Seven Legs Across the Seas Part 21

CHAPTER II

Dar-es-Salaam, the capital of German-East Africa, was, after leaving Ibo, the next place where the vessel put in. What a difference is observable in the make-up and general appearance of this German town to those in Portuguese-East Africa! Some very imposing stone and cement buildings, with others under construction; good streets, clean surroundings, and a sprinkling of white people, were a very welcome change from the poorly built and almost totally black-populated places we had left behind.

The railway station, freight cars and locomotives, good wharves and paved streets brought to mind old scenes. For nearly 800 miles the railroad pierces westward through a black-populated and wild-beast inhabited country to the sh.o.r.e of Lake Tanganyika, this body of water, 420 miles long and 10 to 60 miles wide, being the boundary of this German possession and the Belgian Congo. Rubber and coffee plantations have been laid out, particularly at the western end of the railroad line; and from the great native pa.s.senger traffic, and bringing of supplies to these and to races far beyond the western terminus, good returns are a.s.sured. The area of this German possession is 384,000 square miles.

Unlike Beira, motor cars and bicycles were in evidence in Dar-es-Salaam, but no horses were to be seen, as in Beira. In the South African notes mention was made of the miserable breed of horse in Durban, also of horses being unable to live in some parts of that country. So, on the East Coast of Africa, where horses cannot live, and the life of Europeans is measured by but a short number of years, there must be something radically wrong with the climate.

Numerous fresh earth mounds may be seen in graveyards in the settlements along the East Coast. Fat men are scarce in these districts, all having a slender frame and veiny, bleached appearance, with drooping eyelids. Malarial and black-water fever are prevalent in Dar-es-Salaam. White clothes, white cloth or skin shoes, and white helmets are worn. This place has a European population of 1,000, most of them government employes. The native population is 25,000.

Natives build their own huts, which are of mud, covered with cocoanut leaves, and settlements are located some distance from town.

The sight of native women prisoners, with a band of iron around the neck and a chain fastened to the first band, then to the second, and so on, according to the number of prisoners, seemed pretty severe punishment--too barbarous even for blacks. This is what we saw in Dar-es-Salaam. Six or eight men and women are generally chained together. The steel collar or band, an inch and a half wide, opens and closes with a clasp, and the length of the chain from band to band is between two and three feet. Groups of women were seen carrying water on their heads in five-gallon oil-cans. The prisoners have to move at the same time, as the chain is connected with the iron band around each neck. The band and chain is a relic of slavery days, as we are at a noted slave-trading center.

This German capital is the prettiest town on the East Coast of Africa.

It is smart in appearance, has an electric light plant and good drives. Cocoanut palms grow all around, and the fragrance from the frangi-pangi flower heavily perfumes the atmosphere and adds much to the attractiveness of that center. Germany acquired this possession in 1886.

"Should you wear your street dress ash.o.r.e, instead of the short skirt, it may 'let the cat out of the bag,' and then we would have to pay the full fare," one of our lady pa.s.sengers cautioned her daughter who wished to join other travelers making ready to leave the ship to take a look at the German colony capital. Mother and daughter embarked at Lourenzo Marques, having come from the Transvaal, their destination being Bombay, India. The daughter, twenty, being slightly under medium size, did not look her age. When booking their pa.s.sage she was represented as "fifteen," any one of that age or under being carried for half rate. Short skirts, extending to just below the knees, were worn as an age "decoy" to this point of the journey. Though Miss Agnes bravely nursed her sheepishness, evoked by wearing "kid clothes" as she termed the "disguise," aboard ship, she drew the line at appearing "in public" in them. The captain having been observed leaving the vessel in his launch, Agnes, learning of this, hurriedly donned a "woman's" dress, joined the sightseeing party ash.o.r.e, and took the chance of being detected. Returning to the ship before the skipper, she quickly changed street clothes to the "kid" garb, breaking her suspense, none of the officers being any the wiser, and resumed the journey to Bombay, as she started from the Portuguese port--a combination of woman-juvenile-half-fare pa.s.senger.

Zanzibar, on Zanzibar Island, is located 40 miles from Dar-es-Salaam.

All the way from Durban we had been getting breaths of Asia, but Zanzibar is like an Asia in Africa. With perhaps the exception of Cairo and Alexandria, Egypt, Zanzibar is the largest place on the African continent. Out of a mixed population, composed of Arabs, Mohammedans, Hindus, Singhalese, Goanese, Parsis and natives--negroes-- only 500 are whites. Though the city was inhabited as early as the tenth century, their first sultan did not begin to reign until 1741.

