The name Gaboon is used, especially by the English, in a general way to designate not only the river of that name but all the adjacent territory. Most people prefer it to the name Libreville, because it is of native origin; and they like the far-away sound of it. If we would be strictly accurate, however, the name belongs only to the great estuary of the river. The Gaboon River is not long, but it receives many tributaries and for the last hundred miles from the sea it is magnificent. Forty miles before it reaches the sea it bends northward by northwest and widens out into a broad estuary from five to fifteen miles in width and forty miles long, which I have always called the bay. It is one of the few, and one of the best, harbours on the entire coast of Africa. Libreville, the old French capital of the Congo Français, and Baraka, our mission station, are situated on the east bank of the estuary and opposite its broad mouth. They look therefore directly over the sea.
Gaboon was known in the Middle Ages and probably in the early centuries. Travellers and adventurers of a superstitious age, passing upon the high seas, reported that it was a dreadful land where at night strange fires bursting from the earth leaped to the clouds and reddened the sky, fires which probably came from “inferno” not far beneath. It is quite possible that the fire which they saw may have issued from Mount Kamerun, farther to the north, which is now an extinct volcano; but there is a more likely explanation. The country around Gaboon is more open than most parts of West Africa. A dense undergrowth of shrubbery and long grass grows up each year, which towards the end of the dry season is burned off by the natives, in some places to clear their gardens, and in some places for the fun of seeing it burn. As seen from the mission hill the fires are seldom extensive, though the effect is a ruddy glow upon the clouds and is beautiful. But as I have seen them when out upon the bay at night, and upon the sea, the effect of their full extent, the glowing sky and its reflection in the sea, were sufficient to inspire awe and impress deeply the superstitious mind of a sailor gazing on a strange land of savage people.
Libreville as it is approached from the sea is one of the most beautiful places on the entire West Coast. The government buildings stand upon a hill, the Plateau, from which a handsome boulevard runs to the south parallel with the beach, between rows of giant coco-palms. On this boulevard are the trading-houses, French, Portuguese, German and English. The buildings are nearly all white, including the iron roofs; but some of them have roofs of red tile. There are many beautiful trees. The houses are only half visible through screens of foliage; and along the walks every unsightly thing, every deserted building or decaying hut is overgrown with vines of delicate beauty and the wildest profusion of scarlet, purple and lavender flowers.
The beach is strewn with logs of African mahogany of great value, which the traders are preparing to ship. For these they have exchanged a variety of goods. They carry a large stock of flint-lock guns especially for the interior trade. The average price of a trade-gun is five dollars. They are called “gas-pipe” guns in the vernacular of the coast. The barrel is three feet four inches long, and the bore Mr. Richard Harding Davis compares to an artesian well. “The native fills four inches of this cavity with powder and the remaining three feet with rusty nails, barbed wire, leaden slugs, and broken parts of iron pots.” This dreadful weapon “kicks” so violently in the recoil that it is always a question as to which is the more dangerous end. Of course, if the contents of the barrel should actually enter a man’s body it would tear him all to pieces. But there is always a doubt about the aim, and there is no doubt about the kick.
Two miles south of the Plateau there is another hill nearly as high, and having the finest outlook towards the sea. On this hill is the mission station, Baraka.
MISSION HOUSE AT BARAKA, GABOON.
The roof is of palm thatch, upon which poles of bamboo are placed.
The house, as one approaches it, appears through a screen of palms and orange-trees, of the strong-scented frangipani, the scarlet hibiscus, and oleander growing as high as the house. There is an abundance of roses everywhere. There are also a few coffee-trees in the yard, and one exquisite cinnamon.
The view from the veranda of the mission house at Baraka is a scene of magic beauty. The joyous lavishness of colour excludes from the mind the thought of the deadly serpent and the relentless fever-fiend that stealthily glide within the shadows. The long hillside sloping to the beach is half covered with mangoes and palms, oleander and orange-trees, and the graceful plumes of the bamboo that wave to and fro and tumble in the breeze like children at play. In front is the open sea. On the left, looking up the estuary, one sees in the bright morning light a fairy island of deep emerald set in a silver sea, and beyond it a distant shore in dim purple and gold. And even while one is looking, the island, the silver sea and the golden-purple shore gradually dissolve and disappear in the haze that gathers and deepens as the day advances. But again, and always, it appears in the clear evening light, more beautiful than ever.
I found it impossible to persuade my friends that Gaboon is not the hottest place in the world, since it is not only in Africa, but at the equator. This was also my own idea of Gaboon until it was corrected by experience. It is not as hot at the equator as it is several hundred miles north or south of it. The thermometer ranges between 72° and 86°, seldom going above or below this range. But the humidity is extreme (not surpassed, I believe, in the world) and this makes it seem hotter than these figures would indicate. The atmosphere feels as if it were about fifty per cent. hot water. At the coast there is the delightful sea-breeze—but as soon as one says it is “delightful” he is reminded that it is very dangerous.