The architecture of the Egba tribe is mostly confined to “swish” walls and thatched roofs. A vast number of workers,—or rather idlers—are engaged on a single house, and the subdivision of labor is carried out to an extreme extent. Indeed, as Captain Burton quaintly remarks, the Egbas divide the labor so much that the remainder is imperceptible.
Some of them dig the clay, forming thereby deep pits, which they never trouble themselves to fill up again, and which become the receptacles of all sorts of filth and offal. Water, in this wet country, soon pours into them, and sometimes the corpse of a slave or child is flung into the nearest pit, to save the trouble of burial. It may easily be imagined that such pits contribute their part to the fever-breeding atmosphere of the country.
Another gang is employed in kneading clay and rolling it into balls; and a third carries it, one ball at a time, to the builders. Another gang puts the clay balls into the squared shape needful for architectural purposes; and a fifth hands the shaped clay to the sixth, who are the actual architects. Yet a seventh gang occupies itself in preparing palm leaves and thatch; and those who fasten them on the roof form an eighth gang. Besides these, there is the chief architect, who by his plumb-line and level rectifies and smooths the walls with a broad wooden shovel, and sees that they are perfectly upright.
Three successive layers of clay or “swish” are needed, each layer being allowed to dry for a few days before the next is added. The builders always manage, if possible, to complete their walls by November, so that the dry harmattan of December may consolidate the soft clay, and render it as hard as concrete. This, indeed, is the only reason why the Egbas approve of the harmattan, its cold, dusty breath being exceedingly injurious to native constitutions.
One might have thought that this elaborate subdivision of labor would have the effect of multiplying the working power, as is the case in Europe. So it would, if the negro worked like the European, but that he never did, and never will do, unless absolutely compelled by a master of European extraction. He only subdivides labor in order to spare himself, and not with the least idea of increasing the amount of work that he can do in a given time.
The capital of the Egbas and their kindred sub-tribes is called Abeokuta, a name that has already become somewhat familiar to English ears on account of the attempts which have been made to introduce Christianity, civilization, and manufactures among a pagan, savage, and idle race of negroes. The name of Abeokuta may be literally translated as Understone, and the title has been given to the place in allusion to the rock or stone around which it is built. The best description that has yet been given of Abeokuta is by Captain Burton, from whose writings the following particulars are gathered.
The city itself is surrounded with concentric lines of fortification, the outermost being some twenty miles in circumference. These walls are made of hardened mud, are about five or six feet in height, and have no embrasures for guns, an omission of very little importance, seeing that there are scarcely any guns to place in them, and that, if they were fired, the defenders would be in much greater danger than the attacking force.
Utterly ignorant of the first principles of fortification, the Egbas have not troubled themselves to throw out bastions, or to take any means of securing a flanking fire, and they have made so liberal a use of matting, poles, and dry leaves within the fortification, that a carcass or a rocket would set the whole place in a blaze; and, if the attacking force were to take advantage of the direction of the wind, they might easily drive out the defenders merely by the smoke and flames of their own burning houses. Moreover the wall is of such frail material, and so thinly built, that a single bag of powder hung against it, and fired, would make a breach that would admit a column of soldiers together with their field-guns. Around the inner and principal wall runs a moat some five feet in breadth, partly wet and partly dry, and of so insignificant a depth that it could be filled up with a few fascines, or even with a dozen or so of dead bodies.
These defences, ludicrously inefficient as they would be if attacked by European soldiers, are very formidable obstacles to the Dahoman and Ibadan, against whose inroads they are chiefly built. As a rule, the negro has a great horror of attacking a wall, and, as has been proved by actual conflict, the Dahomans could make no impression whatever upon these rude fortifications.
The real strength of the city, however, lies in the interior, and belongs to the rock or “stone” which gives the name to Abeokuta. Within the walls, the place is broken up into granite eminences, caverns, and forest clumps, which form natural fortifications, infinitely superior to those formed by the unskilful hands of the native engineer. Indeed, the selection of the spot seems to have been the only point in which the Egbas have exhibited the least appreciation of the art of warfare. The mode of fighting will presently be described.