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To the Gold Coast for Gold

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TO THE GOLD COAST FOR GOLD

_A Personal Narrative_

BY Richard F. Burton AND Verney Lovett Cameron

In Two Volumes--Vol. I.



TO OUR EXCELLENT FRIEND

JAMES IRVINE

(OF LIVERPOOL, F.R.G.S, F.S.A, &C.)

WE INSCRIBE THESE PAGES AS A TOKEN OF OUR APPRECIATION AND ADMIRATION
FOR HIS COURAGE AND ENERGY IN OPENING AND WORKING THE GOLDEN LANDS OF
WESTERN AFRICA



_'Much have I travelled in the realms of gold'_

SHAKESPEARE



PREFACE.

The following extract from 'Wanderings in West Africa,' a book which I
wrote in 1862 and published (anonymously) in 1863, will best explain the
reasons which lately sent me to Western Africa:--

In several countries, for instance, Dinkira, Tueful, Wásá (Wassaw), and
especially Akim, the hill-region lying north of Accra, the people are
still active in digging gold. The pits, varying from two to three feet
in diameter, and from twelve to fifty deep (eighty feet is the extreme),
are often so near the roads that loss of life has been the
result. 'Shoring up' being little known, the miners are not unfrequently
buried alive. The stuff is drawn up by ropes in clay pots, or
calabashes, and thus a workman at the bottom widens the pit to a
pyriform shape; tunnelling, however, is unknown. The excavated earth is
carried down to be washed. Besides sinking these holes, they pan in the
beds of rivers, and in places collect quartz, which is roughly pounded.

They (the natives) often refuse to dig deeper than the chin, for fear of
the earth 'caving in;' and, quartz-crushing and the use of quicksilver
being unknown, they will not wash unless the gold 'show colour' to the
naked eye.

As we advance northwards from the Gold Coast the yield becomes
richer....

It is becoming evident that Africa will one day equal half-a-dozen
Californias....

Will our grandsons believe in these times ... that this Ophir--that
this California, where every river is a Tmolus and a Pactolus, every
hillock is a gold-field--does not contain a cradle, a puddling-machine,
a quartz-crusher, a pound of mercury? That half the washings are wasted
because quicksilver is unknown? That whilst convict labour is
attainable, not a company has been formed, not a surveyor has been sent
out? I exclaim with Dominie Sampson--'Pro-di-gious!'

Western Africa was the first field that supplied the precious metal to
mediaeval Europe. The French claim to have imported it from Elmina as
early as A.D. 1382. In 1442 Gonçales Baldeza returned from his second
voyage to the regions about Bojador, bringing with him the first gold.
Presently a company was formed for the purpose of carrying on the
gold-trade between Portugal and Africa. Its leading men were the
navigators Lanzarote and Gilianez, and Prince Henry 'the Navigator' did
not disdain to become a member. In 1471 João de Santarem and Pedro
Escobar reached a place on the Gold Coast to which, from the abundance
of gold found there, they gave the name of 'São Jorje da Mina,' the
present Elmina. After this a flood of gold poured into the lap of
Europe; and at last, cupidity having mastered terror of the Papal Bull,
which assigned to Portugal an exclusive right to the Eastern Hemisphere,
English, French, and Dutch adventurers hastened to share the spoils.

For long years my words fell upon flat ears. Presently the Ashanti war
of 1873-74 brought the subject before the public. The Protectorate was
overrun by British officers, and their reports and itineraries never
failed to contain, with a marvellous unanimity of iteration, the magic
word--Gold.

The fraction of country, twenty-six miles of seaboard out of two
hundred, by a depth of sixty--in fact, the valley of the Ancobra
River--now (early 1882) contains five working companies. Upwards of
seventy concessions, to my knowledge, have been obtained from native
owners, and many more are spoken of. In fact, development has at length
begun, and the line of progress is clearly traced.

At Madeira I was joined (January 8, 1882) by Captain Cameron, R.N.,
C.B., &c. Our object was to explore the so-called Kong Mountains, which
of late years have become _quasi_-mythical. He came out admirably
equipped; nor was I less prepared. But inevitable business had delayed
us both, and we landed on the Gold Coast at the end of January instead
of early October. The hot-dry season had set in with a heat and a
drought unknown for years; the climate was exceptionally trying, and all
experts predicted early and violent rains. Finally, we found so much to
do upon the Ancobra River that we had no time for exploration. Geography
is good, but Gold is better.

