JOHN BULL IN EAST AFRICA
I have just had a long talk with Mr. Frederick J. Jackson, the acting
governor and commander-in-chief of this big territory which John Bull
owns in the heart of East Africa. Mr. Jackson came out here to hunt big
game years ago, and he has been on the ground from that time to this. He
has long been employed by the British Government in the administration
of Uganda and of the protectorate of East Africa, and he is now
lieutenant-governor in the absence of Colonel Sadler, the acting governor
of the country.
Let me give you some idea of this vast region which the British are
opening up in the midst of the black continent. This country altogether
is larger than the combined states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and
Wisconsin. It has a population of four million natives, most of whom not
so long ago were warring with one another. Some of the tribes made their
living by preying upon their neighbours. Slavery was everywhere common,
and one of the great slave routes to the coast was not far from the line
where the Uganda railway now runs. To-day all these evils have been done
away with. The warlike tribes have been conquered, and are turning their
attention to stock raising and farming. Slavery has been practically
abolished, and peace prevails everywhere. The whole country is now kept
in good order by only about eighteen hundred police and less than two
thousand English and East Indian soldiers. A large part of the region
along the line of the railroad has been divided into ranches and farms.
Small towns are springing up here and there, and in time the greater part
of the plateau will be settled.
There is no doubt that white men can live here. The children I see are
rosy with health, and the farmers claim that, with care, they are as
well as they were when back home in England. There are some Europeans
here who have had their homes on the highlands for over twelve years,
and they report that the climate is healthful and invigorating. They are
able to work out of doors from six until ten o’clock in the morning and
from three to six o’clock in the afternoon, and during a part of the year
all the day through. As a rule, however, the sun is so hot at midday
that one should not go out unless his head is well protected. The heat
here is dry. The nights are usually so cool that a blanket is needed.
Notwithstanding the fact that we are almost on the Equator, at any
altitude above eight thousand feet ice may be found in the early morning.
Nearer the coast the land drops and the climate is tropical. For two
hundred miles back from the Indian Ocean there are practically no white
settlers, except at Mombasa, for it is only on this high plateau that
they are as yet attempting to live.
But let me continue my description in the words of the man who governs
the country. My conversation took place in a long, blue, iron-roofed
building known as the Commissioner’s office, situated on the hill above
Nairobi. I had asked as to the colony’s future. Mr. Jackson replied:
“It is all problematical. We have an enormous territory and millions of
people. We have not yet prospected the country, nor have we dealt long
enough with the natives to know what we can do with the people. We have
really no idea as yet as to just what our resources are, or the labour we
can secure to exploit them.”
[Illustration: Not long ago the great plateau of Kenya Colony was
inaccessible and unknown and its four million blacks were in continual
war with one another. Now, besides the railway, it is being opened up
with roads permitting the use of motor transport.]
[Illustration: Each group of huts is usually surrounded by a thatched
wall, making an inclosure into which cattle, sheep, and goats are driven
at night. Some of the tribes are practically vegetarians, living mostly
on corn, beans, sweet potatoes, millet, and milk.]
“How many inhabitants have you?”
“We do not know. We can get some idea from the taxes, for most of the
provinces have to pay so much per hut. In other places the natives have
hardly been subdued, and of no province have we an accurate census. The
number has been estimated at from two to four millions, but I believe it
is nearer five millions, and possibly more.”
“How about your white settlers? Will this country ever be inhabited by
Caucasians?”
“That, again, is difficult to say,” replied the conservative governor.
“We have a few European settlers already, but whether we can make this
colony a second South Africa remains to be seen. I have lived here for
over twenty years, and I am not sure as to how much hard manual labour
any white man can do in this latitude. It is true we are more than a mile
above the sea, but nevertheless we are on the Equator, and the climate on
the Equator is not suited to the white man. The only Europeans who will
succeed here will be those who bring some money with them, and who will
use the native labour in their work. I don’t think any settler should
come to East Africa without as much as three thousand dollars, reckoning
the amount in your money. He should have enough to buy his land, stock
it, build his house, and then have something to go on. He should not
start out with a very small tract. Much of the grazing land is now being
divided up into tracts of five thousand acres. If a man takes the first
thousand and pays for it, the other four thousand are held for him
subject to certain improvements and developments upon the first thousand.
After these are completed he may buy the remaining tract at the price of
the first thousand acres.”
“I understand much of your land is being taken up in large holdings.”
“That is so to a certain extent,” replied Mr. Jackson, “but we are now
discouraging such allotments, and would rather have the land apportioned
in tracts of from six hundred and forty acres to about five thousand
acres each. If the land is for grazing the larger area is desirable.
If it is for grain farming or dairying, it is better that it should be
small. As to our large landholders, the British East African Company owns
about five hundred square miles, Lord Delamere has about one hundred
thousand acres, and Lord Hindlip a little less. There are a number of
settlers who have twenty thousand acres or more.”
“How about your ranching possibilities? I understand that your stock
growers expect to found a great meat industry here which will crowd our
Chicago packers out of the markets of England.”
