m
NORTHWESTERN
UNIVERSITY
LIBRARY
*
Purchased from
The Ford Foundation grant
for the
Program of African Studies
LIBERIA:
THE AMERICOAFRICAN REPUBLIC.
BEING
SOME IMPRESSIONS OF THE CLIMATE,
RESOURCES, AND PEOPLE,
RESULTING FROM
PERSONAL OBSERVATIONS AND EXPERIENCES
IN WEST AFRICA.
By T. McCANTS STEWART,
Former Professor of Mathematics in the South Carolina State Agricultural College ;
Late General Agent for Industrial Education in Liberia.
with an introduction
By DR. G. W. SAMSON,
Former President of Columbian University, Washington, D. C.
NEW YORK:
EDWARD O. JENKINS' SONS,
20 NORTH WILLIAM STREET.
l886.
COPYRIGHT, 1885, BY
T. McCANTS STEWART.
edward o. jenkins' sons,
Printers and Stereotypers,
20 North William Street.
THIS VOLUME IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED
BY THE AUTHOR
TO
HENRY M. SCHIEFFELIN,
Former Consul-General of Liberia for the United States of America,
WHOSE
INCREASING INTEREST IN THE GROWTH AND PERPETUITY OF THE
AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC; WHOSE UNSELFISH SERVICES
AND WISE COUNSELS FREELY GIVEN THE GOVERNMENT
AND THE PEOPLE; AND WHOSE LARGE AND
GENEROUS DONATIONS TO PUBLIC AND
PRIVATE LIBERIAN ENTERPRISES,
PLACE HIM FIRST AMONG THE AMERICAN FRIENDS OF THAT RE¬
PUBLIC, EVEN AS HE STANDS FOREMOST IN SCHIEFFELIN VILLE
IN THE REPUBLIC OF LIBERIA.
INTRODUCTION.
The Belgian king, who has enlisted the great States of
Europe to follow his "New Star in the East " on the Congo,
found his parallel to guide him in Berkeley's "Star of Em¬
pire"; which arose two and a half centuries ago on the
American shores. In the history of Liberia the parallel
holds good. fThe men who colonized the new settlements,
now constituting the United States of America, were
mostly the descendants of slaves under successive Ro¬
man, Saxon, Danish, and Norman lords. They learned
self-government as colonists only after five generations of
protectorate under the mother country. Their early set¬
tlements on the coast and along river-bottoms proved un-
healthful, sterile, and inhospitable. Jamestown was soon
deserted ; Chester and Plymouth were left to decay; com¬
merce often was hampered; and public debt seemed irre¬
trievable. Youth were sent to the mother country to be
educated; and churches sought both ministers and their
support from the mother country.^
Liberia was settled only two generations ago by slaves
just freed, without property or education. In one genera¬
tion they were nominally independent ; having their own
Executive, Judiciary, and Legislature. No nation behind,
fully in sympathy, fostered them in their need ; the U. S.
Government only making their territory an asylum for re¬
captured slaves; and not even granting their special needs,
exploration and opening up inland resources, mail com¬
munication with their kindred at home, a gun-boat to pro¬
tect their commerce ; all which " neglect " another Burke
in the U. S. Congress is needed faithfully to portray. If
Millsburg is deserted, and Monrovia decaying ; if no sani¬
tary safeguards are inaugurated, no harbor opened, and no
wharf erected; if roads are not opened, and mineral resources
are not developed ; if territory purchased by the U. S.
6
INTRODUCTION.
Government is seized by European Powers, and Liberian
commerce is monopolized ; if interior settlements are not
therefore made possible ; if education is struggling both
against ignorance and imperfect guardianship—not only
the Americo - African, but the Anglo-American—yes, all
Europe is asking : " Who for this is responsible ? the colo¬
nists ? or the nation whose lands have been tilled, whose cot¬
ton has been raised, whose mills erected, whose marts have
been made busy, and whose treasury has been supplied
from their half-requited labor?"
Another generation of Americo - Africans has arisen;
whose claim to be true Americans outranks in length of
time any other nationalities except the primitive English
and Dutch settlers. In twenty years they have witnessed
an advance in culture unparalleled in the annals of nations
and races. They see the " New Star in the East " rising.
They wish to know the practical facts as to its history and
promise ; for it is their " fatherland." If never to enlist in
its redemption, it is as dear to them as is their own to
Anglo-Saxon or German-Americans. Just now, too, the
world's eye is turned to that land, the early seat of an ad¬
vanced civilization ; and they who hail it as the home of
ancestry, wish to be assured as to its hope for the future.
He who reads thoughtfully, impartially, the pages that
follow, will find just what practical Americans of all pre¬
dilections need and desire to know.
What is vital in the work now offered the public, is its
call to Christian thought. Burke, in 1790, foretold that the
French Republic would fail from lack of Christian rever¬
ence ; Senator Sumner recalled this forcibly to Jules Favre
in 1872 ; and if Liberia is saved from disaster, it will only
be by having public men like those who, in many a time of
peril, have saved the American Republic.
G. W. Samson.
121 W. 125th St., New York City.
PREFACE.
This book is an honest endeavor to do some good. In
it nothing is set down in malice ; and yet its truths may
be offensive to some. In writing it, however, I have never
at any time paused for a moment to consider whether or
not I shall please or displease anybody. My aim has
been simply to set forth plainly and truthfully the situa¬
tion as I found it in Liberia, so as to give information
which may be of interest, and possibly of use, to others.
Many will criticise my work. Some will say I have
minimized the difficulties attending life in West Africa,
and exaggerated the resources of the country. Others
will urge that I have been too much of an apologist ; that
I have not told the whole truth. There may be some
force in this latter criticism.
True, I have not mentioned the dishonesty and incom¬
petency of political officials. I have not told the story of
a swindling loan contracted in England fifteen years ago,
when the English money-sharks and dishonest Liberians
preyed upon the Republic like vultures, stealing almost
seventy-five cents out of every dollar borrowed. I have
not recorded the fact that this swindle, which is not yet
settled, may cause the British Government to assume a
Protectorate over Liberia, as it has lately done over Egypt.
I confess that I have left much unsaid from the necessary
limits of a work of this kind. But, although much has
been omitted, I have said enough to awaken thought and
inquiry which may lead to practical results.
If this should prove true, I shall take it to be an answer
in part to the prayer I offered, when I stood for the first
time in Palm Grove Cemetery, in Monrovia, at the grave
of the illustrious Henry Highland Garnet, whose body
lies near the shores of the Atlantic Ocean, which he so
heroically crossed, in his old age, with a Message of sym¬
pathy and cheer to the struggling Liberian Republic.
The Author.
81 Adelphi St., Brooklyn, N. Y.
CONTENTS.
Chapter L—The African Continent, ... 9
" II.—The Search for African Territory, . 13
" III.—The Struggle to Establish the Col¬
ony, 19
IV.—Climate—The Rainy Season, . . 22
V.—Climate—The Dry Season, ... 26
VI.—Climate—The Causes of Unhealthi-
ness, 30
" VII.—Climate—Malaria Dethroned, . . 35
VIII.—Climate—African Fever, ... 40
" IX.—Resources—Natural and Cultivated
Products—a Growing Commerce, . 45
" X.—People—The Natives—Their Customs
and Manners 54
XI.—People—The Kroo and the Vey Tribes, 65
XII.—People—The Americo-Africans, . . 70
XIII.—People—Relation of Liberians and
Natives, 77
XIV.—People—General Condition and Pros¬
pects 83
XV.—Mission and Educational Work Need¬
ed, ........ 92
" XVI.—American Interest ,in the African
Republic 100
CHAPTER I.
THE AFRICAN CONTINENT.
THE name " Dark Continent " has lost its significance.
Africa now stands in the eye-flash of Deity and be¬
fore the gaze of the civilized world. Exploration and com¬
merce have opened the mouth of the Sphinx, and there is
no longer deep-veiled mystery enshrouding the land of
" Ethiopia's blameless race." Mungo Park, Livingstone,
and Stanley have penetrated its swamps and its forests,
traversed its lakes and its rivers, and have told us what
they revealed unto them.
Even the name of this great continent has been a sub¬
ject of much discussion. It is believed that it is derived
from the Latin word Aprica (sunny), or the Greek word
Aphriké (without cold).
Africa lies between the latitudes of 38° N. and 35° S.
More of its surface is within the tropics than that of any
other of the continents. It is larger than Europe or Aus¬
tralia. In its physical conformation it may be compared
to an upturned plate or saucer. It slopes at the coast and
rises toward the interior. On entering the continent, the
explorer must cut his way through swamps of mangrove-
trees in order to reach the table-lands, the hills, the moun¬
tains, the plain.
We have learned more within the last eighty-five years
of the geography of Africa than people knew in the pre-
1* (9)
IO
LIBERIA.
ceding eighteen centuries. Strictly speaking, Mungo Park
is the father of African exploration. True, the enterpris¬
ing Phcenicians sent out colonies to the "Dark Continent,"
and the warlike Greeks made conquests there. The Ro¬
man standards were also unfurled on African soil ; but so
far as we know these nations confined their operations to
the coasts of the Red Sea, the Mediterranean, and Egypt.
They did not penetrate the interior. The Carthaginians
claim to have sent their merchants into the Niger valley,
but there is no evidence to support this boast. It was
reserved for the nineteenth century civilization to open
Africa to the gaze of the world.
In 1788, " The African Association " was formed in Eng¬
land, for the purpose of exploring " Inner Africa." They
sent out Mungo Park, whose great career as an explorer
inspired Barth, Overweg, Livingstone, Stanley, and De
Brazza, and led them to achieve a work for Africa for
which humanity will ever be grateful, and upon which
God will forever pour out His heavenly benedictions.
I can not in a paragraph, or even a page, follow the his¬
tory of African exploration, or describe the physical fea¬
tures and peculiarities of this interesting country. The
reader will find agreeable and profitable work in studying,
in the latest geographies, the coast lines, the rivers, the
lakes, the snow-clad mountains, the deserts, and the
swamps of Africa. Such a study will not fail to produce
surprise, because we, who passed through the schools a
generation ago, are so ignorant of the topography and
physical conformations of the Dark Continent. We think
of it simply as a horrid, sickly country. We can hardly
believe that within it are snow-clad mountains, charming
valleys, and lovely landscape scenery.
Africa is a beautiful country. Let the reader imagine
THE BASSA COUNTRY COAST.
12
LIBERIA :
himself viewing the land from the deck of a steamer. The
golden-sanded beach stretches away into the distance.
The waves look like crystal drops as they break amidst
the golden sands. From amidst the dense, variegated
foliage come the sweet carolings of birds of beautiful plu¬
mage. Back of all are the everlasting hills, standing at some
points on the coast like grand old sentinels of nature. Be¬
yond them all are the mountain ranges, seen dimly through
the eyes, but rising boldly in your glasses. The water of
ocean, lake, and river is clear as crystal—beautiful as a sea
of glass. The azure skies glisten in the light of the sun,
but grow soft when " the stars hold their vigil around the
midnight throne." It is grand. I saw it and rejoiced.
Our steamer stopped in the harbor of a West African
city. A small boat came for me from the shore. I de¬
scended the ladder, crossed the dangerous sand-bar, and
stood early one August morning upon African soil. It was
in the confines of the Americo-African Republic, known
in the family of nations as Liberia ; where colored Ameri¬
cans have been going for more than half a century with
the hope to find a field in which to grow to the full stature
of manhood, and to exercise the prerogatives of rulers in
a government of Africans.
Monrovia, built on a plateau includino: area of about
three-quarters of a mile square, eighty „ .move the level
of the sea, on the summit of Cape Mesurado, the Plymouth
Rock of Liberia, looks picturesque. The whole view is
charming. Here, sixty-five years ago, a band of brave, heroic
colored people from America landed and established a home
of their own. Here, thirty-eight years ago, a government
of the Negro, for the Negro, and by the Negro was .institu¬
ted, amidst praise and prayer. Sharp and uneven has been
the contest. Poor and unlettered men have struggled with
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
13
"the audacity of faith" to solve the Problem of Negro
Independence. Various have been the opposing forces.
Death has reaped an abundant harvest. War, hunger, and
disease have been his instruments. The struggle still con¬
tinues, but with no apparent decisive results. Interesting
is the impression which I formed of this country—its
climate, resources, and people.
CHAPTER II.
THE SEARCH FOR AFRICAN TERRITORY.
THE Americo-African Republic is situated on the west¬
ern shore of Africa, occupying what is known as the
Grain Coast. Its undisputed territory begins on the north,
from the south bank of the Manna River, about 6° 80'
north latitude, and runs as far south as the San Pedro
River, about 40 20/ north latitude, a distance of about 600
miles. Its interior boundary can not be definitely stated.
Some authorities make it to run back about 200 miles. East
of Liberia is the Soudan, the abode of Ethiopia's teeming
millions ; on f c is the Atlantic Ocean ; north is
Sierra Leone, the English colony ; and south, though not
contiguous, is Ashantee, the powerful Negro monarchy.
Running down the West Coast we come to a French
possession, Grand Bassam ; and next, the English colonies,
Axim and Cape Coast. The English desire to secure
Grand Bassam from the French. If they succeed, either
by purchase or seizure, the entire coast line from Sierra
Leone to the Cameroons would be under the control of
H
LIBERIA :
an English-speaking people, and under the influence of
British and Americo-African civilization. This would in¬
clude a coast line of about two thousand geographical
miles.
Liberia is the fruit of American colonization. The first
practical colonizationist was a Negro, Paul Cuffee, of New
Bedford, Mass. This bold leader, full of zeal for the civ¬
ilization of Africa, took, in 1815, forty colored persons in
his own vessel, at his own expense, from Boston to Sierra
Leone, which was the colony established on the West
African Coast by Great Britain for the reception of slaves
captured from the Americans in the Revolutionary War.
Rev. Dr. G. W. Samson, ex-President of Columbian
University, Washington, D. C., in a Memorial on behalf
of Liberian Interests, presented to the President of the
United States, and to the Secretary of State, September
18, 1885, makes this historically accurate statement :
" Liberia had its origin in a want and duty of the Uni¬
ted States. That want is presented in the Constitution
of the United States, Art. I., Sec.9, Par. 1, in these words:
' The migration or importation of such persons as any of
the States now existing shall think proper to admit, shall
not be prohibited by the Congress prior to the year one
thousand eight hundred and eight.'
" This period expired near the close of the second term
of President Jefferson's administration. Being recognized
as referring mainly to the importation of slaves from Africa,
President Jefferson considered the need of an asylum for
Africans to be seized and provided for when expected
violations of law should occur. His first suggestion was
a treaty with Great Britain, which Power had transferred
African slaves, taken during the war for American Indepen¬
dence, to Sierra Leone ; permitting that colony to serve as
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
15
the asylum required. The second war with Great Britain,
under President Madison, frustrated this design and de¬
ferred the provision needed.
" Under President Monroe the necessity for such an asy¬
lum became imperative, since captured slaves could not
be protected when returned to the African Coast."
Congress was petitioned to establish a colony on the
West Coast of Africa, and responded favorably with a re¬
port containing the recommendation, that stipulations be
obtained from Great Britain and other maritime powers,
both for the suppression of the slave-trade, and also
"guaranteeing a permanent neutrality for any colony of
free people of color, which, at the expense and under the
auspices of the United States, shall be established on the
African Coast"; to which was added:
Resolved, That adequate provision be hereafter made to defray
any necessary expenses which may be incurred in carrying the pre¬
ceding resolution into effect.
Finally, on the 3d of March, 1819, an Act was passed by
Congress, authorizing the President (then President Mon¬
roe) to return all recaptured Africans to Africa, and to
provide for their support by establishing an Agency on
the West Coast.
The Colonization Society, which was organized in 1816,
having as officers such men as Henry Clay, Bushrod Wash¬
ington, and President Monroe, became, practically, the
General Agent of the United States, carrying out the
provision of the Act of 1819 in the selection and estab¬
lishment of what is now known as the Republic of Liberia.
Practically this was a Government venture—the only co¬
lonial enterprise to which this country ever committed
itself.
i6
LIBERIA :
In February, 1820, Samuel Bacon, as United States Agent,
started from New York City for the West Coast of Africa
with eighty-eight persons of color, in the ship Elizabeth,
which was chartered by the Government, and sailed under
the flag of the United,States. The colored colonists were
given free passage, they agreeing to prepare suitable ac¬
commodations on the West Coast for the recaptured Af¬
ricans.
The colonists made their first stop, after leaving New
York City, at Freetown, the capital of the English colony,
Sierra Leone. Thence they sailed to the island of Sher-
bro, where they disembarked. The English governor gave
the Americans permission to reside there until a location
on the mainland of Africa could be chosen and pur¬
chased.
It was very unhealthy at Sherbro. It is so now. Fever
made sad havoc. Death was busy. The grave was never
closed. Back to Sierra Leone, from the jaws of death, the
disheartened remnant fled. Many died there. In Fourah
Bay they laid them down to rest till the trump of the
archangel and the voice of God shall proclaim the dissolu¬
tion of the earth and the resurrection of the dead. Great
were the difficulties experienced in planting this American
colony ; but the Government and the Society kept straight
onward.
In October, 1821, the United States Government or¬
dered Lieut. R. F. Stockton, of the Navy, to proceed to
the West Coast of Africa, and select and purchase terri¬
tory for the United States Agency.
Stopping at Sierra Leone, Lieut. Stockton's war-vessel
took on board the Agent and a few of the colored Amer¬
ican colonists. They moved slowly down the coast, look¬
ing for an inviting site for the settlement. When they
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. 17
came to Cape Mesurado,* a bold promontory, eighty feet
above the level of the sea, the party decided to make a
purchase of land. The war-ship hove-to and dropped an¬
chor. The Lieutenant (who was promoted to be Captain,
and who subsequently became Commodore) went ashore.
He explored the country round about the lofty Cape,
rowing up the Mesurado River, and a stream which now
bears the name of this bold and brave officer—Stockton
Creek.
While Capt. Stockton and his party moved around by
day, interviewing the native kings and chiefs, and ex¬
amining and exploring the country, the slave-traders were
also at work. They knew that a settlement there would
destroy their business.