Mohammedan women--on whose features no one but husband or family are permitted to set eyes--walking about with their faces covered in a cloth having eye-holes cut out; palanquins, enclosed boxes accommodating one person, are carried by two natives, one on each end of a pole, on which the box rests, these containing the wives of Arabs and Mohammedans; native women, ever ready to imitate the clothing of others, are seen entirely covered in black cloth, save for the eye-holes in their face coverings; these dark, mysterious, and weird creatures stalk about the alleyways of Zanzibar during the day and the night hours. The pale face of the Parsi woman, the Hindu woman with ornaments in her nostrils, on her ears, arms, hands and toes, and the gewgaws worn by native women, are seen at every turn. The Parsi, with his cuff-like cap; the Singhalese with his long, oily hair and amber haircomb; the Hindu, in his big, cloth head-covering; the bewhiskered Arab, wearing a fez, and the black, woolly bare head of the native, form an unusual scene on entering the city of Zanzibar. The Waswahili are the natives, and the native language of the island, German-East Africa, and British-East Africa is the Kiswahili.

Zanzibar, comprising the island of Pemba, 40 miles to the north, is a British possession. The island of Zanzibar is 50 miles in length and 20 miles wide. These islands are presided over by a Sultan, Seyid Khalifa bin Harub, but his ruling has to be approved by a British governor-general. He is sultan in name only, but his salary is $60,000 a year. The national flag is of a plain red color. The Sultan received his education in England.

The streets of the city are so narrow in some instances that both sides can almost be touched by the hands extended. Houses are built of brick and cement, and one to three stories in height. A couple of goats are usually found tied in front of buildings, and often a donkey may be seen munching a whisk of gra.s.s while standing on the steps of a home. A stranger able to find his way about Zanzibar must have a pretty level head. On entering a street, one has no a.s.surance that the street has an opening, for they often end in a solid building across--a "blind alley." Doors to the buildings are heavy enough for a jail, and the alleys, veiled women, black and suspicious-looking men, wearing sandals and strange head-coverings, bespeak Asia. Europeans live in another section.

A very good hospital is pointed out to the visitor, which indicates in that part of the world a very large graveyard, Zanzibar being regularly visited with smallpox, while malarial fever is prevalent and bubonic plague and leprosy common.

Up to 1897 Zanzibar was one of the most noted slave-trading centers in the world. Slaves shipped from that place numbered from 6,000 to 10,000 a year. The best building in the city is the Sultan's palace, but this has recently been converted into an office building for Protectorate officials; the Sultan's harem building, located in a city park, is now used as a place of amus.e.m.e.nt; but, as Arabs own most of the land, and also the property in the city, Zanzibar will always remain as it is.

A distance of seven miles, from the city to Bu-bu-bu, comprises the railway system of Zanzibar. The fare is 32 cents first-cla.s.s and 16 cents second-cla.s.s, the run taking 45 minutes. Pa.s.sing through a street where almost everything is sold--an Indian bazaar--one may reach out of the window of the railway coach and pull off wearing apparel, shoes, etc., that are displayed on rope lines outside of the buildings on the narrow street. Through such places the train seems to be walled in by blacks on both sides.

The rupee is in use in Zanzibar, along the coast places, and in the interior in that section of the African continent. The value of the rupee in American money is 32 cents, and the anna two cents. The anna piece is nickel, with a hole in the center, and almost every one carries these on a string. It is certainly odd to see a man pull from his pocket a string about a foot or eighteen inches in length and take from it one to half a dozen annas with bored-out centers.

America was the first country to establish a consulate in Zanzibar, in 1836. The natives then took a fancy to our bright-colored calico, which they wear to-day, though close compet.i.tion for that trade has taken place through other nations importing a similar cla.s.s of goods.

The sun is very hot here, and flowers are temporarily faded by 10 o'clock in the morning. Should a white person walk a few feet in the sun bare-headed he would be very apt to fall from sunstroke.

The date palm, a tree 20 to 30 feet high, with a bare trunk, as the cocoanut palm, but with smaller limbs and a more spreading top, grows here. It produces its fruit in bunches, similar to the banana plant.

Some of the cl.u.s.ters of dates depending from the top will half fill a barrel. A wide leaf grows from the stem, to which the dates grow, and in time, the leaf dies and then bends. It happens, though, that when it bends it covers and thus protects the large cl.u.s.ter of fruit.

Zanzibar oranges are said to be the sweetest that grow.

One may hear a few taps on a drum at a corner of an alley in the native quarter any time--the signal that there will be a dance that evening.

Automobiles are seen about the city, and an electric light plant and a wireless station are among the limited public utilities.

