of alcohol. The African is not a drunkard in his primitive state and he detests our ardent spirits; once in an extremity I gave a young man a sip of brandy in water from my medicine case, and he literally howled over it and set his teeth firmly against my trying to give him another dose!

[Sidenote: THE MERCHANT AND THE LIQUOR TRAFFIC]

The error to which most people cling so tenaciously is that of the “scoundrelly merchant” theory. They cannot understand—because they do not know Africa—why a merchant should pour gin into West Africa, unless he is making a fortune out of it. As a plain matter of fact the merchant makes less out of the sale of alcohol than he would out of almost any other article of commerce. In a village store on the Gold Coast hinterland, I found rum costing 6_s._ 9_d._ a gallon being retailed at 7_s._ 3_d._—a profit of only 6_d._ per gallon. In another store I visited, the native merchant was retailing gin at 9_d._ a bottle, for which he was paying 8_s._ 1½_d._ per dozen, and 4_d._ a case for transport to his store. A West African merchant once remarked to me, “If you could stop the demand for intoxicating liquor it would pay me to give you twenty thousand pounds.” The merchant was quite right, because, whilst he could get fifteen and twenty per cent. on the sale of Manchester cotton goods, he was only making a few pence a case on the gin he was shipping to Lagos! The sale of alcohol does not pay the merchant, but we cannot escape from the fact that it is a good revenue producer.

There seems to be a general impression that the British administrations are the worst in this respect, and that their record is not without fault few would deny, but I am confident that the moral sentiment of the British Government and people will save them from falling so low as the French administration—an easy first in almost all that is retrograde in Equatorial Africa. France to-day recognizes the terrible evils which follow in the train of Absinthe-drinking in the homeland, yet she can calmly look on whilst natives stream into the little drink stores of French Congo with their 25 cent pieces to purchase “nips” of what I was assured by the vendor was the worst form of drink in the whole of the African continent. When we were at Gaboon, an official informed me that quite recently two young Europeans had taken to drinking trade Absinthe, and in each case had died in a manner which called for a post-mortem examination, the results of which horrified the examining doctors.

The Portuguese have long been regarded as by far the worst sinners, but it is the fashion in West Africa to place every sin at the door of that not unkindly nation, yet however deeply they may have sinned in the past, there are happily signs of repentance and reform. In Angola the Government has recently decreed the abolition of distilleries throughout the colony, providing, out of their extreme poverty, considerable sums as compensation for the manufacturers.

The Belgians lead the way among the colonizing nations in West Africa, for in their colony they are bringing the prohibition line ever nearer the coast and it is now impossible even in the “open” areas for a native to purchase any intoxicating liquor between Friday night and Monday morning.

[Sidenote: “BANKING” SPIRITS]

If the natives as a rule dislike alcohol, if the natives of West Africa are less drunken than Europeans, what happens to this ceaseless and increasing flow of spirits into the West African colonies? “Over one million cases of Hamburg spirit are retailed to the natives here by a single firm within a year.” Such was the remark passed by a dispassionate Government official to me when in Southern Nigeria. There are twenty or thirty big merchants in Lagos alone, who handle huge consignments of this spirit by every steamer. Sitting on the banks of the Lagoon, one sees an endless stream of small craft passing to and fro with their loads of gin, going to a hundred different centres, some with only six cases, others with fifty and even one hundred. I visited a farmer up country, who admitted to me that he retailed over £1000 worth of gin and rum every year. The same story met us at Abeokuta, where something like thirty-three per cent. of the imports are spirituous liquors, and the returns published show that in the month of January, 1911, out of a customs revenue of £2644, no less than £2450 came from duty on spirits.

None deny, because they cannot, this prodigious importation of spirits into the Gold Coast and Southern Nigerian territories; but one thing baffles every observer—where does it go? The Egba and Yoruba people of Southern Nigeria are not drunken. We could find very few white people who had seen any appreciable degree of drunkenness; generally it was suggested that drinking took place at night. In order to test this theory, I went several times, at a late hour, quietly through the lowest parts of Lagos town. I saw many things, some of an appalling nature, but no single drunken man or woman could I find, and the statistics for convictions barely show one per thousand of the population.

Yet we cannot escape from the official figures. Over six and a half million gallons of spirituous liquor of European manufacture were imported last year into the British colonies of Sierra Leone, Nigeria and the Gold Coast.

