The Ingotro concession, the largest we have yet seen, measures 3,000 fathoms square, the measurements being taken from the central shaft. Assuming every thousand fathoms roughly to represent a geographical mile, the area would be of nine square miles. This will evidently admit of being divided and sub-divided into half a dozen or more estates. As yet little of its wealth has been explored, chiefly owing to the dense growth of forest. As Mr. Walker remarks, 'Although timber is a great desideratum on a mining-estate, the thick woods have the disadvantage of concealing many rich deposits of gold, and I have very little doubt that the diminution of the population, and the consequent overgrowth of the bush or jungle, has much to do with the great falling off in the production and export of gold from this region.'
The emancipation of slaves and 'pawns' would have in Africa no other effect. Free men will not work, and 'bush,' unless kept down, will grow with terrible ferocity.
When Indian file was duly formed, we descended the Nánwá hillock, which takes its name from the stream. Here the little rivulet, deeply encased, bore a fine growth of snowy water-lilies. It had been newly bridged with corduroy. The next passage boasted tree-trunks, and after that all was leaping. The Nánwá must rise near the trial-shaft, which we are about to visit, and it snakes through the property in all directions with a general rhumb from west-north-west to east-south-east. At this season there is little or no flow, and the bed is mostly a string of detached pools, where gold has been washed and will be washed again. Thus the facilities for 'hydraulicking' are superior, and the number of shallow native pits at once suggests the properest process.
We then struck across the heavily timbered country, which is the wildest state of 'bushiness.' A few paces led to 'King's Croom,' a deserted mining-village in a dwarf clearing rapidly overgrowing with the Brazilian Catinga. Hereabouts we saw nothing save 'hungry quartz.' Then we struck across three several ridges, whose slopes were notably easier on the eastern, and more abrupt on the western side. The people had sunk several pits in places likely to yield 'kindly quartz,' and they had made no mistakes as to the overlay of the lode, its foot-wall or its hanging-wall.
Cameron presently made an offset to the north, and, cutting his road, walked ten minutes up the tail of Tuáko Hill, at whose southern base lies the Nánwá bed. Here, guided by Mr. Grant, who knew the place well, he found a native shaft thirty feet deep and a lode of disintegrated quartz in red or yellow ferruginous clay, the surface looking as rich as the stone it overlies.
A few paces further and a third drop led us again to the swampy valley of the Nánwá, here flowing south. It is bounded by two rises, tree-grown from foot to head. That on the left bank is the Tuáko, the husband, along whose skirt we have been walking; the other, on the opposite side, is Jama, the wife. From their conjugal visits the gold is born. Some attempts had been made to blast a rock in the skirt of Jama's garment; but all had notably failed. The reeking, unwholesome bottom showed extensive traces of digging and washing.
Following the water, we came to the second little mining-village, also deserted. The name 'Ingotro' means a broad-leaved liliaceous plant, the wura-haban (water-leaf) of the Fantis, used for thatching when palm-fronds are not found. From this place an old bush-path once led directly to the lands we call 'Izrah,' but it has long been closed by native squabbles. A few yards further placed us in an exceedingly rich bottom, honeycombed by native workers. Hard by it appeared the central shaft, lying between two hills, the Ingotro-buká and the Nánwá-buká, which define the course of the rivulet. The distance from Nánwá village may have been three miles, but we had spent more than three hours in making collections.
Amongst the insects was the silk-spider, a large arachnid of sulphur-yellow tint, with three black transverse bars. It weaves no web, but spins a thread of the strongest texture and the richest golden hue. I had sent from Fernando Po several pounds of this fine silk, intending to experiment upon it in a veil or lace shawl; and afterwards I learned that the Empress Eugénie had a dress made of it, which cost a fabulous number of francs. Bacon and other old writers talk of 'spider's silk' like gathering moonbeams. [Footnote: The Ananse or Agya ananse (father spider), as the Oji-speaking peoples call the insect, is with them either a creator of man (corresponding so far with the scarabeus in the Nile valley) or a representative of the evil principle. Bosman (Letter xvii.), describing a 'great hideous hairy species,' says, 'The negroes call this spider ananse, and believe that the first men were made by that creature; and, notwithstanding some of them by conversation with the Europeans are better informed, there are yet a great number that remain of that opinion, out of which folly they are not to be reasoned.' The people have a number of fables called Anansesem, such as Spider and Spiderson and the Three Ghosts; in these spider-stories the insect, like the fox with us, is the most intelligent of animals (the late Rev. J. Zimmermann's Akra or Gã Grammar, Stuttgart, 1858). It is represented as speaking through the nose like the local 'bogy,' and its hobbling gait is imitated by the story-teller. Another superstition is that the Anánu (the Akra form of the word) injures children sleeping in the same room with it. At Fernando Po I found another valuable spider which preys upon cockroaches. When a cruiser was particularly afflicted by the blatta, a couple of these insects would effectually clear chests and drawers in a few days. There are other species, Entekuma, &c.]
The upper shaft had been sunk, as it should be, in the eastern flank of the hill, which faces north 71º east, and which runs north 3º west (both true). The surface and subsoil are the usual sandy loam scattered with gravel of quartz and ironstone, and the spoil-banks showed blue and white quartz. The clay-slate, dark, soft, and laminated, appeared everywhere. Lower down, on the same slope, Mr. Grant had dug a second shaft, somewhat smaller than the upper: both were full of rain-water. Mr. Walker mentions a large native pit near the centre, whence rich stone had been taken. He picked up from the refuse several pieces of quartz showing free gold, which gave, when assayed, 2.6 oz. gold and 0.3 oz. silver per ton. This was from a depth of only ten feet. His own trial-shaft, when he left the Coast, was not more than three feet deep; but every sample showed traces of gold, and an Australian miner of thirty years' experience declared that the 'stuff' promised a rich yield below. Like ourselves, he found the whole country 'impregnated with gold.' On the path within fifty yards of the Nánwá village we knocked off some pieces of quartz that displayed the precious ore to the naked eye.
The slope in which the two shafts had been sunk fell into a depression between the hills which indicated the richest surface-diggings. Here a number of detached sinkings had been run together by the recent rains into a long miry pool. Mr. Walker also speaks of a 'very large number of shallow native pits.' No one could see this exceedingly rich 'gulch' without determining that it should be washed upon the largest scale. It will be time to sink shafts and make deep diggings here when sluicing and surfacing shall have done their work.