Part 34

The second quality is that imported from the regions about the Nyassa Lake, and carried to Kilwa by the Wabisa, the Wahiao, the Wangindo, the Wamakua, and other clans. The “Bisha ivory” formerly found its way to the Mozambique, but the barbarians have now learned to prefer Zanzibar; and the citizens welcome them, as they sell their stores more cheaply than the Wahiao, who have become adepts in coast arts. The ivory of the Wabisa, though white and soft, is generally small, the full length of a tusk being 7 feet. The price of the “bab kalasi”--scrivellos or small tusks, under 20 lbs.--is from 24 to 25 dollars; and the value increases at the rate of somewhat less than 1 dollar per lb. The “bab gujrati or kashshi,” the bab kashshi, is that intended for the Cutch market. The tusk must be of middling size, little bent, very bluff at the point as it is intended for rings and armlets; the girth must be a short span and three fingers, the bamboo shallow and not longer than a hand. Ivory fulfilling all these conditions will sell as high as 70 dollars per frasilah,--medium size of 20 to 45 lbs.--fetches 56 to 60 dollars. The “bab wilaiti,” or “foreign sort,” is that purchased in European and American markets. The largest size is preferred, which ranging from 45 to 100 lbs., may be purchased for 52 dollars per frasilah.

The third and least valued quality is the western ivory, the Gendai, and other varieties imported from Usagara, Uhehe, Urori, Unyamwezi, and its neighbourhood. The price varies according to size, form, and weight, from 45 to 56 dollars per frasilah.

The transport of ivory to the coast, and the profits derived by the maritime settlers, Arab and Indian, have been described. When all fees have been paid, the tusk, guarded against smuggling by the custom-house stamp, is sent to Zanzibar. On the island scrivellos under 6 lbs. in weight are not registered. According to the late Lieutenant-Colonel Hamerton, the annual average of large tusks is not less than 20,000. The people of the country make the weight range between 17,000 and 25,000 frasilah. The tusk is larger at Zanzibar than elsewhere. At Mozambique, for instance, 60 lbs. would be considered a good average for a lot. Monster tusks are spoken of. Specimens of 5 farasilah are not very rare, and the people have traditions that these wonderful armatures have extended to 227 lbs., and even to 280 lbs. each.

Amongst the minor articles of export from the interior, hippopotamus teeth have been enumerated. Beyond the coast, however, they form but a slender item in the caravan load. In the inner regions they are bought in retail; the price ranges between 1 and 2 fundo of beads, and at times 3 may be procured for a shukkah. On the coast they rise, when fine, to 25 dollars per frasilah. At Zanzibar a large lot, averaging 6 to 8 lbs. in weight (12 lbs. would be about the largest), will sell for 60 dollars; per frasilah of 5 lbs. from 40 to 45 dollars: whilst the smallest fetch from 5 to 6 dollars. Of surpassing hardness, they are still used in Europe for artificial teeth. In America porcelain bids fair to supplant them.

The gargatan (karkadan?), or small black rhinoceros with a double horn, is as common as the elephant in the interior. The price of the horn is regulated by its size; a small specimen is to be bought for 1 jembe or iron hoe. When large the price is doubled. Upon the coast a lot fetches from 6 to 9 dollars per frasilah, which at Zanzibar increases to from 8 to 12 dollars. The inner barbarians apply plates of the horn to helcomas and ulcerations, and they cut it into bits, which are bound with twine round the limb, like the wooden mpigii or hirizi. Large horns are imported through Bombay to China and Central Asia, where it is said the people convert them into drinking-cups, which sweat if poison be administered in them: thus they act like the Venetian glass of our ancestors, and are as highly prized as that eccentric fruit the coco de mer. The Arabs of Maskat and Yemen cut them into sword-hilts, dagger-hafts, tool-handles, and small boxes for tobacco, and other articles. They greatly prize, and will pay 12 dollars per frasilah, for the spoils of the kobaoba, or long-horned white rhinoceros, which, however, appears no longer to exist in the latitudes westward of Zanzibar island.