“I do not think there is room for alarm about that matter as yet,”
replied the official. “This country is just in the making, and we know
practically nothing about it. We realize that we have some of the richest
grasses of the world—grasses which have supported vast herds of game, and
upon which cattle, sheep, goats, and hogs will thrive. But we do not know
whether we can conquer the diseases and insect pests which attack all the
animals we have so far imported. We seem to have every disease to which
cows, horses, or sheep are subject in other parts of the world, and I
believe we have some peculiarly our own. We have ticks by the millions
and flies by the myriads. So far, however, our experiments with cattle
are turning out well, and we know that we can produce excellent beef and
good butter. We hope to find our first market for our meats and dairy
products in South Africa, and later on to ship such things to Europe.
The creation of an industry of that kind, though, is a matter of gradual
development. We shall have to arrange about proper transportation, which
means cold-storage cars and cold-storage ships. We have not gone far
enough as yet to be able to predict what we can do.”
“What other possibilities have you?” I asked.
“I think we may eventually be able to raise coffee, and we are already
exploiting certain fibres which grow well between here and the coast. The
plant which produces the Sansivera fibre is indigenous to this country
and is being exploited by Americans who are working not far from the
station of Voi, about one hundred miles from the Indian Ocean. I have no
doubt we can raise sisal hemp, and know that we can grow ramie without
cultivation.
“As to minerals, a great deal of prospecting has already been done,
but the results have not been satisfactory. We know that we have gold,
silver, and copper, but the deposits so far discovered have not been
valuable enough to pay for their mining. This whole country is volcanic.
We lie here in a basin surrounded by volcanoes. We have Mt. Kenya on the
north, Kilimanjaro on the south, and Mt. Elgon away off to the northwest.
The eruptions of these mountains have been so comparatively recent that
some believe that they have buried the precious metals so deep down in
the earth that we shall never get at them.”
“How about your timber?”
“We have fine forests, containing both hard and soft woods, among them
a great deal of cedar such as is used for making cigar boxes and lead
pencils. Most of such wood, however, is inland and at long distance from
streams upon which it could be floated down to the sea. At present, our
timber resources are practically inaccessible by railroad.”
Speaking of the possibilities of this East African colony, it may be one
of the coffee lands of the future. Several plantations which have been
set out not far from here are doing well. There is one coffee estate
within five miles of Nairobi which belongs to the Catholic Mission of the
Holy Ghost. Yesterday I rode out on horseback over the prairie to have
a look at it. The way to the estate is through fenced fields, which are
spotted here and there with the sheet-iron cottages of English settlers.
As I rode on I saw many humped cattle grazing in the pastures. The
grass is everywhere tall and thick, and the red soil, although not much
cultivated as yet, seems rich.
Arriving at the plantation, I was met by Father Tom Burke and walked
with him through his coffee plantation. It covers something like fifteen
acres, and has now more than eight thousand trees in full bearing. The
yield is so good that the plantation is supplying not only the town of
Nairobi with all the coffee it needs, but is shipping several tons every
year to Europe. Father Burke tells me that the coffee trees begin to bear
at a year and a half, and that they are in full bearing within about four
years. As the ripening season is long, the berries have to be picked
many times. I saw blossoms and green and ripe berries on the same tree.
In one place the natives were picking, at another they were hoeing the
plants, while in a third place they were pulping the berries in a pulper
turned by hand. The trees seem thrifty. Father Burke says that the young
plants grow easily, and that where the birds carry the berries away
and drop the seeds the plants will sprout up of themselves. There is a
plantation near by of thirty thousand trees, and I am told that there is
a fair prospect of a considerable coffee industry springing up.
[Illustration: Contact with the white man’s institutions of work, wages,
and money usually leads to an interest in clothing. The demand from East
Africa will some day add millions of yards of cotton cloth to the output
of American mills.]
[Illustration: The Kikuyus are highlanders and number more than a
million. The men coat their bodies and fill their hair with rancid fat
and coloured clay, giving themselves a weird appearance and a worse
smell.]
[Illustration: Cattle are the wealth of such tribes as the Masai, who own
great numbers of them. The young men especially covet them, for cattle
buy them brides. Sometimes the horns measure fifty-four inches from tip
to tip.]
I saw many Negroes at work in the fields. They were Kikuyus, and were
really fine-looking fellows. They were clearing up new ground, chopping
down the weeds with mattocks, and digging up the soil and turning it
over. The sweat stood in beads upon their brows and backs and ran down
their bare legs. I asked the priest what wages they got, and was told
that they each received the equivalent of about five cents for a day of
ten hours. I suggested to the reverend father that the pay was small, but
he said that the natives could not earn more than that sum and even at
those wages it was difficult to keep them at work.
I hear this same statement made everywhere. The English people here think
that the native Africans are well enough paid at the rate of a half cent
per hour or of a rupee per month. If you protest they will say that that
sum is sufficient to supply all the wants of a black man and ask why he
should be paid more. Think of it, ye American toilers who belong to our
labour unions. Think of five cents a day for carrying bricks or stone,
for chopping up ground under the eyes of a taskmaster, or for trotting
along through the grass, hour after hour, with a load of sixty pounds on
your head! Think of it, and you may get an idea of how the English white
man here is carrying the black man’s burden! Indeed, as the Frenchman
says, “it is to laugh!”