I could obtain few details concerning the 'Black Devil Society,' which suggests the old 'Know-nothings.' It has been, they say, somewhat active in flogging strangers, especially Sá Leone men. Most of the latter, however, have been expelled for refusing to change their style from 'subjects' to 'citizens'—a foreign word in English and Anglo-African ears.
At the time of our visit the republic was in a parlous state. H.E. Mr. Gardiner, the new President, refused to swear in the Upper House, and the Lower refused to acknowledge the Presidential authority. Consequently business had been at a standstill for six weeks. We were disappointed in our hopes of being accompanied by the Honourable Professor E. W. Blyden, ex-minister to England and afterwards principal of the college. He had travelled with Winwood Reade, and I looked forward to hearing the opinions of an African Arabic scholar touching the progress and future of El-Islam in the Dark Continent. That it advances with giant steps may be proved by these figures. Between 1861 and 1862 I found at most a dozen Moslems at Lagos; in 1865 the number had risen to 1,200, and in 1880, according to my old friend M. Colonna, Agent Consulaire de France, it passes 10,000, requiring twenty-seven mosques.
The latest charts of Liberia show no less than twenty-six parallelograms stretching inland, at various angles with the shore, and stated to have been acquired by 'conquest or purchase' between 1822 and 1827; but the natives, especially the Krumen, complain that after allowing the foreigners to dwell, amongst them they have been despoiled of their possessions, and that, once lords of the soil, they have sunk to mere serfs. Hence the frequent wars and chronic bad blood. Every African traveller knows the meaning of land-purchase in these regions. There are two ideas peculiar to the negro brain, but apparently inadmissible into European heads. The first is the non-alienation of land. Niger never parts with his ground in perpetuity; he has always the mental reservation, while selling it to a stranger, that the soil and its improvements return to him by right after the death or the departure of the purchaser. Should the settler's heirs or assignees desire to remain in loco, they are expected to pay a fresh gratification; the lessor will raise his terms as high as possible, but public opinion will oblige him to remain content with a 'dash,' or present, equivalent to that paid by the original lessee.
The second idea is even more repugnant to European feelings. In Africa a born chattel is a chattel for ever: the native phrase is, ''Pose man once come up slave, he be slave all time.' There is no such thing as absolute manumission: the unsophisticated libertus himself would not dream of claiming it. We have on board a white-headed negro in an old and threadbare Dutch uniform, returning from Java on a yearly pension of fifteen dollars. According to treaty he had been given by the King of Ashanti to the Hollanders, and he had served them so long that he spoke only Low German and Malay. He will be compelled to end his career somewhere within the range of our fort-guns, or his owner's family will claim and carry off their property.
At 8 A.M. we steamed against a fine fresh wind past mount Mesurado en route for Grand Bassá (Bassaw), distant fifty-five miles. To port lies Montserrado County, where the shore-strip looks comparatively high and healthy. The Bassás begin some thirty miles below the Jong River, and now we enter the regions of Grand, Middle, and Little Piccaninny (pequenino), Whole and Half, i.e. half-way. Thus we pass, going south-wards, Bassá, Middle Bassá, Grand Bassá, and Bassá Cove, followed by Cestos and Cess, Settra and Sesters, Whole and Half. The coast is well known, while the interior is almost unexplored. Probably there is no inducement to attract strangers.
We are grateful for small mercies, and note a picturesque view from the open roadstead of Grand Bassá. The flats are knobbed with lumpy mounds; North Saddle Hill, with its central seat; Tall Hill; the blue ridges of the Bassá Hills, and St. John's Hill upon the line of its river. Nothing can be healthier than these sites, which are well populated; and the slopes are admirably fitted for that 'Arabian berry' whose proper home is Africa. But, while hill-coffee has superior flavour lowland-coffee is preferred in commerce, because the grain is larger and heavier.
Grand Bassá is the only tract in Liberia where the Sá Leonite is still admitted. The foreshore of yellow sand, pointed and dotted by lines and falls of black rock, fronts a shallow bay as foul and stony as the coast. Here are three settlements, parted by narrow walls of 'bush.' Edina, the northernmost, is said to do more business than any other port in the republic; she also builds fine, strong surf-boats of German and American type, carrying from one to five tons. The keels are bow-shaped, never straight-lined from stem to stern; and the breakers are well under the craft before their mighty crests toss it aloft and fling it into the deep trough. They are far superior to the boats with weather-boards in the fore which formerly bore us to land. The crew scoop up the water as if digging with the paddle; they vary the exercise by highly eccentric movements, and they sing savage barcarolles the better to keep time.
The middle settlement is Upper Buchanan, whose river, the St. John's, owns a bar infamous as that of Lagos for surf and sharks. The southernmost, Lower Buchanan, is defended by a long and broken wall of black reef, but the village is far from smooth water. All these 'towns' occupy holes in a curtain of the densest and tallest greenery. They are composed of groups and scatters of whitewashed houses, half of them looking like chapels and the other like toys. Each has its adjunct of brown huts, the native quarter. These Bassá tribes must not be confounded with their neighbours the Krumen; the languages are quite different, and the latter is of much harsher sound. There is no doubt of this being a good place for engaging labour, and it is hoped that in due time Bassá-hands, who work well, will be engaged for the Gold Coast mines. At present, however, they avoid English ships, call themselves 'Americans,' and willingly serve on board the Yankee craft which load with coffee, cam-wood, and palm-oil.
We steamed along the Cape, River, and Town of Sinou, the very home of the Kráo, or Krumen, strictly speaking a small tribe. Returning homeward-bound, we here landed a host of men from the Oil-rivers, greatly to my delight, as they had cumbered the deck with their leaky powder-kegs, amid which wandered the sailors, smoking unconcernedly. In the 'good old times' this would not have been allowed. At least one poor fellow was drowned, so careful were the relatives to embark the kit, so careless of the owner's person. Next day we sighted the 'Garraway-trees,' silk cottons some 200 feet high, fine marks for clearing the Cape shoals. Then came Fishtown and Rocktown, once celebrated for the exploits of Ashmun and his associates; and at 2.15 P.M. we anchored in the heavy Harmatan roll off
The Cape of Palmas, called from palmy shade.