Black cattle are seldom driven down from the interior, on account of the length and risk of the journey. It is evident, however, that the trade is capable of extensive development. The price of full-grown bullocks varies, according to the distance from the coast, between 3 and 5 doti; whilst that of cows is about double. When imported from the mainland ports, 1 dollar per head is paid as an octroi to the government, and about the same sum for passage-money. As Banyans will not allow this traffic to be conducted by their own craft, it is confined to the Moslem population. The island of Zanzibar is supplied with black cattle, chiefly from the Banadir and Madagascar, places beyond the range of this description. The price of bullocks varies from 5 to 8 dollars, and of cows from 6 to 9 dollars. Goats and sheep abound throughout Eastern Africa. The former, which are preferred, cost in the maritime regions from 8 to 10 shukkah merkani; in Usagara, the most distant province which exports them to Zanzibar, they may be bought for 4 to 6 shukkah per head. The Wasawahili conduct a small trade in this live stock, and sell them upon the island for 4 to 5 dollars per head. From their large profits, however, must be deducted the risk of transport, the price of passage, and the octroi, which is 25 cents per head.

The exceptional expense of man-carriage renders the exportation of hides and horns from the far interior impossible. The former are sold with the animal, and are used for shields, bedding, saddle-bags, awnings, sandals, and similar minor purposes. Skins, as has been explained, are in some regions almost the only wear; consequently the spoils of a fine goat command, even in far Usukuma, a doti of domestics. The principal wild hides, which, however, rarely find their way to the coast, are those of the rhinoceros--much prized by the Arabs for targes--the lion and the leopard, the giraffe and the buffalo, the zebra and the quagga. Horns are allowed to crumble upon the ground. The island of Zanzibar exports hides and skins, which are principally those of bullocks and goats brought from Brava, Marka, Makdishu, and the Somali country. The korjah or score of the former has risen from 10 to 24 dollars; and the people have learned to mix them with the spoils of wild animals, especially the buffalo. When taken from the animal the hides are pinned down with pegs passed through holes in the edges; thus they dry without shrinking, and become stiff as boards. When thoroughly sun-parched they are put in soak and are pickled in sea-water for forty-eight hours; thus softened, they are again stretched and staked, that they may remain smooth: as they are carelessly removed by the natives, the meat fat, flippers, ears, and all the parts likely to be corrupted, or, to prevent close stowage, are cut off whilst wet. They are again thoroughly sun-dried, the grease which exudes during the operation is scraped off, and they are beaten with sticks to expel the dust. The Hamburg merchants paint their hides with an arsenical mixture, which preserves them during the long months of magazine-storing and sea-voyage. The French and American traders omit this operation, and their hides suffer severely from insects.

Details concerning the growth of cereals in the interior have occurred in the preceding pages. Grain is never exported from the lands lying beyond the maritime regions: yet the disforesting of the island of Zanzibar and the extensive plantations of clove-trees rendering a large importation of cereals necessary to the Arabs, an active business is carried on by Arab dows from the whole of the coast between Tanga and Ngao (Monghou), and during the dear season, after the rains, considerable profits are realised. The corn measures used by the Banyans are as follows:--

2 Kubabah (each from 1·25 to 1·50 lbs., in fact, our “quart”) = 1 Kisaga. 3 Kubabah = 1 Pishi (in Khutu the Pishi = 2 Kubabah). 4 Kubabah = 1 Kayla (equal to 2 Man). 24 Kayla = 1 Frasilah. 60 Kayla = 1 Jizlah, in Kisawahili Mzo. 20 Farasilah = 1 Kandi (candy).

As usual in these lands, the kubabah or unit is made to be arbitrary; it is divided into two kinds, large and small. The measure is usually a gourd.