A foreign-born colored man in their employ circulated
among the natives lies and slanders prejudicial to the
Americans. The aboriginal kings and chiefs were made
to feel that Capt. Stockton's enterprise meant no good
to them, but would prove positively hurtful. They were
urged to refuse to sell any part of the land to the Ameri¬
can people.
Of course there was arranged a public conference. The
Africans call it " Palaver." The day came. The King
and Chiefs assembled with scores of their armed followers.
Capt. Stockton and escort, Agent Eli Ayres, and a few
colored American colonists were on hand ; so was the col¬
ored slave-trader.
The " Palaver " began. Capt. Stockton explained his
* This Cape was named by the Spaniards. In the early days of the slave-trade
a squad of well-armed Spanish marines landed there, searching doubtless for slaves.
The natives attacked them. A furious contest took place, and the Spaniards were
cut down by the bold, warlike Deys. During the fight, the Spanish marines cried
44 Misericordia ! Misericordia ! " " Mercy ! Mercy ! " The Cape came to be called
Mesurado ; by some, Montserrado, a corruption of the Spanish " Misericordia."
i8
LIBERIA :
mission, and made his proposal for the purchase of land
The natives replied. The "Palaver" grew warm. The
colored slave-trader, who could speak the native language,
the Dey, boldly and frequently interjected such comments
and interruptions as were clearly making trouble. Feeling
ran high. Imminent peril threatened the lives of the Amer¬
icans. Destruction would have overtaken the strangers,
had not Capt. Stockton, with great coolness and presence
of mind, drawn his revolver, held it at the colored slave-
trader's head, ordered his marines to prepare to fire, and
threatened death to any man who dared to break the peace.
Under this self-possessed and determined action the
colored slave-trader grew " mild as a sucking dove."
The natives, knowing the white man's war power, and
seeing "the fighting ship" in the harbor, grew calm, and
the negotiations proceeded decently and in order. The
result was the signing and delivery of this deed of sale :
" Witnesseth : That whereas certain persons, citizens of
the United States of America, are desirous to establish
themselves on the Western Coast of Africa, and have in¬
vested Capt. Robert F. Stockton and Eli Ayres with full
powers to treat with and purchase from us, the said kings,
princes, and head men, certain lands [which are described],
we do hereby, in consideration of [certain specified articles
or merchandise], forever cede and relinquish the above
described lands to Capt. Robert F. Stockton and Eli Ayres ;
To Have and To Hold the said premises for the use of
these said citizens of America."
This deed was duly executed and delivered on payment
of the stipulated price by these Agents of the United
States Government, and thus was planted the seed of
what has grown to be the Americo-African Republic.
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
19
CHAPTER III
THE STRUGGLE TO ESTABLISH THE COLONY.
IT is not my purpose to dwell upon the details of Li-
berian history. Therefore with this brief statement,
which should not be overlooked, and which will interest
the reader, I shall pass to an examination of the climate,
resources, and people of the country.
The slave-traders were not easily subdued. They were
cast down, but not destroyed. They were vanquished,
but not routed. They lingered around the Cape, stirred
up the bad blood of the natives, and incited them to make
war on the colonists.
Soon after the purchase, which Capt. Stockton effected,
a large number of armed natives made their appearance
and attacked the colonists. They were driven away ; but
for months they annoyed the new settlers, causing them
to sleep on their arms, and to build their cabins with their
swords at their sides and their guns within reach.
It was a time that tried men's souls. These difficulties
alone caused great hardships ; but they were not all. An
enemy more persistent than the hostile natives, and dead¬
lier by far, played sad havoc in that heroic colony.
The West Coast of Africa is called "The White Man's
Grave." Mr. Spurgeon, the great London divine, said to
me in April, 1883: "We English people think the West
Coast climate fatal to white men. We always have two
Governors for our colony, Sierra Leone—one dead, being
brought home; and the other alive, on his way out."
The spirit of this remark is true. " White men can not
stand the climate. After a bitter struggle with it they
20
liberia :
either retire or die. Missionaries, traders, and commercial
men go to the West Coast with the understanding, which
is usually put in the contract, that they must have a change
of climate in two or three years. There are the exceptions ;
but the rule for white men is to retire or die.
This fact tried both the Government and their General
Agent, the Colonization Society, in their early efforts to
foster the colony planted in 1821 at Cape Mesurado, where
now stands Monrovia, the capital of Liberia, named in
honor of President Monroe.
As early as 1822 there was not a white American on the
Cape. The hostile climate put to flight even the intrepid
Dr. Eli Ayres. It would have destroyed Liberia, root and
branch, had it not been for the heroic conduct of one of
the noblest men the world has ever seen. He was a
Negro. His son, born in Africa, an Americo-African, is
now the able and scholarly President of the Republic of
Liberia.
The name of Elijah johnson is held in great rever¬
ence by all of his countrymen. Like Toussaint L'Ouver¬
ture he was brave and heroic ; and like George Washington
he was patriotic and noble. When, under the pressure of
the hostile natives and a deadly climate, it was proposed
to abandon the settlement on Cape Mesurado and return
to the United States, Elijah Johnson lifted up his voice
and made this heroic declaration : " I have been two years
searching for a home in Africa. I have found it ; and
I shall stay here."
This courageous stand touched the hearts of the people ;
and they resolved to establish right there a home and a gov¬
ernment for themselves, their posterity, and their breth¬
ren who were still in bondage in America, or to die in the
attempt. The white agents, thoroughly discouraged, aban-
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
21
doned the enterprise, and Elijah Johnson became Gov¬
ernor of the colony.
The situation was gloomy. None but a hero could have
faced it undaunted. The climate was trying. The natives
were exceedingly hostile. They regretted the sale of the
Cape, and determined to expel or exterminate the colon¬
ists. Governor Johnson's naval stores became exhausted.
Who can fitly describe the embarrassing situation ? The
Governor and his followers must have felt like the Amer¬
ican Pilgrim Fathers when, with bated breath, they said
one to the other, "Oursupplies are out " ! Here, it was death
from wild Indians, starvation, and cold on Plymouth Rock.
There,it was death from hostile Africans,fever, and exposure
on Cape Mesurado. But annihilation was only threatened.
It did not come. God sent the ship with daily bread to
the American Rock; and He too sent the ship with naval
stores to the African Cape.
One night the sentry hearing a noise not far from the
settlement and thinking that the natives were approach¬
ing, fired a cannon, and aroused the sleeping colonists.
There was, however, no cause for alarm. The noise may
have been caused by the footsteps of some prowling leop¬
ards ; but there was a special Providence in the firing of
that cannon.
An English man-of-war was passing. Hearing the dis¬
charge, the commander dropped anchor and sent a detail
ashore to make an investigation. The colonists rejoiced
at this opportunity to supply themselves with powder.
They were even then recognized as an ally in the sup¬
pression of the slave-trade.
Again Governor Johnson saved a country and a Gov¬
ernment to his posterity. The English naval officer vol¬
unteered assistance by arms and effective protection if a
22
LIBERIA. :
few feet of ground were ceded on which to erect the
British flag. Gov. Johnson promptly replied, "We want
no flag-staff put up here that will cost more to get it
down than to whip the natives." In this patriotic act
Elijah Johnson showed that he possessed the mind and
the spirit of a far-seeing statesman. He looked down the
vista of coming ages and saw the occurrences of the pres¬
ent generation, the scramble for West African territory
which is going on among European nations. Had Eng¬
land planted herself then on Cape Mesurado, she never
would have withdrawn.
But, as our aim is not history, we pass over the events
of Gov. Johnson's administration. We shall not pause to
describe the growth and development of the colony un¬
der the fostering care of the American Colonization So¬
ciety ; nor the heroic and self-sacrificing labors of such
men as Governors Ayres, Ashmun, Russwurm, Pinney,
and Lot Cary. It is enough now and here to! say that
the early American settlers in Africa met and bore their
difficulties with a brave and heroic spirit, finding their
greatest obstacle in a trying, a hostile, a deadly climate.
CHAPTER IV.
CLIMATE—THE RAINY SEASON.
THE Americo-African Republic lies wholly within the
tropics, and is very near the equator. Its southern
extremity is only four degrees north of that great belt,
and its northern limit seven degrees. The days and nights
are practically equal. There is no twilight. Darkness fol-
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
23
lows fast behind the setting sun ; and the daylight breaks
again suddenly upon the darkness.
The climate is essentially different from that of the
United States, excepting the lower part of Florida. Per¬
petual summer reigns. The grass and foliage are ever
green.
But torrid heat does not always prevail. Indeed the
new-comer is generally surprised by the prevailing climate
of the West Coast. We usually think of Africa as a red-
hot furnace. True, in Nubia and Upper Egypt eggs
may be roasted in the hot sand ; but along the Mediter¬
ranean and to the south of the Desert of Sahara the cli¬
mate is more temperate ; at times cold. Indeed, in the in¬
terior and even near the equator perpetual snow is found.
The West African year may be divided into two sea¬
sons, the wet and the dry. The rain begins in Liberia in
May, and ceases in October. It is dry the remainder of
the year.
This is the recognized division ; but in some respects it
is confusing. It is impossible to accurately define these
seasons. An English sea-captain of thirty years' experi¬
ence on the West Coast, tried to give a description to his
friends, but failed. He impatiently said, " This is the idea ;
In the rainy season it rains every day, and in the dry
season it rains any day." But this is not true.
In the rainy season there are some beautiful days.
Many an afternoon have I enjoyed a boat-ride on the
Monrovia Bay in this season. It has rained in the Dries as
if the clouds were all falling down upon the earth. In the
rainy season there is what is called the Middle Dries. For
from three to six weeks Nature gives man an opportunity
to gather in his rice crop. She will not starve him, if he
is industrious. The sky is clear; the sun shines bright;
24
LIBERIA :
the air is cool and bracing. After long, weary months of
water, mud, and dampness, the Middle Dries brings sun¬
shine, vigor, and cheerfulness. One feels as if he could
live forever in such a climate ; but it ends ; and the rains
begin again with increased fury, as if to make up for lost
time. They call it Middle Dries because it comes between
the seasons—in the middle of them. It is clear from all
this, that there can be no arbitrary division of the year.
Terrific tornadoes precede and end the rainy season. In
April and October the skies resound with the clash of
electric shocks. The forked lightning leaps and dances
through the clouds, the forests, and the earth ; and the
winds howl furiously or moan piteously.
By May everybody is prepared for the rains, just as in
the Northern part of the United States people are ready
by Thanksgiving Day for winter; and when they fairly
get to falling, the man who sees them for the first time,
wonders if the world is again to be destroyed by a flood,
and if the great day of the Lord has come.
Rising one morning in August off the West Coast, I
looked through the port of our steamer and was surprised
at the thickness of what appeared to be a fog. I dressed
and started on deck for a walk before breakfast. To my
surprise I found that we were in the African rains. It was
like a fog on Long Island Sound, or off the coasts of New¬
foundland. At times our steamer stood still, the pilot
being unable to find his way through the drenching, driv¬
ing rain.
The prevailing weather during this season is damp and
cool. The thermometer averages yo° Fahrenheit. A fire
is comfortable in the early morning and in the evening.
Indeed, the natives, at dark, invariably build fires in their
houses, and keep them up all night. This is healthy and
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
25
wise. The Americo-Africans do not have a fire in their
houses. Most of the houses are built in style like those
in the Southern part of the United States. The kitchen
is off from the house ; and in Liberia the residences, as a
rule, are without fire-places. Dampness, therefore, reigns
supreme. My towels have hung on the wash-stand rack
in my bedroom damp from one day to another. No
wonder that rheumatism is a common complaint among
the Americo-Africans.
The stranger is comfortable in the rainy season in the
same clothing which is worn in New York or London in
the fall of the year, excepting the overcoat. Much of the
suffering among the emigrants sent out by the American
Colonization Society arises from the fact that they go to
the West Coast from " the sweet, sunny South," without
sufficient or proper clothing. Flannel ought to be worn
next to the skin, and most persons who can afford it, do
so. Although there are many who advocate cotton as
undergarments ; yet, all other things being equal, those
wearing flannel are healthier than those who wear cotton,
often nothing at all, underneath their outer clothing.
There is less sickness and there are fewer deaths in the
rainy than in the dry season. Body and mind have more
vigor. The evenings remind us of the long American
winter nights, when we close the blinds, pull down the cur¬
tains, stir up the fire, light the gas, draw up to the study
table, and commune with those gifted and immortal minds
who have left " footprints on the sands of time."
In this season business slackens. The rivers rise and
become dangerous. Travel on them is often attended
with fatal consequences. The Government of Liberia has
done comparatively nothing for internal improvements,
such as opening roads, building bridges, etc. ; hence it is
2
26
LIBERIA :
impossible to move around through the country freely
during the rains. The merchants and traders sit quietly
in their places of business, review the transactions of the
last dry season, and plan their operations for the next.
The camwood and palm-trees, which furnish valuable arti¬
cles of trade, grow on undisturbed even by native industry.
The coffee-tree and sugar-cane, the chief staples of Libe-
rian agriculture, enlarge, and blossom, and mature, while
the cultivators lounge and cry, like the old Southern
slave, " More rain, more rest."
It is impossible to give a clear idea of the African rains.
The water does not fall in drops, but in sheets. It sounds
as if all the clouds were tumbling down at once. If the
reader should take a hogshead of water to the third story
window of a house and empty it upon the roof of the
piazza below, he would have an idea of how the falling
rain sounded in Africa to me, as I listened to it under the
iron roof of my attic room.
But the gloom, and the damp, and the rain, and the
wind, like all things human, change ; and we come out of
them into the bright, cheering sunlight.
CTOBER is the month of light tornadoes and fre¬
quent showers. It is, therefore, called " the month
of short journeys." It ushers in the dry season. With it
" the melancholy days " depart and the bright skies are,,
as a rule, without a cloud.
These African tornadoes are wondrous to behold. They-
CHAPTER V.
CLIMATE—THE DRY SEASON.
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. 2?
come suddenly, and for a brief space of time riot madly,
and as suddenly end their fury.
One afternoon I was boat-riding with some friends on
Monrovia Bay. Suddenly a cloud, " no bigger than a
man's hand," appeared. Rapidly it spread over the heav¬
ens until it cast deep darkness upon the waters. We
headed for the land ; and our Kroo boatmen pulled hard
for the shore. The bay became suddenly turbulent. We
were dashed hither and thither by the white-crested waves.
The wind grew fiercer every moment. The black clouds
completely blotted out the sun. The lightning flashes
became blinding and rapid. The heavens, at times, for a
brief moment seemed to be on fire. The thunder roared
like hungry lions eager for their prey. Man and bird and
beast rushed pell-mell to seek shelter from the storm.
Suddenly the lightning ceased ; the thunder hushed ; and
the winds died away. Then as suddenly the rain descended
in torrents and the floods came with the voice of many
waters. In an hour or two it was all over ; and the silvery
moon shone with great splendor.
November is the queen of the months. The dome of
heaven is beautiful beyond description. The grass is
greener after the rains. Everything is brighter for the
washing. Out of the thick, variegated foliage a rosebud,
a blossom, or a flower peeps ; and lo ! the sweet notes of
birds of beautiful plumage are heard. Even the stranger,
worn with fever, wonders why this is not considered the
loveliest climate on the face of the earth. I have plunged
into the ocean surf in the early morning ; and in the after¬
noon I have wandered up the hill and along " the shores of
the far-resounding sea," till the setting sun went down
with my messages of cheer, which I invariably sent to my
friends across the boundless deep.
28
LIBERIA :
I have never seen more beautiful days than those of
November and December in Liberia. The azure skies,
the golden beams of the sun, the fragrance of the early
morning, and the cool breezes of the afternoon, all unite
to make the heart rejoice and the soul to praise God. I
was once in an interior Liberian town, Arthington, bo¬
somed in green and lofty hills, at whose feet the St. Paul's
River flows, making sweet music as it madly leaps and
dashes over the murmuring shallows. I looked from my
window over the hills and valleys and saw a brilliant sun¬
rise, and felt the full force of Addison's sublime ode :
The unwearied sun from day to day
Doth his Creator's power display,
And publishes to every land
The work of an almighty hand.
But it is the night scene I most admired. One sees
brilliancy beyond description when
" The stars hold their vigil round the midnight throne."
The clearness of the atmosphere can not be excelled by
anything of the kind which is known in other parts of the
world. Famous as is the Italian sky, I think it can hardly
rival what one sees in Africa. European astronomers, it
is said, visiting this land, especially in the midst of the
Dries, look with astonishment on the nocturnal splendor
of the heavens ; some of the planets shining with great
brilliancy and occasioning deep and well-defined shadows.
The thermometer in this season shows an average, until
the month of February, of about 850 Fahrenheit. It
would be too high to put it at go°. It never is as hot as
in New York City in mid-summer. Most people are sur¬
prised at this. Nevertheless it is true that Americans ex¬
perience hotter weather in August, especially in the cen¬
tres of civilization, than the Liberians ever feel.
THE A ME RICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
29
What a strange world ! In November the people of the
United States are having cold weather. The merchants
sell their " Fall and Winter goods." I was in a large mer¬
cantile establishment in Liberia early in December, and
was surprised to see upon^ the counters and shelves
" Spring and Summer goods "—bright calicoes, straw hats
and bonnets, white vests, linen coats, etc., etc.
About the middle of December a cold, disagreeable, and
dangerous wind blows through the land. It is like the
-sirocco that sweeps over'Italy. It is called the " Harmattan
Wind." It blows for from four to six weeks. During these
winds the thermometer'at sunrise and at sunset averages
66°, and it seldom rises higher than 8o° at any time dur¬
ing the day.
The Harmattan comes from the interior ; some say from
the Desert of Sahara. It injures vegetation, and affects
the lower animals. Man does not escape. It is the sickly
season. Deaths are frequent. People suffer from neuralgia,
colds, and coughs ; and even the natives are affected. The
Harmattan is no respecter of persons. It dries up the eyes,
nostrils, and mouth ; chaps the lips, the hands, and the
face ; opens the seams of furniture, and curls up the leaves
of books just as the heat of the fire would do. Indeed, it
plays havoc in general with man and beast. The physicians
and druggists, though few in number, keep busy, and the
undertaker and the grave-digger are not unemployed.
All this was a surprise in my experience. When getting
my medicines in London, I struck Ayer's Cherry Pectoral
from the list. What would I want with a remedy for
colds and coughs on the West Coast of Africa? A cold
was my first complaint !
After the Harmattan, until the rains again, hot weather
holds high carnival. February and March are the hottest
3°
LIBERIA :
months of the year. They are also the sickliest. The
thermometer, it is said, keeps above the nineties, though
it rarely exceeds 95° ; but the heat is intense, and the sea
breeze, which blows from about ten o'clock in the morn¬
ing until midnight, does not suffice to moisten the dry and
oppressive atmosphere.
By this time the reader, doubtless, asks, why is there so
much said about " the trying African climate " ? What an
equable temperature seems to prevail! No part of the
United States can match it. For about six months there
is an average of 720; for about three months it is from
850 to 90° ; and at no time does the thermometer stay for
any length of time above 950. Why is not this considered
as lovely a climate as is found anywhere on the earth ?
We answer, it would be a delightful climate, a healthy
country, a veritable El Dorado, if it were not for this fact
—Malaria is king !
HE Americo-African Republic, like Holland, has a
low and flat coast. Marshes and swamps of man¬
grove-trees abound. These trees thrive in mud. They
are found near the mouths of rivers, and form a close and
impenetrable thicket. They spread rapidly, propagating
themselves. Their branches turn down, seek the mud,
and grow to be trees, and in this way increase and per¬
petuate the species. Their foliage is abundant and dense,
forming secure retreats for multitudes of aquatic birds.
The leaves and branches of these trees fall and rot and
form a sickening mass of decayed vegetation. In the
CHAPTER VI.
CLIMATE—CAUSES OF UNHEALTHINESS,
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
31
dry season, particularly, the sun brings out of this reek¬
ing bed of putrefaction an extraordinary amount of poison
that mingles with the air, and both man and beast inhale
disease and receive the seeds of infirmity or death.
These swamps, and their sickly, deadly condition, give
character to the climate of the entire West Coast belt,
which extends back into the country for several miles. It
is hard to fix a definite limit. It varies at different points,
following the physical conformations of the country. This
malarial coast belt is the greatest barrier in the way of the
growth and development of the Americo-African Repub¬
lic. As long as the swamps and marshes stand ; as long
as there is not money or energy enough to counteract, to
some extent, by drainage, sewerage, and other modern ap¬
pliances, the effect of these miasmas, so long will Malaria
reign !
Dr. Edward W. Blyden, a Negro of great learning, who
has lived since 1852 on the West Coast of Africa, says, in
a scholarly paper in an English magazine : *
" Now it is well known that a belt of malarious lands,
which are hot-beds of fever, extends along the whole of
the West Coast of Africa, running from forty to fifty miles
back from the sea-coast. In this region of country neither
horses nor cattle will thrive. Horses will not live at all.
Sheep, goats, and hogs drag out an indifferent existence.
At Sierra Leone, Monrovia, and other settlements on the
coast, fortunes have been expended by lovers of horses in
trying to keep them, but with the most scrupulous and
expensive care they die.
" The interior tribes, who have from time to time mi¬
grated to the coast, have perished or degenerated. Every
child born on the coast is stunted, physically and mentally,
* Fraser*s Magazine, October, 1876.
32
LIBERIA :
in the cradle by the jungle fever which assails it a few
days after birth. European infants seldom survive such
attacks. The very tribe occupying the country about Gal-
linas and Cape Mount have traditions that they came to
the coast as conquerors, driving before them all tribal or¬
ganizations which opposed their march. They were a nu¬
merous, intelligent, handsome people. Now only melan¬
choly traces of what they once were can be discovered in
individuals of that waning tribe.
" As long as the malarious vegetation and deadly man¬
grove swamps occupy so large a portion of West African
territory, there will be no more probability of making any
permanent moral or even material progress on the coast,
or of developing a great mind, than there is in improving
the haunts of the polar bear and the reindeer."
Being a pure Negro, and an enthusiastic advocate of
the colonization of American colored people on the West
Coast, and also a resident of Africa for nearly thirty-five
years, Dr. Blyden's view of the climate may be accepted
as sound and correct.
I have seen both cows and horses on the West Coast ;
but they were small and spiritless. They were living at
" a poor dying rate." The English Governor of Sierra
Leone keeps a horse, but he would not be able to sell it
in London. Nobody would own the poor, cadaverous-
looking creature. I have ridden horseback in Monrovia ;
but though brought down from the interior about eighty
miles, the animal was small and spiritless. Under the
depressing influence of the coast climate he became worth¬
less in a month, and soon died. Indeed, the life of man
and beast on the coast has been described by Dr. Blyden
in these words; which he applies only to white men, but
which admit of general application :
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
33
" The miasma seems to have a singular effect ; . . . .
where it does not at once extinguish life, it diminishes im¬
perceptibly its force, sapping physical energy and render¬
ing the mind dull and spiritless." *
Rev. Dr. Wilson, who from long years of residence and
travel in West Africa, knew the climate well, and whose
book, " Western Africa," breathes a Christian, an unpreju¬
diced, and a hopeful spirit, says :
" A belt of the densest wood and jungle of a hundred
miles wide, extends along the whole length of Western
Africa, and is, no doubt, the chief cause of the sickness
which prevails in this region When these natural
forests are once cut down, the land is soon covered by a
jungle of undergrowth which is almost impenetrable for
man or beast." f He also says:
" Another great drawback to the prosperity of Liberia
is the undoubted unhealthiness of the climate. The pro¬
cess of acclimation must be passed through even by colored
persons ; and for the first six months it is quite as trying
to them as to the whites."J
Another writer may be profitably quoted in this connec¬
tion. He says : " The sun pours its fiercest rays upon these
marshes. They become stagnant, and the vegetable and
animal matter in them becomes putrid. The breeze passes
over these desolate and extensive regions and carries with
it the seeds of fever and death in every direction." §
Finally, let us get the testimony of one of the United
States Ministers to the Republic of Liberia. He wrote the
Government : " It has been demonstrated that neither
horses nor mules can withstand the climate on the sea-coast.
* " From West Africa to Palestine," p. 15. + u Western Africa," p. 27.
X Ibid., p. 104. § Moister's " Memorials of Missionary Labors in Africa."
34
LIBERIA :
Horses are found in the interior, but when brought to the
coast they sicken and die. Although constant summer
prevails, as to temperature, the miasmatic influence caused
by heavy rains alternating with the hot sunshine, causes
sickness during six months of the year, and during the re¬
maining six months the power of the sun is such that it is
almost impossible for any one, except a native, to work; as
it produces inertia, lassitude, want of energy. Indeed,
after a man has once had the fever he never, in Africa, re¬
gains the energy he was possessed of before."*
This is a strong statement. I do not indorse it in its
entirety. Its general tendency is correct. Perhaps, how¬
ever, we have tarried here too long. Everybody believes
the climate to be unhealthy ; but everybody is not informed
as to the nature and extent of the unhealthiness. Many
turn their backs upon the West Coast of Africa, with the
sneer, " It's a death-trap while others either conceal or
deny the unhealthiness of its coast-belt. Let us enter our
earnest protest against both positions. Back from the
Liberian coast, for example, are the hills, the Finley and
the Kong Mountains, a salubrious climate and a healthy
land ; and this is also true of the Congo. But capital,
brains, and energy are required to open wagon-roads, build
bridges, construct railroads, put freight boats on the rivers,
and thus flood the country with the appliances of modern
civilization. I know that civilization is a thing of slow
growth ; but changes from barbarism to enlightenment are
so rapid in these days that it would not be extravagant to
picture a wonderful growth in African commerce and civili¬
zation if easy access to the interior lands were made by
means of wagon and rail roads and boat facilities. The ob-
* Dispatch, No. 273, of the Legation of the United States, dated Monrovia,
Liberia, Sept. 3d, 1877.
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
35
stacks arising out of the blighting malarial swamps of the
African coast may be overcome, as in other countries, by
the investment of capital, and by drainage and sewerage.
CHAPTER VII.
CLIMATE—MALARIA DETHRONED.
THE Americo-African Republic is not alone in its
struggles against a swampy coast-belt. Holland's
coast lands have always been hot-beds of malarial diseases,
of fever and death. I learned in the land of the Dutch
that an army officer, when transferred from Amsterdam
to Rotterdam, on the coast, suffers from malarial fever
Any traveller who makes observations on the low, marshy
coasts of Holland, goes away fully impressed with the
belief that they must be the home of diseases and period¬
ical fevers. The excessive mortality among English armies
in the Netherlands is not to be wondered at. That they
died like sheep was perfectly natural.*
The sea-coast of the Southern States of the United
States was exceedingly malarial ; until, at the inhabited
points, engineering, drainage, and general sanitary appli
ances counteracted or destroyed the effect of the deadly
poison. From Virginia to Florida thousands of the pio¬
neer settlers fell victims to the malaria of the American
coast ; but they pushed back into the country; and wher¬
ever they built cities, they brought capital to their rescue
* See Sir John Pringle's Observations.
36
LIBERIA :
in counteracting the poison arising from the low, flat
lands upon which they built. There is a parallel between
the Settlement of Delaware and African colonization.
My native city, Charleston, S. C., is fifty per cent,
healthier than it was a half century ago. Money and
science have dethroned malaria. So will it be on the
West Coast of Africa. Interior cities of commercial ac¬
tivity, a farming country of systematic industry will come
into existence in response to the influence of our Christian
civilization ; and then the cities on the coast, through
which there must be ingress and egress both of popula¬
tion and commodities, will be able to command capital to
at least moderate the malarial effects of the swampy sur¬
roundings.
It is somewhat healthier now at points on the African
coast than it was fifty years ago. At Freetown, the capi¬
tal of Sierra Leone, and at Monrovia, the capital of Li¬
beria, the stranger talks of the blessings of health, when
he hears the sickening accounts of the mortality of the
last generation. The unhealthiness of the Congo will be
greatly modified as capital and the appliances of modern
civilization enter the country.
But while all this is true, I have no patience with those
who underrate the effect of the climate of the West Coast
of Africa upon colonizers from America or Europe. It
is a crime to conceal from a man who turns his face to
Africa, the fact that those swamps and marshes will
prove an annoying, a trying, perhaps a fatal enemy ; that in
his battle for life and struggle for bread, malaria will pos¬
sibly cripple him by robbing him of energy and spirit. Let
him know this, so that forewarned, he may be forearmed.
I have not looked favorably on schemes to colonize any
part of Africa with the poor and the comparatively igno-
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
37
rant masses of Europe or America. What can men, with¬
out means, without any knowledge of practical hygiene or
of sanitary requirements, do in the presence of malaria, in¬
trenched as it is in the swamps of the African coast?
If, in addition to this, they emigrate with the idea of having
an easy time, of finding bread growing on trees, of gathering
where they do not sow, as the masses of colonizers too often
do, they must fail in their hopes and expectations ; for the
malarial atmosphere will unfit them for the struggle which
awaits every one who goes to a new country; and their
poverty and inexperience and physical indisposition will
keep them in helplessness amidst their swampy surround¬
ings.
Let hardy, energetic, and determined people, especially
those of African blood, go from the American States or the
British colonies fully informed as to the conditions of life
in Africa ; let capital be judiciously invested, first in sub¬
jecting the malarial swamps at chosen points to sanitary
and hygienic appliances ; and, secondly, to the opening of
roads and the planting of interior settlements ; and the
whole world would profit in the rapid increase of com¬
merce, and the steady advancement of civilization, and
the gradual spread of Christianity.
There must, of course, be seaport towns and cities. But
in the development of West African interests, on the
Congo, on the Niger, in Liberia, the interior people and
settlements will be the backbone of the country. The
mountaineers of every land are noted for their sterling
qualities. The atmosphere of the country and of the high¬
lands makes a stalwart manhood.
Fifteen miles back from the Atlantic Ocean, I stood on
a range of hills in Liberia, and looked down upon the
waters of the sea. The people of this locality, on the St.
3§
LIBERIA.
Paul's River, are healthier than the Monrovians, whose
home is on the coast. I went still further back, and found
it growing healthier as I journeyed toward the interior.
At Arthington, the most flourishing settlement in Li¬
beria, only thirty miles from the coast, I found myself
in an exceedingly hilly country, with a somewhat salu¬
brious climate, and a hardy people living in comparative
comfort. The children were not delicate, and puny, and
full of sores as those on the coast ; but they were fleshy,
chubby, and full of life. One pities most of the Americo-
African coast children. He feels like romping on the grass
with those of a place like Arthington. Almost everything
calls forth the stranger's wonder and admiration. What
strikes him as the most hopeful and encouraging sign is
the fact that thousands of acres are already under cultiva¬
tion, and there is a small increase steadily going on in the
quantity of land which is planted.
It is work done back from the coast, or which leads civ¬
ilizing influences into the interior, that will do for Africa
what commerce, philanthropy, and Christianity wish to
perform. Good roads with substantial bridges must be
constructed, and communication opened up between the
people of the African mountains and their fellow-country¬
men on the coast, who are in direct contact with the civil¬
ized world. And who would dare to foretell the results
of such a course? Who can foresee the effect upon the
hardy, progressive natives whose habitat is beyond the
malarious belt of the deadly coast climate? And would
not the colored Americans grasp the opportunities that
such contact with Africa would produce ? Who can tell
what a mighty commerce and what a powerful civilization
would grow up where such deep and broad foundations
already exist? For we are told that many of the interior
MONROVIA, THE CAPITAL OF LIBERIA.
4°
LIBERIA :
natives are practicing some of the most important indus¬
tries of life, maintaining schools, and living in comparative
comfort and peace. Both Mungo Park and Barth record
in their explorations the fact that in the heart of Africa
they found well-cultivated fields, weaving, dyeing, smithing,
markets, and armies. Mungo Park said of Sego, the cap¬
ital of Bambara : " The view of this extensive city, the
numerous canoes upon the river, the crowded population,
and the cultivated state of the surrounding country, formed
altogether a prospect of civilization and magnificence which
I little expected to find in the bosom of Africa." *
Let capital and science counteract malaria on the coast
and turn the stream of civilization towards the interior,
and mighty results will follow all worthy efforts to develop
the country, and to civilize the people.
HE African coast climate is spoken of as unhealthy
by many people who do not know what special
form of complaint manifests itself there. Europeans and
Americans suffer from malarial troubles, fever and ague.
It is simply this, and nothing more, that afflicts the emi¬
grants to Africa, and even the natives who inhabit the
coast-belt. The disorders and symptoms may be greater
in Liberia and Congo than in New Orleans or Arkansas;
but it is a matter of degree, not of kind.
On the West Coast this malarial complaint is called
CHAPTER VIII
CLIMATE—AFRICAN FEVER,
* Travels, Chap, II.
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
41
"African fever." It is no respecter of persons. It at¬
tacks everybody. The greatest explorers, the wealthiest
merchants, and the most devoted missionaries have suc¬
cumbed to its ravages. Sometimes it attacks a new-comer
on his arrival. Then there are people who go to Africa
and live for months without any symptoms of fever ; but
it never fails to lay siege to the unacclimated system.
The nature of the attack depends upon circumstances.
The constitution and physical condition, the quality of
the food and the state of the mind, all enter into the pro¬
cess of acclimation. If a person goes to the West Coast
with a good constitution in healthy condition, free from
hereditary or acquired weaknesses or diseases ; if he can
get there wholesome food to eat, not depending wholly
upon the diet of the country ; if he is so circumstanced as
to be free from special mental burdens or anxieties, being
contented, cheerful, and happy, he may have no fear of
the African fever. He will easily acclimate. But if these
conditions be reversed, then the person either dies a vic¬
tim of fever, as hundreds before him, or he loses his vigor
and spirit, and sits croakingly asking,
"And must I thus forever live,
At this poor dying rate ? "
as thousands are now doing upon the West Coast of
Africa.
The struggle with the fever is not so much after all
against death as against laziness—not so much for life as
for energy. In my diary I find this entry, made in Africa :
" I am beginning to feel lazy. Is this acclimating ? I
have a disposition to sit down ! Alas ! alas ! my poor
energy, is it falling a prey to this poisonous atmosphere ? "
It would not profit the reader to have the symptoms of
African fever described. I should not, however, omit from
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this chapter a few statements of a general therapeutical na¬
ture. Colonizers, merchants, political officials, teachers, and
missionaries will go, in even greater numbers in the future
than in the past, to meet and struggle with African fever.
They should go to the West Coast, not only with the
purpose of keeping their health, but also with a general
idea of the course of treatment that they should pursue.
In the first place, it is absolutely necessary to keep the
bowels open. The climate has a tendency to produce re¬
laxation, and too much care can not be exercised. Tamar
Indien, Eno's Fruit Salt, and castor oil are most excel¬
lent laxatives. For torpidity of the liver, which manifests
itself in loss of appetite, a coated tongue, and heavy, yel¬
lowish eyes, the usual remedies are podophillyn powders
or pills, or compound cathartic pills, taken overnight, and
followed next morning by a seidlitz-powder, if necessary.
Certain symptoms precede fever. The person to be at¬
tacked loses his appetite ; his skin gets dry, and he feels
somewhat chilly. I look upon medicine as a necessary
evil. It should be avoided as much as possible. Hence,
my first effort to throw off African fever took the form of
a brisk walk, or vigorous exercise with the axe. Some¬
times this brings on perspiration and affords much relief.
But if this natural course of treatment should fail, the pa¬
tient should drink a hot tea of lemon or lime, or of the
leaves of what is called " the fever bush then either get
into bed, or, what is much better, wrap up in shawl or
blanket, and throw himself on the sofa and " sweat it out."
This fever would be a simple ailment, were it not for the
fact that malaria lingers in the system. It fastens itself
upon the vitals and sticks closer than a brother. Hence
quinine, in some form, is an indispensable remedy. Its
effects, however, are often very injurious. It cures, but
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
43
it also blights. It affects the hearing and the sight, and is
harmful in many other respects. I used a medicine called
Paschall's Fever and Ague Mixture,* which can not be too
highly recommended. Quinine is undoubtedly an ingre¬
dient ; but it is in such a proportion to other ingredients
that one escapes the injurious effects experienced from
taking quinine alone. It answers all the purposes of quinine
pills, and, for the reason given, is infinitely better.
The fever leaves the patient in a feeble condition. Often
the stomach and digestive organs fail to properly perform
their work. I found that seltzer water, and such liquids as
extract of beef, were very helpful to a debilitated stomach,
and pepsin very stimulating to the digestive organs.
Spirituous liquors are positively injurious. They have
wrecked more lives on the coast than African fever ; and
they have been the devil's special agent in the destruction
of character.
I have now set forth fairly and squarely my impressions
of the climate of the West Coast. It is not healthy ; yet it
is not deadly. It is severely trying to the system of the
foreigner ; but the man of African blood, although not a
native of the Coast, stands the climate better than either
a Caucasian or a Mongolian. A Negro-American will
thrive where the European can hardly live.
Europeans, who do business on the Coast, at the Gambia,
Sierra Leone, Liberia, Lagos, Congo, contract to remain
at their posts only from two to three years of continuous
service. When they leave to recruit in their own habitat,
their faces are yellow and bloodless, their eyes sunken and
glassy, and their bodies thin and emaciated. One sees on
the steamers bound from the West Coast to Europe a
cadaverous-looking set of white men, who never fail to call
* Sold by Edward S. Morris, 4 South Merrick Street, Philadelphia.
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forth hearty commiseration. Some of them have to be
carried aboard the vessels on stretchers ; and they begin to
recuperate as soon as they breathe the pure air of the sea
for a few days.
If white men could thrive on the West Coast, they would
flock to it as they have done to South Africa, and assert
their "divine right to rule" the land and subjugate the
aboriginal population to their proud sway, as the Cauca¬
sians invariably do wherever they are able to congregate in
large numbers. Their arrogance and intolerance and pride,
begotten of their leadership in the march of civilization,
are seen in their unjust contact with China and their out¬
rageous course in India. In North and South Africa they
hold sway ; but God reserves Tropical Africa for the Negro
race. He has stationed climate there as a gloomy, watch¬
ful sentinel, with special orders against white men.
Hence all their efforts of centuries to penetrate the coun¬
try have resulted in disastrous failures; and throughout
the lands they inhabit the cry has gone, " It is a deadly
climate ; the white man's grave."
I stopped, in 1884, at Freetown, Sierra Leone. The
Queen's Advocate, a white man, was acting for both the
Governor and the Chief-Justice, who were white men.
I asked after them, and I was told that they had gone to
the island of Madeira to recuperate. The climate was
telling upon their systems. This is an illustration of what
Mr. Spurgeon said about the deadly effect of the African
climate upon the English Governors of Sierra Leone.
They either die, or they retire to other climes, and thus
get a new lease on life. On the return of the Governor and
the Chief-Justice, the Queen's Advocate doubtless went off
for his health.
I know that many who read these pages will differ from
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
45
my opinion, that a foreign Negro stands this trying Afri¬
can climate better than the Caucasian ; but the thought¬
ful reader will readily see that there is more affinity in the
blood of a pure Negro, although foreign born, for the
African habitat, from which his ancestors came, than in a
man who has had no connection direct or remote with
Africa. Believing as I do, even without the gift of proph¬
ecy, I can see Ethiopia standing among the nations of
the future, rejoicing in the triumphs of pure-blooded Ethi¬
opians, who shall, in Tropical Africa, work out their great
destiny, and prove equal to their illustrious ancestors, who
" led the way, and acted as the pioneers of mankind in the
various untrodden fields of art, literature, and science." *
CHAPTER IX.
RESOURCES—NATURAL AND CULTIVATED PRODUCTS—A
GROWING COMMERCE.
TANLEY is criticised and denounced as an enthu¬
siast and an optimist, because he gives such glowing
accounts of the vast resources of the Congo ; but he does
not exaggerate in the least. The rapidly increasing African
trade proves conclusively that there must be something
in the Dark Continent after which to send the great ships
of commerce from European and American ports.
Rich and varied are the resources of the Americo-Afri-
can Republic. The soil contains gold, silver, and iron in
great abundance. The iron ore is said to yield sixty per
■cent.; and it is found near the surface. The natives use
*Rawlinson's "Five Great Monarchies," Vol. I., p. 75.
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gold and iron in certain crude manufactures ; and they do
not mine for these metals. English capitalists are digging
gold at Axim, south of Liberia ; and a superintendent of
these mines, on his return to the coast from Scotland, told
me that the same rich vein which he had struck at Axim
certainly passes through Liberia. There can be no ques¬
tion about this. President Johnson, now in office, January,
1886, in denouncing a loan which a previous administra¬
tion made in England, said, " I had heard whispers of a
foreign loan I besought you to go to the mines of
Beulay and Medina, if you wanted gold, and not sell your
country for British gold." * Capital, however, is needed to
utilize these precious metals that lie in the bowels of the
African Continent ; and capital has been slow in finding
its way to the West Coast, and especially to the Negro
Republic.
The resources of the forests are inexhaustible ; and they
are within the reach of simple industry. Neither skilled
labor nor capital is necessary to secure many of them..
Palm-trees are found in great abundance, and they yield
annually an enormous quantity of nuts and oil. Cam¬
wood and rubber-trees also abound, and are very valuable
as articles of export. Millions of dollars go annually out
of Europe and America to the West Coast ; thousands go
to Liberia, to purchase palm oil, palm nuts, camwood,
and rubber. To these should be added ivory, which is.
one of the most valuable articles of trade, and which lies,
around in parts of the interior like common rocks.
But with these exceptions the forests of Liberia are un¬
touched. They contain different varieties of valuable
timber, suitable for almost any purpose. Growing almost
everywhere are mahogany, oak, hickory, poplar, rose-
* Oration at Monrovia, July 26, '82.
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
47
wood, mulberry, and other valuable trees which could be
secured easily and at little cost, for timber, furniture, and
decorative work.
Then there is a great variety of fruit trees. Oranges,
limes, guavas, plantains, pine-apples, plums, cocoanuts,
bananas, pawpaws, rose-apples, sour sops, and others grow
everywhere, and are remarkable for their delicious flavor.
They may be seen in the streets, in the woods, on all
sides. An independent fortune could be made by pre¬
serving and exporting these fruits. A captain running to
the Liberian coast told me that he could easily sell all the
guava preserves that the Republic could furnish.
I am sure I do not exaggerate when I say that the
Americo-African Republic has within its territory, and ly¬
ing back of it, regions of immense value that centuries
of development could not exhaust. Commodore R. W.
Shufeldt, a retired officer of the United States Navy,
has had considerable experience in observation and ex¬
ploration on the West Coast and in Liberia. In a letter
to Dr. G. W. Samson under date of September 21, '85, he
says : " In fact Liberia lies in front of the most fertile and
most densely populated portions of the continent."
The soil of Liberia is very rich. It may be cultivated
with a stick. If it is simply scratched and the seed
dropped in, there is an abundant harvest.
Most of the vegetables may be raised, such as Guinea
corn, sweet potatoes, beans, tomatoes, okra, watermelons,
cabbages, and turnips. The natives cultivate a vegetable
somewhat like the American sweet potato, which they call
eddoes, and another like the turnip, which they call cas¬
savas. I have seen all of these vegetables grown, and
have cultivated many of them myself.
The Americo-Africans raise and export principally cof-
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fee and sugar. There is no reason why they should not
add to these articles ginger, pepper, ground-nuts, indigo,
arrowroot, and cotton. Everywhere, in a wild state, cot¬
ton is found ; and it is of excellent fibre. Of course it is
short, but cultivation would doubtless make it equal to
the best staple in the world. Enterprise and industry,
backed by a little capital, could accomplish great results
where Nature is so lavish of her gifts of forests, soil, and
field ; for there is a limitless growth of plants, out of which
the most valuable and useful medicines could be made.
The coffee of Liberia is the best in the world. It is in¬
digenous ; it grows wild everywhere. Hull, in his excel¬
lent book on Coffee Culture, gives the Liberian coffee the
very first place. It is superior to Java or Mocha, both in
the size of the berry and the deliciousness of the flavor.
Ship-loads of scions have been exported to Brazil ; and
much of the superior American coffee is the product of
the African scion. I have been told both in Europe and
America that there could be created a special and wide
demand for Liberian coffee, if it could be secured in such
quantities as to justify efforts to create a market. Mr. C.
T. Geyer, an enterprising New York merchant, who has
visited the West Coast of Africa and the coffee farms of
Liberia, writes me under date of December 16, 1885 :
" I am pleased to make the following comments on
Liberian coffee, having imported and dealt in it for many
years. The berry is acknowledged by the trade to be the
handsomest in the market ; and it makes the strongest
coffee. Those who have used it and acquired a taste for
it will have no other. One great drawback to its increased
use has been the limited quantity of it that has been raised.
Within a few years coffee grown in the island of Ceylon
from plants obtained in Liberia, has been upon the market
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
49
as Liberian. I believe the best article of commerce Liberi-
ans can raise is coffee. It took the first medal at the Cen¬
tennial Exhibition, in 1876; and it is universally regarded
as the best coffee raised anywhere in the world."
Mr. Edward S. Morris, of Philadelphia, who lived for a
time in Liberia; who has done much in promoting the
culture of coffee there ; and who, since 1856, has been sell¬
ing it in the United States, is the inventor of a machine
for hulling and cleaning the Liberian coffee. The berry is
50 large and hard that the mills used in other countries do
not meet the requirements. Whenever foreign capital is
turned toward the West Coast for investment, coffee cul¬
ture will be one of the industries that will be safe and
highly remunerative.
What a rich field for commercial enterprise the Americo-
African Republic presents, with its vast resources of soil
and woods, and the richest region of Africa lying back of
it ! The time certainly must come when the people of the
United States will interest themselves in some special way
in the growth and perpetuity of their first and only quasi
colonial enterprise, and in the enlargement of its commerce.
The mills of New England will send their manufactures,
and the South and the West will send certain of their
wares to Liberia, and bring back in their ships of com¬
merce the gold, the ivory, and the coffee of this favored
land.
Europeans are pushing their enterprises into the Amer-
ico-African Republic with all their might. The Germans,
Dutch, and Belgians have stores, called " factories," at
every port; and their business seems to be increasing
yearly. English steamers stop at most of the Liberian
ports to deliver cargo, and to take away the produce and
natural treasures of the fields and forests. The French
3
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have just begun to send steamers to Liberian ports. Peti¬
tion was made by the French to the National Legislature
(1884) f°r rights and privileges in common with other
foreigners ; and it was readily and gladly granted. There
are no American business houses on the Liberian coast,
except a very small one at Cape Palmas ; but three firms
send their vessels to these " ports of entry," and trade
from the harbors. They are great movable stores or " fac¬
tories," floating on the water. They bring everything;
the necessaries, the luxuries, and " the destructives food,
raiment, delicacies, and wines, liquors, and segars. Yates
& Porterfield, and Carlton & Moffat, of New York, and
R. Lewis & Co., of Portland, Maine, send their vessels to
the Liberian coast. The first-named firm has been doing
for years a very large business, and are said to have grown
wealthy out of the profits of the trade.
Every decade white men retire from the West Coast
trade rich enough to live comfortably at home in Europe
on their income. But they went into business on the coast
with large capital behind them, usually representing com¬
panies with millions of dollars invested in ships, machin¬
ery, etc. The Liberian merchant plods on year after year,
unable to enlarge his business because he does not have
the capital. The foreigner adds thousands of dollars an¬
nually to his enterprises, puts his own vessel in the trade,,
and increases the number yearly; and as a natural result
he grows independent in a lew years, brings out a successor
from Germany, England, France, or Holland, and retires
to live at ease with "the dear ones all at home." But such
is life. It is true, as Benjamin Franklin said, "To make
money, one must have money."
Foreigners, finding that they "strike oil" in the Libe¬
rian trade, are quietly pushing to have their privileges en-
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
51
larged. To them may be attributed the movement "to
open the constitution," as it is called. They want two
things granted them, for which they openly agitate. First,
the right to lease land for a term of at least one hundred
years ; and, secondly, the right to establish trading posts
up the rivers and in the interior, from which they are now
excluded. The privileges of citizenship, and the right to
vote and hold office, they are secretly working for.
The National Legislature (1884) opened three new
ports of entry—San Pedro, Manna, and Niffou. Foreigners
have the right to trade at them. Pushing and persistent
as are the Europeans and white Americans, my impression
is that their getting into the inferior and up the rivers
with their rum, tobacco, cloth, salt, and brass kettles,
is only a question of time. It will certainly be the
means of developing the interior trade of Liberia which
is not yet touched. In the harbor of Freetown, Sierra
Leone, one sees life, activity, bustle. I saw the harbor
white with the sails of commerce—steamers, brigs, barks,
schooners, sloops, native trading cutters, and row-boats,
scores of them taken all together. Looking at them, I
involuntarily exclaimed : " This is business ! "
I may here presume that the reader asks a natural ques¬
tion : Are the Americo-Africans (the colored people of
American birth or descent) profiting from the wealth of
their country, and growing rich? Although I have not
come to write about the people yet, I pause here to an¬
swer this pertinent inquiry with an emphatic No ! The
Americo-Africans would profit from the natural wealth
of their country if they themselves had money to develop
it, or could induce foreigners to invest their capital more
largely than they do.
Emigrants from Europe to America, in its early history,
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either brought money with them, or they had influence
enough at home to draw capital after them. Even now Amer¬
ican bonds and stocks are prominent on the English finan¬
cial exchanges, and British capital has done much, and it
is still doing a great deal, for the internal development
of the United States—sustaining railroads, constructing
bridges, conducting manufactories, and mining enterprises.
A country may be ever so rich in its natural resources,
but capital is required to make these resources available.
What good would the gold discovered in California have
done to business industries had not Eastern capital gone
West, bored rocks, sunk shafts, erected machinery, dug
up the precious metal, and then prepared it for circula¬
tion? There is money in a wholesale and retail tobacco
house ; but suppose some enterprising colored Americans
should start this business, what would be the result ?
After we have built our establishment, stocked it, and
secured our trading cutters, the white merchants and ship¬
owners who would bring us our tobacco, and who sell it
themselves on the coast, would not consent to be driven
out of the trade—no, not even to share it with us ! They
would run our freight up so high that our profits would be
reduced to nothing. Indeed, it is probable that we should
lose money by the venture ! But if this Negro Company
could put their own ships upon the sea, then they would be
masters of the situation ! This is the key to the solution
of the business problem, so far as it concerns the Liberians
or the American Negroes. We must have our own vessels
upon the ocean carrying our African workers, our civili¬
zation, and our wares to the " Fatherland," and bringing
back its riches.
Says a high commercial authority : " Outside of their
colonies the principal advantages possessed by British and
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. S3
French traders in Africa are their magnificent steamship
lines, and their long-established resident agencies or branch
houses." * I am glad to know that American Negroes are
thinking in this direction. Making this reference to a
New York audience in 1882, I was cheered to the echo;
and addressing the Hampton Institute Alumni Associa¬
tion, in May, 1884, the same expression was most heartily
applauded.
Our references have been mainly to Liberian merchants.
We must bear in mind that Liberia is an exclusively Negro
government. White men, therefore, are cautious as to
making investments. Indeed, there is very little foreign
capital in business in Liberia. Neither Europeans nor
Americans seem to have sufficient confidence in the coun¬
try to entrust their moneys to Liberians, and to invest it
in business through them. It is different at Sierra Leone
and Lagos, which are English possessions.
There are many Negroes who are wealthy merchants in
both places. On my way to Liberia, there was on our
steamer a Lagos merchant, a native African, returning
from England with his family, a wife and two children.
They were accompanied by a nurse and a valet. They had
occupied apartments in London at "the West End," the
aristocratic quarters. He had on board $50,000 worth of
goods, and a small steam yacht for trade on the Niger. I
was told that the trade of the West Coast is passing slowly
into native African hands. But that is perfectly natural.
Europeans can not stand this climate. It costs more to
send and sustain one European in Western Africa than to
do business through three African merchants. Business
men are eminently practical; they do that which pays.
The native merchant has the vantage ground ; Africa is
* The American Mail and Export Journal, March, 1883, p. 115.
54
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the Negro's country. His controlling it in every respect
is only a question of time. The Romans held England ;
the Normans once ruled the country ; but in the fulness of
time God brought those to the front to whom He had
given the land.
God, not we, " divided to the nations their inheritance,"
and "separated the sons of Adam."* The Negro has for
his portion Central-Tropical Africa, and no other race will
supplant, or permanently rule him on that soil. But in the
fulness of God's time, kings and priests and merchants of
Ethiopia shall influence, as they have already begun to do,
the destinies of other countries and other races.
CHAPTER X.
PEOPLE—THE NATIVES—THEIR CUSTOMS AND MANNERS.
HE people of the Americo-African Republic are
divided into two classes: (i). The Aborigines, who
are, (a) the indigenous tribes, and (à) the slaves recap¬
tured from slave-ships and returned to Africa ; and (2).
The colored colonizers from the United States and the
West Indies, and their descendants.
The Natives, as the Aborigines are called, numbering
about 800,000 persons, are divided into tribes, named
Veys, Mandingoes, Kroos, Golahs, Greboes, Pessehs,
Bassas, and Deys. They differ in dialect, as do the people
of Great Britain even to-day. The Welsh, the Scotch,
and the English are different and distinct dialects. The
general appearance of the tribes is alike, except the
* Deut. xxxii. 8.
THE AMERIGO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
55
Mandingoes, who are a tall and sinewy race of men. One
can always distinguish a Krooman. He is the sailor of the
coast. He navigates all the steamers and ships that do
business in West African waters. The Krooman was never
a slave ; he was too useful to the slave-trader as a sailor.
In order to prevent the exportation of a Krooman, the
tribe adopted as a sign a blue band down the forehead.
Every male child is tattooed, and he grows up with that
stamp upon his face, of which he never fails to be proud.
A NATIVE TOWN.
These tribes dwell in towns, each town having its chief
or headman. The houses are neatly constructed of bam¬
boo. Many of them are oblong. The Veys live in conical-
shaped dwellings, with a porch in which they usually hang
a hammock of their own manufacture. The houses are
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comparatively neat, and the African wife prides herself in
keeping her home tidy and in order. The ground serves
as the floor, but they frequently spread their home-made
mats upon it. This is much better than the sleepy people
of Madeira; whose floors are of stone, and are usually
bare. Some of these African-made mats are very pretty.