What happens to this increasing stream of spirits? No one has ever been able to give a satisfactory answer to the question. Some say that being a currency, millions of bottles of gin are “banked,” _i.e._, stored; some say that large quantities are consumed at festivals; others assert that it disappears in secret drinking. I am inclined to think, however, from visits paid at all hours to the people’s homes, that spirit drinking is spread over a much wider area than has hitherto been thought; that is to say, moderate drinking prevails widely, but that at present few of the natives drink to excess. If the moderate drinking of to-day is leading the people to drunkenness to-morrow, then a catastrophe of first magnitude will fall upon West Africa. Drunkenness is admittedly on the increase in the Gold Coast, and this is so obvious that three years ago the Governor sounded a warning by saying that he recognized drunkenness was becoming one of the most dangerous enemies to Christianity.

What is to be done? Everyone admits that the sale of intoxicating liquor to natives (many would also add—and to whites) in Africa is an evil; all are agreed that the danger is potential rather than actual. But very few seem to have any other remedy than—repression, prohibition, high licenses, heavy duties; these are the methods which find greatest favour to-day.

Prohibition is an extremely difficult proposition for any African colony, and it is well-nigh impossible where the French and German boundary lines march with that of another colony. If, for example, Great Britain proclaimed prohibition for the Gold Coast, what guarantee have we that German native traders would not smuggle spirits across the Volta into the Gold Coast, or the French traders carry it over the Dahomean border into Southern Nigeria?

[Sidenote: HIGH LICENSES AND DUTIES]

High license and import duties have both been tried, and both failed to check the growth of imports. In some places, it would seem that these very restrictions make matters worse. I was informed by a white doctor on the Gold Coast that chiefs in the hinterland will take out a license sometimes of £50, or even higher value, but will impose a tax of 5_s._, or more, per head, on the entire community to pay for it. My medical friend, who was a man of long experience and wide knowledge, further said that many of the people resented this tax because they were abstainers, and on that ground complained to the District Commissioner, but the only redress they obtained was, “Call it a loyalty tax then, and pay it!”

It would be interesting to see what would happen if the duty as a prohibitive measure were temporarily removed. I do not think it is altogether clear that it would tend to increase the consumption; one thing is certain, it would cause something like a financial panic amongst those natives who, holding large stores, hope that the agitation in Europe will enhance the local price and thus make possible extremely profitable sales of stocks.

There are two spheres of action entirely untouched to-day. West Africa is a very “dry” place indeed, and the thirsty inhabitants must have some beverage other than water. Palm wine used to be the national beverage, but the demand by Europe for the products of the oil palm is so great that the whole strength of the tree is required for producing vegetable oil.

The other sphere of operation is beyond question the most effective—an internal movement against the consumption of, and trade in, spirits. Repressive measures by Governments are all very well in their place, but without the goodwill of the people those measures cannot be wholly effective. An agitation locally kept up with the vigour that characterizes the campaign in England, would do an enormous amount of good.

For generations past we have been telling the native that he, in his primitive state, is everything that is bad. Certainly the African, modelled upon a combination of the reports of travellers, officials and missionaries, is a creature the devil himself would disown. Unfortunately, the native has, to some extent, come to believe this, and, abandoning his native rôle, has struggled to imitate the whites who, he has been taught to believe, are the highest type of civilization. When, therefore, the white man ships his gin to the African, he considers it the “correct form” of the higher civilization to purchase it, and copy the European to the extent of drinking “gin and bitters,” “gin and water,” “whisky and soda,” “cocktails” and other liver petrifying abominations, forsaking his simple draught of water and his kola nuts for the drinks that help him up to the standard of his inexorable critics and overlords.

[Sidenote: THE FORCE OF EXAMPLE]

The Governor and his officials can, if they like, do more to stop spirit-drinking than all the prohibitions, taxations and high licenses that the wit of man could impose. Is it impossible for one colony to set an example? I think not, for I believe the British officials, as a whole, in spite of their shortcomings, are capable of making any sacrifice for the good of the colonies. If a governor would “set the fashion” and by his example inspire his subordinate officers with a determination to refuse to drink any intoxicating liquors in public, at any function or ceremony whatever, for a period of three years, and thereby set the fashion against spirit-drinking, I venture to predict that within those three years the import of spirits would decrease by at least one half. The natives, rightly led by the Press, and the movement supported by the officials and by the ministers of the native churches, would take fire, so to speak, until the drinking of spirits would become “incorrect form.”

In the hands of the Government officials is the power to turn the natives by example against the consumption of ardent European spirituous liquors. Will they seize the opportunity?

V

THE EDUCATED NATIVE

The man who would understand the African must get beneath the surface, otherwise he will never know the real sentiments of the native races. By confining himself to the hospitality of the whites, he will learn a great deal about the natives, and will also learn to appreciate the position of the merchant and the administrator, but if he would probe the mind and thought of the African, he will find no better way than that of living with him.

[Sidenote: NATIVE HOSPITALITY]

It is of course more congenial—to many essential—to accept the hospitality of trader or official, for there are little things a native host and hostess will inevitably forget; but the compensations! What a wealth of affection, courtesy and native lore is poured at the feet of the visitor.

