Chapter XXIV: Return to the Seaboard

_Monday, February_ 15, 1864.—We rose at dawn, ready to depart. Our porters, however, were, as usual, dispersed about the town, or drinking the King’s rum, or quarrelling over his cowries, whilst the Reverend was settling the last accounts with Harpagon, our landlord. Vain were threats, the stick was vainer, as the carriers would only have run away. At last we collected a party of three hammock-men, and passed rapidly out of the red mud-walled box, where we had been closeted for fifty-six days. We felt some natural elation, although setting out upon what was fated to be the most comfortless march which I had made in Africa. The old Meu had been commanded by the King to supply us with bearers; but, not being bribed, he had found it better to forget the order. Everything, therefore, fell into the wildest confusion.

This time, by way of variety, we chose the Toffo, or western road, which anastomoses with the straighter main line at Hen-vi, and which, during the rains, is preferred by travellers.

The path, at first familiar to us, passed through the Uhun-jro market- place, and by the Komasi Palace, where our patience had been so often sorely tried; thence it struck into the open country. All was sunburnt, and, in many places, black with the fires whose smoke and glare, rolling up from the east and south-east, had not unfrequently, during the last fortnight, rendered my observations unreliable. At 8 A.M. we left on the right hand a bush market-place, under a shady tree, near some mat huts, scattered over the rough palm plantation—hereabouts the normal view. It rejoiced in the high-sounding name of Adanda-hogi-huto-gon,[267] namely, the place of the man that slew Adanda-hogi. We had no cowries wherewith to buy water; but the Sin-no in the fields readily gave us a draught in exchange for a cigar. Shortly afterwards we crossed a fiumara-bed, tending northwards: it is called Hun-to-nun, or canoe-water, and there are traditions that it once floated boats. The bed probably supplies the element in pot-holes at all seasons, and the ground on both sides is exceptionally stony. At 10 A.M., after 3h. 40m. (equal to ten miles) of “walking and tieing” our single hammock, we made Ahwansu-gon, the place of Ahwansu, a straggling village in the bush, landmarked from afar by magnificent bombax trees.

The servants had been sent on, after East-Indian fashion, the night before, to prepare breakfast.[268] Mensa Cook, two hulking school- pupils, Nahum and “Laja” (Elijah), with four slave boys, dashed by the King, were under charge of the bibacious Hinton. Uncontrollable as wild asses, they had walked off with only their own bags and boxes, and, reaching the first village, they had fallen asleep in some distant hut, where we found them with great difficulty, and roused them with greater. When in the anger of hunger we called for food, nothing was forthcoming. The better to abate that nuisance, the rascal Hinton was ordered to carry his effects himself—he preferred to remain three days behind until he could hire a porter.

We had nothing to do but to sit under the fig-trees that formed the market-place, and to watch the domesticalities of the scene. There was scant regard for apparently poor travellers. A witty Persian book, the “Al-Namah,” defines Al-Hich, or “The Nothing,” to be a Mogol walking (not riding) in India. The word is equally applicable to the “mean white” in Africa without a hammock, unless he is on fighting errand. Jenny Johnson, however, a Makhi woman, who had been brought up at S’a Leone, but who, having married and settled here, had forgotten nearly all her English, showed us the little civilities of offering maize and manioc. The supply of comestibles was limited to a goat, a few balls of Akansan, palm nuts, and water—the latter apparently the article most in demand. The dogs were almost all neutered, which must be as good a plan as the vow of perpetual celibacy for inducing a modified monomania.

After 3 P.M. the rest of the party straggled in, many with unshod feet lamed by the sun. Our score of laggard hammock-men came up sneakingly, and were threatened with docking of pay in case of their repeating the trick.[269] We could not help again remarking, with a cynical pleasure, that every rag, every empty bottle—even the broken drum and the cowrie- board belonging to the blacks who had been so long eating our salt, and to their master, had been brought on, whilst our five bags and boxes, the latter containing all our books and instruments, had been left behind. “It is all right,” quoth the Reverend, “I have left the things in charge of Yamojia, the eunuch, who will be here with them soon.” “But until every single item appears, O Reverend! we leave not this place.” Of course the eunuch joined us at nightfall without a load, and of course I also kept my word. Otherwise our properties might have been in Agbome to this day.

