Morris tribune., 1903-09-05

SIR Harry Johnston Regards the
Uganda Plateau as Unparalleled In
Tropical Africa-weI watered and
Covered With Noble Forests-Cli-
mate Favorable to White Men.
When the British government recent
~ offered the Zionist conference at
Basel so considerable a stretch of ter
ritory in east Africa for Jewish settle
ment it volunteered to give away one
Of the most remarkable as well as one
Of the most interesting tracts of land
in the world today, says special cable
dispatch from London to the Philadel-
phia Press. The great plateau of the
Uganda region is not only one Of the
very few in all Africa where white
| men may live and prosper, but it is a
land as we'll which is both inviting in
all those respects which should make
life worth living, and Astounding, too,
in much Of the mystery and glamour
| which have for so long hung over the
cen, r;il stretches of the dark continent
The Victoria Nyanza region, where
the Nile takes it's birth, lies $500 feet
above sea level, land remarkable for
its forests and plains and unique in it's
Mau escarpment, a mighty stone wall
thrown up by nature with regularity
almost as marked as though it were
man made, which faces upon a sunken
valley, called "The Great Rift" About
this rise mighty mountains, which are
almost beyond question those which
figured in the geographical stories Of
the ancients as "the Mountains of the
Moon"
When, even in comparatively modern
times, the coast lands Of Africa had
been opened up by discovery and no
mountains Of any unusual size had
been found it was affirmed that these
Mountains of the Moon could have ex-
listed only in the imaginations Of those
who first wrote Of them. But the geog-
raphy Of today has found in such
peaks as Mount Kenia and Mount Kill
manjaro. which rise $4,000 and $4,000
feet above the surrounding country.
full warrant for all stories Of the past.
Sir Harry Johnston, who undoubted-
ly knows more of the Uganda region
than any other man living, in his re-
port on the country made as special
commissioner for the Uganda protec-
torate describes it as unparalleled in
tropical Africa. He declares it to be !
admirably watered, fertile and cool, |
covered with noble forests and but /
sparsely inhabited He adds that it is !
quite as healthy for Europeans as
Great Britain itself. A very interest
ing feature of his report has to do with
the various vegetable growths Of the
country, which would seem to be re- !
markable for the size they assume. !,
Plants which in the temperate zone
are properly regarded as small attain :
in the Uganda a growth many times
that which is characteristic of them In ;,
lands farther north
AS for the people-and, one might also,
say, "as for the neighbors which the. /
Jews will find awaiting them"Athe8,
make up in peculiarities what they, may
lack in numbers. The tract off terri. |
tory which has been offered, by Great
Britain is perhaps 200 patles, long byh96 |
Dr. 100 miles in width. Ia that there
are now living seven distinct tribes, Off |,
African natives, one of them .alDeady, in
4 state of some civilization, but the !
,ther six enthusiastically barbarous,
;hough Sir Harry. Johnston. is the au-
:hority for the statement that all of the
hem are well disposed toward the
white man and willing to study and !
initiate hts ways. The Baganda peo-
lie wear European clothes-that is,
Turkish garments-and most of them
peak little French or English. The
'ther peoples of the region still go in
he state of undress so long associated
With African natives.
Probably the strangest of the tribes
re the KavfronMos, whose cannibal
traditions still prompt them tO1filg their
eeth to needle-like points, and the
amous Kiagwe dwarfs, a. tribe Of
fminutive hunters which |wanders
yer the greater part Of eastern AT |
lea between the Victoria fC2yanza and 4