In this joint book my energetic and hard-working friend and
fellow-traveller has described the five working mines which I was unable
to visit. He has also made an excellent route-survey of the country,
corrected by many and careful astronomical observations. It is curious
to compare his work with the sketches of previous observers, Jeekel,
Wyatt, Bonnat, and Dahse. To my companion's industry also are mainly due
our collections of natural history.

We are answerable only for our own, not for each other's statements. As
regards my part, I have described the Gold-land as minutely as possible,
despite the many and obvious disadvantages of the 'photographic style.'
Indeed, we travellers often find ourselves in a serious dilemma. If we
do not draw our landscapes somewhat in pre-Raphaelite fashion, they do
not impress the reader; if we do, critics tell us that they are
wearisome _longueurs,_ and that the half would be better than the
whole. The latter alternative must often be risked, especially in
writing about a country where many at home have friends and
relatives. Of course they desire to have as much detail about it as
possible; hence the reader will probably pardon my 'curiosity.'

The Appendix discusses at some length the various objections made to the
Gold Coast mines by the public, which suffers equally from the 'bull'
and the 'bear' and from the wild rumours set afloat by those not
interested in the speculation. I first dispose of the dangers menaced by
Ashanti invasions. The second number notices the threatened
labour-famine, and shows how immigration of Chinese, of coolies, and of
Zanzibar-men will, when wanted, supply not only the Gold Coast, but also
the whole of our unhappy West African stations, miscalled colonies,
which are now starving for lack of hands. The third briefly sketches the
history of the Gold-trade in the north-western section of the Dark
Continent, discusses the position and the connections of the auriferous
Kong Mountains, and suggests the easiest system of 'getting' the
precious metal. This is by shallow working, by washing, and by the
'hydraulicking' which I had studied in California. The earlier miners
have, it is believed, begun at the wrong end with deep workings, shafts,
and tunnels; with quartz-crushers, stamps, and heavy and expensive
machinery, when flumes and force-pumps would have cost less and brought
more. Our observations and deductions, drawn from a section of coast,
will apply if true, as I believe they are, to the whole region between
the Assini and the Volta Rivers.

I went to the Gold Coast with small expectations. I found the Wásá
(Wassaw) country, Ancobra section, far richer than the most glowing
descriptions had represented it. Gold and other metals are there in
abundance, and there are good signs of diamond, ruby, and sapphire.

Remains to be seen if England has still honesty and public spirit enough
to work this old-new California as it should be worked. I will answer
for its success if the workers will avoid over-exclusiveness, undue
jealousy and rivalry, stockjobbing, and the rings of 'guinea-pigs' and
'guinea-worms.'

RICHARD F. BURTON.




CONTENTS OF THE FIRST VOLUME.


CHAPTER

I. PRELIMINARY: TRIESTE TO LISBON

II. FROM LISBON TO MADEIRA

III. A FORTNIGHT AT MADEIRA

IV. MADEIRA _(continued)_--CHRISTMAS--SMALL
INDUSTRIES--WINE--DEPARTURE FOR TENERIFE

V. TO TENERIFE, LA LAGUNA, AND OROTAVA

VI. THE ROUTINE ASCENT OF MOUNT ATLAS, THE 'PIKE' OF TENERIFE

VII. THE SPANISH ACCOUNT OF THE REPULSE OF NELSON FROM
SANTA CRUZ DE TENERIFE

VIII. TO GRAND CANARY--LAS PALMAS, THE CAPITAL

IX. THE COCHINEAL--THE 'GALLO'--CANARY 'SACK'--ADIEU TO THE CANARIES

X. THE RUINED RIVER--PORT AND THE TATTERED FLAG

XI. SIERRA LEONE: THE CHANGE FOR THE BETTER



TO THE GOLD COAST FOR GOLD.


CHAPTER I.

PRELIMINARY: TRIESTE TO LISBON.

