CHAPTER VIII.
ETHNOLOGY OF ZANZIBAR. THE FOREIGN RESIDENTS.
‘Quiconque ne voit guère
N’a guère à dire aussi. Mon voyage depeint
Vous sera d’un plaisir extrême.
Je dirai; j’étais là; telle chose m’avint,
Vous y croirez être vous-même.’—La Fontaine.
The 300,000 souls[[84]] now (1857-9) composing the residents on, and the population of, the Zanzibar Island, are a heterogeneous body. The former consist of Americans and Europeans, about 14,000 Banyans (including those of the Coast), a few Parsees and Portuguese from Goa, and sundry castes of Hindustani Moslems, Khojahs, Mehmans, and Borahs, numbering some 1200. There are also trifling numbers of free blacks from the Comoro Islands, Madagascar, Unyamwezi, and the Somali country. To this accidental division I will devote the present chapter.
The Consular corps is represented by three members, who, as usual in these remote Oriental spots, assume, and are allowed to assume, the position of plenipos. The first American official was Mr Richard Palmer, who was succeeded by sundry acting men: the second was Mr Waters, who left in 1844: then came Mr C. Ward, Mr Webb, and Mr Macmullan. Captain Mansfield now (1859) holding office, is agent to Messrs John Bertram and Co. of Salem. This gentleman, who took a great interest in the East African Expedition, has had a more extensive experience of the East than his predecessors; he has also the advantage of being respectable and respected.
On the part of the French Government the first Consul was M. Broquant: he died of fever and dysentery at Zanzibar, and was succeeded by M. de Beligny, a French Creole from Santo Domingo, afterwards transferred to Manilla and to Charleston, South Carolina. M. Vignard, a young man of amiable manners, and distinguished in Algeria as an Arabic scholar, fell victim to a sunstroke when voyaging from Aden, where I met him en route for his post. The present Consul is M. Ladislas Cochet: the Chancellier and Dragoman is M. Jablonski, Pole and poet.
Lieut.-Colonel Atkins Hamerton is, and has been, I have said, H. B. Majesty’s Consul, and H. E. I. Company’s Agent at the Court of H. H. Sayyid Said, since December, 1841, when we first established relations with Zanzibar. Attached to his establishment is a passed apothecary, an Eurasian, the only attempt at a medico on the Island. Lieut.-Colonel Hamerton had been on terms of intimacy with Sayyid Said during a quarter of a century; and their friendship, as happens, began with a ‘little aversion.’ The Britisher proposed to travel in the interior from Maskat, in those days a favourite exploration with the more adventurous; and the Arab, suspicious as all Arabs, thinking it safest to put the intruder out of the way, imprudently wrote a letter to that effect. This missive fell into the hands of the person whom it most concerned: he boldly carried it to the Prince, and reproached him in no measured terms with his perfidy. Sayyid Said found himself overmatched, submitted to Kismat, and, admiring the traveller’s spirit and openness, determined to win his attachment. The two became firm friends; the Consul was the influential adviser of the ruler, and the latter intrusted him with secrets jealously hidden from his own. The reason why the trade of Zanzibar was surprisingly developed under the primitive rule of an Arab Prince is not only the immense wealth of Eastern Africa, it results mainly from the wise measures of a man who for the greater part of his life devoted himself to the task. It was an unworthy feeling which made M. Guillain write of my late friend (ii. 23), ‘Bref, sa réputation est de placer fort bien, et à beaux bénéfices, l’argent que lui donnent la reine et le gouvernment de la compagnie’—his generosity to his family left little after his decease. Not the least of Sayyid Said’s anxieties upon his death-bed was to reach Zanzibar alive, and even when half-unconscious he continually called for Colonel Hamerton. It is suspected that he wished to communicate the place of his concealed treasures, which, despite the most careful search, were never found. When hiding their hoards it is not unusual for Arabs to put to death the slaves who assist in the labour, and thus to prevent negro indiscretion. The family, I may here say, firmly believes that Colonel Hamerton knows where the hoards lay, and yet refuses to divulge the secret.