Returning to Mr. Wike’s house, we were shown a small collection of

industrial specimens prepared by the Commercial Association of Abeokuta

for the Great Exhibition of 1862. There was some poor líf, or palm-tree

fibre, used as a sponge throughout Africa; specimens of the silk-cotton

from the bombax; and _someye_, or native silk produced by a worm that

feeds upon a fig-leaf. This article may some day become valuable. Beans

were in great abundance, of several varieties—purple, the common kind,

red-peckled, yellow (_Calavances_), white haricots, black, pink, whity-

brown, and some large red, like our kidney-beans. I recognized, for the

first time, the Njugu ya mawe (_Voiandzeia subterranea_) of East Africa,

which is there regarded as the tiger-nut of the western regions. Besides

which there was a soft, useful chalk dug up near the town, and farm-

grown piper cubebs, whose oil, like that of the ricinus, when not

rancid, is much prized for sauces. I defer an account of the cotton to a

future page.

At 11·15 A.M. we were again summoned to the palace, and, entering, we

found all _in statu quo ante_, except that there was a greater gathering

than before, and that the curtains relieving the majestic form of his

Majesty were a fine green velvet and a striped silk. He receives, it is

said, unofficial visitors far less formally, and the cooking in his

verandah is not interrupted. The same old deal table and native body-

cloth, the same jugs and basins, glasses and case-bottles, stood before

the presence, and he was fanned by a young wife, who, perceiving the

admiration excited by _ses appas_, veiled her bosom with a bit of

velvet. Behind me sat a handsome young Alufa,[151] or Moslem, who told

me that he was an Arab, born at Burnu: he certainly spoke the purest

Semitic. ‘And how about the Jihad?’ I inquired, in his vernacular. ‘Give

those guns and powder to us,’ he replied, with a gleaming eye, ‘and we

will soon Islamize these dogs!’ The Alake grunted out that he did not

understand ‘dat mouf,’ and a sign to the Alufa caused him to rise and

depart.

Commander Bedingfield opened the palaver by asking explanations

concerning our being sent back from the ‘palace.’ Fault was thrown upon

Beri, the M.C., and we had the grace to accept this apology for a

designed impertinence. This time it was business ‘and no mistake.’ The

Akpesi of Eruwan was the king’s orator, and he spoke well, dividing his

speech topically, touching upon all the interesting heads, quoting

proverbs, monopolizing attention like a diner-out, and exciting us

against his enemies. He began by saying, after the usual compliments—the

Arabic _afiyah_, health, was repeatedly used, and the reply was _amin_,

or amen—that he must be allowed to give us a detailed account of the

events that had lately happened. On our consenting, he commenced a good

two hours’ speech, talking ten minutes at a time, and then resting

whilst his words were interpreted to us by Lagos Williams, who, assuming

all the tone of a Methodist preacher, spun out his words to the finest

length, lest his African brethren might suspect him of ‘skipping’ or

‘fudging.’ The assembly was hushed, except when some chief vociferated

‘silence!’ or some sycophant drawled out ‘don’t die!’ The ‘mad dogs of

Ibadan,’ we were told, had repeatedly rejected the king’s messengers,

had bought ammunition at Lagos, had declared their intention of first

shaving the forehead, then the back of the head, _i.e._, of destroying,

as a preliminary, Ijaye, their neighbour, and afterwards Abeokuta; and

they had threatened, in case of interference, to blacken every

Englishman’s face as cloth is dyed with indigo. ‘These,’ he said,

pointing to six seniors squatting in the opposite verandah, three brown

as Mulattos, and all the half-dozen naked to the waist, with the various

appurtenances of chiefdom—cowrie-bags, chauris, gun-barrel walking-

sticks, and huge broad-brimmed beavers, trimmed with half a foot of

faded gilt lace—‘these are the kings of cities which have fallen into

the hands of the Yorubas,[152] and which we will recover before we

rest.’ He scouted the report that the people of Ijaye had been sold off

by their allies, the Egbas; the cry had been raised at Lagos by the

Yorubas to excite the English against innocent Abeokuta; and in disproof

of it he pointed in the direction where four men’s heads had been taken

off for kidnapping. He explained the notorious disappearance of the

Ijayans by the fact that the Are, their king, had made sale the penalty

of _fainéance_ in war, and that the people, pressed by hunger, had been

compelled to dispose of their slaves and children, their wives, and even

themselves, for two bags, or about one pound sixteen shillings each. All

of which was plausible, but not true. He then slipped into another

subject, declared that Mr. Sam. Crowther, jun., should never again enter

the gates of Abeokuta, protesting, as the cause of the people’s wrath,

that Europeanized Egba’s spite against the Rev. Mr. Townsend, an

excellent man, ever their friend, who kept five hundred kegs of powder

ready for the defence of their city. Waxing aggrieved, he entered into a

complaint touching the conduct of the acting governor of Lagos, who had

written insulting letters to them, and the late Captain Jones, who,

bribed with four hundred bags by the Ibadans, had not only broken his

promise to bring up from Lagos, for the purpose of drilling the

Abeokutans, a detachment of ten men from the West India regiment, but

had also attempted to visit their very enemy—that scum of the

country—who was sworn to dye white men black, as with indigo. He

concluded with the apposite remark that all of public had now been said,

and that what remained must be spoken in private. This was the gist of

an harangue which did not cease till men began to yawn; many followed

the example of the farmer-king and snored, a few rose to depart, and all

appeared to be tired. Even the palaver soon wearies the cobweb brains of

these Africans.

Commander Bedingfield saw his opportunity, and sensibly declared that as

they had had their say he also must have his. As regards the war with

Ibadan, it was their own affair, their loss and not ours; we wanted not

Abeokuta, but peace and plenty of cotton; and although we might aid her

in defence, we should never abet her in offensive war. With respect to

the man Crowther, he also was entitled to a fair hearing; and although

the Alake had a right to banish a foreigner offending against the laws

of the land, still allegations against a British subject holding

property in the place should be substantiated before being acted upon.

Captain Jones’s letter to government—it had, by its entire truth, given

great offence at Abeokuta to white men as well as to black—might contain

a few expressions better omitted, still excusable in so young an

officer; but no one wearing her Majesty’s uniform was capable of

receiving a bribe (as this was stated with indignation, the Akpesi rose

and explained that the bribe had been given by the Ibadans to the

Ijebus). Moreover, it is an European practice for a non-combatant to

visit both armies in the field. An allusion was then made to a human

sacrifice, whose object was good fortune in war against the enemy,

offered up, on the 12th October, 1861, outside the Ijaye gate, with the

permission of the Egbas, by the people of Ikesi and Ife, the town

destroyed, it is said, by the Ibadans four or five years ago. An Ibadan

prisoner, who had long been in chains, of which he showed marks, was led

out, loaded with cowries, and made contented with rum; a crowd collected

round him, sending messages to their departed friends, and begging the

victim to remember their wants, children for the women and wives for the

bachelors. The captive, at first, made some objections, but presently

became in excellent humour, and sang his epicedium with a will. Mr.

Stone, an American Baptist missionary, had heard what was to take place,

but did not arrive in time. The man was duly decapitated, and the usual

ceremonies followed the death, such as entreating the ghost not to be

wrath with, or to haunt his slayers. This was the tale palmed upon us:

it was a systematic falsehood. The Alake had become possessor of an Ife

idol,[153] and the chiefs had told him that a man should be offered to

it for peace. The job was given to the Ife people because the idol was

from their country, and the rite was performed outside the gate to throw

dust in European eyes. ‘The captain’ reprobated all such proceedings,

and concluded by informing the Alake that H.E. the acting governor of

Lagos, who had offended them, had done so under orders, and that, as he

was acknowledged by the home authorities, he must be treated with

respect. Whereupon a form of written apology was passed to Mr. King, a

coloured missionary sitting hard by.

But kidnapping and human sacrifice are still sore subjects with the West

African. Presently we had a scene. The old Alake had ceased to doze, and

gradually his one eye lighted up, he forgot to fan his under-arms, to

swab his face, to snuff, and to drink. As he insisted upon breaking

silence, many chiefs, turbulent and unvenerative as Africans ever are,

left the assembly, audibly declaring that, as their king would speak,

they washed their hands of the consequences. His Majesty began by

telling us fiercely that he himself had written the letter to the acting

governor of Lagos without the knowledge of his councillors, and that

since the time of the Ado war, he had ever known him as a merchant and

as an enemy. He then entered upon the subject of the war, his voice

changed from a low sing-song recitative to a louder tone, he lashed

himself into a rage—the listeners half applauding—and finally he rose

upon his feet and bellowed like a rickety old bull. He was rather an

effective figure; a tall, large, aged man, amply clad—only his left eye,

the bright side, showing. He thumped his breast, and not being over-firm

upon his legs, he leaned back so much that his wives were compelled to

hold on his white-topped, blue-fringed, scarlet velvet cap. ‘Never,’ he

exclaimed with violence, ‘will my word be for peace as long as Ibadan

holds the graves of our fathers, our homes, and our ancestral farms!’

And he foamed at the mouth with the idea. Some of my companions thought

the display natural. I was too much at home with African customs—the

scene is by no means unfamiliar to Europe—to mistake the movement, but I

judged from it that our mediation would not be highly acceptable. At

last the Alake, who had gradually left his cage, sank back into it, the

curtain fell amidst shouts of applause, and the assembly—warned by the

cold gusts and the lively dust that a tornado was at hand—prepared to

break up. We drank a little peppermint, and as we were told that the

king would meet us outside, Mr. Eales and I left the palace. Commander

Bedingfield, however, more sensibly sent in a message that he must shake

hands with and be duly dismissed by the Alake, who, after some delay,

returned smiling in fresh clean robes, and hobnobbed with his

‘distinguished visitor.’

The palaver was well managed, and in one sense successful: it seemed to

promise an early, though not a satisfactory, adjustment of a very

complicated affair, which however was not fated to be. As the

explanation throws light upon the customs and politics of this part of

the world, I will enter upon it at some length.

The war between Abeokuta and Ibadan, which formed the subject of the

late palaver, began ‘twenty moons ago,’ _i.e._ in May, 1859, and in 1863

it is far from settled.[154] It is an old quarrel. As early as Richard

Lander’s day that mysterious race the Fulas[155] were driving the pure

Yorubas southwards, and they in their turn were ousting the Egbas. As

has been shown, the dispersion of the Egbas was mainly brought about by

the Ijebus and the Ibadans, who, being warlike and quasi-Moslems, took

possession of the rich farm lands north of comparatively barren

Abeokuta, and have now made them their own. There has long, therefore,

been bad blood. The origin of the last quarrel is stated to be that the

Ibadans slew the wealthy mother-in-law of Murummi, Are or chief of

Ijaye, who seized the murderers, and refused to give them up without

ransom. Whereupon Ibadan marched against Ijaye, and the latter threw

themselves into the arms of Abeokuta. On the other hand, it is generally

believed that the Ijebu Remo and Dahome, those ever-watchful enemies of

the Egbas, supported Ibadan. The quarrel has lately been complicated by

the threats of Dahome, who is preparing his sacrifices: the arrangements

usually begin in September and October, and the attack takes place in

December and January. To make matters worse, the Mohammedans of Ilori,

to the north of Ibadan, thinking, I suppose, that when Kafirs fall out

Moslems come in, have promised aid and comfort to Abeokuta. The war has

produced great scarcity, trebling the price of many articles in Yoruba,

besides causing a serious deficiency in palm-oil and other products. It

was generally supposed that both were weary of the affair, but that they

would not cease without the intervention of a third party. Further

experience, however, has proved the error of the supposition.