The glory of an explorer, I need hardly say, results not so much from
the extent, or the marvels of his explorations, as from the consequences
to which they lead. Judged by this test, my little list of discoveries
has not been unfavoured of fortune. Where two purblind fever-stricken
men plodded painfully through fetid swamp and fiery thorn-bush over the
Zanzibar-Tanganyika track, mission-houses and schools may now be
numbered by the dozen. Missionaries bring consuls, and consuls bring
commerce and colonisation. On the Gold Coast of Western Africa, whence
came the good old 'guinea,' not a washing-cradle, not a pound of
quicksilver was to be found in 1862; in 1882 five mining companies are
at work; and in 1892 there will be as many score.

I had long and curiously watched from afar the movement of the Golden
Land, our long-neglected El Dorado, before the opportunity of a revisit
presented itself. At last, in the autumn of 1881, Mr. James Irvine, of
Liverpool, formerly of the West African 'Oil-rivers,' and now a large
mine-owner in the Gulf of Guinea, proposed to me a tour with the object
of inspecting his concessions, and I proposed to myself a journey of
exploration inland. The Foreign Office liberally gave me leave to escape
the winter of Trieste, where the ferocious Bora (nor'-nor'-easter) wages
eternal war with the depressing and distressing Scirocco, or
south-easter. Some One marvelled aloud and said, 'You are certainly the
first that ever applied to seek health in the "genial and congenial
climate" of the West African Coast.' But then Some One had not realised
the horrors of January and February at the storm-beaten head of the ever
unquiet Adriatic.

Thus it happened that on November 18,1881, after many adieux and _au
revoirs,_ I found myself on board the Cunard s.s. _Demerara_
(Captain C. Jones), bound for 'Gib.' My wife was to accompany me as far
as Hungarian Fiume.

The Cunard route to 'Gib' is decidedly roundabout. We began with a run
to Venice, usually six hours from the Vice-Queen of the Adriatic: it was
prolonged to double by the thick and clinging mist-fog. The sea-city was
enjoying her usual lethargy of repose after the excitement of the
'geographical Carnival,' as we called the farcical Congress of last
September. She is essentially a summering place. Her winter is
miserable, neither city nor houses being built for any but the finest of
fine weather; her 'society'-season lasts only four months from
St. Stephen's Day; her traveller-seasons are spring and autumn. We found
all our friends either in bed with bad colds, or on the wing for England
and elsewhere; we inhaled a _quant. suff._ of choking vapour, even
in the comfortable Britannia Hotel; and, on the morning of the 23rd, we
awoke to find ourselves moored alongside of the new warehouses on the
new port of Hungarian, or rather Croatian, Fiume.

Fiume had made prodigious strides since I last saw her in 1878; and she
is gradually taking the wind out of the sails of her sister-rival. While
old Tergeste wastes time and trouble upon futile questions of policy,
and angry contrasts between Germans and Slavs, and Italians and
Triestines, Fiume looks to the main chance. The neat, clean, and
well-watered little harbour-city may be called a two-dinner-a-day place,
so profuse is her hospitality to strangers. Here, too, we once more
enjoyed her glorious outlook, the warm winter sun gilding the
snowy-silvery head of Monte Maggiore and raining light and life upon the
indigo-tinted waters of Fiume Bay. Next to Naples, I know nothing in
Europe more beautiful than this ill-named Quarnero. We saw a shot or so
of the far-famed Whitehead torpedo, which now makes twenty-one miles an
hour; and on Nov. 25 we began to run down the Gulf _en route_ for
Patras.

It was a pleasure to emerge from the stern and gloomy Adriatic; and
nothing could be more lovely than the first evening amongst the Ionian
Islands. To port, backed by the bold heights of the Grecian sea-range,
lay the hoary mount, and the red cliffs, 780 feet high, of Sappho's
Leap, a never-forgotten memory. Starboard rose bleak Ithaca, fronting
the black mountain of Cephalonia, now bald and bare, but clothed with
dark forests till these were burnt down by some mischievous
malignant. Whatever of sterility deformed the scene lay robed under a
glory of colour painted with perfect beauty by the last smile of the
sun. Earth and air and sea showed every variety of the chromatic scale,
especially of rose-tints, from the tenderest morning blush of virgin
snow to the vinous evening flush upon the lowlands washed by the purple
wave. The pure translucent vault never ceased to shift its
chameleon-like hues, that ranged between the diaphanous azure of the
zenith and the faintest rainbow green, a border-land where blue and
yellow met and parted. The air felt soft and balmy; a holy calm was on
the face of creation; all looked delicious after the rude north, and we
acknowledged once more that life was worth living.

