Settlement of Sinoe--Account of a murder by the natives--Arrival at
Monrovia--Appearance of the town--Temperance--Law-suits and
Pleadings--Expedition up the St. Paul's river--Remarks on the cultivation
of sugar--Prospects of the coffee-culture in Liberia--Desultory
observations on agriculture.
_October_ 22.--At Sinoe. Mr. Morris, the principal man of the settlement,
came on board, in order to take passage with us to Monrovia. He informs us
that there are but seventy-two colonists here at present, but that nearly
a hundred are daily expected. Such an accession of strength is much needed
for the natives in the vicinity are powerful, and not very friendly, and
the colony is too weak to chastise them. Our appearance has caused them
some alarm. This is the place where the mate of an American vessel was
harpooned, some months since, by the Fishmen. We shall hold a palaver
about it, when the Commodore joins us.
We left Sinoe at 7 o'clock, P.M.
23. Mr. Morris has been narrating the circumstances of the murder of the
American mate, at Sinoe, in reference to which we are to "set a palaver."
"Palaver," by-the-by, is probably a corruption of the Portuguese word,
"Palabra." As used by the natives, it has many significations, among which
is that of an open quarrel. To "set a palaver," is to bring it to a final
issue, either by talking or fighting.
The story of the murder is as follows. A Fishman agreed to go down the
coast with Captain Burke, who paid him his wages in advance; on receiving
which, the fellow jumped overboard, and escaped. The captain then refused
to pay the sums due to two members of the same tribe, unless the first
should refund the money. Finding the threat insufficient, he endeavored to
entice these two natives on board his vessel, by promises of payment, but
ineffectually. Meanwhile, the mate going ashore with a colonist, his boat
was detained by the natives, during the night, but given up the next
morning, at the intercession of the inhabitants. The mate returned on
board, in a violent rage, and sent a sailor to catch a Fishman, on whom to
take vengeance. But the man caught a Tartar, and was himself taken ashore
as prisoner. The mate and cook then went out in a boat, and were attacked
by a war-canoe, the men in which harpooned the cook, and stripping the
mate naked, threw him overboard. They beat the poor fellow off, as he
attempted to seize hold of the canoe, and, after torturing him for some
time, at length harpooned him in the back. Captain Burke, having but one
man and two passengers left, made sail, and got away as fast as possible.
23.--Arrived at Monrovia, where we find the Porpoise, with six native
prisoners on board, who were taken at Berebee, as being concerned in the
murder of Captain Farwell and his crew, two years ago. To accomplish their
capture, the Porpoise was disguised as a barque, with only four or five
men visible on deck, and these in Scotch caps and red shirts, so as to
resemble the crew of a merchant-vessel. The first canoe approached, and
Prince Jumbo stepped boldly up the brig's side, but started back into his
boat, the moment that he saw the guns and martial equipment on deck. The
Kroomen of the Porpoise, however, jumped into the water and upset the
canoe, making prisoners of the four natives whom it contained. Six or
eight miles further along the coast, the brig being under sail, another
canoe came off with two natives, who were likewise secured. The Kroomen
begged to be allowed to kill the prisoners, as they were of a hostile
tribe.
28.--Leaving the ship in one of our boats, pulled by Kroomen, we crossed
the bar at the mouth of the Mesurado, and in ten minutes afterwards, were
alongside of the colonial wharf. Half-a-dozen young natives and colonists
issued from a small house to watch our landing; but their curiosity was
less intrusive and annoying, than would have been that of the same number
of New-York boys, at the landing of a foreign man-of-war's boat. On our
part, we looked around us with the interest which even common-place
objects possess for those, whose daily spectacle is nothing more varied
than the sea and sky. Even the most ordinary shore-scenery becomes
captivating, after a week or two on shipboard. Two colonists were sawing
plank in the shade of the large stone store-house of the colony. Ascending
the hill, we passed the printing-office of the Liberia Herald, where two
workmen were printing the colonial laws. The publication of the newspaper
had been suspended for nearly three months, to enable them to accomplish
work of more pressing importance. Proceeding onward, we came to the
Governor's house, and were received with that gentleman's usual courtesy.
The house is well furnished, and arranged for a hot climate; it is
situated near the highest point of the principal street, and commands from
its piazza a view of most of the edifices in Monrovia town.