There was, moreover, a deeper cause of quarrel than old and obsolete

animosities, and this was carefully kept concealed. To an African power,

direct connection with the seaboard is a necessity. Dahome was unknown

in the last century until she had conquered and absorbed the maritime

kingdom of Whydah. The Ashanti wars in the earlier part of the present

century were waged against the Gold Coast races and ourselves with the

same object; and at the present moment there are actual hostilities for

the same end. The possession of a port gives two great advantages. The

first is a power of exportation and importation without paying the heavy

African transit dues. The second is the right to claim such transit dues

from neighbours and nations dwelling inland. The African ever aspires to

the condition of a middleman, when, Jew-like, he can live gratis and

labourless by the sweat of another’s brow. Such is the condition of the

whole of this coast, a broken line of broker settlements, some

numbering, like Grand Bonny, nine thousand souls, and such has from time

immemorial been the condition of the shores of Eastern Africa. Abeokuta

having obtained by means of the Ogun a direct communication with the

sea, is determined to charge a heavy transit duty upon the produce of

Ibadan and the inland kingdoms. And those who can find no other direct

road will fight till they can obtain access to the ocean. This greed of

gain—not the pious and patriotic aspiration to recover the lands of

their forefathers—has sustained the Abeokutans in a four years’ conflict

with the Ibadans.[156]

It remains to consider the causes of complaint brought by the Egbas

against the Crowthers and Captain Jones—they are as instructive as the

causes of the war. Mr. Sam. Crowther, like his brother Mr. Josiah, had

made himself wonderfully unpopular at Abeokuta. He had refused to pay

certain fines leviable on certain offences. His accusations against Mr.

Townsend were the _cheval de bataille_ of the Abeokutans. But as before,

so here, the true cause of complaint lay much deeper. Mr. Sam., like his

respected father who was proposed for a bishopric, had been witness to

and an active hand in promoting a treaty, upon which the Alake, his

chiefs, and his subjects, soon learned to look in its real light, and

were seized with violent indignation.

I quote this instructive instrument _in extenso_ below.[157] It speaks

for itself: it is sublime in its impudence. If carried out it would

create a system of _fueros_ more exceptional than any that Mexico has

yet seen: it would found an _imperium in imperio_, bringing into the

heart of the country a wholly irresponsible race. There is no possible

guarantee for Art. 3. Whence is ‘the intelligence’ to come, and what may

be its measure? Moreover, though signed by eight names, of whom half

died before the end of 1861, it was never submitted to the greater

chiefs and to the Ogboni lodges, or Upper and Lower Houses of the land,

and it degrades the people because it places their freedom in the bands

of a king and of a few chiefs. The reader has already seen that the

Alake of Abeokuta is no autocrat.

That needy and greedy coloured fugitives from the western world should

enter into such speculations is no wonder. That the late Sir Culling E.

Eardley, Bart., of Bedwell Park, should ‘heartily recommend’ the scheme

in a preface to Mr. Campbell’s _brochure_, and call upon Manchester to

second the movement, _is_, as I have already shown, the error of those

who make Africa a no-man’s land. Land quarrels caused the old Egba

troubles, and nothing but agrarian wars could result in the haven of

refuge opened to his brethren by the Pilgrim to his Motherland. What

would Sir Culling E. Eardley have replied to a deputation of gipsies,

who proposed to settle themselves as a free republic under the spare

shades of Bedwell Park? Yet that is what he advocates for Egba-

land.[158]

Meanwhile, the Alake and chiefs, far more acute than the English

philanthrope, declare that, whilst perfectly ready to admit settlers

subject to the British authorities at Lagos, and amenable to English

law, they will have nothing to do with these irresponsible adventurers,

who, in time, may become too strong for them. They have already tasted

the sweets of a negro immigration from Sierra Leone, and they are by no

means willing to see anything more of the Oibo dúdú, white-blacks, or

trouser-white-men, as they call their guests. They therefore adopt the

African, I may say the universal plan, of denying the transaction in

toto. The Alake was half asleep when he affixed his mark; moreover,

‘black and white’ does not bind firm and fast in these lands. The chiefs

assert with truth that they have no power to execute such instrument

without the full permission of the Ogboni lodges. The people declare

that they know nothing of the matter which most concerns them. And I

venture to opine that, as a mere act of justice, we should allow the

Egbas to do what they like with their own.

Mr. Consul Foote had applied for a detachment of two hundred soldiers of

the Second West India Regiment, to instruct the Egbas in military

matters. The idea was not brilliant. These negro troops naturally

despise ‘niggers,’ and are not willing to serve with them: the men,

however, were forwarded to Lagos, were kept there till they became

troublesome, and were sent back to head-quarters. Meanwhile, Capt. A. T.

Jones, of the same corps—the son of a well-known military name—was a

young officer of considerable talent and energy, of an ardent

temperament, strong in body, but unfortunately in ill-health. He was

directed to obtain ‘military information touching the resources of the

country, and the means the Abeokutans may have of carrying on offensive

war.’ Delayed by a fever caught on the Osa Lagoon during the affair at

Porto Novo, he left his detachment of ten men at Lagos, reached Abeokuta

on the 11th May, 1861, and was graciously received by the Alake. After

stating his object, he was forwarded to the seat of war with an escort

and introductions to the chiefs. On the 20th of May he arrived at

Okomeji, the camp of observation, distant thirty miles from Abeokuta,

and he visited its commander, the late Ogubonna, who, ten years before,

had repulsed the Dahoman attack. He then proceeded forty miles

northwards to Ijaye, and on the 22nd of May he started for the front.

The enemy, hearing from spies of the white man’s arrival, resolved to

waylay him: however, by hard riding, and by preceding his escort,

Captain Jones entered the Egba lines that same evening. On the next

day—operations were hurried by both parties, who were anxious for the

fetish of the white man’s presence—took place the battle of Ijaye.

Captain Jones placed himself near the first rank of the Abeokutan army,

about three hundred yards from the enemy, and watched the tactics of

both parties. He withdrew only when his interpreter was wounded in the

thigh by his side, a bullet grazed his own leg, and a third ball struck

the tree against which he was leaning, a few inches above his head. When

the action, which proved a drawn battle, ended, he retired to the Egba

lines, and returned to Abeokuta on the 31st of May.

The report written by Captain Jones, after his return to Lagos, caused

great umbrage at Abeokuta. The older missionaries were vexed to see the

place ‘shown up,’ and declared that it had been malignantly described.

The natives, influenced by one Turner, a coloured man, now living with

the King of Ijebu, were loud in their complaints. They declared that

Captain Jones had appeared their friend, that he had made all manner of

promises, and that he had deliberately broken them for the worst of

purposes—all of which was of course false. Perhaps he was a little hot

and hasty in his expressions touching the lukewarmness with which our

offer of auxiliaries was received, and the ‘scorn and indifference’

manifested by the Abeokutans in neglecting certain useless pieces of

artillery sent to them from England. But, on the whole, his report was

perfectly truthful, and redounded greatly to the credit of this young

and promising officer.

Captain Jones remained at Lagos for a few days, suffering from fever. He

then set out _viâ_ Ijebu for Ibadan, taking with him a servant, an

interpreter named Thomas, and a messenger or mihmandar from King Dosumo.

Falling ill on the way, he was advised to return, and at last he was

carried in a hammock from the landing-place at Ijini, twenty miles down

the Lagoon, to his canoe. The breeze being against him, he was delayed

there for some time, and he breathed his last—Europeans say from

congestion of the lungs, natives say from poison—on the Ikoradu Waters,

within sight of Lagos, 7th July, 1861.

Monday’s evening was as gloomy as its morning; the tornado, after

exhausting its electricity, poured down a slow, steady rain, which

effectually confined us to in-door amusements. The _séjour_ was becoming

_bien triste_. On Saturday the Ake converts and those of Abaka had a

prayer-meeting for general purposes, for the success of Commander

Bedingfield’s mission. Sunday was of course a ‘day of rest’ (7 A.M.,

native service and school; 10·30 A.M., English service, followed by

school; and 4·30 P.M., native service—such is ‘rest’). On Monday

afternoon there was a monthly prayer-meeting of all the churches and

chapels for the forwarding of peace—a custom, I believe, originating

with the Loodhianah Mission in Northern India; and on Tuesday, it being

the 5th of the month, there will be a gathering for the benefit of the

natives; ministers, schoolmasters, and native agents all meet, and the

converts are expected to attend. It is evident that the Abeokuta mission

cannot be accused of neglecting its duties.

[Footnote 149: The Jatawalla worships Shiva, and is so called from his

jata, or huge mop of hair, which he twists in the shape of a turban. I

have found the length, by careful measurement—passing my thumb-nail down

it to detect plaiting, if possible—six feet and upwards. If there be any

secret in this, what a fortune it would make, even compared with the

‘incomparable oil, Macassar!’]

[Footnote 150: The doors have distinct panels, upon which are seen a

leopard, a fish, a serpent, and a land tortoise. The horseman is also

common. Mr. Bowen remarks, that one of the carvings was ‘a female

figure, with one hand and one foot,’ probably a half Obatala, or the

female principle of Nature; ‘and the monster was remarkable for having a

queue of very long hair (which no negro can have), with a ball or globe

at the end.’ Opposite to this were the symbols of the Lampsacan god, or

rather the Yoni Lingam, in juxtaposition. I differ from Mr. Bowen in the

opinion that no negro can have long hair; the Fans of the Gaboon River,

to mention no other tribe, often wear it falling upon their shoulders.]

[Footnote 151: ‘Alpha’ is the usual English way of writing the word,

which I presume is a corruption of the Arabic Árif.]

[Footnote 152: Yoruba Proper, Ibadan, and Ilori, is here alluded to.]

[Footnote 153: The Rev. Mr. Crowther informs us that all kinds of idols

are to be had at Ife, and that celebrated gods are frequently purchased

there by the people of other tribes.]

[Footnote 154: The style of fighting will be described in a future

chapter.]

[Footnote 155: ‘Fula,’ a word said to signify brown or yellow, has been

traced back to the Psylli, or Psulloi, of the classical authors; and

others make them descendants of the shepherd kings. They are known by a

variety of names—Poul, Poulh, Peul, Pheul, Pholey, and Phoulah: in Hausa

and Yoruba they are known as Filani and Falani; in Burnu as Filata or

Fillatah; and their country is called Fuladú. The race is said to come

from Masina, near Tinbuktu, and to have inhabited the three Fula

countries which are derived from Phut, the grandson of Noah. About a

century ago, their celebrated Shaykh Usman (_alias_ Danfodio) built

Sokoto in the woods of Ader, organized an empire, and marched under a

white flag to the Jihad. He conquered Hausa, Kubbi, Yaori, Nupe, and

Moslem Burnu, and became Amir el Muminin over followers that have now

spread from the Senegal River to the Ibos, at the head of the Niger

Delta,—an extent of country larger than Russia in Europe.]

[Footnote 156: The missionaries, headed by Mr. Townsend, take an

opposite view of the affair. According to them, the Ibadans seized Ido

and Ilugun, stopped the trade road to Ijaye and Isehin, and drove the

Abeokutans out of their farms. Her Majesty’s Consul at Lagos, and the

British merchants, sent deputations to Abeokuta and Ibadan, to prevent

the war: at the former place it succeeded, at the latter it failed. My

belief is, however, that the Abeokutans were, and are still, the

aggressors.]

[Footnote 157:

TREATY.

This treaty, made between His Majesty Okukenu, Alake; Somoye, Ibashorun;

Sokenu, Ogubonna, and Atambala, chiefs and baloguns of Abbeokuta, on the

first part; and Martin Robinson Delany, and Robert Campbell, of the

Niger Valley exploring party, commissioners from the African race of the

United States and the Canadas in America, on the second part, covenants—

ART. 1.—That the king and chiefs, on their part, agree to grant and

assign unto the said commissioners, on behalf of the African race in

America, the right and privilege of settling, in common with the Egba

people, on any part of the territory belonging to Abbeokuta, not

otherwise occupied.

ART. 2.—That all matters requiring legal investigation among the

settlers be left to themselves, to be disposed of according to their own

custom.

ART. 3.—That the commissioners, on their part, also agree that the

settlers shall bring with them, as an equivalent for the privileges

above accorded, intelligence, education, a knowledge of the arts and

sciences, agriculture, and other mechanic and industrial occupations,

which they shall put into immediate operation, by improving the lands,

and in other useful vocations.

ART. 4.—That the laws of the Egba people shall be strictly respected by

the settlers, and in all matters in which both parties are concerned, an

equal number of commissioners, mutually agreed upon, shall be appointed,

who shall have power to settle such matters. As a pledge of our faith,

and the sincerity of our hearts, we each of us hereunto affix our hand

and seal, this twenty-seventh day of December, Anno Domini One thousand

eight hundred and fifty-nine.

His mark X OKUKENU, ALAKE.

His mark X SOMOYE, IBASHORUN.

His mark X SOKENU, BALOGUN.

His mark X OGUBONNA, BALOGUN.

His mark X ATAMBALA, BALOGUN.

His mark X OGUSEYE, ANABA.