Patras also has greatly improved since I last saw her in 1872. The
malaria-swamps to the north and south of the town have been drained and
are being warped up: the 'never-failing succession of aguish fevers'
will presently fade out of the guide-books. A macadamised boulevard has
been built, and a breakwater is building. The once desert square,
'Georgios A',' has been planted with trees, which should be Eucalyptus;
and adorned with two French statues of bronze which harmonise admirably
with the surroundings. The thoroughfares are still Sloughs of Despond
after rain, and gridirons of St. Laurence in dusty summer; but there are
incipient symptoms of trottoirs. And throughout there is a disappearance
of the hovels which resembled Port Sa'id in her younger day, and a
notable substitution of tall solid houses.

All this has been brought about by 'fruit,' which in Patras means
currants; that is, 'Corinthian grapes.' The export this year is unusual,
110,000 tons, including the Morea and the Islands; and of this total
only 20,000 go to France for wine-making. It gives a surprising idea of
the Christmas plum-pudding manufacture. Patras also imports for all the
small adjacent places, inhabited by 'shaggy capotes.' And she will have
a fine time when that talented and energetic soldier, General Türr, whom
we last met at Venice, begins the 'piercing of the Isthmus.' _À
propos_ of which, one might suggest to Patras, with due respect, that
(politically speaking) 'honesty is the best policy.'

Being at Patras on St. Andrew's Day, with a Scotch demoiselle on board,
we could hardly but pilgrimage to the place of the Apostle's
martyrdom. Mrs. Wood kindly sent her daughters to do the honours.
Aghyos Andreas lies at the extreme south of the town on the system of
ruts, called a road, which conducts down-coast. The church is a long
yellow barn, fronting a cypress-grown cemetery, whose contents are being
transferred to the new extramural. A little finger of the holy man
reposes under a dwarf canopy in the south-eastern angle: his left arm is
preserved at Mount Athos in a silver reliquary, set with gems. Outside,
near the south-western corner, is the old well of Demeter (Ceres), which
has not lost its curative virtues by being baptised. You descend a dwarf
flight of brick steps to a mean shrine and portrait of the saint, and
remark the solid bases and the rude rubble arch of the pagan temple. A
fig-tree, under which the martyrdom took place, grew in the adjacent
court; it has long been cut down, probably for fuel.

The population of Patras still affords a fine study of the 'dirty
picturesque,' with clothes mostly home-made; sheepskin cloaks;
fustanellas or kilts, which contain a whole piece of calico; red
leggings, and the rudest of sandals; Turkish caps, and an occasional
pistol-belt. The Palikar still struts about in all his old bravery; and
the _bourgeois_ humbly imitates the dingy garb of Southern
Italy. The people have no taste for music, no regard for art, no respect
for antiquities, except for just as much as these will bring. They own
two, and only two, objects in life: firstly, to make money, and
secondly, to keep and not to spend it. But this dark picture has a
bright side. No race that I know is so greedy of education; the small
boys, instead of wending unwillingly to school, crowd the doors before
they are opened. Where this exceptional feeling is universal we may hope
for much.