At 4 P.M., when the east wind had sunk the mercury to 85 deg. (F.), the market began to disperse, and the drums to appear. With the characteristic negro impudence, which ever pierces through Dahoman politeness, we were directed to remove from under our favourite tree, and naturally we did not. Presently a wild-goose line of old and ugly Nesu women, first three and then nine, defiled into the shady space, and danced round the fetish hut. The _prima donna_ was a very dark and ancient sybil, in a white night-cap; the greater number had red, white, or coloured fillets, and two wore broad brims, with coquettish little steeple crowns that contrasted oddly with the vast expanse of sooty cheek and jowl below. Five of the superiors held cow-tails, and their ornaments were armlets of single cowries, divided by black seeds or red beans, and long belts of similar material crossing their ample covered bosoms. Being engaged in a very serious and religious exercise, they averted their heads and ignored us like the younger and more shame-faced sort of nun. The vulgar made “Ububu,” knelt before them, and rubbed their foreheads against the reverend feet, whose owners bending low, passed the open right hand over the laical occiput, and thus frictioned a blessing.

We slept soundly through a fine moonlight night in the lukewarm air, with the satisfactory feelings of men suddenly transported from Newgate to a yacht in the Mediterranean.[270]

_Tuesday, February_ 16.—Having sent back, before midnight, the eunuch and my krumen, I was not surprised to see them again at dawn: all were pining for the coast. At 7 A.M. we set out and crossed the outskirts of the Agrimé, or Great Swamp, over land here boggy, there cultivated, and rich in pine apples and wild solaneæ. High grasses then led us to Gome, the usual bush village scattered on both sides of the path: the next, lying on our left, and distant but a few yards, was Sémén; whilst a third, to the right, was named Akiza’-agbamen, the Broom in the Swamp. We then fell into a depression, where cracked mud-flakes showed that water had been, and would soon be again there. A few yards of rising ground then introduced us, after a march of an hour, equal to four miles, to the De-nun or Frontier Custom-House, whose “captain” lay on his back in aristocratic repose, his head pressing a soft Palmyra log, and a child playing between his legs as he watched for want of other work, the ducks, the fowls, the poor devil-niggers and ourselves.

The Harmattan still swept the air clear of cloud, threatening a torrid sun, whilst the thermometer stood at 83 deg. (F.), and the aneroid showed a descent of more than 350 feet. We hurried our breakfast, the more energetically as no food was to be bought at the De-nun; and at 10 A.M. we addressed ourselves to the Swamp. In some places, the burnt grass and trees robbed the road of shade, and in others we were canopied over with verdure. The flooring, everywhere hardened by water, was bad for the bearers’ feet, but it was a decided improvement upon the Eastern or Agrime line. After forty minutes (equal to 1·50 mile), we made the Chito, a deep gully trending from east to west, with a southerly bend. The black earthy banks of this swamp-drain are steep, and 15 feet high. Slatey and almost stagnant water stands at the present season in pools at the bottom, whilst the remnants of a bridge show the current to be deep and strong during the rains. The Chito, under a dense avenue of giant trees, was as algid as it was impure, but a dip in Dahome is a rarity and a luxury.

After the Chito, the path became tortuous, and to the eastward there had been a huge bush-fire, whose effects, in smoke and radiation of heat, still lasted. The sun became fiery—so did the ground, undefended by vegetation, and a gadfly, like the Tsetse, revenged us upon the lazy and laggard bearers. At noon, after 1h. 40m. (equal to three miles) from the De-nun, a roar of voices arose from Koje, a well-known market place near the southern edge of the swamp. It was a round hole cut clear in the bush, paved with hard mud and dotted with sheds, and logs for sitting. The aneroid still showed only 350 feet below Agbome, but the thermometer, though the breeze was fine, had risen to 94 deg. (F.) in the shade. The business seemed to be brisk, and we bought some tolerable palm wine.

Leaving Koje at 12.30 P.M., along a similar but a straighter path, hedged in by the tallest grasses, we soon emerged, as tall single trees growing upon sandy ground informed us, from the Great Agrime Swamp. After an hour of gradual up-slope, we saw on our right or westward well wooded ridges and high broken ground rolling away towards the blue distance. The nearer surface was greener, and the palms were thicker than about Agbome. The beauty of the Toffo plateau has not been exaggerated. It is supposed to contain gold, and it is all gold. Unfortunately, it is in the vulture claw of Dahome, and the officials of the capital have mostly houses and grounds where their palm-oil is made.