Driven by fierce tornadoes, wet, cold and utterly miserable, I have sought the simple hut of the forest hunter, or the fishing-shed on the banks of an African river. How warm the welcome! How quickly the good wife will bring forward native refreshment! Let a drop of rain find its way through the roof into the hut and on to the white guest, and nothing will stop the impetuous host from dashing outside in the foulest of weather to stop the leakage. Readily, too, he gives up his rough bed and will curl up in the hollow of a tree, or beneath its branches, joyfully enduring any discomfort so long as the white man may be made comfortable.

It is the same at the other end of the scale. Those who discover that terrible disease—negrophobia—creeping over them, often in spite of the better self, will find an infallible cure by staying for a few days with some leading educated native. Their view-point will almost unconsciously change under the genial and enlightened conversation of the dinner-table; their hostility will melt away under the influence of the natural courtesy of the warmhearted host. They will begin to marvel that some things should never have occurred to them before, and, unless race prejudice closes the observant mind to all reason, the guest will forget that his host is an “accursed educated African.”

The “educated negro” is to many only a worse evil than the primitive savage, but what has the educated native done? What terrible crime has he committed? I admit he has imbibed the education European civilization provides, but is that a crime? I admit that he is probably a greater consumer of spirituous liquor than the illiterate native, but if it is wrong for the native to follow in the footsteps of his white exemplars, why does the white man import it? I admit that he is often overdressed in too demonstrative European clothes, but again, if it is wrong for him to wear these things, why does European compete with European in producing the liveliest patterns in clothes and the most outrageous collars and boots? If these are the things which make the educated native unfit to live, why send them to him?

I am not here concerned in condemning the sale of European outfits, importation of spirits, least of all European education, but in fairness to the African, let us brush aside unreasoning and unreasonable prejudice and put ourselves in his place for a moment. Let us at least recognize for example that if grave faults exist in the educational systems we provide for Africa, it is upon us, rather than upon the African, that the responsibility rests.

We all agree that the educated African has his weaknesses, and pretty bad ones too, but though I have met hundreds of them, though I have read volumes of material they have written, I have never met one who claims the perfection in life and conduct that not a few of his critics assume. It seems to be mainly in British colonies that the educated native is such a bugbear, and if our educational system produces such evils, it is done after all under an autocratic and not a representative Government. Surely, therefore, we should lose no time in abolishing, root and branch, the cause of the mischief.

But is it a failure? If so, wherein has the African failed? Take first the elementary curriculum of mission and Government schools. Where would Africa be to-day without its thousands of coloured clerks and Government officials? In Southern Nigeria alone there are 5000 natives in the British Government service, all of them more or less educated. In every colony, too, you meet cultured natives trained at these schools who are now devoting their lives to the education of the rising generation.

[Sidenote: EDUCATION AND THE AFRICAN]

We are told that the education of the African has been too largely concentrated on a purely literary and spiritual curriculum. Beyond question there is some force in this criticism, but the Missions and Governments are surely more responsible for this than the natives themselves. The Government particularly so, for missionary committees are after all only trustees for the funds placed at their disposal, and such are almost entirely given for purely missionary propaganda. But even this criticism is unjust in ignoring the existence all over West Central Africa of the educated native carpenters, bricklayers, engineers on steamers, engine drivers and guards on railway trains.

Crossing the Kasai territory I met an American Bishop, who had also travelled not a few thousand miles in Central Africa, and this charming old Divine could not cease exclaiming, “Well, the way you English are covering this continent with educated native carpenters, bricklayers and engineers is just marvellous.” Go where you will, you meet these men. In the upland cocoa roças of San Thomé, in the workshops of German Cameroons, in the trading factories of almost every island, you will always find the Accra or Sierra Leone trader and mechanic who has received a fairly liberal general education at the mission schools. A thousand miles north in the Congo, away south towards Rhodesia, you will hear frequently the welcome salutation, “How do you do, sir!” Welcome then indeed is the claim to one Throne one Empire; more welcome still is the kindly assistance with baggage, the clean hut, the generous gifts of fruit and provisions.

“May I pay you for your kindness?”

“No, sir, I am too glad to see you. God bless you, sir. Goodbye.”

The traveller thus refreshed goes on his way and vows that when he gets home he will send a subscription to those missionary societies who are sending forth this stream of men to the distant parts of the dark continent.

The principal openings for the sons of native chiefs are the medical and legal professions. First let it be remembered that the enlightened chiefs fortunately saw that by giving the flower of the race scientific European education the power of the witch doctor, who, throughout African history has been both medical and legal quack, would be broken. Not only so, but the sick and afflicted among the race would receive the best alleviation that science could provide.