Clove and cocoanut plantations are the princ.i.p.al industries of Zanzibar. The clove tree is of the myrtle family, and the older it grows the greater the yield. Practically all the cloves used in the world come from the islands of Pemba and Zanzibar. There are sent to the United States from these islands from 2,000,000 to 3,000,000 pounds of cloves each year. The output for a year is from 15,000,000 to 20,000,000 pounds. It requires 10 years' time from planting before the clove tree blossoms. The Island of Pemba produces 75 per cent. of a year's crop. A hurricane blew down the trees growing on Zanzibar island in 1872, while those on Pemba island were not disturbed. The Pemba trees are 100 years old, those of Zanzibar island only 50 years old. They are planted 24 feet apart each way, and 100 grow on an acre.

The clove of commerce is the bud of the clove tree, picked before the petals open. The clove we use would be the seed of the clove tree were the petals allowed to expand. The buds are picked by natives, whose carelessness often destroys bearing limbs. When picked, the buds are placed on matting, and remain exposed to the sun for three days, when they become dried. A clove tree buds for three months, so this is the clove-bud picking period. The tree grows to a height of 30 feet, is bushy, with small limbs, on all of which buds grow. The leaf of the clove tree resembles that of the English poplar. The buds are more numerous on the limbs at intervals of four and five years than during the years between. A tree produces from five to seven pounds a year, and the price of cloves range from 16 to 20 cents a pound. Growers have to pay a tax to the government of 25 per cent. of their yield.

When leaving Durban I provided myself with a draft for $900 on a bank in Bombay, India, and $50 in cash. From the pa.s.sengers I heard so many interesting things about British East Africa that I decided to go inland from Mombasa, if I could raise the necessary money on the Bombay draft. Taking my pa.s.sport for identification, I learned from a banker in Zanzibar that he could not advance money on the draft, but that by cancelling the Durban draft and issuing a new one on the same bank in Bombay he could provide me with any funds needed. I agreed to that. On receiving the new draft I learned that $15 had been taken for exchange.

Tanga, German East Africa, a sea junction for that part of Africa, was our next stop. Pa.s.sengers going to Europe from Durban and other points along the East coast trans-ship to the European liners going through the Suez Ca.n.a.l and Port Said.

A railway from this place pushes westward over 200 miles to the base of Mount Kilimanjaro, which rises to a height of over 19,000 feet.

Tanga is another place that puts one in mind of a snake charming a bird and then devouring it. Cocoanut palms grow everywhere, and the pretty trees, frangi-pangi and flowers are enough to lure any one there. Yet a walk to the graveyard, after observing the large number of unsodded mounds for a population of 500, would soon alter one's opinion. The native population is 12,000.

One of the pa.s.sengers made up his mind not to shave during the voyage from Durban to London. The Indian barber is the most useful tradesman the world over. He carries his kit with him, and is always prowling about for work. He will shave a man standing up or lying down; in the rain or in the sun; in bed or on the roof of a house--any time, any way, or any place an Indian barber will do his work. We no sooner stepped on sh.o.r.e than the unshaven pa.s.senger was picked out as a possible "job," and was shadowed by the black knights of the razor until he returned to the ship.

Rubber plantations are numerous in this section of the colony, and copra is another of the exports.

The horse of the East Coast of Africa is really the negro. Everything is moved on two-wheeled trucks, pushed or pulled with ropes by natives. No cattle or oxen were seen, so it is fair to conclude that neither cattle nor horses can live along this section of the coast.

Any one can form an idea of what a sickly country it must be for human beings where cattle and horses cannot exist. Fever runs down the natives, also, but not in the same proportion as the whites.

"The last time we were in Tanga," the ship's doctor remarked on sailing, "I suffered terribly from jumping toothache. Fortunate in being in a port where there was a dentist, I called at his office and had it pulled. Asking him his charge, the dentist replied, 'Seventy-five rupees' ($25)." When my eyes again settled in their sockets, having bulged at mention of such a fee for pulling a tooth, the doctor, in answer to a question if he did not consider the dentist's charge exorbitant, said he was under that impression at the time, but was not so sure of it now. "Only a handful of Europeans live here," he philosophically went on to explain why he changed his impression from a positive to an uncertain one, "and fever is bad. The dentist--the only one within hundreds of miles--as most persons who come to the tropics, aims at making enough money in a few years, before fever robs him of his health, to take things easy for a while afterward in a good climate. Life, with a thumping tooth and a pumpkin-like face, was misery to me; I could not pull my tooth, and antidotes failed to a.s.suage the pain it caused. So, considering the fee from various angles, I would not feel quite justified in charging the dentist with unprofessional conduct." Notwithstanding the doctor's reconciliation to the dentist's charge, it would seem he "paid for it through the nose," to use a British term for "stung," the standard rate in Africa for placing a tooth in a plate, whether one or sixteen, being only $5 each.