The only timber now utilised in commerce is the mukanda’a or red and white mangrove, which supplies the well-known bordi or “Zanzibar rafters.” They are the produce of the fluviatile estuaries and the marine lagoons, and attain large dimensions under the influence of potent heat and copious rains. The best is the red variety, which, when thrown upon the shore, stains the sand; it grows on the soft and slimy bank, and anchors itself with ligneous shoots to the shifting soil. The white mangrove, springing from harder ground, dispenses with these supports; it is called mti wa muytu (“wild wood”), and is quickly destroyed by worms. Indeed, all the bordi at Zanzibar begin to fail after the fifth year if exposed to the humid atmosphere; at Maskat it is said they will last nearly a century. The rafter trade is conducted by Arab dows: the crews fell the trees, after paying 2 or 3 dollars in cloth by way of ada or present to the diwan, who permits them to hire labourers. The korjah or score of cut and trimmed red mangrove rafters formerly cost at Zanzibar 1 dollar; the price has now risen to 2 and 3 dollars. This timber finds its way to Aden and the woodless lands of Eastern and Western Arabia; at Jeddah they have been known to fetch 1 dollar each.

The maritime regions also supply a small quantity of the “grenadille wood,” called by the people, who confound it with real ebony (Diospyros ebenus), abnus and pingú. It is not so brittle as ebony; it is harder than lignum-vitæ (G. officinalis), spoiling the common saw, and is readily recognised by its weight. As it does not absorb water or grease, it is sent to Europe for the mouth-pieces and flanges of instruments, and for the finer parts of mills. The people use it in the interior for pipe-bowls.

The mpira or caoutchouc-tree (Ficus elastica) grows abundantly throughout the maritime regions. A few lumps of the gum were brought to Zanzibar at the request of a merchant, who offered a large sum for a few tons, in the vain hope of stimulating the exploitation of this valuable article. The specimens were not, however, cast in moulds as by the South American Indians; they were full of water, and even fouler than those brought from Madagascar. To develop the trade European supervision would be absolutely necessary during the season for tapping the trees.

A tree growing upon the coast and common in Madagascar produces, when an incision has been made in the bark, a juice inspissating to the consistency of soft soap, and much resembling the Indian “kokam.” This “kanya” is eaten by Arabs and Africans, with the idea that it “moistens the body:” in cases of stiff joints, swellings of the extremities, and contractions of the sinews, it is melted over the fire and is rubbed into the skin for a fortnight or three weeks.

The produce and the value of the coco and areca palms have already been noted. Orchella-weed (Rocilla fuciformis?), a lichen most valuable in dyeing, is found, according to the late Lieut.-Colonel Hamerton, growing on trees and rocks throughout the maritime regions. The important growths of the interior are the frankincense and bdellium, the coffee and nutmeg--which, however, are still in a wild state--the tamarind, and the sisam or black wood. The largest planks are made of the mtimbati (African teak?) and the mvule; they are now exported from the coast to the island, where they have almost died out. As the art of sawing is unknown, a fine large tree is invariably sacrificed for a single board. It was the opinion of the late Lieut.-Colonel Hamerton that a saw-mill at the mouth of the Pangani River would, if sanctioned by the local government, be highly remunerative.

Cowries, called by the Arabs kaure, in Kisawahili khete, and in the interior simbi, are collected from various places in the coast-region between Ras Hafun and the Mozambique. This trade is in the hands of Moslem hucksters; the Banyan who has no objection to the valuable ivory or hippopotamus-tooth, finds his religion averse to the vile spoils of the Cypræa. Cowries are purchased on the mainland by a curious specimen of the “round-trade;” money is not taken, so the article is sold measure for measure of holcus grain. From Zanzibar the cowrie takes two directions. As it forms the currency of the regions north of the “Land of the Moon,” and is occasionally demanded as an ornament in Unyamwezi, the return African porters, whose labour costs them nothing, often

## partly load themselves with the article; the Arab, on the other hand,

who seldom visits the northern kingdoms, does not find compensation for porterage and rations. The second and principal use of cowries is for exportation to the West African coast, where they are used in currency--50 strings, each of 40 shells, or a total of 2000, representing the dollar. This, in former days a most lucrative trade, is now nearly ruined. Cowries were purchased at 75 cents per jizlah, which represents from 3 to 3½ sacks, of which much, however, was worthless. The sacks in which they were shipped cost in Zanzibar 1 dollar 44 cents, and fetched in West Africa 8 or 9 dollars. The shells sold at the rate of 80_l._ (60_l._ was the average English price) per ton; thus the profits were estimated at 500 per cent., and a Hamburg house rose, it is said, by this traffic, from 1 to 18 ships, of which 7 were annually engaged in shipping cowries. From 75 cents the price rose to 4 dollars, it even attained a maximum of 10 dollars, the medium being 6 and 7 dollars per jizlah, and the profits necessarily declined.

Cotton is indigenous to the more fertile regions of Eastern as well as of Western Africa. The specimens hitherto imported from Port Natal and from Angola have given satisfaction, as they promise, with careful cultivation, to rival in fineness, firmness, and weight the medium-staple cotton of the New World. On the line between Zanzibar and the Tanganyika Lake the shrub grows almost wild, with the sole exception of Ugogo and its two flanks of wilderness, where the ground is too hard and the dry season too prolonged to support it. The partial existence of the same causes renders it scarce and dear in Unyamwezi. A superior quality was introduced by the travelling Arabs, but it soon degenerated. Cotton flourishes luxuriantly in the black earths fat with decayed vegetation, and on the rich red clays of the coast regions, of Usumbara, Usagara, and Ujiji, where water underlies the surface. These almost virgin soils are peculiarly fitted by atmospheric and geologic conditions for the development of the shrub, and the time may come when vast tracts, nearly half the superficies of the lands, here grass-grown, there cumbered by the primæval forest, may be taught to bear crops equalling the celebrated growths of Egypt and Algeria, Harar and Abyssinia. At present the cultivation is nowhere encouraged, and it is limited by the impossibility of exportation to the scanty domestic requirements of the people. It is grown from seed sown immediately after the rains, and the only care given to it is the hedging requisite to preserve the dwarf patches from the depredations of cattle. In some parts the shrub is said to wither after the third year, in others to be perennial.

Upon the coast the cotton grown by the Wasawahili and Wamrima is chiefly used as lamp-wicks and for similar domestic purposes; Zanzibar Island is supplied from Western India. The price of raw uncleaned cotton in the mountain regions is about 0·25 dollar per maund of 3 Arab lbs. In Zanzibar, where the msufi or bombax abounds, its fibrous substance is a favourite substitute for cotton, and costs about half the price. In Unyamwezi it fetches fancy prices; it is sold in handfuls for salt, beads, and similar articles. About 1 maund may be purchased for a shukkah, and from 1 to 2 oz. of rough home-spun yarn for a fundo of beads. At Ujiji the people bring it daily to the bazar and spend their waste time in spinning yarn with the rude implements before described. This cotton, though superior in quality, as well as quantity, to that of Unyanyembe, is but little less expensive.

Tobacco grows plentifully in the more fertile regions of East Africa. Planted at the end of the rains, it gains strength by sun and dew, and is harvested in October. It is prepared for sale in different forms. Everywhere, however, a simple sun-drying supplies the place of cocking and sweating, and the people are not so fastidious as to reject the lower or coarser leaves and those tainted by the earth. Usumbara produces what is considered at Zanzibar a superior article: it is kneaded into little circular cakes four inches in diameter by half an inch deep: rolls of these cakes are neatly packed in plantain-leaves for exportation. The next in order of excellence is that grown in Uhiáo: it is exported in leaf or in the form called kambari, “roll-tobacco,” a circle of coils each about an inch in diameter. The people of Khutu and Usagara mould the pounded and wetted material into discs like cheeses, 8 or 9 inches across by 2 or 3 in depth, and weighing about 3 lbs.; they supply the Wagogo with tobacco, taking in exchange for it salt. The leaf in Unyamwezi generally is soft and perishable, that of Usukuma being the worst: it is sold in blunt cones, so shaped by the mortars in which they are pounded. At Karagwah, according to the Arabs, the tobacco, a superior variety, tastes like musk in the water-pipe. The produce of Ujiji is better than that of Unyamwezi; it is sold in leaf, and is called by the Arabs hamúmí, after a well-known growth in Hazramaut. It is impossible to assign an average price to tobacco in East Africa; it varies from 1 khete of coral beads per 6 oz. to 2 lbs.