His mark X NGTEBO BALOGUNOSO.

His mark X OGUDEMU, AGEOKO.

(Signed) M. R. DELANY.

(Signed) ROBERT CAMPBELL.

(_Witness_) SAMUEL CROWTHER, JUN.

(_Attest_) SAMUEL CROWTHER, SEN.

]

[Footnote 158: With similar simplicity, Mr. Abraham Lincoln proposed

shunting off his spare contrabands into the Republics of Central

America, who, as might be expected, gratefully declined the boon,

declaring, like the Abeokutans, that they are ready to receive emigrants

of every colour, but not those who appear as an independent power.]

CHAPTER VII.

THE KING’S RETURN VISIT.

Matutinè, I ascended the Ake church steeple, pulled out a board to

enable me to catch a glimpse of the Ogboni lodge of Eruwan, and

succeeded only in seeing that it had three courts, which confirmed the

account of my informant. This day, Tuesday, the to us memorable 5th of

November, was to become more memorable yet. His Majesty the Alake had

overwhelmed Commander Bedingfield with the proffer of a return visit—an

event rare in Abeokuta; moreover, his Majesty had the grace to be

punctual to his time, 10 A.M.

The Egbas, it must be remembered, are a race of bushmen and farmers,

clothiers and blacksmiths, compelled by their enemies to collect and

centralize. They were naturally unwilling to elect a king till necessity

drove, and then they did it with all manner of limitations. The Alake, I

have said, possesses neither the state nor the power of the pettiest

Indian Rajah. The only king ever known in Yoruba was he of Oyo (Eyeo),

the capital, who was described as living in regal state.

Negrotic Africa—not unlike her sisters Europe and Asia—has three

distinctly marked forms of government. The first and strongest is a

military despotism, like that of Ashanti, Dahome, Kongo, the Balonda

people, the Kazembe and Urungu; Turkey, Persia, and the Great Mogul of

the olden time, are their equivalents. In these the ruler owns no law

but custom, which means right, and which cannot be transgressed even by

the most powerful.[159] The second is a kind of feudal monarchy,

modified by the personal character of the king; oftentimes he is

inferior in weight to his councillors and officers, and even a slave may

refuse to obey him. Instances are, the Kafir races, Umyamwezi, Karagwah,

Yoruba, and others, in which, like those of Maskat, Yemen, and most

parts of Arabia, the regal power is sometimes almost obliterated. The

last and lowest are rude republics, in which a kind of autonomy

prevails: they are chiefly found amongst the Bedouin tribes, the hill

people, and the jungle races of Asia and Africa.

To the second of this category belongs the government of Abeokuta, a

weak constitutional monarchy, blighted by the checks and limits which

were intended to prevent its luxuriance. The king commands in his own

town, but nowhere else, like the magistrate of a Swiss canton—to which,

indeed, the state of Abeokuta may fitly be compared—and his orders

hardly extend within gunshot. His is a monarchy engrafted upon the old

barbarous patriarchal rule. The chiefs and councillors, more formidable

than the barons in King John’s day, are bound, though they often refuse,

to render suit and service to their suzerain. Ancient tradition is their

statute law, which, amongst civilized people, sanctions the most

arbitrary injustice, and which breeds a hundred tyrants instead of one.

Their king is also fettered by the laws of the land, of which the

Ogbonis are the conservators and exponents. He and his council may act

in judicial proceedings, or the case may be carried before the Ogbonis

in lodge assembled, or, if generally important, it may be decided by a

‘monster meeting’ of the lieges. No treaty or agreement is valid, unless

ratified by all those who have a voice in it. No ordinance against witch

torture or human sacrifice would be respected, unless the bill pass

through the House of Lords, viz., the Bale,[160] with the chiefs, civil

and military; the head fetishmen, who are the peers spiritual; the

select elders, who are the law officers of the crown; and the House of

Commons, or Ogboni lodges. A subject transgressing such law would put

himself under the protection of a chief, and then, unless the popular

voice be unanimous, he cannot be punished. ‘An Englishman’s house is his

castle,’ says the European proverb. ‘Every man is king in his own

house,’ is the less moderate Yoruban saying. It will now be clear to the

reader how much can be expected from civilized treaties and conventions

with such barbarians.

After this long digression, return we to the Alake’s visit.

‘Shouts of applause ran rattling to the skies’

in most discordant music, whilst a braying of horns and a beating of

tom-toms, giving notice of his Majesty’s arrival, brought us all to the

compound’s gate. The procession was not imposing. First came the family-

chair or stool; it was probably a common framework of bamboo, hidden by

a cloth of coarse red serge. This ‘venerable utensil’ was accompanied by

the Akpesis and other chiefs, who ominously seemed thus to pay more

attention to it than to its master; so amongst Moslems the turban often

fares better than the wearer. Succeeded a few lads carrying drawn knives

and coarse swords; they acted cutlass boys or pages to the Alake. The

great man himself appeared under an umbrella of huge dimensions,

inferior only to the little tent under which the King of Ashanti walks

in state: the material was a glaring pink silk, with a heavy red fringe,

and it was bran new, as the paper lingering about the wires showed.

During the visit it was placed outside, against the house-wall, and its

accidental fall was followed by the sound of cudgelling, and the normal

results. The Alake was habited in the larger fez, with its band of blue

beads, and he tottered along with difficulty under a ponderous robe of

scarlet velvet—in shape somewhat like the proctor’s at Alma Mater—worn

over an Ewu ágbadá or Guinea-fowl pattern of similar shape, but of less

gorgeous hue. He propped himself on a beaded staff, some five feet

long—canes and swords here do the duty of European cards and Asiatic

signets[161]—and he flirted a white fly-whisk, with beaded handle, but

without the little bells. His pantaloons were of purple velvet, with a

broad stripe of the veriest tinsel gold, and his carpet slippers were

fringed round with black monkey’s skin, reminding one of the ‘pair,

large enough for an elephant,’ worn by that dread Nigerian potentate who

declared all embarkation in a canoe to be essentially unkingly. Never

before was such an old ‘Guy’ seen. Being very fond of children, he led

by the hand a son and heir; the boy was by no means plain, and was

dressed somewhat after the fashion of his papa. Around them pressed a

multitude of wives and slave girls, with bare heads, and hair dressed

melon-wise, coral necklaces, and bosoms veiled with white cloths, over

which, at the waist, were fastened sacques of black and variegated

cotton velvets, girt with light-coloured kerchiefs. The harem was

accompanied by the _hoi polloi_, cowrie-bag bearers and other officials

of the household, armed with huge black whips of hippopotamus hide,

decorated with brass tacks. The total might have been eighty souls, and

they all crowded into one not large room. The atmosphere soon became

that of a slave-ship.

After _com’liments_—to use the customary initial formula of diplomatic

communication in these regions—which were acknowledged by the chief

protruding his tongue, he sat down, handed his _chob_ or stick of office

to an attendant, placed the son between his knees, and became the

central point of a female semicircle. The eldest wife, a gaunt old

woman, standing bolt upright behind him, supported his upper regions

with both hands upon his shoulders, and occasionally passed a yellow

bandanna over his pearl-studded face and neck. Two others, on his right

and left, used cow-skin fans: when undue warmth troubled the great man’s

body, he raised his arms high in the air, threw off the wide sleeves,

and directed the cooling draught to be applied where most wanted. The

rest grouped themselves near the wall, in a crescent, open to the front.

Commander Bedingfield sat down opposite the Alake, Mr. Eales on the

right of his chief officer, whilst I took my place in the rear for the

purpose of easier sketching. The chiefs ranged themselves round Mr.

Wike’s room, crowding on the chairs and sofas, and looking daggers if

compelled to squat, as they do at home, upon the floor. The usual

_afiyah_ and _amin_—these words sounded like signs of ‘a good time

coming’—concluded, the palaver proceeded, the interlocutors being ‘the

captain,’ through Lagos Williams, who, having lately been made an

Ogboni, had become ultra-Egba; the Akpesi, and at times the Alake.

The subject of the human sacrifice was again brought upon the _tapis_.

As has been said, when the Awajali of Ode dies, his servants are slain.

Lately an attendant youth, seeing the royal personage likely to ‘hop the

twig,’ endeavoured to make his escape in time. He was seized, however,

and history is silent as to his fate.

I need hardly enlarge upon the national duty of putting down with a

strong hand such abominations as those of Abeokuta and Ode. The late Mr.

M‘Gregor Laird describes moral suasion in Africa as a twenty-four

pounder, with British seamen behind it; and Mr. Consul Hutchinson

equally happily defined an English official’s moral force to be a moral

farce without a gun-boat. When children require the stick, we apply it;

when adults misbehave themselves, we put them in irons; and if Africa,

Western or Eastern, requires the twenty-four pounder and the gun-boat,

we ought not to withhold them from her.

England is passing from one phase of sentiment into another. Before the

mutiny of the mild Hindu, all was ordered to be _suaviter in modo_, till

the natives, our respectable ‘fellow-subjects,’ were petted and spoiled

by over-indulgence. In those fiery times we found that the _fortiter in

re_—measures which, a year before, would have provoked a national

shudder—was necessary to our very existence. In the due admixture of

both, the _narm_ and the _garm_—as the people have it—the rough and the

smooth, the bakhshish and the bastinado, lies the secret of preserving

the health of the Asiatic and African body politic. The old trader was

not so far wrong who advised his friends, when dealing with a ‘black

fellow,’ to hold out one hand for shaking, and to keep the other ready

for knocking down.

The Akpesi of Eruwan again explained—without a word of truth—that the

human sacrifice in question was the work, not of Abeokutans, but solely

of men from Ife and Ikisi. But Commander Bedingfield, who now knew the

whole affair, simply replied that he was shocked at such an event; that

it was a step in the wrong direction; that it would be a hard nut for

the English people to crack, and that the Alake should not have allowed

it.

A little lying on the part of the natives ensued, when it was broken off

by the sudden irruption of Mr., Mrs., and Master Gollmer, and Messrs.

Wilcoxon and Roper, of the Church Missionary Society. The first-

mentioned did not fail to impress us carefully and intelligibly with a

sense of the high honour conferred upon us by the presence of the Alake.

All Windsor Castle in the house of a subject would hardly have produced

an equal amount of congratulation. Master Gollmer was politely received

by the young prince, who was about the size of a small French poodle;

but the European juvenile, alarmed at the novelty of the scene, began to

boo-hoo in a style which soon caused the precipitate retreat of the

party. We resumed the palaver.

Many solemn promises of reform, not to be broken, as the phrase is, till

the next opportunity, were voluntarily given to us. The Akpesi then

observed that it might be the wish of Englishmen not to behead

criminals; that yesterday we had been looking at and ‘writing’ the

skulls, and so forth.

This was easily settled. Legal executions are not yet objected to by the

civilized people of England. _C’est incroyable, mais c’est vrai_.

The Akpesi then referred to the correspondence from Lagos, which he

insisted had been far from courteous, and which he said had been

answered in a similar spirit. The fact is, they did not say so, but they

could not get over the charge of having pulled a beast’s whiskers.

Commander Bedingfield suggested _bona verba_, remarking that _litera

scripta manet_, and that civility, is a _sine quâ non_ in official

correspondence.

The Akpesi then uprose and spoke as he was wont—_submissè, temperatè,

granditer_. He ran through a brief history of the white men who had

visited Abeokuta, beginning with Mr. Townsend and ending with Messrs.

Beecroft and Forbes. He then digressed into a little violence touching

the Crowthers. Mr. Sam. Crowther, Sen.’s name was Ajai, ‘struggling for

life,’ a native of the little village of Ishoggo (Oshogun), who had been

taken prisoner in a Fula attack about 1821, and who had been rescued

from a Portuguese slaver by H.M.S. ‘Myrmidon,’ Captain, afterwards Sir

Henry Leeke. Ajai was therefore still a subject of the Alake, but, from

respect for the English, he had been allowed to wear pantaloons, and to

call himself an Oibo dudu. Yet his son, Mr. Samuel Crowther, Jun., had

proved himself a bitter enemy to his black brethren, or rather masters,

by traducing their friend Mr. Townsend. Therefore he had better stay at

Lagos; and if he came to Abeokuta, the people would certainly kill him.

The reply was, that the Alake could object for a good and sufficient

reason to any one setting foot in his city, but that killing was not to

be spoken of, as such an event might lead to serious complications.