They combine different colors in making them. They
cover the dining-room and sitting-room of many a well-to-
do Americo-African, who buys them from the skillful, in¬
dustrious natives. In building their houses they use no
nails, but a rope and a cord of their own make, which are
as strong and as durable as anything manufactured in
Europe or America.
Most people have the idea that the Negro at home is
an idle being who sits around and does nothing. They
will hardly believe that they have their smiths who work
in iron and gold, their weavers of cloth, and their looms,
their dyers, carpenters, merchants, teachers, doctors, and
farmers ; and are engaged in many of the pursuits common
to our more advanced civilized life. This is true of many
of the Liberian tribes. Among some, if not all of them,
the various industries of life are pursued, even if in a
feeble way.
The food of the natives consists of rice, cassava, beef,
mutton, game, fish, palm oil, and palm butter; and their
drink is water and palm wine. Every native family looks out
for something to eat. One of the difficulties in connection
with hired labor arises from this fact. The native man
will leave your work to make his rice farm, so as to be
sure of the staff of life. A month before the rains, in
March and April, he clears his land. At the first sign of
the beginning of the rains he burns the brushwood and
weeds. He plants after the first rain. The soil being ex-
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
57
tremely fertile, the seeds spring up in a few days. He
then makes his wives and children watch the crop till it is
gathered. And they have to be very attentive, or the
rice-birds, which are always on the alert, would destroy it in
a very short time. In four months the crop is gathered.
The rice is cut down on the stalk. The stalks are put
up in bundles ; and these are taken home and put in the
top of the houses. They keep dry, and are taken down,
beaten, winnowed, boiled, and eaten as needed. It is a
picturesque sight to pass, as I have often done, through
a native town and see the busy housewife get the rice
ready for cooking. One sees many mortars, and hears the
music of the descending pestles and the sweet chatter or
laughter of " the blameless Ethiopians."
The native wife is a very good housekeeper. In her
dwelling the pans, kettles, and basins are hung around the
room in order. When she puts dinner on the rudely con¬
structed table, she never sits down, but in your presence
tastes a little from every dish, as a sign that she has put
nothing in it to hurt you. It is called, " Taking the witch
off."
I saw the African at home for the first time at the Isles
de Los ; an island on the West Coast. I was struck with
their intelligent countenances and matchless physical de¬
velopment. Looking from the deck of the steamer into
a merchant row-boat, I saw the stalwart fellows gather
around what appeared to be a wash-basin filled with rice
and palm oil. The African boatmen stuck their hands in,
filled them with rice, squeezed it into a ball, then in the
twinkling of an eye they tossed it down their throats ; and
the food disappeared without chewing ! I looked on with
wide-open eyes. They gulped the entire dinner. They
boil their rice very soft and the palm oil helps it to pass
3*
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through the organs of digestion. Strange to say, dys¬
pepsia is unknown among the natives. Of course they
chew their meats. After eating they invariably wash their
hands, mouth, and teeth.
It would require a volume to write about their customs.
Some are good, many are bad, and some are ludicrous.
Their diversions would entertain and amuse. I attended
a play by natives on Vey Island. Its effect was like that
of a comic tragedy—ridiculous and grand, laughable and
exciting ! Instead of paying money to see the perform¬
ance, I gave them tobacco ; others gave cloth, beads, and
caps. One thing appears to be true—" When the sun
goes down, all Africa dances."
Two customs are interwoven with the warp and woof
of their social system. They are evils which can not be
removed except by slow moral processes. We refer to
polygamy and slavery. The former evil, however, is not
as wide-spread"~a3~t>ne would suppose. Passing through
Krootovvn one day, and seeing a Krooman building a
house, I asked him how many wives he had. " Me no fit
to have but two. Woman he be cost too much money,"
was the reply. And thereby hangs a tale. The African
woman spends her money, or rather her husband's, just as
an American or European wife does. An African lady
sees her neighbor wearing a new pair of " anklets," or
necklace, or bracelets. She must have a new set too ; and
she taunts her husband with his poverty if he does not
respond to her appeals. Well, the African husband finds
it uncomfortable to have a half dozen women begging or
taunting him at the same time. Indeed, monogamists
sometimes find it hard to keep up with the fancies and
wants of " the lady of the house." It must also be re¬
membered that an African wife costs money before she is
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
59
secured. The man who wants a girl to wife must first get
together the purchase-money in the form of oxen, bul¬
locks, or some other article of trade. A woman has no
choice in the matter of marriage. Often she is chosen
while quite a child. A Krooman by the name of " Poor
Fellow" took me, while I was passing through Krootown,
to the dwelling of his affianced. He was a grown man ;
she was a little twelve-year-old girl. Poor Fellow was
saving money to pay for her. She had already been prom¬
ised him. The article was not to be delivered, however, till
full payment was made.
The wife is property. She is in absolute submission to
her husband. She never sits down to meals with him,
and always treats him as her lord.
As in Holland and other parts of Europe, notably in
the Alps, where wives are often seen hitched up with
asses and plowing in the fields while their husbands guide
the plow ;* as in all barbarous countries, so also in Liberia
among the natives, the women perform much physical labor.
I have seen women in " the land of the Dutch " load
and unload vessels, run the freight canal boats, and carry
immense burdens. The African wife takes her axe, goes
to the woods, and comes home with a huge pile of sticks
on her head. It is perfectly wonderful to see the loads
women carry on the head ; and they can keep them there,
and even dance, without touching them with their hands.
The African wife is not an idle, useless being. She
washes the clothes, looks after the house, and cooks. She
boils rice to perfectiom. She rises with the sun, goes to
the spring for water, takes up the mats from the station¬
ary beds, which are used during the day as settees,
brushes up, arranges things in order, then cooks the break-
* Foster's Cyclopedia, p. 668.
6o
LIBERIA :
fast. I have seen her varied daily experiences morn¬
ing, noon, and afternoon. I have seen her going to and
returning from the spring, busy in her dwelling, cooking
outside, looking after the children, bathing them, and oil¬
ing and braiding their hair.
The traveller is familiar with the dress of the native Afri¬
can. He wears a girdle about his loins, and a wide piece
of cloth, manufactured by his wife, thrown loosely across
his left shoulder and wrapped around his body. It is like
the kilt worn by the Scottish Highlander. The Mandingoes
wear a long, loose flowing robe, usually made out of white
cloth of their own manufacture.
I think, of course, that the African can improve on both
the quantity and style of his dress. I except the Man-
dingoes. But I do not believe that they will ever adopt
European or American garments and style. They ought
not to do so. They are not suited to their climate.
Dressed as they are, these Liberian natives could appear
in Hyde Park or on Broadway without violating the de¬
cencies of life. Of course, they would create an excite¬
ment ; but so does the East Indiaman in London, and the
Chinaman in New York. After all it is a question of
comfort, custom, and taste.
Some of the women are very handsome. One can see
nowhere in the world better specimens of natural beauty.
They carry themselves like queens. The Vey women are
especially handsome. Their expression and form are
charming. Their feet are perfectly symmetrical and deli¬
cately small. Their eyes and teeth would be envied by a
Parisian belle. "Thou art black and comely," could be
applied to a Vey woman without hesitation.
The native women wear a piece of cloth which extends
from their waist down to their ankles. The cloth is some-
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. 61
times a prettily-dyed specimen of their own skillful mak¬
ing ; but near the coast one often sees imported cloth
worn with pride by those who can afford it. African
women, like American women, prefer foreign goods. It
sounds "bigger" than "home-made." Around their
necks, ankles, and wrists they wear flashy ornaments. It
is amusing to see the variegated adornments of an African
lady. We smile just as we would at a Dutch peasant, or
at the Apostle of Afstheticism. The hair is always done
up with scrupulous care. These women have "fleecy
locks"; but they do their hair up so as to charm "the
civilized man." It is something wonderful. When they
get through combing, plaiting, braiding, and adorning,
they look exceedingly well.
Such is the picture of an African woman. A head done
up with neatness, skill, and taste ; a piece of cloth ex¬
tending from the waist to the ankles ; gold or some other
kind of adornments around neck, wrists, and ankles. There
she stands ; and you involuntarily repeat what the queen
of Sheba may have inspired Solomon to say, " Thou art
black and comely."
A part of her body is exposed, it is true ; but nobody
has evil thoughts or evil desires. The stranger, visiting
Edinburgh, Scotland, turns and looks long and admiringly
at the beautifully shaped limbs of the fish-wives of New-
haven, whose dresses are as short as those of school-girls.
The stranger may have evil thoughts ; but the Scotch¬
man never thinks about those charming women who go
about their streets with exposed limbs selling fish to who¬
ever may buy. It is so in Liberia with the native women.
No one notices a woman's bust, or arms, or limbs other
than to think of specimens of painting and sculpture, and
go on his way saying to himself, " Art may imitate, but it
can not equal nature."
62
LIBERIA :
The natives living in the territory of Liberia have rules
and laws of their own ; but they acknowledge, to some
extent, the general oversight and control of the Republic.
Their governments are monarchical, as a rule. Their
kings, chiefs, or headmen inherit their position and
authority. Native kings have attended the Liberian
Legislature and participated in its deliberations. Two
native delegates from the Grebos sat in the last House
(1884). The intention is to give the native element even
larger representation in the future than in the past, go¬
ing as far as practicable in the matter. Of course, to
grant general representation, that is, in proportion to
numbers, would be to subjugate the Americo- Liberian
civilization to native Paganism and Mohammedanism.
Men write about " the savages of Africa." The geog¬
raphies read, "Central Africa is an unexplored region,
inhabited by savage tribes of Negroes." There can be
no question as to the existence of savages. There are
some tribes which have been made savages by the in¬
famous slave-trade conducted for centuries by Europeans
and white Americans ; but, as a rule, the natives of Cen¬
tral-Tropical Africa are kind, hospitable, good-natured,
trustful to a fault. Their confidence can be more easily
secured than any people on the face of the earth, because
their natural bonhomie leads them to trust ; and they
too easily forgive and forget wrongs, because of the nat¬
ural buoyancy of their character. Mungo Park is sick unto
death among them. They nurse him till he gets well,
and send him away with this parting blessing :
" Go, white man, go ; but with thee bear
The Negro's wish, the Negro's prayer ;
Remembrance of the Negro's care."
Livingstone dies in the interior of Central Africa, and
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
63
"willing Negro hands hear him over hills and through val¬
leys and jungles and swamps, until they deliver his lifeless
body to the white men, who dwell by the shores of the far-
resounding Indian Ocean.
If in interior Africa, if on the coast, if in the North or
in the South, they have shot into and destroyed exploring
expeditions, it has been because white men, in order to get
.slaves, have burnt down their towns and carried into
bondage their women and their children, and produced such
impressions as made them savage and revengeful. Even
explorers, when opposed, have fought their way through
a country in which they had no rights except such as were
granted them. Africa, for centuries, has been robbed and
mobbed ; and yet, man's inhumanity to man has only made
her countless millions mourn.
I have heard of African honesty and hospitality from
the lips of white and black travellers, men unknown to
literature or fame, and yet who as merchants, missionaries,
and explorers have seen much of the interior. Being
strangers, they were given " the best house " and " the
very best fare." Being at the mercy of the natives, they
slept with their purse exposed to view, and yet never lost
a dollar. One man lost a package fully fifty miles from
town. On his arrival, he reported his loss to the king.
On rising next morning, the package was handed him,
having been found by natives passing over the same road.
Read the criminal records of Christendom, and then hear
our challenge to find more good-heartcdness, more honesty
anywhere than we find among the natives ol Atrica, espe¬
cially those who are removed from the evil influences of
the coast.
But some people will not believe in the honesty of the
natives. I gave some stubborn facts to a white man on
64
LIBERIA :
one occasion. His reply was, " Well, that may be true ;
but it is to be ascribed not to innate honesty, but to their
fear resulting from superstition." I deny it. England
once was as Liberia is. I speak of the natives. As a
French writer says, " M. Guizot tells us that Alfred, to put
the honesty of his subjects to the test, used to cause
bracelets of gold to be hung up in public places. They
were never stolen ; and if a traveller dropped his purse by
the roadside, he had no need to turn back and seek it, for
he was certain to find it untouched, even though he did
not pass that way again for a month. Such was the Saxon
in the time of Alfred the Great."
Such are many of the African tribes to-day. But Euro¬
pean commercial intercourse is certainly somewhat demor¬
alizing. First, the slave-trade came like a dragon to bite,
to poison, to kill. And now Christian nations are contin¬
uing their damnable work by sending rum to " the heathen
in Africa." True, they send missionaries. But they first
make Africa sick, then they send in the doctor; they give
poison, then they administer an antidote. So did Spain
deal with Africa when she sent her priests in her slave-
ships. So does Great Britain treat "the Dark Continent"
to-day in sending her missionaries in her rum-ships. No
wonder that Catholic cathedrals and monasteries are decay¬
ing in the Congo valley ! No wonder that the natives turned
from the priest and the crucifix in disgust ! No wonder
that Protestant Christianity has an up-hill work ! No won¬
der that the tipsy African recently said, in reply to the re¬
buke of the European missionary : " Be he no your brud-
der who send us rum ? Go talkee him ; no talkee me ! "
THE AMERIGO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
65
CHAPTER XI.
PEOPLE—THE KROO AND THE VEY TRIBES.
THESE two tribes are especially useful and distin¬
guished. Both the Kroos and the Veys have towns
near Monrovia, the capital of Liberia. I saw more of
them than of any of the other tribes.
The Kroomen are the first people one meets on the
West Coast. They are the sailors. They are in the sea
from infancy. I have seen little girls and boys that could
hardly walk, playing in the water as the child of an interior
town would play in the sand. At Sierra Leone or Mon¬
rovia, Kroo sailors board every vessel bound down the
•coast. It is an interesting change from white sailors to
black sailors, and from a known to an unknown tongue.
White sailors, hardy though they be, are not equal to the
task of taking a vessel from Sierra Leone to the Congo,
and bringing her back. The sun, the rain, the night air,
and the dew would enfeeble them in a fortnight. They
would sicken and die before they reached the Cameroons.
These Kroomen are indispensable. They were found to
be so in the days of the slave-trade, hence every Krooman
is able to make the proud boast : " I have never been a
slave."
Being sailors, the Kroomen are of a roving disposition.
Their highest ambition is to cross the deep blue sea.
Many of them have been " abroad"; and they become " lions "
on their return. The " lions " delight to gather their less
fortunate brethren around them and expatiate on the
wonders of " the white man's country."
It is amusing to see some of them on their return from
"abroad." Of course they must dress "white man fash";
66
LIBERIA :
and they parade themselves to the amusement of the Eu¬
ropean and American, and to the envy of many of their
fellow-comrades. I have seen a returned Krooman wearing
a Prince Albert diagonal coat buttoned up to his neck, but
not another article of clothing did he have on—no shoes,
pants, shirt, collar, or hat—nothing but his " girdle about
his loins " and his " Prince Albert " ! But he strutted around
" Allee same like 'Merican man " ! I have seen a Krooman
in English walking-coat, silk hat, and umbrella, but no-
shoes ! Many amusing pictures could be drawn.
These Kroomen return home with singular names. The
sailors must palm them off on their confiding Ethiopian
comrades as " proper 'Merican," or " 'ristocratic English."
One day, at Krootown, I asked a lad who had been with
his father on an English man-of-war, and who could speak
a little English : " Bubbs, what is your name?" "Little
Potato," was the reply. "What is your father's name?"
I laughed aloud on receiving for answer, " Big Potato."
They take a pride in such names as "Two Pound Ten,"
"Pea Soup," " Jumping Jack," "Poor Fellow," etc. Twa
brothers returned from a man-of-war. I asked one of them
on Kroo beach: "What is your name?" "Jack Savage,"
he answered. "What is your brother's name?" "John
Savage." The steward on board of a West Coast vessel,
on which I was a passenger, told me that his name was
Dick Richard, and it was a long time before I could make
any change in such a peculiar cognomen. We changed
several names. " Little Potato " is now known as " Tous¬
saint L'Ouverture," and "Poor Fellow" is called "Han¬
nibal." After all, " what's in a name ? " But it is bar¬
barous to make a man, who knows no English, call himself
" Slow Coach."
These Kroomen have no respect for titles. They are
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
67
very democratic; they are perfectly courteous and re¬
spectful when they call you by your surname, without any
prefix whatever. I was surprised beyond expression to
hear the United States Minister's hired Kroo head-boat¬
man say, " Smit, are you going boat-riding to-day?" For
six weeks the Kroo steward on board our homeward-
bound vessel occasionally amused me by asking, " Stewart,
can I do anything for you?" I never corrected him till
the end of the voyage, when I gave him a few points on
American etiquette.
My impression is that the Krooman is a very mercenary
fellow. His contact with white men in trade has made
him so, however. He will beg if he is dying, and charge
you for telling his name ; but he is a manly fellow, and if
he gets attached to you, there is nothing that he will not
do for you.
The Kroos are neat and cleanly ; the women bathe three
times a day. They use a wonderful amount of water. One
of the most picturesque sights I have ever seen in my life
was the Krootown girls and women going to and coming
from the spring, in the early morning and the late after¬
noon, with tubs, buckets, and barrels of water balanced on
their heads, while they laughed, jtalked^jang, and danced.
A Krooman thinks there is no place like home, and no
person in the world like mother. The attachment of
grown men to their mothers is childlike and truly touch¬
ing. This is natural. Polygamy gives a man several
families and homes; but the children have only one hut
and one mamma. Father is often away—never in one house
long ; but mother is always present to decide the little dis¬
putes, to satisfy the little stomachs, to sing away the 11-
tle pains and sorrows. The sweetest name on Krooman
tongue is " mother."