According to the History, the “Tuffoes,” in the days of Agaja the Great, attacked, plundered, and murdered a peaceful caravan of Dahomans, passing through their lands. The merciless king justly attacked them, captured 1800 prisoners, and sold or sacrificed them all. In a foot-note we are informed “Tuffoe, Tafoe, or Tafu, is an inland country of the Gold Coast, nearly south-west of Abomy, ten or twelve leagues to the northward of Rio Grande, and at about sixty leagues, or six days’ journey, from Ardra.[271]” The tribe that inhabits it is called Aizoh, and is now blended with the Dahoman; and between them and Agbome I would place the “Croo-too-hoon-too” people of Mr. Dalzel. The last dissyllable is evidently a corruption of the “Hun-to” fiumara, which we crossed yesterday.

After 1h. 40m. (equal to four miles) we halted at the Toffo market- place, a few tattered sheds to the left of the path. Several of the morning’s _corvée_ were women, and they had lagged behind, footsore. Resolving, therefore, to halt, we walked for about half a mile to the town of Toffo, by a slow incline, on both sides of which rose dark palm trees, ruffed and sometimes double ruffed, with bright fern-tufts, and sheltering gay verdure, spangled with lilies. The settlement is the normal Dahoman, but comparatively clean and well built. The aneroid proved that we were but a hundred feet below Agbome, and though the thermometer was 99 deg. (F.), the wind was fresh and the air was elastic. I was visited by an old Hausa Moslem, whom the king had made chief of the Tokko village lying to the west. He brought his wife and his books, but, alas! he turned the latter upside down. The night was charming, and at 6 A.M. the mercury stood at 73 deg. (F.): it was our last experience of cool and dry skin. Adieu, “Sanitas!”

_Wednesday, February_ 17.—At 6 A.M. we left the fresh crisp air of Toffo. The bush path took a generally south-eastern direction, over ridgy ground, all ascents and descents. After about three miles, a plantation of palms and bananas led us to the Ajagbwe, a streamlet with sandy and pebbly bed, flowing westward, and not quite so deep as the Chito: it was a poor thing, but a pleasure to see. On the rising ground beyond it lay the settlement of Koli: we observed sundry aged and doubtless pious matrons on their knees at matins, before the fetish hut: unfortunately, for sentiment, they were also on their hands.

Beyond Koli, the bush again became dense, except where it had been cleared away for cultivation, and cardamoms everywhere appeared. The number of market people had made the path hard and slippery. At last a long descent led us, after two hours (equal to five miles), to the town of Hen-vi—Hold the Child—on the main road.

We had now returned to the climate of the plains: the thermometer showed, in the shade, 75 deg. (F.), and the aneroid 778 feet below Agbome. At Hen-vi the water was, as usual, vile, and two shillings were refused for the leanest of chickens. The road was crowded with soldiers hurrying up to the war, and there were many chain-gangs of unwilling men. Some of the passing caboceers attempted, but in vain, to seize our carriers, and even our hammock-bearers. The latter became every day more troublesome, and whenever they mutinied the Reverend begged a dollar and some rum to smooth their tempers. The huts, built at every hundred to two hundred yards for the late firing at Whydah, had almost all been burned down, and the villages were foul with fetish, dead dogs sacrificed for good luck, and poultry slain by order of Afa. We halted for so short a time at Allada, that we passed without knowing the Prince Chyudaton, who was marching northwards. I regretted thus losing the opportunity of having with him a few last words. The evening saw us at Azohwe where not a chicken was to be bought, and where only one old man was left to guard the women and children. What an opportunity to attack Whydah, or even Agbome!

_Thursday, February_ 18, 1864.—We slept in the open, through a fine cool and dewless night. Before dawn, the Reverend, greatly dejected, awoke us with the tidings that all Whydah had been burned down yesterday. Naturally believing about a quarter of what was told us, we mounted hammocks, and in hot haste hurried through Toli and Savi. Arrived at Sogro’s House, and just catching the morning sparkles of the sea, we saw at a glance that the damage had been extensive, and that the conflagration had not ceased. We wound south-westwards through the streets, where women were weeping, and carrying off their kit: as we approached the centre of danger we saw, at long intervals, men sitting upon their roofs with green boughs, to extinguish the sparks. Volumes of hot heavy smoke barred our road, and a crowd of natives opposed our passing through the Zobeme market, which was still a fire. We wound round by the north, avoiding as best could the burning poles lying on the ground, and the lighted straws that filled the air. All the circumspection was required: in these places the flames run with a horse’s speed.

We were happy to find the English Fort still standing, the inmates safe, and their property carried into the compound. The mulattoes were patrolling with drawn swords, to prevent plunder, and they had, we were told, exerted themselves to turn off the fire. But all went “hithering and thithering”; wherever a servant was ordered to do _this_, he forthwith did _that_; and my opinion was, that with the least change of wind the Fort would have inevitably been burned. The Whydahs afterwards declared that they had no idea why that house should have been the only building saved in the vicinity, and lest they might attempt to correct the exceptional nature of the phenomenon, I employed every wakeful hour at night in looking out with a loaded carbine.

The conflagration began, no one knows how, on February 17th, near the house of the late M. Josè D. Martinez: it was about noon, and the strong Harmattan had already lasted two days. The fire swept, in a broad straight band, from east to west. Sparing the northern quarter, it gutted the house of the Chacha de Souza, who, when informed of the calamity, nearly died with rage, like his brother chief. Of the French Factory, nothing was left but the slated and lime-washed frontage. The _gérant_ had prudently started all his gunpowder into the well, but the loss in palm oil and stores must have been heavy—men named 300,000 dollars.

Apparently extinguished before sunset on the 17th, the fire again broke out at 8 P.M. The worst reports spread through the town, and all looked for some terrible disaster. Again, at 10 on the next morning, about three hours before our arrival, it appeared in the very heart of the settlement, all about the English Fort, sweeping away the Zobeme bazár, and doing damage to the northwards of the yesterday’s line. Even the late Mr. Hutton’s quondam house was not spared, and it was “_murus proximus ardet_” with Mr. Bernasko’s homestead. These fires are common enough in Yoruba towns—Lagos, for instance, where want of space compels men to build closely—but three fires in three days wore a suspicious appearance. Those whose houses were first seen in flames were imprisoned at the Yevo-gan’s quarters, but they were not proved to be the real arsonists.[272]

According to the French missionaries, from sixty to eighty people lost their lives. Negro like, they watched the advancing flames incuriously till their roofs caught fire, when they would rush inside the house to carry off a cloth or a pipkin. Some two hundred were wounded, and two- thirds of the town appeared either burnt down or reduced to scorched clay-walls. This does not include the casualties amongst the slaves: many of the wretches were confined in barracoons, and there being no one to release them, they perished miserably. To make the confusion greater, the death of the Yevo-gan was rumoured,[273] and his successor the Prince, was, I have said, absent. Though the roads were at once stopped, many will fly from this modern Sodom and Gomorrah.

* * * * * *

I passed at Whydah a few quiet days, chiefly in the society of the French Mission. On February 23, 1864, tidings reached the fort that the King had set out on his campaign. Three days afterwards I transferred myself to H.M.S. Jaseur, Commander Grubbe, who had the pleasant prospect of a tour round the Oil Rivers. Mr. Cruikshank shipped on board his own vessel, H.M.S. Philomel, Commander Wildman. After the scenes and chances through which we had passed during the last ten weeks, I parted from him with regret.

“Enough! now turn from that polluted shore.”

[Footnote 267: Some of these names, ending in -gon, have an East-Indian twang; but it is an accidental and superficial resemblance between the Hindustani “gaon” (a village), and the Ffon “gon” (a place).]

[Footnote 268: In a previous page I have said that the negro is the best of slaves, and the worst of servants: this will illustrate what I mean.]

[Footnote 269: At Whydah I was obliged, in several cases, out of the two dozen that accompanied us, to carry out the threat. This is an unpleasant duty, which the traveller owes to those who may come after him. The African even thinks the last day’s good conduct enough to wipe away all his previous sins. It is well that he should learn his mistake. On this occasion the badly behaved were sent off campaigning without a present, whilst the others were liberally paid. I venture to say that the next visitor to Agbome will thank me for this severity.]

[Footnote 270: I would willingly have spent another month at Agbome; but all those around me were wild with impatience to escape, and the emotion is contagious.]

[Footnote 271: R. 34.]

[Footnote 272: In former days, according to Captain John Adams, the Dahomans, like the Fantis, always put to death the man in whose house a destructive fire first broke out.]

[Footnote 273: He soon recovered enough to summon me to his house, on the pretext that the King had appointed me governor of English Town. The invitation was declined—_not_ with thanks.]