‘Then,’ quoth the Akpesi, ‘he—Ajai’s son—shall not come back till

Tow’sen’ returns.’

‘Presently,’ replied the captain, ‘we shall know if it be Mr. Townsend’s

wish to revisit Abeokuta.’

The Alake, who awaking after a long doze, now wreathed his face with

curious smiles, and took up the thread of discourse. His delivery was

not pleasant; the loss of his incisors, and the length of his canines,

rendered him almost unintelligible. His tongue protruded in a queer,

paralytic way. He spoke so low as to be hardly audible, and at times he

broke forth into a crone-like chuckle. He spoke with the utmost

deliberation, and when he stopped to be fanned and wiped, his

_claqueurs_ vociferated the usual cries. He also thought it necessary to

go through the history of his white visitors, beginning, not as German

savans with the inevitable Adam, but with the siege of Ado, when the

acting governor of Lagos first became his enemy. It took place, I may

observe, in 1840, or one year before Mr. M‘Coskry came to the coast. He

ended with Mr. Foote and the attack on Porto Novo. ‘White men,’ said the

Alake, ‘have stood before me in three forms—missionaries, war-men, and

merchants. Missionaries are good men who ‘teach book,’ and who dissuade

people from slavery and sacrifice, exhorting them to live in peace and

quiet, but never meddling with their neighbours’ business. (!) War-men

are also good men; their trade is to fight, and yet they fight for

order, not to gratify their own passions; they harm no one but enemies;

they are heroes—they are giants. As for merchants, they come to get what

they can; they care for nothing but cowries; they trade with a man, and

his enemy—in fact,’ said the Alake, raising his voice, ‘they are liars

and rascals.’ N.B.—Two members of this unjustly abused body were sitting

in the room, and one was looking uncommonly glum. ‘As for the Oibo

dudu’—the white-blacks, or Sierra Leonites—resumed the king, ‘I must

call them even worse than the merchants.’[162] After this ebullition of

feeling Okokenu ran over all the Ibadan war; how the Ibadans had

intrigued with Lagos and with Fallun—King Dosumo’s string-puller—how

they had brought Dahome to war with him, and how they had slaughtered

his Ijayan friends. Could he be at peace with such people? Finally, he

again warned us to write to England, that Agbome was engaged in the

sacrifices preliminary to a commando. This may be true:[163] that

amiable people are mustered at the end of every wet season for the

annual slave hunt; the king then inspects the force, makes all

preparations and forms a camp always away from the place which he

purposes to attack. The next step is a rapid raid, direction unknown.

Breakfast was being placed on the table, and at noon the palaver ceased,

the king retiring in state under the salute of trade muskets, which,

loaded like chambers, were fired from the hip. The next day was fixed

for signing the reformed treaty. These people, I have said, will sign

everything, but they have no idea of keeping anything.

In the evening, the chiefs, privily meeting Commander Bedingfield,

consented to append more stringent clauses to the treaty concluded in

1852 by Commander Forbes, and left him well contented. He had expected

another summons from the king, but, fortunately for us, it did not come.

The day ended with another fierce tornado, and a steamy heat, which

fully accounts for the complexion of the European and the Europeaness at

Abeokuta. Physiologists inform us that blue and green are not found in

the human skin; I have now seen both—aye, and yellow-green, too.

This chapter will conclude with an account of the strategy and the

military force of the Egbas. The admirable report of the late Captain

Jones has been my principal authority.

War in Yoruba is carried on much as it was in India some two centuries

ago. There is no regular army, but each chief has his armed retainers

like the Highland clansmen, and these form the force. After an ‘Oro-

palaver,’ which sometimes lasts three days, when the time and place of

rendezvous are settled upon, the warriors march out, with the usual mob

of sutlers carrying their beds and provisions upon their heads, and

laden with arms and ammunition. They march better even than Spaniards or

Portuguese, and they can easily get over forty miles in twenty-four

hours. When the quarrel is not very popular, an edict threatens all who

lag behind with the loss of their heads. Those who cannot afford horses,

walk—after Nelson’s saying, ‘Let the man trudge it who has lost his

budget.’

The warriors arm themselves. Their principal weapons are ‘buccaneer

guns,’ called ‘long Danes,’ because first imported from the Gold Coast:

these are large flint pieces in gaily-painted stocks, costing in England

from seven to ten shillings each, and here seven to eight gallons of

palm-oil = fourteen to sixteen shillings. Africans rarely, if ever, pay

anything like a decent price for muskets. The process of firing is

peculiar, the gun being either discharged from the hip, or held out at

arm’s length, with averted face, for good reason; the kick is that of an

ass, and it would lay open even Deaf Burke’s cheek. The state finds a

coarse powder, mostly exported from Boston, more than three parts

charcoal, and of this two hands’ breadth is the usual charge; the

bullets are bolts of bar-iron, cast and cut by the blacksmiths. Pistols

are rarely worn; spears and bows and arrows are little used. Swords seem

intended principally to hack and hew the wounded and dead. A few,

especially Moslems, have straight, double-edged blades, with brass

handles and leather scabbards, from which they are drawn with

difficulty, and only Arabs use the scimitar or curved blade. Bowie

knives have of late formed an article of importation, and are found

handy. The only artillery consists of wall-pieces, about 1½ inch bore,

crammed with a handful of bolts or nails, fired from a rest, and easily

transported from place to place. Rockets are as yet unknown; these and

case-shot would be found uncommonly serviceable.

Arrived at the field of action, the Egba army’s proceedings explain the

phrases ‘going out to war, sitting down, and encamping before a town.’

They select ground about three-quarters of an hour’s march from the

place to be attacked, generally choosing the bank of a stream. The first

operation is to dig a scarpless, narrow ditch, facing towards the

fields. The earth thrown out is mixed with water, and made into a swish

parapet, which, besides wanting height and thickness, is weakened by

round loop-holes. A rain-thatch is then placed over it, and at certain

points scaffoldings are prepared for sentinels and look-out men, only

the chiefs having spyglasses.

This part of the encampment being concluded, the warriors house

themselves. The camp is laid out without streets, the rule being for the

retainers to live pell-mell near their chief. The huts are built with

four corner-posts, two forked poles support the ridge of the roof, which

is composed of three large bars with smaller between, the whole being

covered with grass or matting. These places are laid out generally in

three rooms, the centre for reception, and the two sides for sleeping

and storing. Compounds are often attached, and in the rear, away from

the enemy, they prepare fields of maize and beans. The siege may last

for years, and commissariat there is none: women and camp-followers

attend to hold bazars; provisions are sometimes sent from the town; and

when ‘provaunt’ fails the warriors walk home.

There is no attempt at uniform. The soldiers wear

shogoto—knickerbockers—or waist-cloths, and war jackets, striped blue,

white, and red. The bullet-bag is neatly made of leather, far inferior,

however, to Mandenga or Morocco work. The powder-flask is either a

calabash or a skin bottle, the latter often having the hair outside. The

accoutrements hang from the right shoulder to the left side. The chiefs

are elaborately dressed, with teeth cowries and a multitude of talismans

sewn upon their garments and accoutrements. Being thus somewhat

conspicuous, they avoid the danger of discouraging their men by a rare

prudence when under fire. Like the North American Indians, the Egbas

ignore defensive armour: a few Wilkinson’s coats of mail worn under the

dress would soon turn the tide of battle.

The army, it will be observed, is wholly infantry, and the actions are

settled by skirmishers and light troops. Though here and there a man

fights on horseback, it seems never to have occurred to these people to

organize a troop; yet there are animals enough in the country to form an

excellent light cavalry, and irregulars are much wanted. The temper of

the beasts, however, would require them to be Rareyfied or prepared for

discipline by such treatment as was adopted in the Poonah Horse, Western

India.

There is an attempt to divide the army into a resemblance of the

civilized brigade and the regiment, under the several chiefs: moreover,

the Egbas do not wholly ignore the use of the reserve. Both parties are

perfectly well acquainted with each other’s movements, many men having

in both camps friends to whom they are bound by oath. It will sometimes

happen that a chief refuses to go forth to war, pleading brotherhood

with the enemy; and the reason is rarely disregarded.

Before an action begins, bribes are freely given to learn the strength

of the enemy, his health, his spirit, and his number; all manner of

false reports—now the intention of a retreat, then the advent of an

auxiliary—fly about, like Crimean shaves, to little purpose. Ambushes

are tried, and invariably fail. After this preliminary the hosts find

themselves embattled opposite each other as unwillingly as in the præ-

Napoleonic German wars, when it was the general’s great object to avoid

the enemy. The chiefs tree themselves, and receive reports in the rear,

not unlike a certain commander-in-chief in Crim-Tartary—most unlike him

who never said _Ite_, but _Venite_, or his Chinese equivalent[164] the

great Wang. The action begins by ordering a corps from each brigade or

division to the fore. Instead, however, of charging—bayonets are

unknown—they spread out in open order, skirmishing till their ammunition

is exhausted, and then retiring to ask for more in the rear. At times A.

feigns a retreat, and B. advances, perhaps sufficiently to produce a hot

fire, but never so far as to reach the enemy’s walls, which he

instinctively fears. If there be any danger of a hand-to-hand fight B.

then retires, and A., in his turn, advances. No one dreams of

outflanking more than of charging home, and the reserve sits quietly, as

did the commissariat behind the sand-heaps at the ‘Battle of Meeanee.’

Even platoon firing is unknown. This kind of Champ de Mars work is kept

up till sunset, when both hosts wend homewards to sup, dance, boast

hugely, and claim the victory. A Sikh review in the olden days, when the

followers of Nanak Shah disdained to sponge their guns or to box their

ammunition, was a bloody affair compared with a pitched battle in

Yoruba; and a single civilized regiment would, I should say, scatter an

army.

After ten thousand rounds the dead are counted by units, the wounded by

tens. The ‘battle of Ijaye’ was fought by seventeen thousand men: of

these, five were killed and fifty were hurt. From the weapons used we

could hardly expect otherwise. In the campaigns of the first Napoleon a

man’s own weight in powder, and ten times his weight in lead, were

consumed for each individual placed _hors de combat_ by their ridiculous

musket. In 1851 Brown Bess expended at the Cape three thousand two

hundred rounds to each Kafir, and in the Crimea the French fired away

five millions of small-arm cartridges without killing twenty-five

thousand Russians. It is becoming the belief of military men that the

use of arms of precision, cannon and rifles, assisted by skill and

practice, will eventually settle the fate of campaigns—which remains to

be seen. But at any rate a reliable weapon is an absolute necessity to

the soldier. It might not be advisable to arm the Egbas with Enfield

rifles, Prince’s breech-loaders, and Colt’s revolvers; still they might

supply themselves with sound Tower muskets and bayonets, with tolerable

sabres for their horsemen, and with pikes for a select body, which,

forming in column, would take that initiative in which all are so

notably deficient. These people have a modicum of invention, and a total

want of progressive power. It is as if a certain amount of knowledge is

spontaneously evolved by them, and then ceases.

The Egba army fought at a considerable disadvantage at the time when

Captain Jones was present. The commander-in-chief, His Highness

Ogubonna, had won a certain prestige by his conduct in 1851 against

Dahome. He was, however, a very old man, said to be seventy—equal to

ninety in England, gross, effete, wholly addicted to women, and rarely

in the habit of leaving his hut. Yet it is the deliberate opinion of

Captain Jones that, with all its faults of commission and omission,

Abeokuta is ‘capable of carrying on an offensive war against any

neighbouring native power.’

The tactic to be used against this people is that which never yet failed

in India; and the superiority of European weapons would at once give the

victory to a civilized force. All our disasters in the East have been

caused by abandoning the one true and easy system—an opening by a hot

fire of artillery, round shot, howitzers, and rockets; a steady advance

of infantry in masses, covered by sharpshooters; and, finally, a rush of

cavalry to cut down the fugitives and to render the rout complete.

It is at present our policy in these regions to maintain the strictest

neutrality. We have hitherto been persuaded to side with the Abeokutans,

thinking that they were engaged in a defensive when they were really

waging an offensive war. The great variety of tribes to whom the broad

lands of Yoruba belong are all willing, in their several degrees, to

become our ‘faithful friends and allies;’ and we shall have no

difficulty in keeping them so. The object of each is of course to

monopolize our amity and assistance for the pure purpose of self-

aggrandizement, and to the prejudice of its neighbours. Peace with us,

however, would be its object when nothing is to be gained by war.