Tobacco is chewed by the maritime races, the Wasawahili, and especially the Zanzibar Arabs, who affect a religious scruple about smoking. They usually insert a pinch of nurah or coral-lime into their quids,--as the Somal introduces ashes,--to make them bite; in the interior, where calcareous formations are deficient, they procure the article from cowries brought from the coast, or from shells found in the lakes and streams. About Unyamwezi all sexes and ages enjoy the pipe. Farther eastward snuff is preferred. The liquid article in fashion amongst the Wajiji has already been described. The dry snuff is made of leaf toasted till crisp and pounded between two stones, mixed with a little magádí or saltpetre, sometimes scented with the heart of the plantain-tree and stored in the tumbakira or gourd-box.

The other articles exported from the coast to Zanzibar are bees’-wax and honey, tortoiseshell and ambergris, ghee, tobacco, the sugar-cane, the wild arrowroot, gums, and fibrous substances; of these many have been noticed, and the remainder are of too trifling a value to deserve attention.

To conclude the subject of commerce in East Africa. It is rather to the merchant than to the missionary that we must look for the regeneration of the country by the development of her resources. The attention of the civilized world, now turned towards this hitherto neglected region, will presently cause slavery to cease; man will not risk his all in petty and passionless feuds undertaken to sell his weaker neighbour; and commerce, which induces mansuetude of manners, will create wants and interests at present unknown. As the remote is gradually drawn nigh, and the difficult becomes accessible, the intercourse of man--strongest instrument of civilisation in the hand of Providence--will raise Africa to that place in the great republic of nations from which she has hitherto been unhappily excluded.

Already a line of steam navigation from the Cape of Good Hope to Aden and the Red Sea, touching at the various important posts upon the mainland and the islands of East Africa, has been proposed. This will be the first step towards material improvement. The preceding pages have, it is believed, convinced the reader that the construction of a tramroad through a country abounding in timber and iron, and where only one pass of any importance presents itself, will be attended with no engineering difficulties. As the land now lies, trade stagnates, loanable capital remains idle, produce is depreciated, and new seats of enterprise are unexplored. The specific for existing evils is to be found in facilitating intercourse between the interior and the coast, and that this will in due season be effected we may no longer doubt.

APPENDIX II.

FIRST CORRESPONDENCE.

1.

“East India House, 13th September, 1856.

“Sir,--I am commanded by the Court of Directors of the East India Company to inform you, that, in compliance with the request of the Royal Geographical Society, you are permitted to be absent from your duties as a regimental officer whilst employed with an Expedition, under the patronage of Her Majesty’s Government, to be despatched into Equatorial Africa, for the exploration of that country, for a period not exceeding two years. I am directed to add, that you are permitted to draw the pay and allowances of your rank during the period of your absence, which will be calculated from the date of your departure from Bombay.

“I am, Sir, “Your most obedient humble Servant, “(Signature illegible.)

“Lieutenant R. BURTON.”

2.

“East India House, 24th October, 1856.

“Sir,--In consequence of a communication from the office of the Secretary of State for War, intimating that you are required as a witness on the trial by Court-Martial now pending on Colonel A. Shirley, I am desired to convey to you the commands of the Court of Directors that you instantly return to London for that purpose. In obeying this order, you are required to proceed, not through France, but by the steamer direct from Alexandria to Southampton. You will report yourself to the Secretary of State for War immediately on your arrival. The agent for the East India Company in Egypt has received instructions by this mail to supply you with the necessary funds for your passage.

“I am, Sir, “Your most obedient humble Servant, “(Signed) JAMES MELVILLE.

“Lieutenant BURTON.”

3.

“_The Military Secretary, East India House._

“Aden, 14th November.

“Sir,--I have the honour to acknowledge your official letter of the 24th October, conveying to me the commands of the Court of Directors to return instantly to London by the steamer direct from Alexandria to Southampton.

“The steamer in question left Alexandria on November 6th, at about 10 a.m. I received and acknowledged from the British Consulate your official letter on the same day at Cairo, about noon. No steamer leaves Alexandria before the 20th inst.; it is therefore evident that I could not possibly obey the order within the limits specified.