Apart from eating, their sole occupation is to talk, and this they do unceasingly, emphasizing their words with a marvellous wealth of gesticulation. Talking, indeed, is an art here—the art it must once have been in Europe before the newspaper drove it out of fashion. The native voices are sometimes highly musical, though in the strict sense the people have no notion whatever of singing; and the languages themselves are full of melody. Every word, like the Italian, ends in a vowel, and when well spoken they are exceedingly effective and full of character.
Notwithstanding their rudimentary estate, the people of Africa have the beginnings of all the more characteristic things that make up the life of civilized man. They have a national amusement, the dance; a national musical instrument, the drum; a national drink, pombé; a national religion, the fear of evil spirits. Their chamber of justice is a council of head-men or chiefs; their court of appeal, the muavi, or poison cup. No new thing is found here that is not in some form in modern civilization; no new thing in civilization but has its embryo and prophecy in the simpler life of these primitive tribes. To the ignorant these men are animals; but the eye of evolution looks on them with a kindlier and more instructed sense. They are what we were once; possibly they may become what we are now.
What, then, is to become of this strange people and their land? With the glowing figures of a very distinguished traveller in our minds, are we to expect that the Shiré and Congo routes have but to be connected with New York and Manchester to cause at once a revolution among the people of Africa and in the commerce of the world? We hear two criticisms upon that subject. One complains that while Mr. Stanley emphasizes in the most convincing way the thousands of miles of cloth the African is waiting to receive from Europe, he is all but silent as to what Europe is to get in return. A second remark is that Africa has nothing to give in return, and never will have.
The facts of the case briefly, as it seems to me, are these:—
First, The only thing of value the interior of Africa produces at present in any quantity is ivory. There is still, undoubtedly, a supply of this precious material in the country—a supply which may last yet for fifteen or twenty years. But it is well to frame future calculation on the certainty of this abnormal source of wealth ceasing, as it must do, in the immediate future.
Second, Africa already produces in a wild state a number of vegetable and other products of considerable commercial value; and although the soil can only be said to be of average fertility, there is practically no limit to the extent to which these could be developed.
Wild indigo—the true indigofera tinctoria is already growing on the hills of the interior. The Londolphia, an indiarubber-bearing creeper, is to be seen on most of the watercourses; and a variety of the Ficus elastica, the well-known rubber plant, abounds on Lake Nyassa. The orchilla weed is common. The castor-oil plant, ginger, and other spices, the tobacco-plant, the cotton-plant, and many fibre-yielding grasses, are also found; and oil-seeds of every variety and in endless quantity are grown by the natives for local use.
The fatal drawback, meantime, to the further development of these comparatively invaluable products is the transit, carriage to the coast from Nyassa or Tanganyika being almost prohibitive. Up till very recently only two native products have ever been exported from this region—indiarubber and beeswax, and these in but trifling quantity. But there is no reason why these products should not be largely developed, and freights must become lower and lower every year. In addition to the plants named, the soil of Central Africa is undoubtedly adapted for growing coffee; and the Cinchona would probably flourish well on the higher grounds of the Tanganyika plateau.
I must not omit to mention in this connection that an attempt is now being made, and so far with marked success, to form actual plantations in the interior of Africa; and the result of the experiment ought to be watched with exceptional interest. Mr. Moir, on behalf of the African Lakes Company, and the Brothers Buchanan on their own account, and also Mr. Scott, with remarkable industry and enterprise have each formed at Blantyre a coffee plantation of considerable size. The plants, when I saw them, were still young, but very healthy and promising, and already a first crop of fine coffee-berries hung from the trees, and has since been marketed. These same gentlemen have also grown heavy crops of wheat; and Mr. Buchanan has succeeded well with sugar-cane, potatoes and other English vegetables. The manual work here has been entirely done by natives; and an immense saving to resident Europeans will be effected when the interior is able to provide its own food supplies, for at present wheat, coffee, and sugar, have all to be imported from home.
With so satisfactory an account of the possibilities of the country, the only question that remains is this—Can the African native really be taught to work?