The last evening at Patras showed us a beautiful view of what is here
called Parnassus (Parnassó), the tall bluff mountain up the Gulf, whose
snows at sunset glowed like a balass ruby. We left the Morea at 2
A.M. (December 2), and covered the fifty-two miles to Zante before
breakfast. There is, and ever has been, something peculiarly sympathetic
to me in the 'flower of the Levant.' 'Eh! 'tis a bonny, bonny place,'
repeatedly ejaculated our demoiselle. The city lies at the foot of the
grey cliffs, whose northern prolongation extends to the Akroteri, or
Lighthouse Point. A fine quay, the Strada Marina, has been opened during
the last six years along the northern sea-front, where the arcades
suggest those of Chester. It is being prolonged southwards to the old
quarantine-ground and the modern prison, which rests upon the skirts of
the remarkable Skopo, the Prospect Mountain, 1,489 feet high. This
feature, which first shows itself to mariners approaching Zakynthos from
north or from south, has a saddle-back sky-line, with a knob of
limestone shaped like a Turkish pommel and sheltering its monastery,
Panaghia of Skopo, alias Our Lady of the Look-out. Below it appears
another and a similar outcrop near a white patch which has suggested
marble-quarrying; and the northern flank is dotted with farmhouses and
villas. The dwarf breakwater, so easily prolonged over the shallows, has
not been improved; but at its base rises a brand-new opera-house, big
enough for a first-rate city. Similarly at Barletta they raised a loan
to build a mole and they built a theatre. Unlike Patras, Zante long had
the advantage of Italian and then of English rule; and the citizens care
for music more than for transformation-scenes. The Palikar element also
is notably absent; and the soldiers are in uniform, not in half-uniform
and half-brigand attire. I missed the British flag once so conspicuous
upon the southern round tower of the castle, where in days, or rather
nights, of old I had spent not a few jolly hours; but I heard with
pleasure that it is proposed to make a _haute-ville_ of the now
deserted and crumbling triangle, a _Sommerfrisch_ where the
parboiled citizens of Athens will find a splendid prospect and a cooling
sea-breeze.

Mr. E. Barff kindly accompanied us in the usual drive 'round the
Wrekin,' for which we may here read the 'wreck.' We set out along the
sea-flank of the Castle hill. This formation, once a regular hog's-back,
has been split by weather about the middle; and its southern end has
been shaken down by earthquakes, and carved by wind and rain into
precipices and pinnacles of crumbling sandstone, which form the 'Grey
Cliffs.' Having heard at Patras the worst accounts of Zante since it
passed under Greek rule, I was not a little surprised by the excellent
condition of the roads and the general look of prosperity.

Turning to the right we entered Mr. Barff's garden-house, where the
grounds were bright and beautiful with balsam and mignonette, dahlias
and cyclamens, chrysanthemums and oleanders, jasmine and double-violets,
orange-blossoms, and a perfect Gulistan of roses, roses of York and
Lancaster, white, pink, and purple, yellow and green--a perfumed spring
in dreary December. Laden with bouquets we again threaded the
olive-grounds, whose huge trunks are truly patriarchal, and saw basking
in the sun old Eumæus, the Swine-King, waiting upon his black and
bristly herd. The glimpse led to a characteristic tale. A wealthy Greek
merchant in London had made the most liberal offers to his brother, a
shepherd in the hills of Cephalonia; the latter returned his very best
thanks, but declared himself perfectly happy and unwilling to tempt
fortune by change of condition to England. Greece, it is evident, has
not ceased to breed 'wise men.'

We returned, _viâ_ the landward flank of the hog's-back, along the
fine plain ('O Kampos') bounded west by the range called after Mount
Meriy, the apex, rising 3,274 feet. Anglo-Zantiots fondly compare its
outline with the Jura's. The look of the rich lowlands, 'the vale,' as
our charts call it, suggested a river-valley, but river there is
none. Every nook and corner was under cultivation, and each
country-house had its chapel and its drying-ground for 'fruit,' level
yards now hidden under large-leaved daisies and wild flowers. We passed
through the Graetani village, whose tenants bear a bad name, and saw
none of the pretty faces for which Zante is famed. The sex was dressed
in dark jackets and petticoats _à l'italienne_; and the elders were
apparently employed in gathering 'bitter herbs,' dandelion and the wild
endive. Verily this is a frugal race.

The drive ended with passing up the Strada Larga, the inner High Street,
running parallel with the Marina. After Turkish fashion, trades flock
together, shoemakers to the south and vegetable-vendors to the
north. There are two good specimens of Venetian palazzetti, one
fantastic, the other classical; and there is a rough pavement, which is
still wanting in Patras. A visit to the silk-shop of Garafuglia
Papaiouanou was obligatory: here the golden-hued threads reminded me of
the Indian Tussur-moth. Also _de rigueur_ was the purchase of nougat
and raki, the local mandorlato and mastaché, almond-cake and
grape-spirit.

