Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1890-01-11
The AFRICAN ~ AFRICA.
He IL Not Always "a barbarian, but IL
Often Semi-CIyiIiEed.

Often Semi-CIyiIiEed.
MANY people" said DIR. T. II. Eddy
to a reporter Of tho st. Louis Republic,
think the African in Africa is a bar
barian, but while some of them are, the
majority of them are far from being so.
Stanley in his travels visited the very
worst classes on the Congo. They are
no criterions of the Mahometan negroes,
but quite the contrary. Africa contains
l30,O 00, 900 negro inhabitants outside OF
the Moors and people of the Arabic de-
scent. When say negroes l mean ma
tives with woolly hair. Woolly hair is
characteristic of the negro, but the fa4
hos and thick lips are only peculiar te
them. One of the finest nations
of Africa is the Foulah, which num-
Der about 80, 000,0 600 souls, and live
back Of Senegambia, occupying q cOun-
try 1000 miles north to south and l. 500
east TO west. These people are all Ma
hometans and write their own language
in Arabic characters, also speaking,
reading and writing Arabic. They are
black, with woolly hair, but have thin,
prominent noses and very thin lips. No
traveller has ever been IN their country
since 1850, and what / know OF them I
have learned from Foulahs whom / have
met on the coast They make their
own guns and gunpowder, and as fine
leather work as | ever saw. 1 have
known English officers 70 pay as high as
800 for a pair OF boots made by them,
and they Q very beautiful, being
buttoned 20 above the knee with silver
buttons. In their cities they build
houses two and three stories high
of adobe and frame. They are gov
erned by n sultan and each man is
entitled TO o u wives. Their costumes
are similar TO the Turks. Within their
nation they have very large cities. but
as they will not allow strangers within
the borders all that can be learned Of
then Is from such members of the coun-
try as make visits 10 the coast and else
where. On n occasion a French army
of 700 French and ., 500 mixed soldiers
with officers attempted to invade the
FOulah country aad got LAT miles. Only
seventeen succeeded 1t getting back.
These people make pilgrimages TO
Mecca, distance Of 800 miles, to paw
their respects TO the great shrine Of the
Mahometans.
THE most beautiful race OF negroes
are the Jaloff. from which the beautiful
negroes of Louisiana were brought.
In africa polygamy is the rule, and
and the proportion of females born Ia
two and ene-half to one of the males. I
knew one African-Ben Mamma, king Of
the eastern Veys-who had 22s wives.
and 54s children and 1850 slaves, and
every one of his children resemble him
- u,~k an n~%ant sh.e aa,ll ,.~@ g-sr
10 recognize them sitter once seeing the
father.
.sThe white nan cannot exist in
Africa He will o multiply and de-
generates under the climate. Again,
the country is so densely populated that
t4sere 10 no immigration, yet the soil is
moro people than America The
quered, and wen IL this were done the
result would not be worth the effort
1.-THE Congo country is not. compare.
lively, q new country, nor Is there much
trade there. The Niger Valley, how
ever, which Is the best in Africa, 10
2,600 miles long, very rich, and has Q
trade amounting 70 $40, 0o0, 900 a year.
Liberia Is q terrible country. Sierra
Leone is known as the White Mans
Grave, and Cape Palmas rs the country
where where white women weep. Ma
beasts of burden can live there, NOT
even q mule All die Of malaria. The
English army lost 1000 men there in
three months. And while natives
thrive and multiply, while everything
produces two crops q year and mems lag
two eggs . day, foreigners die and
children are never born to them"