The fort is on the highest ground in the village, one hundred feet above
the sea; it is of stone, triangular in shape, and has a good deal the
appearance of an American pound for cattle, but is substantial, and
adequate for its intended purposes. From this point, the street descends
in both directions. About fifty houses are in view. First, the Government
House, opposite to which stand the neat dwellings of Judge Benedict and
Doctor Day. Further on, you perceive the largest house in the village,
erected by Rev. Mr. Williams, of the Methodist mission. On the right is a
one-story brick house, and two or three wooden ones. A large stone
edifice, intended for a Court-House and Legislative Hall, has recently
been completed. The street itself is wide enough for a spacious pasture,
and affords abundance of luxuriant grass, through which run two or three
well-trodden foot-paths. Apart from the village, on the Cape, we discerned
the light-house, the base of which is about two hundred feet above the
sea.
We dined to-day at the New Hotel. The dinner was ill-cooked (an
unpardonable fault at Monrovia, where good cooks, formerly in the service
of our southern planters, might be supposed to abound), and not served up
in proper style. But there was abundance to eat and drink. Though the
keeper of the house is a clergyman and a temperance-man, ale, porter,
wine, and cherry-brandy, are to be had at fair prices. Three years ago, a
tavern was kept here in Monrovia by a Mr. Cooper, whose handbill set
forth, that "nothing was more repugnant to his feelings than to sell
ardent spirits"--but added--"if gentlemen _will_ have them, the following
is the price." Of course, after such a salvo, Mr. Cooper pocketed the
profits of his liquor-trade with a quiet conscience. He used to tell me
that a little brandy was good for the "suggestion;" but I fear that he
made, in his own person, too large a demand upon its suggestive
properties; for his house is now untenanted and ruinous, and he himself
has carried his tender conscience to another settlement.
30.--Went ashore in the second cutter. The Kroomen managed her so
bunglingly, that, on striking the beach, she swung broadside to the sea.
In this position, a wave rolled into her, half-filled the boat, and
drenched us from head to foot. Apprehending that she would roll over upon
us, and break our limbs or backs, we jumped into the water, and waded
ashore.
While in the village, I visited the Court House, to hear the trial of a
cause involving an amount of eight hundred dollars. Governor Roberts acted
as judge, and displayed a great deal of dignity in presiding, and much
wisdom and good sense in his decision. This is the highest court of the
Colony. There are no regularly educated lawyers in Liberia, devoting
themselves exclusively to the profession; but the pleading seems to be
done principally by the medical faculty. Two Doctors were of counsel in
the case alluded to, and talked of Coke, Blackstone, and Kent, as
learnedly as if it had been the business of their lives to unravel legal
mysteries. The pleadings were simple, and the arguments brief, for the
judge kept them strictly to the point. An action for slander was
afterwards tried, in which the damages were laid at one hundred dollars.
One of the medico-jurisconsults opened the cause with an appeal to the
feelings, and wrought his own sensibilities to such a pitch as to declare,
that, though his client asked only for one hundred dollars, he considered
the jury bound in conscience to give him two. The Doctor afterwards told
me that he had walked eighty miles to act as counsel in this court. A
tailor argued stoutly for the defendant, but with little success; his
client was fined twenty dollars.
On our return, a companion and myself took passage for the ship in a
native canoe. These little vessels are scooped out of a log, and are of
even less size and capacity than the birch-canoes of our Indians, and so
light that two men, using each a single hand, may easily carry them from
place to place. Our weight caused the frail bark to sit so deep in the
water, that, before reaching the ship, we underwent another drenching.
Three changes of linen in one day are altogether too expensive and
troublesome.
_November_ 1.--Went up the St. Paul's river on a pleasure excursion, with
the Governor, and several men of lesser note. We touched at the public
farm, and found only a single man in charge. The sugar-cane was small in
size, was ill-weeded, and, to my eye, did not appear flourishing. The land
is apparently good and suitable, but labor is deficient, and my
impressions were not favorable in regard to the manner of cultivation. The
mill was exposed to the atmosphere, and the kettles were full of foul
water. We landed likewise at New Georgia, a settlement of recaptured
Africans. There was here a pretty good appearance, both of people and
farms. We called also at Caldwell, a rich tract of level land, of which a
space of about two miles is cultivated by comfortable and happy-looking
colonists. A very pleasant dinner was furnished by the Governor at what
was once a great slave station, and the proprietor of which is still
hostile to the colonists, and to both English and Americans, for breaking
up the trade. We saw several alligators. One of them, about three feet in
length, lay on a log, with his mouth wide open, catching flies.
