A journey to Central Africa

by Bayard Taylor

The Commerce of Soudân—Avenues of Trade—The Merchants—Character of the Imports—Speculation—The Gum Trade of Kordofan—The Ivory Trade—Abuses of the Government—The Traffic in Slaves—Prices of Slaves—Their Treatment.

Before taking a final leave of Soudân, it may be well to say a few words concerning the trade of the country. As the Nile is the principal avenue of communication between the Mediterranean and the eastern half of Central Africa, Soudân is thus made a centre of commerce, the character of which may be taken as an index to all the interior traffic of the continent.

European goods reach Soudân through two principal channels; by the port of Sowakin, on the Red Sea, and the caravan route up the Nile and across the Great Nubian Desert. Of late years the latter has become the principal thoroughfare, as winter is the commercial season, and the storms on the Red Sea are very destructive to the small Arab craft. The merchants leave Cairo through the autumn, principally between the first of October and the first of December, as they travel slowly and rarely make the journey in less than two months and a half. The great proportion of them take the same route I followed, from Korosko to Berber, where they ship again for Khartoum. Those who buy their own camels at Assouan, make the whole trip by land; but it is more usual for them to buy camels in Soudân for the return journey, as they can sell them in Upper Egypt at advanced prices. In fact, the trade, in camels alone is not inconsiderable. On my way to Khartoum I met many thousands, in droves of from one to five hundred, on their way to Egypt.

The merchants who make this yearly trip to Soudân are mostly Egyptians and Nubians. There are a number of Syrians established in the country, but they are for the most part connected with houses in Cairo, and their caravans between the two places are in charge of agents, natives, whose character has been proved by long service. There were also three or four French and Italian merchants, and one Englishman (Mr. Peterick, in Kordofan), who carried on their business in the same manner. It is no unusual thing for Nubians who have amassed two or three thousand piastres by household service in Cairo, to form partnerships, invest their money in cotton goods, and after a year or two on the journey (for time is any thing but money to them), return to Egypt with a few hundred weight of gum or half a dozen camels. They earn a few piastres, perhaps, in return for the long toils and privations they have endured; but their pride is gratified by the title of Djellabiàt—merchants. It is reckoned a good school, and not without reason, for young Egyptians who devote themselves to commerce. I met even the sons of Beys among this class. Those who are prudent, and have a fair capital to start upon, can generally gain enough in two or three years to establish themselves respectably in Egypt.

The goods brought into Central Africa consist principally of English muslins and calicoes, the light red woollen stuffs of Barbary, cutlery, beads and trinkets. Cloths, silks, powder, tobacco, and arakee, are also brought in considerable quantities, while in the large towns there is always a good sale for sugar, rice, coffee and spices. The Turkish officials and the Franks are very fond of the aniseed cordial of Scio, maraschino, rosoglio, and the other Levantine liquors; and even the heavy, resinous wines of Smyrna and Cyprus find their way here. The natives prefer for clothing the coarse, unbleached cotton stuffs of their own manufacture, one mantle of which is sufficient for years. As may readily be supposed, the market is frequently glutted with goods of this description, whence the large houses often send money from Cairo for the purchase of gum and ivory, in preference to running any risk. At the time of my visit, all sorts of muslins and calicoes might be had in Khartoum at a very slight advance on Cairo prices, and the merchants who were daily arriving with additional bales, complained that the sale would not pay the expenses of their journey. The remarkable success of the caravans of the previous year had brought a crowd of adventurers into the lists, very few of whom realized their expectations. It was the California experience in another form. No passion is half so blind as the greed for gain.

Khartoum is the great metropolis of all this region. Some few caravans strike directly through the Beyooda Desert, from Dongola to Kordofan, but the great part come directly to the former place, where they dispose of their goods, and then proceed to Kordofan for gum, or wait the return of the yearly expedition up the White Nile, to stock themselves with ivory. On both these articles there is generally a good, sometimes a great, profit. The gum comes almost entirely from Kordofan, where the quantity annually gathered amounts to thirty thousand contar, or cwt. It is collected by the natives from that variety of the mimosa called the ashaba, and sold by them at from fifty-five to sixty piastres the contar. Lattif Pasha at one time issued a decree prohibiting any person from selling it at less than sixty piastres, but Dr. Reitz, by an energetic protest, obtained the revocation of this arbitrary edict. The cost of carrying it to Cairo is very nearly fifty piastres the contar, exclusive of a government tax of twelve and a half per cent.; and as the price of gum in Cairo fluctuates according to the demand from one hundred and fifty to two hundred and fifty piastres, the merchant’s gain may be as low as ten or as high as one hundred per cent. The gum brought from Yemen and the shores of the Red Sea is considered superior in quality but is not produced in such abundance.

The ivory is mostly obtained from the negro tribes on the White Nile. Small quantities are occasionally brought from Dar-Fūr and the unknown regions towards Bornou, by Arab caravans. The trading expeditions up the White Nile, until the winter of 1851-2, were entirely under the control of the Pasha of Soudân, in spite of the treaty of 1838, making it free to all nations. The expedition of that winter, which sailed from Khartoum about two months before my arrival, consisted of seven vessels, accompanied by an armed force. The parties interested in it consisted of the Pasha, the Egyptian merchants, and the rayahs, or European merchants. The gains were to be divided into twenty-four parts, eight of which went to the Pasha, nine to the Turks and seven to the Franks. Dr. Reitz undertook to enforce the treaty, and actually ran two vessels belonging to Austrian protégés past the guard established at the junction of the Niles. The Pasha thereupon had all the sailors belonging to these vessels arrested, but after two days of violent manœuvres and counter-manœuvres, allowed the vessels to proceed. The unjust monopoly was therefore virtually annulled—an important fact to Europeans who may wish to engage in the trade. The vessels take with them great quantities of glass beads, ear, arm and nose rings, and the like, for which the natives readily barter their elephants’ teeth. These are not found in abundance before reaching the land of the Nuehrs and the Kyks, about lat. 7°, and the best specimens come from regions still further south. They are sold in Khartoum at the rate of twelve hundred piastres the cwt., and in Cairo at twenty-two hundred, burdened with a tax of twelve and a half per cent.

The Government has done its best to cramp and injure Trade, the only life of that stagnant land. In addition to the custom-house at Assouan, where every thing going into Egypt must pay duty, the Pasha and his satellites had established an illegal custom-house at Dongola, and obliged merchants to pay another toll, midway on their journey. This was afterwards abolished, on account of the remonstrances which were forwarded to Cairo. I found the Pasha so uniformly courteous and affable, that at first I rejected many of the stories told me of his oppression and cruelty, but I was afterwards informed of circumstances which exhibited his character in a still more hideous light. Nevertheless, I believe he was in most respects superior to his predecessors in the office, and certainly to his successor.