It will wholly conduce to proper relations with the interior when we

have a sufficient armed force at Lagos. The Egbas, like the people of

the West African coast generally, have persuaded themselves that the

English are invincible at sea, and upon the seaboard, where their ships’

guns can be brought to bear, but that they are no soldiers. This is the

first lesson that should be taught them. Europeans are unnecessary,

except as officers, and the Upper Yoruba country, with Hausa and Burnu,

supplies an admirable material for native soldiers. The province of

Lagos will hold a very different standing in the country when provided,

not, as proposed, with two hundred men, but with a weak troop of light

irregular cavalry, a battery of field artillery, and a small regiment of

four hundred infantry.

[Footnote 159: So Darius (Dan. vi. 13-15), unable to change the ‘custom’

which he had established, could kill but not spare.]

[Footnote 160: The Bale of a town is its governor, subject only to the

king. In each house there is a Bale or householder. Like the king, these

Bales also have their associates or lieutenants.]

[Footnote 161: Similarly, in the olden times of England, a stick called

Irmin Sule or the Pillar of Irmin, and sacred to Thor, was used in

musters.]

[Footnote 162: H.M. was not so far wrong. The following, which is an

exact copy of a letter addressed to Dr. Harrison, will show what is

going on at Abeokuta on the part of the Sierra Leone settlers:—

_‘To the Editor of the Iwe Irohin._

‘_Lagos, Sept. 28th_, 1861.

‘DEAR SIR,

‘Sorry you have not inserted the whole of our defence against such

notorious falsehood of the W. African of the 26th May.

‘But as you take upon yourselves to refute our defence. We therefore

pray you most earnestly to proof the fact, who is this Sierra Leone

Emigrants that thus denie, that he is not an emigrant from Sierra Leone,

and in the next place to proof, which of the Sierra Leone Emigrants, has

at any time claimed to be tried by native law, which is another error,

which you must either proof or correct.

‘We belief that whatever is inserted in any such paper for public

perusal, must be true and nothing but the truth.

‘We are not forced by the late Consul Foote to register our names as you

imagine.

‘With regard to a S. Woman who you said to be exacting five strings out

of seven from a boy slave who was servant to a whiteman “Pray Messrs.

Editors,” It is in your place to report such one to H.B.M. Consul and to

be punished, and if not, you can name such one, but not to charge the

whole population with an offence committed by a single individual. It

was in order to distinguish one man from another was the reason a name

given to every man.

‘We remain, dear Sir,

‘Your Obedient Servants,

‘THE SIERRA LEONE EMIGRANTS.

‘P.S.—Pray to insert the whole of the above.’]

[Footnote 163: It was true, but the attack was not directed against

Abeokuta. Early in the ensuing spring King Baddahun, with six thousand

warriors, fell upon Ishagga, which had treacherously attacked his

father. The plans were well laid, and the place was surprised; only

sixteen men defending themselves, the others flying to a bush a quarter

of a mile from the town. The Dahomans slew some five hundred souls and

carried off the church bell, the catechist Doherty, and seventeen or

eighteen converts of both sexes, natives and Sierra Leonites. This is

the fifth Egbado town destroyed during the Ibadan war, the others being

Jigá, Mashaye, Shampa, and Igo.]

[Footnote 164: This general, after tying up his beard in two knots,

would take a sabre in each hand, and filling up the rear of his men, so

lustily belabour all who hung back, that the Chinese terrified rush

never failed to secure the victory.]

CHAPTER VIII.

THE DE OMNIBUS AND COTTON CHAPTER.

Of Egba society it cannot be said to be ‘based upon slavery.’ It has a

variety of ranks. Omo bibi, a child born born, _i.e._, twice born, the

Hindu ‘dwija,’ is one whose parents are both free Egbas. The son of a

free mother by a domestic slave is called omo ohi wabe. Omo odo, or ‘the

child of presence,’ is a domestic, and eru a common slave. Either of the

two, when manumitted after the master’s death, is called eru edili,

which is also the name of the progeny of a slave girl by a free father.

Those pawned by others—a custom reminding us of the old Roman Nexum—are

termed ofá, or wafa, apparently an Arabic derivative; one pawned by

himself is faru so fá. Of the population, probably four-fifths are

free,—a large proportion in this part of Africa.

There are, therefore, three great classes of Egbas. The first is the

rich free man, the second the poor free man, and, thirdly, the serf,

colonus, or slave. If we reckon the fetish men as the fourth class, we

obtain that quadruple division which prevailed amongst the old

Egyptians, Hindus, Greeks, &c., and which, under the name of caste,[165]

has so often and so ignorantly been abused. The license of liberty to be

observed amongst the Egbas probably results from their habits of

domestic slavery. As was said of the citizens of Athens and Sparta, and

in the later days of the Southern States of the American Union, the

masters of slaves, if free themselves, are ever the freest of the

free.[166]

African slavery here, as elsewhere, results from four causes—famine,

captivity in war, debt, and crime. Captives of course prefer the chain

to the sword, and insolvents and felons would be imprisoned in Europe.

The Egbas are, now, too much of a trading people to sell their brethren

except for the best reasons. Whilst our cruisers cut down the branches

of slave export, trade in cotton and oil—the ‘little palm-nut’ has been

described as the ‘true emblem of peace in Africa’—fells the trunk and

digs up the stumps of this Shajrat el Zukkum. But the development of

commerce naturally increases the necessity for slave labour in a land

where hired labour is expensive and uncertain, whilst the increased

price of provisions greatly adds to the miseries of the servile.[167]

Thus the Abeokutans—who are far from being disciples of Clarkson and

Wilberforce, Acland and Buxton—took the earliest opportunity of

enriching themselves at the expense of their allies the Ijayans. Of this

unhappy tribe no less than twenty thousand have, it is said,

disappeared. But the Egbas are fighting without pay or rations,

consequently their friends form their commissariat. The enemies, of

course, vend their captives, and even the Ijayans sell themselves for

provisions, or are sold by their chiefs as a penalty for shirking the

war. Kidnapping is severely punished by the Egbas, who, in April 1847,

passed a law making the penalty death. Once it was so common that at

Badagry and other places no poor man could sleep in peace. Lagos was

then one of seventy exporting points on this ill-fated coast, extending

three thousand six hundred miles, from Cape Verde to where the shores of

the Camaroons deflect to the south. The traffic has naturally

diminished. In 1825 the export was probably two hundred thousand; in

1839 Lord John Russell announced that the number of slaves annually

introduced into America and the West Indies exceeded one hundred

thousand; now it has diminished to a maximum of half the latter total,

and north of the equator it is almost entirely confined to the Slave

Coast, or the western half of the Benin Bight.

The Yorubas have a marked national character. Divided into a number of

little states, or independent cantons, they are eminently clannish. An

Egba will feel hurt if his people be not properly appreciated, and the

‘Aku’ race at Sierra Leone produces the most dangerous because the most

intelligent recaptives. They have strong virtues and vices, and, by

dwelling upon one side, to the neglect of the rest of the moral

development, it would be easy to make them the best or the worst of

men.[168] They are kind and courteous, hospitable and not eminently

dishonest, except in and around the cities. On the other hand, they are

covetous, cruel, and wholly deficient in what the civilized man calls

Conscience. With considerable shrewdness in business, they are as simple

in some points as children. They believe that white men fabricate

cowries, and an old farmer, seeing a cloud, will say to a missionary,

‘Please let it rain for us!’ There is the usual African want of

invention; a plough, a saw, or an alphabet are equally beyond the limits

of their organization. They are somewhat litigious, and there is a

numerous judiciary, whilst private disputes are settled by a kind of

_consiglio di famiglia_. Their cruelty is shown rather in their religion

than in their laws. Murder, treason, and arson, sometimes adultery and

theft, are punished by death, the offender being beheaded or garotted

with a rope. In Ilori the neck is broken with an iron mace. Minor

offences are visited with the whip, fine, or imprisonment.

Men amongst the Egbas are farmers, tillers of ground, blacksmiths, wood-

workers, carpenters, weavers, tailors, and barbers. Women do the

housework and sell at market; between whiles they spin, wash, cook, draw

water, dye cloth, and make soap and pottery. The Egba rises with the

dawn, brushes his teeth, bathes at home or in the brook, and repairs to

the jungle, which, as in India, is twice visited; if once only, the

exception would be attributed to disordered health. The breakfast, or

first of the three meals, is usually eaten round the pots of the market

women. It is a light affair, of the hot diluted paste, or burgoo, here

called ekko. The farmer then repairs to his fields, and the townsman to

his business, whilst the gude-wife either busies herself at home or sits

selling in the bazar. Dinner, from 10 A.M. to noon, is eaten either in

the farms or the streets. The farm-wives and hill-wives bring in the

material and the townswomen prepare it. It is something hot and simple,

yam balls or Indian corn cakes, with a ‘kitchen’ of the highly-seasoned

palaver sauce: the trash in which Europeans delight, papaws and

pineapples, plantains and oranges, are mostly left to the monkeys.

Vegetables, farinaceous food, and meat, especially the two latter, are

the general favourites. The rich will eat rats and snails, and the poor

carrion, rather than condemn themselves to become vegetarians. Meat,

however, as in Asia, is rarely cooked solid, hashes and stews being

preferred to roast and boiled. Those of easy means pass the greater part

of the day in dressing their hair, consulting Ifa, saluting friends, and

visiting the Ogboni lodges. After dark they eat once more, sometimes in

the streets, more generally in the house, and then gossip, play, if not

gamble, see dances or dance themselves, smoke, snuff, drink palm-wine,

maize-beer, and trade-rum, and retire to rest when they can do no more.

As regards the Yoruba language, spoken by the Egbas, Egbados, Ijebus,

Iketus, and Otas, as well as by many of the people of Badagry and Lagos,

and said to extend along the coast to New Calabar, and internally to the

Niger, I know nothing of it except what the two grammars, Mr. Crowther’s

and Mr. Bowen’s, teach.[169] As many people have not read even these, I

may still be able to offer something new to them. The language is

decidedly difficult. In other countries missionaries expect to speak

fluently after the second year; here they usually take five. Mr. Bowen

is said to have learned it in eighteen months; but he was uncommonly

’cute in picking up languages, though he turned his knowledge to scant

account. Learning the Yoruba dialect is a severe exertion to a brain

relaxed by the climate, and students complain that all books published

upon the subject are mere sketches, leaving the learner to fill in

details. Something of the same kind was asserted touching Persian by Sir

William Jones. And it certainly is now time for a work upon the

scholarship, not the mere accidence, of African speech.

Mr. Bowen finds in the Yoruban language affinities with Sanscrit, Greek,

Latin, Pahlivi, Persian, German, Arabic, Hebrew and Syriac, Saxon and

English, Swedish, Danish, Finnish, Esquimaux, Basque, Welsh, Celtic,

Slavonic, Albanian, French, Spanish, Portuguese, Celebes, Philippines,

Brazilian, besides a host of African languages, Okem, Opandi, Kufa,

Nupe, Uchan, Isubu, Ashanti, Oloma, Accra, Kru, Dahome, Mahi, Opaddi,

Fula, Mbariki, Kaniki, Mbe, Wolof, Mose, Dey, Shoa, Filham, Bullom,

Mandenga, Goali, Bassa, Golal, Benin, Melou, Kakanda, Madagascar, Galla,

and others. This is not the way to treat philology, we may not argue

radical affinity from a chance resemblance of words. I must also differ

in opinion with the learned Bishop Vidal,[170] who wrote his

‘Introduction’ before the Yoruba was classified, and before the

alliteral languages of Southern Africa, of which the types are the

Kongoese and the Zulu, were sufficiently studied. The bishop, by the

absence of classified prefixes and modifications of the particles

contained in the verb, judges Yoruba to be unconnected with the large

family of Kafir tongues.[171] On the other hand, there is an artful

system of prefixes and a purely conventional euphony, which, to say

nothing of minor points, denotes a similarity of origin.