68
LIBERIA :
Seeing New York for the first time from the deck of a
vessel, a Krooman went into ecstasies. He was asked if
he would not like to live in that great city. "No," was
the quick reply. " Why ? " asked the astounded Ameri¬
can. The answer was readily given, "No Krooman live
here; no Kroowoman. No Kroo own house." The rea¬
son given me by a Kroo steward for not living in New
York was, "Can't leave mammy." He was fully thirty-
five years of age. Enterprising and progressive, the Kroos,
under the stimulus of a righteous commerce and a truly
Christian civilization, will become a powerful force in
African regeneration.
The Veys are the tribe which take the first place in
Liberia. They are barbarians or " heathen " magis natione
quam ratione. In what makes manly character, in what
makes intellectual strength, the Veys rank with any peo¬
ple. They have invented their own alphabet, constructed
their own written as well as spoken language, and they are
slowly growing a literature. They use a pen and an in¬
delible ink that they make themselves. I have often vis¬
ited Veytown and looked with pride upon these repre¬
sentatives of the Ethiopian race, who show that they
possess the highest order of intellect. I admire the Man-
dingoes, because they are learned in the Koran and the
Commentaries ; but their books are borrowed from the
Arabic. I go into inexpressible enthusiasm over the
Veys; because they are not only versed in Arabic lore,
but because, as has already been said, they also have
their own language in which they speak and write ; and they
have a growing literature. May they be speedily brought
in contact with a better civilization, and receive the ben¬
efits of a truly Christian education.
It is a mistake to suppose these Liberian natives sim-
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. 69
pie, ignorant creatures. My impression is that they are
naturally superior to the average Negro who has been
crushed by the monster, slavery. They are keen, bright,
quick-witted, able to distinguish the genuine from the
sham. Let the reader remember that the Veyman lives
in his neatly constructed dwelling; that he has his own
written language, and is acquainted with Arabic liter¬
ature, and can converse in that Asiatic tongue as well
as in the English! Is that man to be despised? No;
I have often felt his comparative superiority ! Since
seeing them, I do not wonder at the brains found among
Negroes in the land of their captivity. Theodore Dwight,
Esq., says that between 1770-5, a report reached Eng¬
land that a young African slave in Maryland could
read and write Arabic, and was well versed in Arabic
literature. His name was Job-ben-Solomon. He was re¬
leased, sent to England, and there assisted Sir Hans Sloane,
the able scholar and founder of the British Museum, in
translating several Arabic works.* Much has been done
in Liberia to promote Christian civilization and education
among the natives. They respond everywhere to outside
influences, Africanizing them, and using them to develop
their country and to promote its welfare. May the good
work go on until Ethiopia shall rise from her reclining
position and stand upon her feet to illustrate the poet's
prophecy :
" Time's noblest offspring is the last."
* Methodist Quarterly Review, January, 1869.
LIBERIA :
CHAPTER XII.
PEOPLE—THE AMERICO-AFRICANS.
THE emigrants from the United States and the West
Indies and their descendants are called " Liberians."
They were sent out by the American Colonization Society.
Up to January I, 1867, 13,136 emigrants had gone to
Liberia, and the United States Government had returned
to Africa 5,722 recaptured slaves. But since 1867 there
has been a remarkable decrease in the number of colored
people who have left America for Africa. The Coloniza¬
tion Society pays the emigrant's passage and provides for
his maintenance for six months.
We must candidly say that the Americo-Africans in
Liberia are not in such a condition as to call forth our
enthusiasm. We refer to the masses, not to the few.
Most of the colored people who have emigrated to Africa
were poor and comparatively ignorant. In this new
country and hostile climate, they have enjoyed neither the
support of large capital nor the direction of general in¬
telligence. They carried to Africa very little idea of vol¬
untary, systematic labor. They worked in America more
from outside than inside influences. Finding themselves
free to lie down and to rise up, and having been supported
by the Colonization Society, they have done very little
work. I have seen Liberians who went to the West Coast,
with reputations for industry, sitting idly in dilapidated
or rudely constructed houses, or walking around abusing
the Government for not opening roads and building
bridges, thus creating prosperity ; or these demoralized
individuals would exhaust their vocabulary in abusing
their neighbors, characterizing them as the meanest and
THE AMERICO-AFKICAN REPUBLIC.
71
most devilish of mankind. Then some have plainly said,
" I worked hard enough when I was a slave. Here I can
lie down when I want to and get up when I please ; and
there is no one to molest or make me afraid."
The motto of the Republic is, " The love of liberty
brought us here." Many Liberians make this to mean,
" To be free from labor we came here." True to their old
Southern training, a large class of the people look upon
labor as degrading, as fit only for menials. This spirit,
however, is not as wide-spread as in former years. Wages
are low. Fifteen dollars can buy a native boy " appren¬
tice " for a term of years. Twenty-five cents a day and
meals are considered fair. Four dollars a month is aver¬
age wages even for Liberian help. But it costs in one
way and another to have a retinue of servants. They
must be fed, clothed, and housed. This is a luxury only
for those upon whom Fortune has smiled. But as the
Liberians are eminently democratic, the poor imitate the
rich and render themselves both pitiable and ludicrous.
I have seen many amusing pictures in Monrovia.
I have seen a barefooted little girl about ten years of
age, dressed in poor calico, on her way to school, and a
native boy about twelve, half naked, carrying her primer !
I have seen a boy on the back of a native lad, using the
unfortunate son of the soil in place of a Shetland pony !
There are no ponies, no donkeys, no little carts to ride to
school in ; so native boys are often substituted. It is not
in keeping with the dignity of a gentleman or lady to
carry a bundle in the streets. Such is the general senti¬
ment. There are honorable and pronounced exceptions ;
but, as a general rule, the Americo-Africans have carried
with them old Southern ideas of labor. An eminent gen¬
tleman, having been called to a high and responsible posi-
7 2
LIBERIA :
tion in the Republic to which he must devote all his time
and energy, had to give up his coffee-farm. He adver¬
tised for some one to. take charge of it. He told me that
it was amusing to hear the applicants tell how much work
they could make a native man do. They considered that
their very best recommendation. But this gentleman,
who is a man of great energy and thrift, would interrupt
and astonish each applicant with the question, " How
much work can you do ? "
An orator, Abraham Smith, formerly of Mt. Pleasant,
S. C., making an address in Planters' Hall, on the St. Paul's
River, and rebuking his fellow-citizens for their false
notions about labor, and denouncing many of their silly
practices, brought his speech to a climax with the startling
declaration, "You FREE TILL YOU FOOL." His remark
created a sensation. The Liberian certainly gives a broad
definition to freedom. He is, perhaps, the best living
specimen of the democrat. He recognizes no social grades.
Each man is a king. An American on visiting the Presi¬
dent was surprised to hear him say to his butler, "Mr,
Ross, please bring in the wine." This was six years ago.
Is it not to be wondered at that so little has been
done in Liberia ? The climate is against the people. Their
education has been against them, and they have increased
their weakness by lying down on native muscle, and de¬
pending too much on foreign philanthropy. Charity
enfeebles the energies, destroys enterprise, and prevents
self-reliance. No wonder that even after sixty years of
opportunity, and thirty-seven years of national existence,
there are no railroads, no manufactories, no steam or
water-mills, no bridges, no horses or oxen in use, except
at Cape Palmas ! Practically little beyond what nature
provides ! I send for a barber to trim my hair. There is
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
73
no barber-shop in Monrovia, a town of at least two thou¬
sand inhabitants, the capital and metropolis of the Republic.
He comes. Ten years ago he was doing well in Augusta,
Georgia. He brings neither cloth, towels, comb, brush,
whisk-broom—nothing but an old pair of very dull scissors.
I ask him, "How is this?" "Well," he replies, "I have
stopped barbarizing." I talked to him about railroads
and other enterprises. He complained of the poverty of
the country and the slowness of the people, and said he
had stopped thinking about such things, and then voiced
the sentiment,
" Man wants but little here below,
Nor wants that little long."
The masses of colored people who have settled in Li¬
beria went there with a wrong impression. They emi¬
grated with the feeling that they were going to " a land
flowing with milk and honey then when they found that
to build up a Christian Negro Nationality, tp establish a
new and comfortable home for'the family, and to bear the
burdens of a great social, religious, and political experi¬
ment, required sacrifice, labor, pluck, and steadfastness,
they were surprised, and became disappointed, discouraged,
and despondent.
But this is not to be wondered at. Throw a man upon
the West Coast comparatively penniless and with no regular
habits of industry ; put him to acclimate in some broken-
down old house into which the water runs when it rains,
and through which the Harmattan blows as through a
sieve ; give him poor food to eat for six months, and you
make him an easy prey to death or " constitutional tired-
ness.
I have no sympathy, however, with disappointed per¬
sons who return to the United States and abuse Liberia.
4
74 LIBERIA :
The difficulties to be met there were largely encountered
here by the early settlers. If the emigrant goes back from
the coast, he can settle in a hilly country and enjoy health;
but the Christian Negro is cursed by poverty. He can not
carry capital to Liberia ; and thereby hangs a tale. It is
not the country. Money to put boats on the river, to
build railroads, to drain the swamps, and to open up high¬
ways to the interior—this is what is needed. Capital in
the hands of a population founded on aboriginal stock, and
enjoying the benefits of Christian education, will solve the
problem of life in Liberia. If I could influence the Col¬
onization Society, I would earnestly plead with them to
stop making emigration their objective point and use their
funds mainly in internal improvements, opening roads,
building bridges, fostering industries, and especially in
establishing a system of agricultural and industrial edu¬
cation, beginning with the common schools.
A person who thinks of emigrating to Liberia should
examine himself thoroughly as to his physical condition ;
more carefully than a volunteer is examined before he is
permitted to enlist for the war. One needs all the vigor
of mind and body that it is possible to command. The
African fever invariably attacks and besieges the weakest
part of our system. It develops the germ of any disease
that may be in us ; and, while running riot through our
bodies, it makes us home-sick, fills us with home-longings ;
it makes us hanker after " the flesh-pots of Egypt," as a
distinguished Liberian puts it. If the person meditating
emigration be young, of strong constitution, and good
health ; and if he can live somewhat independent of the
provisions of the Colonization Society, the chances of
acclimating successfully are in his favor. If he can not meet
these conditions, let him look well lest he leap into the
dark ; lest the battle of life be too severe for him.
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
75
Industry, strongly backed by health and a little capital,
can reach competence and acquire wealth. More is not
accomplished because these conditions do not abound. A
man need not go to Liberia without money and expect
to become independent easily or quickly. It is hard to
get money; there is such a little in circulation. Those
who have " cash " generally hold it. The circulating me¬
dium of trade may be said to be cloth, tobacco, and salt
food. Domestic debts are paid in " trade." I have heard
laboring people testify, again and again, on this point.
Even the small farmers find it hard, almost impossible, to
sell their coffee for reasonable " cash " prices. The mer¬
chants prefer to deal in " trade." It is to their advantage to
do so. I work for a man. He gives me an order on the store
where he deals, and I go there and take my pay in trade.
This makes it hard for a poor man to get hold of money.
This condition of things stifles enterprise, especially in the
cultivation of the soil. If an emigrant brings with him
some cloth, tobacco, and a little cash ; if he keeps his health,
and is economical and judicious, he can plant coffee and in
three years begin to gather a crop. He can cultivate sugar,
which he may harvest annually. The coffee-tree does not
commence to yield until from three to four years after the
plant is set out. But when it does begin to bear, it yields
continuously for about thirty years. The farmer sets out
the scions, and then for the next thirty years he has simply
to keep down the weeds and grass, stir the earth around
the roots, and keep his farm clean. His annual harvest is
sure. It is to be said, however, that one man, unaided, can
not cultivate more than five acres of coffee; and the net
profit per acre is not more than forty or fifty dollars, and I
give the very highest estimate. It is hardly ever reached, I
think. The man who can cultivate from fifty to one hun-
76
LIBERIA :
dred acres is the farmer who counts his income by the thou¬
sands. The poor farmer, however, can increase his acreage
every year. But climate and other conditions will make it
a long time before a man, unaided by either capital or labor,
can grow enough coffee to secure a comfortable income.
The same may be said of sugar, with this difference : it is
easier to cultivate coffee than sugar. The poor man can
not own a sugar-mill ; but he can sell his coffee right from
the tree, in the hull.
The Government gives every married emigrant twenty-
five acres of land, and every single man ten acres. Of
course, it is covered with trees and a thick undergrowth.
The emigrant must clear it and prepare it for planting ;
he then must buy coffee scions and set them out, and wait
three years, perhaps four, for his crop. It is hard and trying
work. There are no horses or oxen in use. He does not
own stock himself, nor do his neighbors ; he must walk to
reach town or the nearest settlement ; he must build his
house; he must struggle hard if he would enjoy life. But
after ten, twenty, aye, thirty years of earnest, faithful effort,
he settles down under his own vine and fig-tree, a happy,
contented, and wealthy farmer. I met a few of these in
Liberia.
But while such are the possibilities, the present con¬
dition of the Americo-African is weak. The population
needs energy ; and it will take a mighty force to energize
the whole Republic. Liberia needs a greater population
representing the Christian civilization. She needs men ;
she needs capitalists ; she needs teachers ; she needs a
supply, not of muscle, but of educated brains ; money for
business investments ; people of force of character and
push, who will make the wilderness to bloom, the rivers
and bays to be white with the evidences of commercial
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
77
activity, and the nation to shake off its stagnation and
stand erect in the strength of general prosperity.
CHAPTER XIII.
PEOPLE—RELATION OF LIBERIANS AND NATIVES.
UNTIL within the past ten years, the relation between
the native and the Negro emigrant from America
has been that of master and slave. The former American
slave treated the African freeman as if he had no rights
which were worthy of respect ! And that spirit has not
altogether departed, although I am glad to say it is dis¬
appearing. This fact of the ill-treatment of the natives by
the emigrants is not so strange after all ; for the oppressed,
when given an opportunity, generally become oppressors.
The natives of Liberia have been to the emigrants from
America just what these ex-slaves were to the whites of
the South. They have been defrauded, beaten with
stripes, and made to feel that they were inferior beings.
They were excluded from the churches and the schools ;
given back-seats at the camp-meetings, if there were
any to spare ; and as to entering an emigrant's parlor
or even front door, why, a native would never dream of
it. While much of this snobbish spirit has departed, and
while it is still decreasing, yet enough of it remains to
make a decided impression upon the student of Liberian
history and condition. I have seen a civilized native boy,
who had studied a few months in England, frequently
enter a house on a business errand by the back way ; and
the mistress of the house, a woman who cooked and
washed in the United States for a living, wanted it to be
78
LIBERIA.
distinctly understood, that her " front do' " was not to be
used by " country people," as the natives are sometimes
called.
One Sabbath morning several natives came into a church
in Liberia. They were shown into back pews ; they did
not crowd them ; they hardly filled them. But a thin-
skinned female emigrant flounced out of the pew and
out of the door with the air that an ill-bred white Ameri¬
can woman would exhibit on changing her seat in a street¬
car because she was too near a " nigger." I thought that
she had left not to return ; but no ; in a few moments she
came back with a chair, which she placed far from the na¬
tives, in one of the aisles, and occupied it.
When the natives were not maltreated, they were made
the objects of a scornful and contemptuous indifference.
A native king, with his suite, was presented to one of the
early Presidents of Liberia. His Excellency did not con¬
descend to rise on receiving His Majesty. The king felt
the insult ; said nothing there and then, however, but he
never returned or affiliated with the Liberians.
I am compelled to write the truth. Some facts I record
with regret. It gives me, therefore, special pleasure to
say that there are emigrants who have acted in a spirit
of Christian charity, fairness, and liberality toward the na¬
tives. They have educated and Christianized native youth,
and sent them back among their kinsfolk and acquaint¬
ances. I have discovered that, in many instances, there
are ties of affection and friendship between thé natives
and the Americo-Africans that are as strong as if they
were founded in blood-relationships.
In December, 1866, President Warner said to the Na¬
tional Legislature in his annual message : " But these
chiefs and their subjects have, undoubtedly, certain rights,
A NATIVE PALAVER.
8o
LIBERIA :
both natural and political, which should be highly respected
by this Government and people. And when this is done,
and the natives are not provoked by us to the commission of
lawless deedsf or instigated by dishonorable foreigners to
insubordination, there will subsist between us and them a
permanent good understanding and the greatest cordiality
of feeling." This voice is being heeded now.
Since the last war with the natives, the Greboes of
Cape Palmas in 1875, a radical change has taken place.
The masses have not yet come to regard the native as " a
man and a brother"; but the leaders of thought and public
opinion are moving in the right direction, and a thorough
revolution of the sentiment of the country is only a ques¬
tion of time. The native question is now prominent in
every State paper, in legislation, in public addresses, and
sermons ; and at public dinners the education and civili¬
zation of the natives occupy a conspicuous place on the
list of toasts that are proposed and replied to. There was
a time when they were not admitted to the privileges of
the college, or the schools, with Americo-Liberian chil¬
dren ! Now the policy of school and college is to educate
natives side by side with the Liberian youth.
Another one of the most hopeful features of the problem
of life in Liberia is the fact that men of intelligence are
marrying civilized native women. A former Secretary of
State, an able lawyer, and a man of the broadest views, is
married to a civilized Grebo lady ; and she is a model wife
and an excellent housekeeper, reserved yet intelligent, dig¬
nified yet cordial. This example, set in the highest circle
and walk of life, is being followed by many intelligent and
far-seeing young men. Intermarriages are common at Cape
'Palmas. I made my last visit to the Muhlenberg Mission,
k The italics are the author's.
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. 81
conducted so ably and successfully by the Rev. D. A. Day,
in January, 1884. Mr. Day told me that one of the lead¬
ing young men'of Arthington had written him asking per¬
mission to court a native girl then in the mission school.
Arthington leads Liberia. Energy, thrift, industry, prog¬
ress, and advanced views as to life in general and to the
native question in particular, are better illustrated there
than anywhere else in the Republic. The Liberian boy
works in the coffee-fields, in the barn, and at the coffee-
hulling mill side by side with the native youth. There is
no difference. I visit the settlement. My satchel and
bag are to be brought from the mission, two miles away.
The most prominent citizen sends his son and a native
boy there. What an example, teaching both boys the
dignity of labor ! No wonder that Arthington is the very
embodiment of enterprise. Its history shows what can
be done in Liberia with proper pioneers and a little cap¬
ital. And yet even here the emigrants from America find
it necessary to fight the hostile climate. Intermarriage
with the natives will do much toward solving the difficult
problem of Liberia's advancement. The Republic should
not look mainly to America for its population. It should
use its indigenous material in developing its great resources.