Zante appears to me an excellent home for a large family with a small
income. A single man lives at the best hotel (Nazionale) for forty-five
francs per week. A country-house with nine bedrooms, cellarage,
stabling, dog-house, orangery, and large garden, is to be had for
25_l._ a year. Fowls cost less than a franc; turkeys, if you do not
buy them from a shipchandler, two francs and a half. The strong and
sherry-flavoured white wine of Zante rarely exceeds three shillings the
gallon, sixpence a bottle. And other necessaries in the same proportion.

But, oh that St. Dionysius, patron saint of Zante, would teach his
_protégés_ a little of that old Persian wisdom which abhorred a lie
and its concomitants, cheating and mean trickery! The _Esmeralda_,
after two days and one night at Zante, was charged 15_l._, for
pilotage, when the captain piloted himself; for church, where there is
no parson; and for harbour dues where there is no harbour. It is almost
incredible that so sharp-witted a race can also be so short-sighted; so
wise about pennies, so foolish about pounds.

On Saturday we left Zante in the teeth of a fresh but purely local
north-easter, which whistled through the gear and hurled the spray high
up Cape Skinari. The result was, as the poet sings--

That peculiar up-and-down motion
Which belongs to the treacherous ocean.

Not without regret I saw the last of the memorious old castle and of
Skopo the picturesque. We ran along the western shore of Cephalonia, the
isle of three hundred villages: anyone passing this coast at once
understands how Greece produced so many and such excellent seamen. The
island was a charming spectacle, with its two culminations, Maraviglia
(3,311 ft.) and Elato (5,246 ft.), both capped by purple cloud; its
fertile slopes and its fissured bight, Argostoli Bay, running deep into
the land.

We fondly expected to pass the Messina Straits by daylight, and to cast
another glance upon old Etna, Scylla and Charybdis, the Liparis and
Stromboli. And all looked well, as about noon we were abreast of Cape
Spartivento, the 'Split-wind' which divides the mild northers and
southers of the Straits from the raw Boras and rotting Sciroccos of the
Adriatic. But presently a signal for succour was hoisted by a marvellous
old tub, a sailer-made-steamer, sans boats, sans gunwales; a something
whose dirt and general dilapidation suggested the Flying Dutchman. I
almost expected to see her drop out of form and crumble into dust as our
boys boarded her. The _America_, of Barletta, bound from Brindisi
to Genoa, had hurt her boilers. We hauled in her cable--these gentry
must never be trusted with a chance of slipping loose--and tugged her
into Messina, thereby losing a valuable day.

The famous Straits were almost a replica of Ionian Island scenery: the
shores of the Mediterranean, limestone and sandstone, with here and
there a volcanic patch, continually repeat themselves. After passing the
barren heel of the Boot and its stony big toe, the wady-streaked shores
become populous and well cultivated, while railway trains on either
side, island and continent, toss their snowy plumes in the pride of
civilisation. The ruined castles on the crags and the new villages on
the lowlands told their own story of Turkish and Algerine piracy, now
doomed to the limbo of things that were. In the evening we were safely
anchored within the zancle (sickle) of Messina-port, whose depth of
water and circular shape have suggested an old crater flooded. It was
Sunday, and we were greeted with the familiar sounds, the ringing of
cracked bells, the screaming of harsh, hoarse voices, a military band
and detached musical performances. The classical facade of the Marina,
through whose nineteen archways and upper parallelograms you catch a
vista of dark narrow wynd, contrasts curiously with Catania: the former
is a 'dicky,' a front hiding something unclean; while the latter is laid
out in Eastern style, where, for the best of reasons, the marble palace
hides behind a wall of mud. The only new features I noted were a metal
fish-market, engineer art which contrasts marvellously with the Ionic
pilasters and the solid ashlar of the 'dicky;' and, at the root of the
sickle, a new custom-house of six detached boxes, reddest-roofed and
whitest-walled, built to copy children's toy cottages. Croatian Fiume
would blush to own them. Of the general impurity of the town and of the
_bouquet de Messine_ the less said the better.

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