From the whole course of my observation, I cannot but feel satisfied that
the colonists are better off here than in America. They are more
independent, as healthy, and much happier. Agriculture will doubtless be
their chief employment, but, for years to come, the cultivation of sugar
cane cannot be carried to any considerable extent. There are many calls
upon the resources of the Colonization Society and the inhabitants, more
pressing, and which promise a readier and greater return. A large capital
should be invested in the business, in order to render it profitable. The
want of a steam-mill, to grind the cane, has been severely felt. Ignorance
of the most appropriate soil, and of the most productive kind of cane, and
the best methods of planting and grinding it, have likewise contributed to
retard the cultivation of sugar. But the grand difficulty is the want of a
ready capital, and the high price of labor. The present wages of labor are
from sixty to seventy-five cents per day. The natives refuse to work among
the canes, on account of the prickly nature of the leaves, and the
irritating property of a gum that exudes from them. Yet it may be doubted
whether the colony will ever make sugar to any important extent, unless
some method be found to apply native labor to that purpose. Private
enterprise is no more successful than the public efforts. A plantation has
been commenced at Millsburg, and prosecuted with great diligence, but with
no auspicious results. Sugar has been made, indeed, but at a cost of three
times as much, per pound, as would have purchased it.
Hitherto, the plantations of Coffee trees have not succeeded well. Coffee,
it is true, is sometimes exported from Liberia; and doubtless the friends
of Colonization drink it with great gusto, as an earnest of the progress
of their philanthropic work. The cup, however, will be less grateful to
their taste, when they learn that nearly all this coffee is procured at
the islands of St. Thomas and St. Prince's, in the Bight of Benin, and
entered as the produce of Liberia, _ad captandum_. The same game has been
played in England, by entering their coffee as from Sierra Leone or
Gambia, to entitle it to the benefit of the lower duties on colonial
produce. But the English custom-house officers are now aware of the
deception, and the business is abandoned.
The mode of forming a coffee-plantation is simply to go into the woods
(where the tree abounds), select the wild coffee tree, and transport it
into the prepared field. The indigenous coffee-tree of Liberia produces
fruit of a superior quality, larger and finer flavored, than that of the
West Indies. But the cultivation, I think, is conducted upon wrong
principles. Instead of having large plantations, with no other vegetables
on the land, let every man intermingle a few coffee trees with the corn,
cassada, and other vegetables in his garden or fields. These few trees,
having the benefit of the hoeing and manuring bestowed on the other crops,
will produce much more abundantly and with less trouble, than by separate
culture. In fact, after setting out the trees, there will be no trouble,
except that of gathering and preparing the berries for market. In this
burning climate, the shade afforded by the tree will be beneficial to most
vegetables.
The want of success, hitherto, in the cultivation of coffee, has been
attributed by some to the custom of transplanting the trees from the
forest, instead of raising them from seed. The colonial Secretary is now
making trial of the latter method. He has several thousand young trees in
his nursery, and will soon be able to test the comparative efficiency of
the different systems. Not improbably, the cultivation of seedlings may be
found preferable to that of transplanted trees; but, in my opinion, the
great obstacle to success has been the deficiency of care and proper
manuring. In order to bear well, trees require to have the ground
enriched, and kept free from weeds. Failing this, the plant often dies,
and never flourishes so well as in its native woods. The inhabitants of
Liberia have not the means of bestowing the requisite care upon the
cultivation of coffee, on an extended scale; and I say boldly, that large
plantations, in that region, cannot compete with those of Brazil and the
West Indies, where the plantations are well-stocked, and cultivated by
slave-labor. Free labor in Africa will not soon be so cheap as that of
slaves in other countries. Even in Cuba, the planters can barely feed
themselves and their slaves, by the culture of coffee. How, then, can it
be made profitable in Liberia, where labor commands so high a price, and
is often impossible to be procured?
As incidental, however, to other branches of agriculture, coffee may be
advantageously raised. The best trees are those seen in gardens, where,
from ten or twelve, more berries are gathered than from hundreds in a
plantation. A single tree, in the garden of Colonel Hicks, is said to have
produced sixteen pounds at a gathering; and I have seen several very fine
trees in similar situations. Fifty or a hundred trees, well selected, and
properly distributed through the fields, would yield several hundred
pounds of coffee, which, being gathered and dried by the women and
children, would be gratuitous as regards the cost of labor. Thus, the
coffee culture, in Liberia, must be considered far more eligible than that
of sugar; inasmuch as the latter requires a large capital and extensive
operations, while the former succeeds best on a very moderate scale.
