The stores started only a few months ago, when the railway was completed. They are not in working order and he is wise in his generation who does not rely on them. My stay in Kano has been longer than planned, with the result that for a week I had no bread; hard, thick biscuits—euphemistically called cabin bread—having to be a substitute. They were eaten with tea for which neither milk nor sugar was obtainable. Subsequently I learnt that I could buy fresh cow’s milk from native farmers at 3d. a pint bottle. When the flour had been consumed, I again flourished on cabin bread.
On a supply of flour coming up—sold at 4s. 6d. for a 7 lb. tin—the always willing and useful Oje declared that he “fit to make bread,” and quite a palatable quality he produced.
Fresh food retailed in Kano City is at low figures, though prices have greatly advanced recently. A chicken, furnishing a meal sufficient for two persons, is bought for 5d.; a guinea-fowl, larger than the chicken, costs 3d. or 4d. A duck is to be had at a corresponding figure. Eggs are purchased at 10 a penny. Sweet potatoes—long, thin, circular—are not disposed of by weight, but are retailed at sight; and fivepennyworth lasts four meals. Onions—larger than turnips, some of them scaling 1½ lbs.—minus the strong flavour of the English variety—cost 4 a penny. By going two or three miles to the farms where they are grown, sufficient to fill an apple-barrel can be secured for 6d. A leg of mutton—flesh that is dearer than beef—sells at 5d., and is more than enough for four diners.
Man does not live by meat alone, and anybody coming here should bear in mind that he is entering a new country, from the European standpoint, where, although foodstuffs are raised, the population has quite a different standard of feeding from his; where railway communication has been merely a matter of months; that things which he probably considers necessary for his existence are just beginning to be sold and that they are of less importance and value to the firms selling them than other articles, which therefore are naturally given preference; and, further, that the articles referred to and others of the same character are occasionally sold out at the great port of Lagos. I had trouble there to buy two tins of sugar. Estimate, then, the position in Kano, distance of a week by railway.
With the exception of the Lagos Stores, all the establishments at Kano are in temporary buildings. The Niger Company has houses of mud and straw and one of corrugated iron. The Tin Areas Company has corrugated iron and also mud houses; whilst the French Company and the Syrian trader have confined themselves to the latter material. Each store stands in a compound. A section is 300 feet long by 100 feet wide. The Niger Company has four sections, the French Company four, the Tin Areas two, Lagos Stores two, the Syrian one. The buildings, of course, only cover a small portion of the ground occupied.
I have stated that the chief business of the stores is to buy, not sell. There are great quantities of native produce for which eager markets in your part of the world wait, and though a good profit should show between the prices here and those in Europe, there is strong competition in purchasing, and everyone will be able to gauge its effect on the vendors, who are keen and alert. They have sharpened the hereditary instinct in the course of generations. Therefore, it can be seen that it is no easy, certain course to sit down and deal for merchandise brought in. The principal articles are hides, skins (goats’ and sheep), ground-nuts, gutta percha, beeswax, and ostrich feathers. I am only touching on articles brought out of Kano City in large quantities to the neighbouring stores, not to those on sale at the market there.
Sheep and goats’ skins and ground-nuts form the main items in the former category. The skins are tanned and dyed red, yellow, and green. The dyeing process is kept secret, but I know that the ashes of dung burnt in open ovens near the entrances to Kano City—such spots being by no means attractive in an olfactory sense—I know that such ashes are used, and that the bright red colour much in favour is obtained from juice of the holcus.
I am unable to say at what price the skins are purchased. One cannot put such questions to buyers who, obviously, are averse from disclosing information which would be useful to rivals, but I believe the figure to be well under to slightly above 1s. each. The sound quality skins easily fetch 6s. or 7s. each in Europe. They are used for satchels, purses, bookbinding, and, within the last few years, slippers and boots have been made from them.
It is safe to state that the purchases of all the other stores together do not approach those of the Niger Company. One can see quite a string of dealers, accompanied by servants carrying skins on their heads, processions of camels and bullocks bearing large bales of skins, and hundreds of donkeys panniered with ground-nuts making their way to the compound of that Company.
It is no reflection on the men in charge of the other stores to say that they have a very difficult task indeed in competing with the Niger Company. In the first place, it is known, and was well known before its present competitors were heard of. Ask anybody in Kano of the Bature Company—the White Company—and, if he can, he will direct you to the Niger Company’s store. European firms may comment as they will, the Niger Company is liked by the population. “In the days of the Company’s rule,” I was told in the southern part of the Protectorate, “we paid no taxes.” That is not accurate, but it is believed, which is just as good as if it were. People, therefore, who have skins to sell naturally first think of the Niger Company, and as it has a name for fair dealing, undoubtedly a heavy preponderance is taken there. Everything is paid for by cash, on the spot.