From
Their Own Accounts Of The Dreadful State Of Trade; And The Awful And
Unparalleled Series Of Losses They Have
Had, from the upsetting of
canoes, the raids and robberies made on them and their goods by
"those awful bush
Savages"; you would, if you were of a trustful
disposition, regard the black trader with an admiring awe as the man
who has at last solved the great commercial problem of how to keep a
shop and live by the loss. Nay, not only live, but build for
himself an equivalent to a palatial residence, and keep up, not only
it, but half a dozen wives, with a fine taste for dress every one of
them. I am not of a trustful disposition and I accept those
"losses" with a heavy discount, and know most of the rest of them
have come out of my friend the white trader's pockets. Still I can
never feel the righteous indignation that I ought to feel, when I
see the black trader "down in a seaport town with his Nancy," etc.,
as Sir W. H. S. Gilbert classically says, because I remember those
bush factories.
Mr. Glass, however, was not a trader who made a fortune by losing
those of other people; for he had been many years in the employ of
the firm. He had risen certainly to the high post and position of
charge of the Rembwe, but he was not down giddy-flying at Gaboon.
His accounts of his experiences when he had been many years ago away
up the still little known Nguni River, in a factory in touch with
the lively Bakele, then in a factory among Fans and Igalwa on the
Ogowe, and now among Fans and Skekiani on the Rembwe, were
fascinating, and told vividly of the joys of first starting a
factory in a wild district. The way in which your customers, for
the first month or so, enjoyed themselves by trying to frighten you,
the trader, out of your wits and goods, and into giving them fancy
prices for things you were trading in, and for things of no earthly
use to you, or any one else! The trader's existence during this
period is marked by every unpleasantness save dulness; from that he
is spared by the presence of a mob of noisy, dangerous, thieving
savages all over his place all day; invading his cook-house, to put
some nastiness into his food as a trade charm; helping themselves to
portable property at large; and making themselves at home to the
extent of sitting on his dining-table. At night those customers
proceed to sleep all over the premises, with a view to being on hand
to start shopping in the morning. Woe betide the trader if he gives
in to this, and tolerates the invasion, for there is no chance of
that house ever being his own again; and in addition to the local
flies, etc., on the table-cloth, he will always have several big
black gentlemen to share his meals. If he raises prices, to tide
over some extra row, he is a lost man; for the Africans can
understand prices going up, but never prices coming down; and time
being no object, they will hold back their trade. Then the district
is ruined, and the trader along with it, for he cannot raise the
price he gets for the things he buys.
What that trader has got to do, is to be a "Devil man." They always
kindly said they recognised me as one, which is a great compliment.
He must betray no weakness, but a character which I should describe
as a compound of the best parts of those of Cardinal Richelieu,
Brutus, Julius Caesar, Prince Metternich, and Mezzofanti, the latter
to carry on the native language part of the business; and he must
cast those customers out, not only from his house; but from his
yard; and adhere to the "No admittance except on business"
principle. This causes a good deal of unpleasantness, and the
trader's nights are now cheered by lively war-dances outside his
stockade; the accompanying songs advertising that the customers are
coming over the stockade to raid the store, and cut up the trader
"into bits like a fish." Sometimes they do come - and then - finish;
but usually they don't; and gradually settle down, and respect the
trader greatly as "a Devil man"; and do business on sound lines
during the day. Over the stockade at night, by ones and twos,
stealing, they will come to the end of the chapter.
Moonlight nights are fairly restful for the bush trader, but when it
is inky black, or pouring with rain, he has got to be very much out
and about, and particularly vigilant has he got to be on tornado
nights - a most uncomfortable sort of weather to attend to business
in, I assure you.
The factory at Agonjo was typical; the house is a fine specimen of
the Igalwa style of architecture; mounted on poles above the ground;
the space under the house being used as a store for rubber in
barrels, and ebony in billets; thereby enabling the trader to hover
over these precious possessions, sleeping and waking, like a sitting
hen over her eggs. Near to the house are the sleeping places for
the beach hands, and the cook-house. In front, in a position
commanded by the eye from the verandah, and well withdrawn from the
stockade, are great piles of billets of red bar wood. The whole of
the clean, sandy yard containing these things, and divers others, is
surrounded by a stout stockade, its main face to the river frontage,
the water at high tide lapping its base, and at low tide exposing in
front of it a shore of black slime. Although I cite this factory as
a typical factory of a black trader, it is a specimen of the highest
class, for, being in connection with Messrs.
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