What a difference between Sierra Leone and Liberia, be¬
tween Freetown and Monrovia ! In the English colony
there are enterprise and push. I account for its superior ad¬
vancement in two ways : first, the population is founded
on an indigenous stock ; and, secondly, capital has been
judiciously employed in developing the people and the
country. There must be a fusion between the Liberian
and the native, a baptism of the spirit of labor, and the
judicious introduction of Christian education and invested
capital, if the Republic is to prosper.
4*
82
LIBERIA :
President Johnson says : "We have a population numer¬
ous, hardy, and industrious, devoted to agriculture and
manufactures, when not seduced by the demon of war. I
mean our aboriginal brothers. Where are we to get such
muscle, such bone and sinew, to practice the arts of peace,
and for defensive war? Where such intellects? Where
such shrewdness in trade? And yet we are neglecting
them. Had we discharged our duty to them, to-day the
fruitful fields would be smiling with golden harvests all
over the land ; our seas would be whitened with the sails
of commerce Even in the science of government
they excel us In spité of our neglect of them, these
chiefs and these tribes feel that they are one with us, and
prefer living under the Liberian Government to being
ruled by a foreign Government and an alien race." *
If I had to give a watchword to Liberia, it would be,
"Christian Education, Industrial Work, and Fu¬
sion with the Natives." Herein lies the salvation of the
Republic. Go to almost any town or settlement in the
country, and one sees the ruins of former buildings, farms,
and stores. On every hand is apparent degeneracy and
decay. The people revel in reminiscences of departed
activity and prosperity. Why is this? Poverty and lack
of push keep them on the coast, in the swamps, where
malaria is king, sapping the energy, destroying the vitality,
and rendering them spiritless. My impression is, that the
Americo-Liberian is not productive in the third generation.
This impression may not be correct ; but I have noticed
that the grandchildren of Americo-Liberians do not have
children. Indeed, often the offspring of parents, who
themselves were born and brought up in Liberia, are not
healthy and hardy, but are puny and sickly. Let me
* An oration delivered in Monrovia, July 26, 1882.
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. 83
put it this way: An American emigrant family marry¬
ing among fellow-emigrants, would become extinct after
the third generation. My impression is that this would
be true of any family in any part of the earth, making
an absolute change of climate and physical environ¬
ments, especially where the climate is unhealthy and the
surroundings unfavorable. It is not to be wondered at,
then, that the Liberian children bred, born, and reared in
this malarial atmosphere grow weaker in both mind and
body, as they get further removed from the parent stock.
Let Christian education, work, and fusion with the natives
be the watchword ; and if Liberia be re-enforced by
American Negroes of force of character, push, education,
and earnestness, and if capital start with them and is eco¬
nomically used and judiciously invested, the Republic will
enter upon an era of solid and permanent prosperity, and
will become the pride of Negroes everywhere, and help¬
ful to the civilization of Africa.
CHAPTER XIV.
PEOPLE—GENERAL CONDITION AND PROSPECTS.
UNTIL 1848 Liberia was a colony. Its machinery
was under the control of the American Colonization
Society of the United States.
But certain inconveniences and embarrassments were
experienced. Because it was neither an independent na¬
tion nor an actual colony of the United States, Liberia
suffered in her contact with the Powers of Europe ; and
the colonists themselves grew restless under laws made for
them in the United States, and administered by an agent
in whose appointment they had no voice.
84
LIBERIA :
The Society decided to give the colonists the right of
self-government. In July, 1847, a convention of the peo¬
ple assembled in Monrovia, framed a Declaration of Inde¬
pendence and a Constitution which were adopted by the
people at large July 26, 1847.
It is interesting to note the reasons given by the
colonists in their Declaration of Independence for desiring
to set up for themselves.
It opens with a reference to the fact that man has
an inalienable right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of
happiness. Among the reasons which are given for leav¬
ing the United States are these: (1) "In some parts of
that country we are debarred by law from all the rights
and privileges of men ; in other parts public sentiment,
more powerful than law, frowned us down (2). "We were
everywhere shut out from all civil office"; (3). "We were
excluded from all participation in the government (4).
" We were taxed without our consent (5). " We were
compelled to contribute to the resources of a country
which gave us no protection (6). " We were made a
separate and distinct class, and against us every avenue to
improvement was effectually closed." The history of
colonization is then succinctly stated. The fact is an¬
nounced that " Questions have arisen which it is supposed
can be adjusted only by agreement between sovereign
Powers." Liberia is therefore declared " a free, sovereign,
and independent State, possessed of all the rights, powers,
and functions of government."
The Constitution is like that of the United States, be¬
ginning with a " Declaration of Rights," and containing ar¬
ticles and sections headed " Legislative Powers," " Exec¬
utive Powers," "Judicial Department," and "Miscellane¬
ous Provisions."
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
85
The Hon. John J. Roberts was elected first President
of the new Republic, and inaugurated on the first Mon¬
day in January, 1848, and Liberia entered the family of
nations.
This important event took place twenty-five years after
the landing and settlement of the first emigrants. The
people were fresh from slavery, without knowledge and
without experience. Is it to be wondered at that they
have made many mistakes? It is a wonder that they have
not made more. The Pilgrim Fathers landed on Plymouth
Rock in 1620. They had generations of civilization and
experience in government behind them. They were fresh
from the schools and the universities of the foremost civil¬
ized country in the world. Other emigrants of similar de¬
velopment followed them. The Huguenots who settled
in South Carolina, and the Cavaliers who established them¬
selves in Virginia—these men, who laid the foundation of
the original Thirteen States, were educated ; and they were
not poor. They established schools and colleges out of
their own resources ; and for one hundred and sixty-three
years, five generations, their communities were colonies
and dependents of Great Britain. British brains and cap¬
ital laid the foundation of American growth. European
companies, commanding millions, interested themselves
in the people and the new country, and took a hand
in its practical development. It was not until at least
after five generations that an independent Republic sprang
up on American soil. And this Republic was not the re¬
sult of peaceful concession, but it sprang from the blood
of an awful contest, in which the descendants of the Pil¬
grims, Huguenots and Cavaliers, and enslaved Ethiopians
showed themselves able to stand alone ! Liberia, having
never been properly developed by invested capital, set up
86
LIBERIA.
for herself in the first generation, before her people had
unlearned the lessons of slavery, or acquired an intelligent
comprehension of the problems which underlie all suc¬
cessful national life.
The Republic is exclusively a Negro State. White
persons can not now become citizens or hold property in
Liberia. It is seriously argued that the country will not
prosper until this obstacle is removed, and citizenship
and the rights of property be open to all men. As the Con¬
stitution and the laws are now, white men will not invest
their capital, as they can not protect it as citizens of the
country.
There is a movement now on foot to enlarge the priv¬
ileges of foreigners, so as to encourage them to make
investments. It is proposed to allow them : (i) to trade
and do business anywhere in the Republic. Now they
are confined to the seaports, called " Ports of Entry.'
They are not allowed to establish factories or stores
up the rivers, or in the interior: (2) to lease land for a
long term of years, perhaps ninety-nine. Now the limita¬
tion is twenty years. Such an innovation would certainly
encourage the investment of foreign capital, and would
energize the Republic.
The condition of most of the towns and settlements
shows the pressing need of enterprise and capital. Often
have I stood on the top of Cape Mesurado and looked
down upon Monrovia, with its wide streets crossing one
another at right angles. Cattle and sheep would be grazing
and children playing, and we would be delighted at the
sight; but it was distance that lent enchantment to the view.
Passing through the town one sees the ruins of build¬
ings everywhere. The costliest houses have been aban¬
doned to the lizard and the snake ; and cows graze where
EX-PRESIDENT ROBERTS' RESIDENÇE.
88
LIBERIA :
beautiful gardens and shady walks once were. Houses
propped up by poles, or falling to decay, rise up before us
in vivid memory. If we turn to the streets, and to the
lots containing the ruins of abandoned houses, we wonder
how the people of Monrovia can live amidst such surround¬
ings with such apparent content. In his Inaugural, deliv¬
ered January 7, 1884, President Johnson said: "I think
I should offend our national honor were I to omit to call
your attention to what has been the state of the streets
of the capital during the past year. Their bad condition
has been notorious. Our national self-respect dictates that
we should devise some measure by which the streets of
the metropolis may be kept in a state that will comport
with the dignity of the nation." Monrovia needs to be re¬
built. Its old dilapidated houses should be torn down.
Such a residence as that of ex-President Roberts', which
was built a generation ago, is not seen anywhere in the
Republic nowadays.
Early one morning I passed up the Stockton Creek
through a dense mangrove swamp. After an hour's row
on the narrow stream, I found myself gazing with rap¬
ture and delight upon a broad expanse of water clear as
crystal, " beautiful as a sea of glass." The banks of the
river are high, and are covered with a dense but variegated
and brilliant foliage. It is the St. Paul's. Up, up, I went,
passing through a country that is beautiful beyond de¬
scription, seeing evidences of agricultural thrift, with here
"and there dilapidated buildings and abandoned farms ;
until the name " Millsburg " is pronounced, and I ascended
the banks from my canoe, and began a four-mile tramp to
Arthington. Millsburg was once one of the most flourish¬
ing towns in Liberia ; but now it is a deserted village.
Some one calls it "a graveyard."
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
89
I passed over hills and through dales. It is a charm¬
ing country. I imagine myself there now. It can not be
described, at least I am not equal to the task. Coffee and
sugar farms are on every side, some stretching far and wide.
The majestic cotton-tree towers high, and looks smilingly
down upon the graceful palm. The shrubbery, flowers,
and grass are attractive to the eye, presenting every
variety of color and form. The beautiful birds sing amidst
the leaves, or flit across my path as if to show their gay-
colored dress. Standing upon one of the highest hills,
looking over the country, listening to the roar of the St.
Paul's dashing over the cataracts that impede navigation,
I have wondered where in all God's universe could one see
a more beautiful sight. As I look away into the distance,
I see houses scattered here and there. It is Arthington,
bosomed in the green hills alone !
There is nothing about the place to describe. It is a
settlement rather than a town. Its people are healthy,
industrious, prosperous, and happy. It is the leading set¬
tlement in Liberia. Fifteen years ago the place was a
wilderness. Mr. Robert Arthington, the wealthy manu¬
facturer of Leeds, England, wrote to the American Coloni¬
zation Society, offering to donate one thousand pounds ster¬
ling, or five thousand dollars, toward sustaining a settlement
in the interior of Liberia which would be the beginning of
a line of settlements to extend across the continent, con¬
necting the East with the West Coast, Abyssinia with Li¬
beria. The place named after the distinguished philan¬
thropist resulted from this offer. A colony of emigrants
from North and South Carolina headed by June Moore
and Sol Hill, of Union County, South Carolina, plunged
into what was then a primeval forest, slept on the bare
ground, while their wives aided them in the work of clear¬
ing the land and building homes.
9°
LIBERIA.
I have listened with astonishment to their thrilling
story. How the men's hearts failed them when they
found themselves set down in a barren wilderness ! The
women—and they told me themselves—felt home-long¬
ings for a moment. But a heart-wrench, and they were
gone ; and like heroines, they settled down to do or die !
They inspired their husbands with superhuman power.
They bravely shared the inconveniences, hardships, suf¬
ferings, and perils of the wilderness. But now sitting
in their comfortable homes, many said to me with honest
enthusiasm and pride, " I would not return to live in
America if I could." They live in neat, comfortable
houses. They have prosperous churches ; there is an ex¬
cellent school supported by Edward S. Morris, of Philadel¬
phia ; there are thousands of acres of land under cultivation ;
and they are pushing further into the interior. In Decem¬
ber, 1883, the young men of the settlement held a meeting
and resolved to form a colony and push further back
towards the interior. Brave young men. In other parts
of Liberia, they seem to be content to clerk for a pittance,
to get into the Government service, or to loaf " until the
old man dies." Then they move into the paternal home,
and live on the accumulations of the fathers, and let
things run down !
Arthington is a model place. An election was pending.
A candidate, I was told, sent up to the settlement goods
for distribution, hoping in that way to secure votes. The
bribe was returned, and the vote of the settlement was
solid against that man ! If one could see the energy and
industry so characteristic of the people of Arthington
more general in the Republic, he would become an enthu¬
siastic colonizationist. This thriving settlement shows
that carefully picked pioneers in interior settlements can
SETTLEMENT ON THE ST. PAUL'S RIVER.
92
LIBERIA :
direct and control and utilize the native material, and
through it develop the country. The conditions for the
future prosperity of Liberia are found in Arthington. Its
people seek Christian education, follow industrial pursuits,
and fuse with the natives.
CHAPTER XV.
MISSION AND EDUCATIONAL WORK NEEDED.
AFRICA has the strongest claims upon the benevo¬
lence and generosity of the world. Her early civil¬
ization has been of great value to mankind. She protected
the Christian religion when Herod threatened to destroy
its divine Founder. By unrequited toil, suffering, bonds,
and death, Africans have put the whole world under last¬
ing obligations.
" The Dark Continent " needs the aid of Christians to
reach the light of divine truth. Into their hands it places
its claims growing out of its ancient service, and the inju¬
ries of modern slavery. Remembering, however, the great
work recently done by Christians in abolishing the slave-
trade and in emancipating the slave, Africa kneels at the
feet of the true " Holy Catholic Church," and appeals for
continued sympathy and help in the name of her be¬
nighted children.
The appeal is not in vain. The attention of the world
is turned toward the African Continent ; and the interest
in its civilization and evangelization grows greater every
year. The lethargy and darkness of ages are certainly
disappearing in the light and activities of a Christian civili-
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
93
zation ; and in spite of the inroads which Mohammedanism
is making, Africa will be conquered for Christ, God having
promised to give unto His Son the heathen for His inher¬
itance, and the uttermost parts of the earth for His pos¬
session.*
We believe that God's purposes toward Africa are great
beyond conception. The Rev. Dr. Elder, of New York
City, has said that the Negro in Africa would have in com¬
ing time a purer religion than materialistic America. Rev.
Dr. Withrow, of Boston, has said that the sons of Ham
would yet become the custodians of the sacraments and
institutions of the Church. The eminent and scholarly
Prof. Joseph Cook says to us in a personal letter, "The
capacities of the African people, in religious directions,
may very possibly some day be found to exceed those of
the Anglo-Saxon race."
While we would not be led by these expressions into
the indulgence of vain fancies, yet we truly believe that if
materialism and agnosticism should ever be incarnate in a
Herod—if they should ever seek the young child to de¬
stroy Him—the land of Ham will nourish and protect Him
even as when there came wise men from the East to Jeru¬
salem, saying, " Where is he that is born King of the
Jews ? " And Christianity will again find refuge in Africa,
there to abide until God shall bid her come forth. The
reader may not agree with Cook, Withrow, and Elder.
He may not understand the fact which we now assert,
that there is a wide-spread and deep feeling among Ne¬
groes that God may yet, in a mysterious way, use Africa
to preserve " the faith once delivered unto the saints."
It is not our purpose to exalt the possibilities of this Con¬
tinent and its people. We simply plead that a race with
* Psalm ii. 8.
94
LIBERIA :
such religious potentialities and faith should be brought
in contact with the Bible, so that Christ may be the
chief corner-stone in the civilization of the future. Such
a civilization will be superior to that which flourished in
ancient times in the Nigritian and Nilotic regions, because
it will be neither material nor pagan. It will be strong in
its power to lift men up. It will be stronger in its power
to make men humble, childlike, in honor preferring one
another, Christlike. It will be aggressive, but benevolent.
It will be strong as iron, yet pliable as steel ; great as a
giant, yet little as a child. It will know its strength, yet
it will recognize its weakness. It will be the perfection
of Christianity.
The African Continent is white for the harvest. Libe¬
ria is the gateway to this vast region, which we call
Central-Tropical Africa. The Republic is known to Chris¬
tian Negroes everywhere, and especially in the United
States. And, although millions of Negroes do not believe
in colonization, yet Liberia has the hearty interest of
all ; and Negro ecclesiastical operations will enter Africa
through the Republic. Liberia will be our base of oper¬
ations—the interior our objective point.
Much has already been done by Negro agencies, oper¬
ating in and through Liberia. Thousands of the natives
have been given the English language; thousands have
acquired a taste for our civilization ; many have embraced
it and have become Christians ; and a few are now preach¬
ing the Gospel of Christ to interior tribes. Liberia has
not existed in vain. Christian philanthropy has done
much in sustaining missions and pushing educational en¬
terprises.
Most of the evangelical denominations are doing mis¬
sionary work in Liberia. The Presbyterians were the
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
95
pioneers. Such men as Archibald Alexander, the schol¬
arly and pious first dean of Princeton Seminary, inspired
his Church to enter this field. His great name and burn¬
ing zeal for the evangelization of Africa have been com¬
memorated in the Alexander High-School of Liberia,
which has done much good in the country. There is a
Presbytery of West Africa.
The Baptists, with great zeal and wisdom, inaugurated
their missionary work very early. They lead all the other
denominations in Liberia in vigor and self-reliance. Re¬
ceiving less foreign aid than any other denomination, yet
they have the most flourishing churches.
The Methodist denominations are largely represented ;
and the Missionary Societies of the United States have
spent thousands of dollars in educational and evangelical
work ; but it has not proven to be an encouraging field.
The Episcopalians have prosecuted work in Liberia with
amazing persistency and great results. Their Educational
Institute at Cape Palmas and their school at Cape Mount,
have reached and benefited hundreds of natives. Re¬
cently a scholarly and pious colored clergyman, Rev. Sam¬
uel D. Ferguson, was elected Bishop of Cape Palmas and
Parts Adjacent, thus practically establishing Liberia as a
diocese. This will give new life and energy to the cause
of Episcopal missions.
For twenty years and more a board of philanthropists
in Boston, and one in New York, have prosecuted mission¬
ary educational work in connection with Liberia College ;
but the condition of the country and the people have not
been favorable to great success. It is proposed to inau¬
gurate an Industrial Department in connection with the
College. Such a movement would be a blessing to the
people of Liberia.
96
LIBERIA :
No body of Christians have been more fortunate than
the Lutherans. They have sustained for years a labor
manual school and mission near Arthington, and have
reached hundreds of natives, converting and enlightening
them, and teaching them the art of systematic labor with
the hands. The Rev. D. A. Day has been the most suc¬
cessful, practical worker that Liberia has received from
any source. He has been in charge of this work, called
the Muhlenberg Mission, for twelve years, and he seeks to
make his beneficiaries self-reliant and his work self-sup¬
porting. He enlightens and Christianizes the natives,
then teaches them how to work, and settles them on a
piece of land, and thus starts them in the way of practical
living.
At Arthington there is a private missionary school,
supported by Edward S. Morris, of Philadelphia, and
named in honor of his mother. From what I saw when
there it is doing much good, reaching both natives and
Liberians.
There are several other mission schools; but the
educational facilities are few and poor. Of the Amer-
ico-African children not ten per cent, are in school ; and
of the entire native and Liberian population not one per
cent, is receiving any instruction. The Government is too
poor to educate the children. Help must come from
some quarter. What a needy and inviting field.
There are in Liberia more than half a million of people
who believe in a " Good Spirit," but who blindly worship
Him, having their altars erected unto " the unknown God."
They read the open book of nature, the towering hills, and
the sloping valleys, studded with majestic trees and beau¬
tified with gemlike flowers. They read " the starry garden
of the firmament—those flowers of the skies budding with
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
97
the hopes of immortality." They read the gentle sunshine
and the furious storm, the flashing lightning and the rum¬
bling thunder; and they see, written as with a pen of fire,
■" There is a God." And then there is another writing, to
these natives as mysterious and as inexplicable as was that
upon which Belshazzar gazed—" Christ Jesus came into the
■world to save sinnersThese thousands of souls dwelling
A MISSION SCHOOL.
in Liberia are puzzled as they read. Ask them, " Under-
standest thou what thou readest?" and the earnest reply
is : " How can /, except some man should guide me ? " * A
burning appeal comes from Africa to the whole Church,
and particularly to that part of it most able to help be¬
cause of the possession of consecrated wealth and a mature
civilization. In one of his preludes, in Tremont Temple,
Boston, Mass., Joseph Cook sought to arouse the civiliza-
* Acts viii. 30-31.
5
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tion of the Western world to a sense of its responsibility
in this matter. He said : " The light of the Occident can
not be hidden from the Orient. A spiritual unity is com¬
ing to the whole human family ; and I would have the
head feel its responsibility ; and the Occident is the head
of the earth and the hands of it. Nearest to God, let us
transmit the spark of scientific supernaturalism into the
civilization of the whole planet, and so make its reeling
form stand upon its feet and worship God."
The African cry for help has reached the hearts of thou¬
sands of Negroes in America, and especially in the United
States, and some have even gone, and they are still going
back to the " Fatherland," to labor as teachers and as mis¬
sionaries. And they should be greatly encouraged and
heartily sustained by those who think that Negroes, who
are fully equipped for the work, are to be the redeemers
of Gentral-Tropical Africa. God seems to have written
this truth in history and experience, that the men and the
forces which act directly on the elevation of a people are
of the people themselves—bone of their bone, flesh of
their flesh, blood of their blood. Byron's line,
" Who would be free, themselves must strike the blow,"
applies to intellectual, moral, and spiritual as well as to
physical emancipation. The redemption of Africa must
come largely through the Negro himself. We say largely,
because we do not believe that the work has been exclu¬
sively committed to the Ethiopian. My impression is that
much of the success of Mohammedanism lies in the fact
that its missionaries are Negroes. The Africans hear a
simple Gospel from the lips of men of their own race. It
is our opinion that white men will never evangelize the
Ethiopian. The natives do not separate the white race
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
99
into Christians and sinners. They regard them all as rep¬
resentatives of the Christian religion. The white mission¬
ary preaches Christ and holy living ; the white trader
cheats, swears, ill-treats six days in the week, and on the
seventh occupies the chief seat in the synagogue. At
luncheon in England in 1883, an eminent Englishman,
who had held a very high office in India, and had served
Her Majesty in South Africa, said : " We English people
are counteracting, are paralyzing our missionary efforts
by sending rum and opium to pagan nations and then,
with an earnestness that I shall never forget, he deprecated
the fact, and expressed the hope that God would in some
way put an end to such an anomalous and sinful condition
of things.
It is not to be wondered at that the Catholic cathedrals
and monasteries have fallen into deca)' in the Congo
Valley. The Church was stabbed and killed by her
Spanish slave-holding children. No wonder that the tipsy
African replied to the rebuke of the white missionary
with the question, " Be he no your brudder who bring us
rum ? " The evangelization of Ethiopia will be wrought
out by converted Ethiopians. I do not exclude white
men, nor European and American influences altogether ;
but they will act indirectly in the great work, perhaps
we might say directly, so far as it will inspire, aid, and
guide Ethiopie energy. Bishop Crowther and his Negro
followers have done a wonderful and an effective work on
the Niger. Out of America consecrated and properly
trained men and women will go from year to year to the
" Fatherland " to work for the elevation of a race and the
redemption of a Continent.
Upon all who engage in this great cause, directly or
indirectly, Livingstone's prayer will be answered. He
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died in Africa on bended knees. He lies asleep in West¬
minster Abbey. When in England I stood with reverence
at his grave, and read with emotion this his last prayer,
cut on his tomb : " May heaven's rich blessing rest on
every one—American, English, Turk—who helps to heal
this open sore of the world." That is, "who helps to
suppress the slave-trade and put down domestic slavery ;
uproot idolatry and establish pure homes, commerce, and
education, and found permanent Christian institutions in
Africa." The work of healing goes rapidly on. Soon
Ethiopia shall rise from her reclining position, and take up
her bed and walk. Among the wise men from the East,
she presented to the Infant Redeemer " gifts ; gold, and
frankincense, and myrrh."* Through Simon of Cyrene,
she bore the cross for Christ in His hour of deep humil¬
iation and human weakness.f Through the eunuch con¬
verted under Philip's ministry, she proclaimed her belief
that "Jesus Christ is the Son of God";;]: and soon, under
the inspiration and in the strength of this faith, not one,
but millions of " Ethiopia's blameless race " will go on their
way rejoicing.
CHAPTER XVI.
AMERICAN INTEREST IN THE AFRICAN REPUBLIC.
THE Americo-African Republic has a claim upon the
Government of the United States, growing out of
the fact that in its incipiency it was a quasi colony of this
country. The purchase of land and the planting of the
* Matt. ii. xi. I hare seen paintings in Holland and Belgium of the visit of the
Magi ; and in every one an Ethiopian is prominent,
t Matt, xxvii. 32. J Acts viii. 37.
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. IOI
first settlement on the West Coast of Africa was in ac¬
cordance with an Act of Congress, passed March 3, 1819.
It seems to me that this nation with its seven millions of
Africo-Americans will not leave Liberia alone in her efforts
to get firmly established as a Christian Republic on the
West Coast of Africa.
The colored people of the United States have good and
sufficient cause for their interest in what millions of them
call their " Fatherland." The elevation of the African Con¬
tinent and the advancement of the colored American will
have a reflex influence one upon the other. I believe that
there will always exist on this continent a homogeneous
nation composed of a heterogeneous people. The Africo-
American, the Anglo-American, the Celt, the Teuton,
and the Semitic races will ever dwell here in national
harmony, but with racial differences. I grant that Amer¬
ican environments will operate to transform the races.
True, the American Negro will be a different man from
the African Negro—different in complexion, different in
physiognomy. There are great differences among Ne¬
groes even in Africa. The Anglo-American is not in all
respects like the Anglo-Saxon ; nor do people in the
South of Europe exactly resemble those in the North.
But modification is not the differentia of race. The
changes will not be those that grow out of a sweeping amal¬
gamation of races of men. If we examine carefully the
population of the United States and Canada, we find that
the different species and races of men are moving largely
in parallel lines now as they did two hundred years ago.
We find that Anglo-American, Africo-American, Scotch,
Irish, German, and French make up the population in in¬
creasingly relative proportions. In Great Britain, the
Irish Celt is as distinct from the Saxon, as he was seven
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hundred years ago. The Saxons and the Slavs remain
distinct in Eastern Prussia. The Teutonic and the Slavic
elements in the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, are no near¬
er mixing than they were generations ago. If there is no
amalgamation between species of a similar ethnical fibre,
my belief is that there will be none among races differing
as do the Ethiopian, the Mongolian, and the Caucasian.
In theorizing as to the absorption of the American Ne¬
groes, we should remember the wonderful absorbing vital¬
ity of the African race. The favorite cry of colored orators
is this, " We are not dying out." They ought also to say,
" We are not bleaching out." More white blood has got¬
ten into our veins in the past than will enter it in the fu¬
ture. The dominant feeling among Negroes is against amal¬
gamation. Hence the systematic slighting of a man or a
woman, who in the exercise of an inalienable right, steps
over the race line to marry. The weight of feeling among
leading white men is against a physical amalgamation of
the races. They stand for the preservation of an individual's
right of choice in marriage. They stand for an intel¬
lectual, religious, and political assimilation — all races
dwelling together in an equal brotherhood under one
American flag ; but they go no further ; and this is sig¬
nificant.*
But waiving all opinions as to the ultimate results of
this American problem, the fact will not be disputed, that
for generations yet unborn the Africo-American will be a
distinct species of this rapidly increasing population. Our
future strength and standing among the other American
races will be materially aided by the redemption of our
Fatherland. We can not ignore the claims of Africa upon
• See Cable's " Silent South " in the Century for September, 1885.
THE AMERIC0-AFR1CAN REPUBLIC. 103
us, and lay broad and deep the foundations of future re¬
spect and power.
What Negro can read the history of South Africa with¬
out feelings of indignation against the white men who
have enacted such cruelties there ? Who of us can hear
of the ability and bravery of Zulu and Ashantee states¬
men and warriors without a thrill? Who can visit Sierra
I.eone, or Liberia, and not see with the eye of faith that
the coming years will put National wisdom and wealth
behind the Christian Negro, even as they are behind the
Caucasian and the Mongolian? When a great Christian
Negro Nationality shall speak to the world, as I believe
under God it shall, the Negro everywhere will no longer
be treated as a man to be despised, or to receive pity,
sympathy, or toleration ; but he will be regarded as an
object of interest and respect, because he will no longer
represent slavery and degradation. He will be identified
with a people strong in its civilization, and powerful in its
nationality. Is this time never to come? Is the answer,
No; it will never come? Then let the Christian Negro
speedily bleach out, for slavery has robbed us of our race
instincts, our self-reliance, our pride !
I do not advise emigration to Liberia ; and yet, I
would rejoice to see a voluntary movement to the Repub¬
lic of independent, self-reliant, and self-supporting people
with capital behind them. We expect to see hundreds
go out to teach, to preach, to pursue the professions, and
to engage in commercial pursuits. These will have excep¬
tional opportunities that their education and money will
command. We have truthfully said that Liberia needs
men and capital. We have drawn a true picture of the
obstacles to be encountered in settling in Liberia from cli¬
mate and other difficulties to be met in any new country
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to which capital is not attracted. I have written my Im¬
pressions truthfully, without fear or favor, because I have
felt it to be my duty to give a correct account to those
who want to hear my opinions in these matters ; and be¬
cause I would forewarn those who may go to the West
Coast so that on their arrival they may not be disap¬
pointed, but may settle down to the trying work before
them with an earnestness and a steadfastness that con¬
quer success.
Men who expatriate themselves to gain "a better coun¬
try" deserve great credit for enterprise and courage;
hence I believe it to be the duty of every Negro to give
at least sympathy to those who leave the land of their
nativity to spend and be spent in efforts to build up a
Christian Negro Nationality in the " Fatherland." They
are heroes in a great battle. They are pioneers in a great
work. " The blood of the martyrs was the seed of the
Church." The blood and sweat and tears of our African
emigrationists may be the seed of a glorious heritage for
generations yet unborn.
I am not a colonizationist, because it is not my convic¬
tion that the Negro has no chance to attain here in the
United States the full measure of American manhood and
citizenship. But be this as it may; the colored people
can not afford either to ignore Africa or to be indifferent
to her claims for sympathy and service. We are already
profiting by the progress of African civilization ; and
thousands of us are rejoicing that Africa has come so won¬
derfully to the front within the last twenty-five years ; that
its map is no longer of black ink; but that almost over its
entire surface are seen great cities, commercial centres,
partially civilized tribes, and powerful governments ; that
trade is bringing the Negro of Central-Tropical Africa face
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. 105
to face with the best civilized methods and the most mod¬
ern improvements, and that he is Africanizing and using
them with wonderful ease and rapidity. No one can tell
the changes that will take place in the next quarter of a
century. Steam has brought Africa within a few days of
Europe. Within ten years, Liberia, now more than a
month off from New York City, will be brought within
ten days of the great American metropolis ! Steamships
will run between New York and Monrovia. Capital will
go to cultivate the soil, bring to light the mineral re¬
sources of the country, and develop its general industries ;
and thousands of civilized American Negroes of enterprise
will follow it as emigration from Europe follows capital
to the United States.
Within the next quarter of a century Negroes should
have their own vessels on the ocean running from New
Orleans, Savannah, Charleston, Baltimore, and New York
to Monrovia, Sierra Leone, Grand Bassa, Sino, Cape Pal-
mas, the Gold,Coast, and the Congo. Negro merchants
and shippers should do a large business in the leading At¬
lantic seaports. Soon Negro capital should send at least
a brig to carry our civilization in the form of workers for
Africa, and to carry tobacco, cloth, hardware, and provis¬
ions to Liberia, and to bring thence the riches of that
favored land. God speed the day. It will give a new
impetus to industry in Liberia and to enterprise here.
Do you think me a dreamer? Remember that "the
evolutions of fact are sometimes stranger than the ro¬
mances of fiction." Such a day will come. Aye, it must
come. Negroes, even now, while they cling to the Bible
and put the fear of God as first and best, yet are discon¬
tinuing the song,
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LIBERIA :
" Man wants but little here below ;
Nor wants that little long."
By the acquisition of consecrated wisdom and wealth,
and by its proper use, they desire to bring to earth the
kingdom of heaven ; and this spirit gives us faith, push,
and enterprise.
While regretting her weakness, let us not forget that
the Republic of Liberia is a fact. Among the nations
of the earth she is recognized and received. Her name is
found everywhere in connection with the status or charac¬
teristics of other States. I take up a commercial work and
look at the list of nations that have vessels on the ocean ;
Liberia is there. I examine the list showing the monetary
units and standard coins of the different countries ; Liberia
is there. Her past career has not been altogether fruit¬
less. Although a weak ally, yet she aided England in
suppressing the slave-trade ; and she would, if she had
sufficient strength or influence, totally destroy domestic
slavery among the natives. She has given to hundreds of
natives a knowledge of the English language ; and although
it is spoken poorly, yet even far back into her interior it
is possible to find some one among the aborigines who
can speak our English tongue. She has also imparted to
the natives what she could of her habits of industry; and
she has given of her Christianity to many of them, some
of whom are teaching and preaching unto their pagan
brethren.
While I am no enthusiast over the Americo-African
Republic, yet I could not truthfully say that it has existed
to no purpose. I think that the planting of Liberia has
helped to some extent the work of African civilization.
If in the future the United States Government should
THE AMERICO-AFRICAN REPUBLIC. I 07
take a livelier and deeper interest in Liberia ; if foreign cap¬
ital should enter the country ; if a national system of
industrial education should be vigorously supported ; if,
as a result of these, the aborigines should be civilized and
educated ; and if an intelligent and hardy population from
America should fuse with them and plant and sustain set¬
tlements extending into the interior—then out of this
Americo-African Republic, which President Monroe plant¬
ed, civilizing and Christianizing influences shall sweep
into the Soudan, throughout the Niger and into the
Congo ; and under a mighty African ruler, there will arise
a stable and powerful Government of Africans, for Afri¬
cans, and by Africans, which shall be an inestimable bless¬
ing to all mankind.
THE END.
Liberia College
As soon as the Funds of the New York and Boston Boards having charge
of Liberian Education will warrant, it is proposed to inaugurate the
Agricultural and Industrial Department.
The College of Liberia was opened in 1865. Its work has been altogether
literary. The need of Agricultural and Industrial Training is felt through¬
out the Republic. The Government has donated one thousand acres of land.
A farm to support the boarding hall and industrial shops will be conducted
so as to give the boys a knowledge of practical agriculture and the trades.
The girls will be trained in the kitchen, dairy, laundry, poultry-yard, and
sewing-room. Thus, all will be taught habits of industry ; and in time
the work will become self-supporting.
Up the St. Paul's River, the Industrial Department will be amongthe native
Africans, and also easily accessible to the children of the American emigrants.
To effect this removal, and to erect buildings, plant and stock the board¬
ing-house farm, put the coffee and sugar plantation under cultivation, secure
an outfit for the industrial shops and rooms, and place the work on a self-
supporting basis, contributions are earnestly solicited from the generous
friends of Africa. Referring to this plan,
Prof. Joseph Cook, of Boston, says : "Whoever aids Liberia College will
be promoting the interests of millions of the African people."
President McCosh, of Princeton College, says: " It will be a powerful
means of elevating the people. It will be a centre of light in a region of
the Dark Continent."
Donations may be sent to
CHARLES E. STEVENS, Treasurer,
Boston and Albany R.R., Boston, Mass.
Or, CHARLES T. GEYER, Treasurer,
115 Wall Street, N. Y. City.
Hon. JOS. S. ROPES, President. )
J. C. BRAMAN, Esq., Secretary, > Boston Board.
56 State Street. )
Rev. S. D. ALEXANDER, D.D., President. )
Rev. G. W. SAMSON, D.D., Secretary, > y- Board.
40 Bible House, N, Y. City. )
JUST OUT.
Tlie Negro in Politics.
By T. THOMAS FORTUNE,
Editor of the New York Freeman, Author of '■'■Black and White."
PRICE, 25 CENTS.
Address all orders to
OGILVIE & ROWNTREE, publishers,
No. 4 Cedar Street, New York.