The Yoruba language is mostly one of intonation, and in many cases the

accent and the articulation determine the sense of the words. This is

trying to the dull ear of the northern race, and many are unable to

master the difficulty; yet a stranger, with the organs of tune highly

developed, finds little difficulty in separating the words, which do

not, as in Popo and in English, run into one another. The sounds

peculiar to the tongue are _pk_ and _gb_, sounded almost like a single

consonant, and, like Arabic, it wants the _v_ and the _p_. There is

neither passive voice nor variation for number and person, nor

indefinite article, in which the Greek and Latin are also deficient. It

seems to be built upon a century of biliteral roots, and Mr. Bowen’s

vocabulary contains about twelve thousand vocables. The language is

therefore sufficiently rich for the wants of a simple and barbarous

race.

It is noted as a curious point that the Yoruban is wealthy in abstract

terms, that it possesses distinct words for such far-fetched ideas as

sin, guilt, honour, atonement, faith, mediation, repentance, pardon,

adoption, salvation, perdition, justification, and sanctification. The

same, however, according to the Rev. Mr. Walker, is true of the Mpongwe,

or Gaboon dialect; and, indeed, we may expect it to be an invariable

characteristic of these languages, which have a regular system of

compounding words, equally intelligible, root and branch, to all

speakers.

The Yoruban tongue has no poetry, like the Hausa, nor are words set to

tunes as amongst the musical Fulas, except a few artless attempts like

the corn-songs of the American negroes. But the African development of

the language-power fills it with riddles and childish puzzles; moreover,

it is rich in proverbs, the infant literature of the world. Bishop Vidal

seems to have thought the Yorubas distinguished amongst the nations of

the world by the number and terseness of their proverbial sayings. So

far from this being the case, there is hardly a tribe upon the West

African coast which has not as many and as good. The same philologist

also sees a high standard of morality in this popular code, if it can so

be called, a vestige of the ‘Universal Conscience bearing witness

amongst men.’ There is, according to him, no virtue, sin, nor human

relation which is not enforced, described, or forbidden by some pithy

dictum. As a rule, methinks, the most exalted views in proverbs and

poetry evidence a rather low actuality. Thus the unwarlike delight in

tales of slaughter, liars hold high theories touching truth, universal

selfishness proclaims aloud mutual dependence, the most reckless of

human life have a hundred reasons for not taking it, and no nation more

despises the poor, or has more saws against a right to despise him, than

the Yoruba. Moreover, all the world over, proverbs run in pairs, and

pull both ways: for the most part one neutralizes, by contradiction, the

other. Thus the Englishman bids him who would thrive to consult his

wife, and warns him at the same time that women, being unreasonable as

spaniels, are greatly improved by being beaten.

The Yoruba proverbs have been divided into three kinds, firstly, the

paranomasia, play upon words, or, in simple English, pun; secondly,

sprightly descriptions of natural phenomena and visible objects;

thirdly, moral truths and rules for conduct. The Bishop of Sierra Leone

naturally saw in them a touching resemblance to the parallelism of

Hebrew national poetry, and divided them into the gradational, the

antithetic, the synthetic, and the introverted. But parallelism is

natural to the Semitic mind, one of whose rudest but sublimest

expressions is in the northern dialect called Hebrew. Every page of the

‘Thousand and One Nights’ will supply instances of it. The other more

artful divisions may be found not only in Hebrew and the Yoruba, but in

all the Asiatic languages with which I am acquainted.

Abeokuta lies in the zone of almost constant rain. The warmest months,

which are also comparatively dry, are December, January, February, and

early March. In January trees cast their leaves, and thus enjoy their

annual repose. February is essentially a spring month, as the greenness

of the country shows. At the end of that time the Harmattan wind will

blow from the north and the north-east for two or three days, and

perhaps bring on a few light showers. April and May are distinguished by

tornados, thunderings, and the ‘former rains,’ which are now heavy and

continuous, reaching a crisis when the sun attains the tropic of Cancer,

whilst storms are frequent and severe, and Shango does considerable

damage. Here the heaviest downfalls are not when the sun is directly

vertical, but when he is northing or southing. On this coast of Africa,

however, the ‘rainy monsoon’ is not constant and persisting, as on the

eastern shores of the continent, upon which Trade-winds from the South

Atlantic directly impinge. Four inches at a time is severe, and twenty

inches is the rare extreme. June is generally the wettest month in the

year. About mid July and August there is mostly an intermission in the

rains, but not so marked as in the Gaboon country and the coast south of

the equator. This second dry season is cool and pleasant, broken only by

a few showers. September is again pluviose: the ‘latter rains,’ however,

are rarely heavy, but mostly short and sharp. From October to mid-

November is the second tornado season, whose storms are more violent and

dangerous than those of the first, and December recommences the dry

season.

Thus there are four dry and eight wet months, the former corresponding

with our winter, the latter with our spring, summer, and autumn. That,

however, is the hot, and this the cool time of the year. The rainy is

also the healthier season. From the days of Mungo Park, who attributed

most of his misfortunes to the hot weather, the dry season has been

assumed as the fittest for African travel, and the idea has led to many

a loss. In the West Indies, the rule is, that both dry and wet weather

are healthy, whilst irregular rain and sunshine are feverish. Here, as

in most parts of intertropical Africa, the worst months are those

immediately before and after the rains, the middling is the dry season,

the best is the wet, especially August and September. There is but one

serious disadvantage to those explorers who are compelled to walk their

journeys, the inundations will certainly cause swollen feet, a trivial

evil, but which may arrest progress. Still there is less malaria, that

mysterious agency which, like the pestilence walking in darkness, ever

hides its origin from the world, and leaves us to grope for its origin

in cosmical causes,—vegetation, geology, geographical position, and a

rarefied atmosphere deficient in oxygen. Happily for us the old African

treatment—‘A. B. caught fever, gave him calomel, bled him, blistered his

feet, died on the third day’—is now obsolete: I would not, however,

advise any white man to expose himself for more than two or three

consecutive years to the climate of Western Intertropical Africa.

At Abeokuta the nights are not oppressive; sometimes they are even

chilly, with damp and heavy dews:[172] inland they are hotter and more

trying. The heat of the day is between 10 A.M. and 4 P.M.: near the

coast, however, there is a strong and regular sea breeze, charged with

vapour, and blowing from the south, the west, or the south-west. The

average of summer heat may be 80° Fah. in the shade. During our three

weeks’ stay we had three violent storms in five days, and a heavy fog

every morning. The difference between the wet and the dry bulbs varies

from 0° 2′ Fah. in the rainy season to 25° Fah. during Harmattan winds.

We will conclude with the commerce and the productions of Abeokuta. I

have shown that at present she aspires to become the great highway of

transit between the Sudan—that is to say, the countries north of

Guinea—and the coast; and that it is our object to give the unmaritime

peoples direct communication with our markets on the seaboard.

For the twenty years previous to 1787, the whole import trade of Western

Africa, Morocco included, with England, fell short of 72,000_l._ In 1810

it had increased to 535,577_l._ It may now safely be assumed at three

millions sterling.[173] And there is hardly any limit to its future

development. Yoruba is a valuable and an unexploited field. Its products

are cereals (maize and millet), vegetables (peas, beans, cassava, yams,

and koko, onions and sweet potatoes), sugar-cane, ginger—in small

quantities, and lately introduced—cubebs, and various oil seeds, bene or

sesamum, telfaria, castor plant, ground nuts, cocoa-nuts, and physic

nuts (_Corcos purgans_): coffee has been grown, but it has been allowed

to die out. Copper abounds in places. Indigo and coarse tobacco would

flourish anywhere,[174] and the minerals have not been explored. The

present exports are palm-oil from the nut, now worth 11 heads per

measure of 10 imperial gallons, and black oil from the kernel, worth 7

to 7½ heads; ground-nut oil and shea butter or ‘Niger grease,’ which has

been almost stopped by the war; indigo in balls of ¼ lb. each, worth 2½

strings; and lubi (natron), worth 1 head 10 strings per pound; a few

hides; cotton; ivory, costing, when prime, 3 heads per lb.; country

cloths sent to Bahia and up the coast, and Niger mats worth 2 heads 25

strings to 3 heads each. The minor imports are hardware, pottery,

velvets, red caps, silks, beads, and coral, especially the red;

trinkets, fancy looking-glasses, mostly German.[175] The chief objects

are cowries from East Africa, and a few from England, manufactured roll

tobacco from Brazil, and leaf tobacco from the Anglo-American States,

either _viâ_ England or direct; Manchester cottons, rum and spirits,

arms and ammunition.

The four latter articles are a serious injury to the country, and

present a sad contrast between the West African coast, whose commerce is

in the hands of Christian merchants, and the Eastern shores, which the

Moslems and Hindu Banyans supply with foreign goods. On the shores of

Zanzibar, until the Messrs. Oswald and other Hamburgers settled in the

island of the same name, muskets and gunpowder—used almost entirely for

slave-driving—were unknown except amongst the Beloch and Arab subjects

and mercenaries of the local government. That house sold off, it is

said, 13,000 guns in one year. The interior—Unyamwezi, and the regions

about the Tanganyika Lake—is still in the hands of Arab traders, who

never allow the natives to become possessed of civilized weapons, and

who would incur eternal infamy if they sold ardent spirits to the

people. I shall never cease to protest against the sale of rum, guns,

and gunpowder, when an innocent trade of worked cottons, salt, and the

minor luxuries of life would be equally profitable.[176] It is my

sincere belief that if the slave export trade were revived, with all its

horrors, and that rum, guns, and gunpowder were things unknown, the

country would greatly gain in happiness by the exchange.

Abeokuta, like Lagos, has been inundated with cowries, which, used in

Europe for the arts, here become a coin.[177] Formerly the small white

Indian shell, costing 60_l._ per ton at home, and 80_l._ on the African

coast, was the currency, which extinguished the round trade or barter.

Presently the Hamburg merchants settled at Zanzibar, where the cypræa

can be collected for a mere trifle, made a speculation which succeeded;

the large, coarse, blue African, being much cheaper, arrived in

shiploads, brought fifty per cent. to the importer, and supplanted the

small Indian, which are now rare, and bought up by chiefs and fetish-

men. At present there is a glut, and in every village you tread upon

bits of cowries. Moreover, fewer are found, and therefore fewer are

sent.

The ‘plump-breasted dove,’ as the Yorubas call it, is a vile currency,

an intolerable burden. Lycurgus did not fetter the commerce of Sparta

more effectually with his iron bars. Every shell must be pierced and

strung upon grass or palm fibre, which takes no short time. At Dahome a

hundred slaves will be engaged in this occupation, and a merchant at

Lagos must employ eight or ten ‘cowrie-girls.’ The weight of each bag of

2000 blue Africans will be from 80 to 90 lbs., and of white Indians from

35 to 45 lbs., and yet it is barely worth one pound sterling. Mungo

Park, when he opened a shop during his second journey at Sansanding, was

obliged to employ three tellers to count his cash—25,756 cowries, worth

at Lagos 1_l._ 5_s._[178] Lieut. Forbes complains that to carry 50

dollars, he had to hire five women. A horse will cost 60,000 to 120,000,

a sheep 4000 to 6000, and a fowl 200 to 250 of this barbarous small

change.[179]

It is fully time to change the system. At Zanzibar and Maskat, the late

Sayyid Said found no difficulty in so doing. He applied to the East

Indian Government for some tons of pice or copper coins, and the

improvement was readily adopted by his subjects. The experiment should

be tried without delay at Lagos, and, if successful, it would probably

soon extend into the interior.

At present the country has the nuisance of twelve different dollar-

coinages in circulation, and when these different dollars have been got

rid of there still remains the inconvenience of two currencies, English

money and cowries, which, as has been seen, bear no fixed relative

proportion. And the Abeokutans are little aware of their losses by the

system of barter to which the retail purchaser is sometimes driven: it

obliges them to pay one hundred per cent. above the invoice price for

English goods, which, if the currency were settled, could be profitably

sold by the merchant at a maximum of fifty per cent.

Provisions are somewhat expensive at Abeokuta—the luxuries of life

especially so. The price of maize or Indian corn,[180] of which 15 to

25, and in the best lands 30 bushels, are produced by the acre, varies

from 20 to 75 cents per bushel. At present the bushel of 60 to 70 lbs.

costs from 2 heads 25 strings to 3 heads, and it has fetched 5 in times

of scarcity. Guinea corn (_H. sorghum_) is rare, and sells at fancy

prices; the measure is a calabash, containing about one gallon, and is

usually worth double the price of maize. Rice and farinha, or cassava

flour, are being introduced; the latter fetches 10 to 20 strings per

basket, and makes tolerable tapioca. True arrowroot is as yet unknown.