CHAPTER III

Mombasa, British-East Africa, was not reached until 19 days after sailing from Durban, although we traveled but 2,000 miles. It was a very interesting trip, though, along the East Coast, as the ship stopped so often to unload and take on cargo, that pa.s.sengers obtained a fair idea of that part of the world.

Back in the early '80's England and Germany resorted to every diplomatic device to acquire that great tract of country now known as German East Africa and British East Africa. The Sultan of Zanzibar exercised control of a strip of the coastline, ten miles deep, north of Portuguese East Africa to Italian Somaliland, which naturally blocked the development of the interior. The claims of the two great countries were finally settled by Germany getting the southern part of the domain and England the northern part. The Sultan of Zanzibar still claims sovereignty of the ten-mile sh.o.r.e strip of the Indian Ocean, but in reality it is gone from him. The authentic history of East Africa commences in 1498, when Vasco da Gama, the Portuguese explorer, anch.o.r.ed off Mombasa.

Mombasa, located on Mombasa Island, is the chief seaport on the East Coast north of Durban and Lourenzo Marques. It has had a checkered career, being held at various times by Persians, Arabs, Egyptians, Portuguese and British. To-day the blacks number 30,000 and the whites about 500. Like most tropical places, the surroundings are naturally attractive, but fever is always present, and bubonic plague or smallpox may break out at any moment.

Three years is the limit of residence here for a European. Some part of the human system is bound to give way if one does not leave before the three-year period expires. Two and a half years' residence and six months' vacation in Europe is the usual custom. The tropical climate seems to center its force on the muscles of the stomach, and this is one reason why every one wears flannel bands. Most of the business men are Asiatics. Natives take the place of horses here also, goods being moved on trucks pushed and pulled by black men. England's solid system of doing things is in evidence at every turn--notably in the good, clean streets, parks and docks.

Before the railroad was pushed to the eastern sh.o.r.e of Victoria Nyanza the daring Europeans of early days had to travel four months before the western terminus was reached. Nowadays two days' travel by rail will take one into the heart of Africa. The country then, as it is more or less to-day, was alive with ferocious beasts, and some of the native tribes were warlike. During the winter season there is no rain for a period of from four to six months. Only men of iron would tackle such a journey. The Arabs, however, had preceded the whites.

On the Uganda Railway we boarded a train for Nairobi. For some distance the road pa.s.sed through a tropical growth, when we entered the Taru Desert. Small trees of dense and th.o.r.n.y spreading limbs grow on this land. The lower limbs are brashy and bare of bark, and the ones above are leafless and gnarled, although alive. The Taru Desert is a leafless jungle. No bird life was apparent save vultures, whose repulsive appearance seemed in keeping with the growth on which they rested. Fever trees were mentioned earlier in this Leg, and those growing here suggested the possibility of their exuding something noxious--if not odors leading to some form of fever, then, perhaps, to stomach trouble.

A lone native, and often groups, were seen, with only a clout about the loins, carrying a long pole with a spear fixed to the end, at the station or traversing a native path leading somewhere, as there were no signs of habitation near the railway. Erect, slender, bareheaded and barefooted, he looked every inch the savage warrior one reads about.

The track is meter gauge, three feet six inches, and the railway coaches, of two compartments, are small, each compartment accommodating six persons, 12 in all. The South African system--the best in the world--of providing free sleeping berths for pa.s.sengers, has been adopted by the Uganda Railway Company. Four berths are provided in each compartment, but no bedding is furnished. Breakfast costs 32 cents, and luncheon and dinner 50 cents. Railway fare is only two cents a mile, and the speed 14 miles an hour.

"Dak bungalow" proved a new building term to us, and another was the "G.o.down." The dak bungalow serves the purpose of a hotel and is located at stations. These were built by the railway company for the convenience of pa.s.sengers living in isolated places who used a certain station when traveling. The bungalow, which may be used one night free of charge, is provided with spring beds, but no bedding. The G.o.down is a freight shed--any building where goods or cargo are stored is called a G.o.down. Both terms are Asiatic. It would be a risky undertaking to start through some parts of that country at night, as many sections are infested with wild beasts. The agents at the stations were Indians.

We were traveling over a section of country that had not been refreshed with rain for months. The soil being reddish, pa.s.sengers'

clothes resembled those worn by workers in a red brickyard.

Conversations that had taken place between travelers during the voyage along the East Coast, of big game being seen within easy view of the railway in these parts, which swayed me from my original route at Zanzibar, were foremost in my mind at this point. Skeptical of feasting the eye on herds of zebra, gazelle, wildebeeste, even giraffe, and other game, my doubts were dispelled when a pa.s.senger remarked: