“They’ve brought the cowries, Master.”
“Well! I didn’t tell you to buy £1000 worth—I haven’t brought a bank in my pocket. Clear it all away except what I gave you the money for.”
He said there was only two pounds worth there.
I never felt so rich in my life: as Dr. Johnson would say, I revelled in wealth beyond the potentiality of dreams of avarice. A solitary cowry is not of much value: 20,000 of them are equivalent to twelve shillings and sixpence, so I had more than 60,000. I told the carriers to take a few in payment, filled my pockets with some more, and went out with a light heart to buy up the whole market; taking care, however, to lock up the place, as I thought that so much unguarded wealth might be a temptation to the evilly disposed. My boy suggested that I ought to count my change to see if it was correct; but I decided not to.
A few days after my arrival there was a ball given by a club which rejoices in the name of “The Flower of Lagos.” The members of this Club are all negroes, principally haughty aristocrats from Sierra Leone, Liberia, and the Gold Coast, and I believe that they do not admit any of the Mohammedan canaille to membership.
I never was at such an amusing ball in my life, and, as I suppose such entertainments are given for the purpose of amusement, it may be considered a most complete success. The gorgeous-coloured satin waistcoats, the rainbow cravats, and gigantic buttonhole bouquets of the men, were sufficiently trying to the eyes; but when one turned towards the softer, one cannot in this case say the fairer, sex, who, as usual before the ice was broken, sat all together at one end of the room, I had positively to turn away, and wished for a green shade or a pair of blue glass spectacles. Scarlet, blue, pink, purple, yellow, orange, green, white—every known brilliant colour was there, and I had to follow the example of the other Europeans who were present, and view this brilliant spectacle through the medium of an inverted tumbler. The band was that of the Gold Coast Constabulary, and perhaps the less one says of it the better, unless it is now “the thing” in music to introduce crushing discords and heart-rending shrieks that are not in the original score of the composition.
Before the dancing commenced one could walk about and breathe without any extraordinary discomfort, but after that the bouquet d’Afrique really became quite too, too. I have always held very much the same opinion about dancing as that expressed by the pacha in Salmagundi, and I should have liked then to have been seated afar off on some eminence with a good telescope. It was pitiful to observe the struggles of the belles to appear cool (these poor creatures cannot, of course, like their European sisters, use powder, unless indeed, they used gunpowder or coal-dust), and how at last they gave it up as hopeless, and used their handkerchiefs energetically. A new Administrator had arrived at Lagos a few days previously, and he had to open the ball with the leading Lagos lady. Poor man, he did not seem at all at home, and was evidently unaccustomed to move in such high society. After the ceremony was over he kept going about like one dazed, rubbing his hands together, and bowing and asking what would be the next article. Some people said that the infliction had been too much for his brain, and that he was thinking of his earlier days, but I don’t know.
I noticed that the negro gentlemen were scrupulously polite and dignified, and talked, so to speak, on conversational stilts; the ladies tried hard to do the same, but the high pressure was too much for them. One sable beau went up to a charming creature in pink and yellow, and, bowing by a succession of jerks, said:—
“May I, Miss, enjoy the unparalleled gratification of your hand for the next polka?”
The giddy young thing replied:—