The indigenous yam[181] is here the staff of life: a dozen costs from 1

head to 1 head 5 strings. Native beans, per basket of 40 lbs., fetch

from 2 heads 25 strings to 3 heads. Sugarcane is sold in bundles of 40

canes, four feet long, for from 40 strings to 1 head. Fruits, being

despised, are cheap: there are grape-vines of several varieties, but all

with produce equally dry and insipid: limes, papaws, and pineapples

command 2 cowries each, oranges 10, and bananas 15 to 20 strings per

bunch. Europeans use milk; the negroes, more sensible, do not.[182]

Butter and ghi, the clarified butter of India, is here supplied by the

butyraceous çe or shea butter.

Large and, for Africa, well-bred cattle are as common in the country as

the buffalo—the ‘jackass cow’ of Sierra Leone—is rare. The common cow

may be bought for 4 to 5 bags: the ox of course costs less. The price of

beef varies from 5_d._ to 6_d._ per lb. The sheep—after the first hot

season it becomes hairy, not woolly—is worth 7, and if full grown 20

heads. The goat, which, unlike that of the Oil Rivers, is here cheaper,

averages from 6 to 15. The hogs are black and heavily built, and the

professional hunters bring wild boars to market. Poultry is common,

fetching 10 to 20 strings, and a fine fowl may be had for 25. Guinea

fowls are dearer and better, costing from 1 to 1½ heads: there is a wild

species with a black silky tuft.

Horses are of fancy prices, and are never used for packs or _bât_:

asses, mules, and camels, common in the regions north and south of the

confluence, are as yet unknown. Ladies and children use a peculiar kind

of palanquin—a chair fastened by woodwork to the carrying pole, and

covered with an umbrella-like awning. Domestic slaves are always in the

market: men, women, and girls fetch from 8 to 10 bags, but being

preferred for exportation, are worth from 12 to 16 bags.

The coming exportation from this region will be the shea butter-nut, an

indigenous bassia. However much the palm and palm-kernel oils may fall

before the earth oils of America, shea butter will maintain its price,

from 50_l._ to 52_l._ per ton of 2252 lbs.—about 5_l._ per ton more

valuable than tallow. The tree, which is mentioned with enthusiasm by

Mungo Park, grows in immense forests: there is one between Ilori and

Bida, of nine days’ march; and between Ilori and Sai there are plentiful

scatters, here thick, there thin. It is a fine, large growth, producing

an emerald-green plum, whose pulp is sweet and edible. For butter, the

fruit is gathered in April or June, and smoke-dried in a country oven; a

cone of clay, with the smaller end downwards, containing the fire, and

divided from the nut by a wall of pierced clay. It is subsequently

reduced to powder in a mortar, but so carelessly that the husk is not

removed: it is hand-washed and worked in three or four waters, and when

it rises to the surface it is ladled off. It is then boiled in large

country jars, and stored in smaller earthen pots, after which it will

keep untainted for years. This ‘Niger grease,’ as Europeans call it, is

beautifully white, hard, and subaromatic. Park prefers it, when fresh,

to ‘butter from the cow.’ It is used by the people for all the purposes

of cookery, and, as an unguent, it is considered invaluable for

alleviating rheumatic pains. At Abeokuta, owing to the war, there is but

little in the market. At Ilori it still commands a price of one shilling

per pound—far too expensive for commerce. The opening of the Niger will

bring this valuable vegetable butter in enormous quantities to our

shores; and the varieties of butyraceous nuts are almost wholly unknown:

there are several even upon the Niger, whilst the Gaboon River and the

coast south of the equator abound in tallow-nuts, with which the people

are acquainted, whilst we are not.

It remains to consider the subject of cotton-growing about Abeokuta, and

throughout Yoruba generally.

The shrub is of various qualities, and, as in Africa generally, all are

of tolerable staple. The ‘black-seed’ resembles the sea-island (_G.

arboreum_), and the ‘green-seed’ (_G. herbaceum_) is the short staple or

upland cotton of the Southern States of Anglo-America. Besides which,

there are many hybrids, and all the varieties are grown in the same

field. There is brown cotton, but not the red, long-stapled species,

with small boll and leaf, which flourishes in Hausa. The best kind is

called akashe, and is too expensive for exportation, a penny being the

price of eight seeds. It is not uncommon, however, round Abeokuta, and

it merits a trial in a _jardin d’essai_. The feel is as soft as silk,

and the seed is white: the yarn shown to me was dyed grey. Nothing can

be worse than Abeokutan manufactures, even those made from the finest

cottons. The Egbas are as far from the jenny of James Hargreaves as from

the power-loom. Their materials are still a distaff and spindle, exactly

resembling the artless implements of India and East Africa. The bhaunri

is a bit of wood, weighted with a lump of clay, and painted with the

brightest colours.

Cotton must ever be an interesting subject to a country in which five

millions of souls—about one-sixth of the population, and a number

exceeding the total of Holland and Portugal—are or were interested

directly or indirectly; which possesses 200,000,000_l._ of fixed and

floating investments; which, in 1860, produced an interest of

80,000,000_l._[183]—more than equal to the whole revenue of the empire;

which imported from one country alone 35,000,000_l._ per annum,[184] and

manufactured to the value of 55,000,000_l._; which, in less than a

century, has increased its operations three-hundred-fold—from 4,000,000

lbs. in 1767 to 1,200,000,000 lbs. in 1861; which, during the last fifty

years, has consumed 20,000,000,000 lbs., equal to 750,000,000_l._, or

nearly the national debt; and which for years has paid at least twopence

per lb. over-price to the Southern States of America.[185]

The wars of secession have brought two great rivals in the field, India

and Africa. Despite the persevering efforts of adventurer and speculator

to extract money from the pockets of the British capitalist, little can

be expected from the former. The old Court of Directors spent lac after

lac in improving the staple, and failed. After a few months the produce

returned to the old stock as surely as the English bull-dog became a

pariah and the English child a degenerate. It is a law of

nature—mysterious, unintelligible, yet not to be mistaken. Wherever—as

in Mekran or Zanzibar—the American ‘domestics,’ which are all made of

medium staple, met our cottons, in which medium staple was eked out with

Indian or short staple, the former invariably beat the latter out of the

market. Hindostan and the East certainly did miracles in the olden time,

as the Dacca fabrics and the Mosul muslins prove. These textures,

however, were, like the shawls of Kashmir, hand-woven, at an enormous

expenditure of time and trouble, and it is folly to expect them to be

imitated by the coarse appliances of machinery.

When Indian cotton is cried up for the English market, and is

represented as likely to supersede American, either ignorance or deceit

should be suspected. Mr. H. R. Cassels,[186] a most competent observer,

shall be placed in the witness-box. Leaving other presidencies to speak

for themselves, that gentleman maintains that the experience of half a

century of cotton cultivation in Bombay teaches that—

‘1. Exotic cotton cannot be successfully cultivated on a large scale in

the Bombay Presidency, except in a limited portion of its southern

districts.

‘2. Indian cotton may be improved in clearness, and somewhat reduced in

cost, but the general characteristic of the staple will not be

materially altered.

‘3. In so far as this quality of cotton is serviceable to the

manufacturers of England, India can compete with America; but if a finer

description be required, India cannot adequately supply it.

‘4. Unless, therefore, such alterations in machinery can be devised as

may render the manufacturer indifferent to length and fineness of staple

(and of the probability of this others must judge), India is not likely

to replace the United States.[187]

‘5. It seems evident, then, that Indian cotton must continue to hold a

subordinate place in European markets, and that there is a point at

which its competition with other growths entirely ceases.’

Here, then, is the whole truth. From such cold comfort as this let the

political statistician turn to Africa.

I will not delay to prove that, whereas India yields short staple,

medium staple and long staple are indigenous in Africa. It is also

evident that the cultivation can be developed in a short space of time.

Cotton culture began under the orders of Mohammed Ali in 1818: the first

exportation was in 1823, and in 1855, besides five or six millions of

lbs. worked in the country, it exported 56,874,300 lbs. The United

States of America exported, we know, eight bales in 1784, and it was

doubted at Liverpool that so much could be produced in the country: in

1850, or within the assumed time of a man’s life, America grew 550

millions out of the 1000 millions of lbs. which the world affords.

Algeria is another case in point, proving the adaptability of Africa for

cotton-growing, and Natal will be.[188]

Africa can produce the ‘tree wool’ which England so greatly requires:

she has, however, two grand drawbacks. The first is the inadequacy of

regular labour, the second is the want of roads, tramways, and canals,

and the expensiveness of freight.

The first is a most serious difficulty. It is clear that, without slaves

or quasi-slaves, like the Hindu ryot and the Egyptian fellah under

Mohammed Ali, cotton has not yet anywhere been cultivated in any

considerable quantities, or with any great success. There are certain

stages of the growth when a war, a strike, or anything that removes the

labourer, is fatal to the year’s harvest. Africa, as will be seen by the

example of Abeokuta, cannot depend upon herself; she must look

elsewhere. We have, though tardily, recognized the fact that nothing can

be more suicidal than the emigration of Kulis (coolies) from a land

which, instead of being over-stocked, really suffers from a paucity of

population. From Southern China, however, we can draw supplies of hands

almost _ad libitum_. At present the best fields yield about one-fourth

of the average of the United States, and the prosperity of the crop will

depend upon careful manuring and selection of seed. I have every

confidence in the eventual triumph of free _versus_ slave labour, but it

is hard to say how, at present, any extensive movement of the kind can

be organized, at any rate for the use of Africa.

Transport and freight remain to be considered. There is a difficulty

about road-making in Africa which appears strange to the English reader;

yet it is not a little real. The habits of the natives, and the power of

the climate, would reduce in a few months the best macadam to the

condition of a bridle-path. Beasts of burden are wanting; carts have to

be invented; the country is unfit for canalization, and tramways are

long before its civilization. Finally, freight from the coast is one

penny per pound by steamer, and three-farthings by sailing ship—equal,

in fact, to the Indian, and double the American.

As might be expected, the attempts to develop African cotton have

hitherto been desultory in the extreme. We have tried the ridiculous

Zambezi, and the Spaniards have talked of Fernando Po.[189] Abeokuta has

had a fair trial, and hitherto has failed with an almost total failure.

In the immediate neighbourhood of the city, where farm land lies, there

is little grown, and that little is brought to market in baskets and

blies by the women. The country to the north, especially about Ilori,

supplies the best and the largest quantities. Planted after the harvest

in July, the shrub lasts, they say, for several years, and not being

lopped, attains a height of ten feet. Abeokuta entered the lists with

every prospect of success. She was presented with machinery, agents were

sent to her, she doubled her produce every year, and the Manchester

Association published their expectations for 1859-1860 at 20,000 bales

(112 lbs. to 125 lbs. each). But the war with Ibadan broke out, the

yield fell to 3447 small bales, and between 1st October and 1st January

of the present year (1861) only 500 bales reached Lagos. This, too, in

despite of famine prices in Lancashire and elsewhere. The prime cost at

Abeokuta was 3_d._ to 3½_d._ per lb., and 3_s._ 6_d._ for packing each

bale. Ready for exportation, the bale was worth twenty-eight head of

cowries = 9·60 dollars = 2_l._ 4_s._; it has, however, risen to 2_l._

12_s._ in very scarce times. But peace in America will restore the

balance of the English market, and reduce inferior cottons to a maximum

and minimum of 6¾_d._ and 2_d._, whilst the best qualities will range

between 9_d._ and 5_d._ Under these circumstances, what would become of

cotton culture in Africa?

I presume that the benefits of the cotton famine more than

counterbalance to capitalists its disadvantages, otherwise they would

not sit still calling upon Hercules. It is from them that enterprise

must originate. At present it is confined to trusting a few hundreds of

pounds sterling to any black face with a glib tongue that promises to

procure the article cheap. Combination is wanted, and, still more,

before Europeans expend time and money in Africa, a distinct pledge

that, for so many years, their produce will command a certain price in

the market, which is of course impossible. At present, to tell a plain,

unvarnished truth, we are convinced that if Manchester could once more

buy all her cotton from the Southern States of America at one penny a

bale cheaper than she could obtain it from English territory she would

do so.

The conclusion which I draw from my brief visit to Yoruba is, that it

can produce cotton, and that, for the present at least, it will not. The

public is respectfully advised not so readily to believe those who find

for it cotton districts in every corner of Africa. The Niger River and

Valley offer, perhaps, the best of all sites, and are of all the most

neglected. This part of the subject however must, for the best of

reasons, be reserved for future consideration.

