This preventive service is rather curious, because both banks of the river, in the latter part of its course, are owned by the English, and the service is between the two portions of the Colony. But east of the Volta, whither I was bound, the country is but little known, and apparently the powers that be do not feel themselves equal to cope with a very effective preventive service, so they have there the same duties, a 4 per cent, one that the Germans have in Togo land, while west of the Volta they have a 10 per cent. duty.
I hope there is not much smuggling on the Volta, for with all apologies to the white preventive officers, I doubt the likelihood of the men doing much to stop it. The stations match the river. They have been picturesquely planned—the plans carefully carried out; the houses are well kept up, and round them are some of the few gardens, in English hands, on the Gold Coast that really look like gardens. Though I did not in the course of three days' travel come across him, I felt they marked the presence of some careful, capable white man. The credit is certainly not due to the negro preventive men. In the presence of their white officer they are smart-looking men; seen in his absence they relax their efforts and look as untidy and dirty as a railway porter after a hard day's struggle with a Bank Holiday crowd. After all one can hardly blame the negro for not exerting himself. Nature has given him all he absolutely requires; he has but to stretch out his hand and take it, using almost as little forethought and exertion as the great black cormorants or the little blue-and-white king-fishers that get their livelihood from the river.
And I was afraid of those men. I may have wronged them for they were quite civil, but I was afraid. Again and again they made me remember, as the ordinary peasants never did, that I was a woman alone and very very helpless. Nothing would have induced me to stay two nights at one of those stations. These men were half-civilised. They had lost all awe of a white face, and, I felt, were inclined to be presuming. What could I have done if they had forgotten their thin veneer of civilisation, and gone back to pure savagery. Nothing—I know it—nothing. At Adjena I had to have my camp-bed put up on the verandah, because I found the house too stuffy, and the moonlit river was glorious to look upon, but I was anything but happy in my own mind; I wondered if I wanted help if my canoe-men, who were very decent, respectable savages, would come to my help. I wonder still. But the morning brought me a glorious view. The sun rose behind Chai Hill, and flung its shadow all across the river, and I attempted feebly to reproduce it in a photograph, and gladly and thankfully I went on my way up the river, and I vowed in my own mind that never if I could help it would I come up here again by myself. If any adventurous woman feels desirous of following in my footsteps, I have but one piece of advice to give her—“Don't.” I don't think I would do it again for all the money in the Bank of England. I may do him an injustice, but I do not trust the half-civilised black man. I got through, I think, because for a moment he was astonished. Next time he will not be taken by surprise, and it will not be safe.
At Labolabo I left the river. Dearly I should have loved to have gone on, to have made my way up to the Northern Territories, but for one thing, my canoe-men were only engaged as far as Labolabo; for another, I had not brought enough photographic plates. I really think it was that last consideration that stopped me. What was the good of going without taking photographs? Curiously enough, the fact that I was afraid did not weigh much with me. I suppose we are all built alike, and at moments our mental side weights up our emotional side. Now, my mental side very much wanted to go up past the Afram plain. I should have had to stay in the preventive service houses, which grew farther and farther apart, and I was afraid of the preventive service men, afraid of them in the sordid way one fears the low-class ruffian of the great cities, but there was that in me that whispered that there was a doubt, and therefore it might be exceedingly foolish to check my search after knowledge for a fear that might only be a causeless fear. But about the photographic plates there was no doubt; I had not brought nearly enough with me, and therefore I landed very meekly at Labolabo.
There was rather a desolate-looking factory, but it did not look inviting enough to induce me to go inside it, so I sat down under a tree on the high bank of the river and interviewed the black factor to whom Swanzy's agent had given me a letter. He was mightily surprised, but I was accustomed to being received with surprise now, and began to consider the making of a cup of tea. Then the factor brought another man along and introduced him to me as Swanzy's agent at Pekki Blengo, Mr Olympia. And once more I feel like apologising to all the African peoples for anything I may have said against them. Mr Olympia came from French Dahomey. He was extremely good-looking, and had polished, courteous manners such as one dreams of in the Spanish hidalgos of old. If you searched the wide world over I do not think you could wish to find a more charming man than Swanzy's black agent at Pekki Blengo. I know very little of him. I only met him casually as I met other black men, men outside the pale for me, a white woman, but I felt when I looked at him there might be possibilities in the African race; when I think of their enormous strength and their wonderful vigour, immense possibilities.
I explained to Mr Olympia that I wanted to get to the rest-house at Anum, that I had arranged for my canoe-men to carry my kit there, and that Mr Rowe had told me that he, Mr Olympia, could get me carriers on to Ho. He said certainly, but he thought I ought at least to go up to the British Cotton-growing Experimental Farm, about ten minutes' walk away from the river. He felt that the white man in charge would be much hurt if I did not at least call and see him.