Judge Benedict has probably bestowed more attention on this business, than
any other person in Liberia. He is a man of excellent sense and
information, and has the means to carry out his views, as well as the
patriotism to exert himself for the advantage of the commonwealth. With
these qualifications, he has employed five or six years in the experiment
of raising coffee, and thus far, with little success, although his
plantation comprises some thousands of growing trees. In the spring of
1841, he made presents, to myself and other officers, of genuine Liberian
coffee, in small native bags, containing two or three pounds each. The
Judge is still giving away little bags of the same kind; but I do not yet
learn that his crop is more than sufficient for his own use, and for
distribution as specimens; certainly, it is not so abundant as to render
the sale of it an object. As for the plantation itself, I must confess
that it appeared to me more flourishing three years ago, than at present.
Most of the trees, on the spot originally planted, are dead, and the rest
in a sickly condition; while the most thriving trees are to be seen on the
lower and damper land adjacent, which, at my former visit, was covered
with a dense forest. Beyond a doubt, the coffee tree is as well adapted to
this soil and climate as to those of Cuba, and produces a larger and
better flavored berry; but I repeat my opinion, that the Liberian, hiring
laborers at sixty cents a day, cannot compete with the West Indian, who
has his hundreds of slaves already paid for, and his trees growing in
well-weeded land. The mere feeding, I might almost say, of a dozen
laborers in Liberia, will cost more than all the coffee they raise would
re-imburse, at the Cuba prices.
The cultivation of rice is universal in Africa. The natives never neglect
it, for fear of famine. For an upland crop, the rice-lands are turned over
and planted in March and April. In September and October, the rice is
reaped, beaten out, and cleaned for market or storing. The lowland crop,
on the contrary, is planted in September, October, and November, in marshy
lands, and harvested in March and April. Lands will not produce two
successive crops without manuring and ploughing. About two bushels of seed
are sown to the acre; and the crop, on the acre of upland, is about thirty
bushels, and from forty to forty-five bushels on the lowlands. The rice is
transported to market on the backs of natives, packed in bundles of about
three feet long and nine inches in diameter. The wrappers are made of
large leaves, bound together by cords of bark. The load is sustained by
shoulder-straps, and by a band, passing round the forehead of the bearer.
Cassada is a kind of yam, and sends up a tall stalk, with light green
leaves. It has a long root, looking like a piece of wood with the brown
bark on; the interior is white and mealy, rather insipid, but nutritious,
and invaluable as an article of food. It is raised from the seed, root, or
stem; the latter being considered preferable. Its yield is very great. In
six months, it is fit to dig, and may be preserved fifteen or eighteen
months in the ground, but ceases to be eatable in three or four days after
being dug. Tapioca is manufactured from this root.
Indian corn is planted in May and harvested in September; or, if planted
in July, it ripens in November and December. Sweet potatoes constitute one
of the main reliances of the colonists; they are raised from seeds, roots
or vines, but most successfully from the latter. The season of planting is
in May, or June, and the crop ripens four months later. Plantains and
bananas are a valuable product; they are propagated from suckers, which
yield a first crop in about a year. The top is cut down, and new stalks
spring from the root. Ground nuts are the same article peddled by the old
women at our street-corners, under the name of pea-nuts; so called from
the close resemblance of the bush to the tops of the sweet pea. This nut
is used in England for making oil. The Cocoa is a bulbous root of the size
of a tea-cup, and has some similarity to the artichoke. Pine-apples,
small, but finely flavored, grow wild in the woods, and are abundant in
their season.
In concluding these very imperfect and miscellaneous observations on the
agriculture and products of Liberia, it may be remarked that the farmer's
life and modes of labor are different from those of the same class, in
other countries; inasmuch as there is here no spring, autumn, or winter.
The year is a perpetual summer; therein, if in nothing else, resembling
the climate of the original Paradise, to which men of all colors look back
as the birth-place of their species. The culture of the soil appears to be
emphatically the proper occupation of the Liberians. Many persons have
anticipated making money more easily by trade; but, being unaccustomed to
commercial pursuits, and possessing but little capital, by far the greater
number soon find themselves bankrupt, and burthened with debt. With these
evidences of the inequality, on their part, of competition with vessels
trading on the coast, and with the established traders of the colony, the
inhabitants are now turning their attention more exclusively to
agriculture.