END OF VOL. I

LONDON: PRINTED BY W. CLOWES AND SONS, STAMFORD STREET AND CHARING

CROSS.

[Footnote 165: Caste is one of the most enlightened inventions of the

civilized East. It supplies an admirable system of police, acts as

practical conservatism, and leads to high excellence in the crafts,

arts, and sciences, by breeding generation after generation, till an

instinctive superiority is acquired. The Englishman exclaims, ‘What a

shame it is, because my father is a tinker, that I am forbidden by the

laws of the land to be prime minister;’ and he objects to caste because

it ‘keeps the people down.’ He forgets, however, that he is talking, not

of petty European kingdoms of twenty or thirty millions, but of some two

hundred millions of human beings, and that each caste is quite numerous

enough to form by itself a first-class nation.]

[Footnote 166: The ‘Iwe Irohin,’ appearing October 1862, has the

following sensible but curious article upon the subject of slavery: ‘It

is the boast of Englishmen of the present day that no one is a slave on

British ground; and they have a right to be proud of it, for in 1834

they gave the large sum of twenty million pounds sterling as a

compensation to the slave owners; but though there is no doubt that a

land where every man is free is in a better state than where slavery

exists to a large extent, yet we must remember that slavery is

recognized throughout the Bible, not only in the patriarchal times and

under the Mosaic law, but also very distinctly by St. Paul, who lays

down the relative duties of masters and servants to the Churches of

Ephesus and Colosse, and exhorts Timothy to teach the slaves at Ephesus

to count their own masters worthy of all honour, especially if their

masters were Christians, 1 Tim. vi. 1, 2; and sent back to his master,

Philemon, Onesimus who had been converted under his ministry at Rome,

St. Paul had fully acknowledged the right of Philemon to his servant,

though he thought it convenient for him as a Christian to release him;

and he insists upon the duty of Christian servants to obey their

masters, though he wished them to obtain their freedom if they could, 1

Cor. vii. 21. The tendency of Christianity is no doubt to diminish

slavery, but it does not do this by exciting the slaves to revolt or run

away; on the contrary, it commands them to please their masters well in

all things, but it exhorts masters, as it does all other Christians, to

do to others as they would they should do to them.’]

[Footnote 167: Upon the present state of things that results from

cutting off all slave export, I shall have more to say at some future

time when treating upon the Oil Rivers of West Africa.]

[Footnote 168: As a case in point, compare Richard Lander’s and the Rev.

Mr. Bowen’s estimates of the race.]

[Footnote 169: Mr. Crowther’s is copied too servilely from Murray,

itself an Anglo-Latin modification.]

[Footnote 170: Introductory remarks to Mr. Crowther’s Vocabulary of the

Yoruban language.]

[Footnote 171: The peculiarity which the bishop notices in the adverbs,

viz., that there is a distinct word to express the quality or degree of

each substantive, is already found in Arabic adjectives, especially

those of colour.]

[Footnote 172: New comers are apt to expose themselves needlessly at

night by sleeping in open rooms, and thus by checking perspiration, when

the temperature changes after midnight, to awake with fever or

dysentery. The only Spanish officer who has escaped fever at Fernando Po

attributes his immunity to sleeping in a well-closed apartment. We read

in ‘La Médecine des Prophètes’ (Traduit de l’Arabe par M. le Docteur

Baron. Paris, 1860.): ‘Le sommeil refoule les esprits à l’intérieur du

corps, et alors l’extérieur se refroidit; aussi a-t-on besoin dans le

sommeil de se couvrir davantage.’]

[Footnote 173: The following is an extract of the Returns made to

Parliament of the West African imports and exports:—

There was imported into the United Kingdom, in the year ended 31st

December, 1861, from the Western Coast of Africa, produce of the value,

in round numbers, of one and a half million sterling. This amount is

exclusive of the imports from the British, French, and Spanish

possessions on that coast.

Palm-oil is the chief article of commerce brought into this country from

thence, the value of which, in 1860, was not less than 1,684,532_l._ The

other articles, consisting chiefly of dye woods, cotton, ebony, and

elephants’ teeth, had a total value of only 92,000_l._

The last made-up returns are given below, as well as the increase or

decrease as compared with 1859:—

1860. Increase. Decrease.

£ £ £

Barwood 8,939 2,046

Camwood 7,370 519

Copper ore 648 515

Cotton 6,094 405

Ebony 3,797 1,184

Guano 2,590 1,186

Gum animi 222 531

„ copal 865 727

Oil (palm) 1,684,532 263,503

Orchil 29

Teeth (elephants’) 35,672 6,203

Wax (bees’) 2,134 5,590

All other articles 23,702 4,147

--------- ------- ------

Total 1,776,565 272,990 13,602

13,602

-------

Increase in 1860 over 1859 259,388

-------

The exports of British produce and manufactures were valued at

865,804_l._ for the year 1861, which is less by 85,491_l._ than for the

preceding year.

By the subjoined table it will be seen that the largest shipments in

1860 were cotton goods, gunpowder, guns, spirits, and earthenware, and

that with one exception all the articles exhibit increases over 1859:—

1860. Increase. Decrease.

£ £ £

Apparel 24,158 6,582

Guns 61,613 22,230

Gunpowder 100,169 28,785

Beads 8,338 5,264

Brass manufactures 20,820 1,846

Cottons 464,661 138,216

Earthenware 23,227 11,418

Hardware 50,314 2,405

Iron and steel 25,147 4,442

Silk manufactures 14,421 6,429

Spirits (British) 15,695 12,078

Staves 56,538 1,909

Woollens 11,074 4,032

All other articles 75,120 13,450

------- ------- -------

Total 951,295 257,177 1,909

1,909

-------

Increase in 1860 over 1859 255,268

-------

Of foreign and colonial produce and manufactures exported from this

country to the Western Coast of Africa the value in 1860 was 194,139_l._

The principal articles were beads, cowries, silk manufactures, spirits,

and tobacco.]

[Footnote 174: The tobacco, like that of Africa generally, lacks

strength and flavour: whether cultivation would improve it remains to be

seen.]

[Footnote 175: The traveller’s best outfit would be grey domestics, a

few striped ditto, some silk velvets (red and green, with white stripe),

a little coral, some fez or tarbushes, a few umbrellas, and trifles like

needles, scissors, and little looking-glasses.]

[Footnote 176: According to the ‘Iwe Irohin’ (Appendix, Oct. 1862), ‘the

chiefs of Abeokuta are beginning to feel the evils which are being

inflicted on the town by rum-selling.’ The obvious means of discouraging

the importation would be to impose a duty of 5 per cent., gradually and

by very slow degrees, raised to 50, and even to cent. per cent. on

ardent spirits, and with great prudence to make the imposts on gunpowder

so heavy as to be almost prohibitory. To effect such innovation,

however, we must be free from the presence of rivals; upon the Gold

Coast, for instance, and at Lagos, under present circumstances, hasty

steps would lead to ruinous consequences.]

[Footnote 177: The following is the usual computation:—

40 cowries = 1 string (ojo), which varies, according to the market, from

1_f._ to 1_d._ The string of 50 cowries is called Adotta.

5 strings = 1 bunch.

10 bunches = 50 strings, or 2000 cowries 1 head (Egba or Egbawa) = $1,

whence probably the word ‘head’ was derived in former times, but now

varying from 2_s._ to 1_s._ 5_d._

10 heads, or 20,000 cowries = 1 bag (okkekan), now worth 18_s._

20 heads = 1 oz. gold dust = £4.

Thus assuming the dollar to be at the old value 4_s._ 6_d._ (it has

lately been reduced to 4_s._ 2_d._)—

_s._ _d._ Bags. Heads. Strings. Cowries.

One bag, worth 18 0 contains 1 0 0 0

„ dollar „ 4 6 „ 0 2 25 0

„ head „ 1 9½ „ 0 1 0 0

„ shilling „ 1 0 „ 0 0 27 31

The natives, as might be expected, have a number of names and minor

subdivisions, even a single cowrie being made to buy snuff and similar

small articles. The following are the names generally known:—

Ogonu (_i.e._ one hundred) = 2½ strings.

Igbio = 5 strings; in Portuguese, Gallinha; Anglicè, ‘bunch,’ or

smaller bundle.

Ojuluba (5 strings and 1) = 6 strings.

Enowo = 10 strings.

Egbeta = 15 „

Egbeni = 20 „

Egbenu = 25 „

Egbefa = 30 „

Egbejje = 35 „

Egbejja = 40 „

Egbisi = 45 „

After which comes the head = 50 strings.]

[Footnote 178: At Sansanding, however, 3000 cowries were = 1 minkalli of

gold = 12_s._ 6_d._]

[Footnote 179: The only thing in its favour is that it teaches the

children arithmetic. Mr. Crowther informs us that they begin by counting

one by one, then by twos, and lastly by fives. It is a taunt to say ‘_O

daju danu o o’mo essan messan_’—with all your cleverness, you do not

know nine times nine.]

[Footnote 180: Maize, called muhindi, _i.e._ Indian or Hindostan corn,

in East Africa, is here called yangan or agbado, _i.e._ agba odo, ‘what

is beaten in the mortar.’ It is said to have been brought from the

eastward, beyond the Niger, by a yellow monkey—the Oibo, or white man,

according to the boys, is the ‘old baboon,’—which tends to show that it

is not a native of the land. We cannot however as yet answer the

question whether maize and the arachis be African or purely American

growths.]

[Footnote 181: Mr. Bowen mentions a Yoruban tradition, that yams were

the primitive human food. The first man vainly attempted to eat it raw:

he afterwards found one accidentally roasted before the fire—somewhat

like Elia’s genesis of the sucking pig—and succeeded better. Europeans,

less sensible, eat the yam boiled, in which state it is detestable,

though far superior to potato when roasted.]

[Footnote 182: It is considered heating and bilious, especially if drunk

whilst the sun is hot. The Portuguese, on both coasts of Africa,

carefully avoid it. I prefer tea _à la Russe_, with a small quantity of

sugar, if procurable, and a slice of lemon instead of ‘bullock milk.’]

[Footnote 183: 25,000,000_l._ consumed, and 55,000,000_l._ exported.]

[Footnote 184: England takes 85 per cent. from America, 8 from foreign,

and 7 from British territory.]

[Footnote 185: And it is said landowners have often sold for 9_d._ what

they have raised for 3_d._ per lb.]

[Footnote 186: ‘Cotton; an Account of its Culture in the Bombay

Presidency, prepared from Government Records, and other authentic

sources, in accordance with a resolution of the Government of India.’

(London: Smith, Elder, and Co.)]

[Footnote 187: It has been contended that an improvement of machinery

will make short staple do the work of medium staple. This, if true, only

shifts the difficulty; the same amount of alteration in machinery will

make medium staple do the work of long staple.]

[Footnote 188: Natal has all the constituents of climate which render

the coast of Georgia so famous for cotton-growing: it is not too

constantly hot for seaboard or upland, and its current is a fac-simile

of the Gulf Stream.]

[Footnote 189: Early in 1862 I sent, kindly assisted by D. Pellon, four

samples of cotton, growing almost wild about Clarence, to the African

Association at Liverpool. They were described as follows:—

1. _Gossipium vitifolium_, good colour, uneven, staple equal to

middling Orleans, considered worth 13¼_d._ to 14_d._

2. „ „ good staple, rather yellow, very clean; value

the same.

3. _Gossipium tricuspidatum_, dull colour, uneven staple, mixed with

short; clean, worth 12½_d._

4. „ „ colour too yellow, good strong staple, equal

to Egyptian; when clean worth 16½_d._]

Transcriber's note:

Page 12, footnote 6, Changed: "what the Hansa people call Bature Dudu"

to: "Hausa"

Page 103, Changed: "turbans, or Hauea head-dresses" to: "Hausa"

Page 167, Changed: "his engraver has succeded" to: "succeeded"

Page 206, Changed: "I have something n a future page" to: "in a"

Page 229, footnote 140, Changed: "and Vocabulary or the Yoruba

Language" to: "of the"

Page 229-230 footnote 140, Changed: "with something tired up in it"

to: "tied"

Page 265, Changed: "morever, a deeper cause of quarrel" to: "moreover"