The Birmingham age-herald., 1908-07-19

him pay 10 shillings year for each extra
 wife,"
 q should think that would be a pre- mium on monogamy," said l.
 When we fixed the tax we thought 1t
 might be-" replied the administrator but
 it has not. The natives can make money
 so easily that they can quickly earn the 10 shillings needed for every extra wife,
 and the extra wives more than pay for
 themselves in the work they do. The
 man who has the most wives is consid-
 cred the richest, and he who has several
 as a rule does little else than keep his
 women up to their work"
 More About Farming. Returning to the agricultural possibili-
 ties of Rhodesia, the administrator tells me that the country was greatly injured
 by the rinderpest, and that it had quite
 a setback after the Boer war The far
 mers are slow coming in, and l doubt
 much whether the company is satisfied with it's success in inducing white immi- grafton.
 I understand that one of the great
 troubles is lack of transportation. Horses i cannot be successfully raised here. They are soon attacked by a sickness which carries them off In the past oxen were l used to trek wagons over the country, but the rinderpest killed them by the thousands many falling dead in their yokes The cattle are now steadily in- creasing, and there Is fair prospect of 1 the lands being restocked. Much of the farming Is mixed, the average settler taking up from 300 to 300 acres and using a small amount for cultivation and the | remainder for grazing. He will put a | hundred acres >or so in corn and employ | the rest for cattle. The climate Is such | that the animals can feed out of doors | all the year round, and about ten acres | will furnish enough grass for one head. 1 In my trips about the country I see | that corn Is raised everywhere and that i such oats as have been planted are doing l well. The present demand for grain is such that the country cannot supply it, and in the past quite lot of American 1 corn has been imported. Good corn now | brings about cents a pound, or more | than a dollar a bushel. Much of it is l sold in 200-pound sacks at s4 and upward per sack.
 l As to the tobacco, the administrator has not overstated the possibilities. ] There are Turkish cigarettes sold here which are made from the native weed, | and smokers tell me they are quite as , good as any that can be imported from Cairo or Constantnople.
 A White Mans Country. l asked Sir William Milton whether the climate ol nnOueSla was 1tteu TOT Wulle
 men He replied that the higher parts
 were very healthy and that the heat was altogether dependent on the altitude All
 lands which are over 5000 feet above the
 sea are suitable for European, but 1t Is only upon those which are 1000 feet high
 CT that European children can be born and bred. The latter area is not much
 bigger than the state of Maryland and it has one of the finest climates of the
 world. The former Is almost as large as California, and 1t is healthy. The rain fall averages 2S inches Here at Sails bury the altitude Is about 47O0 feet and
 In coming inland from the ocean I have crossed country which is more than
 mile above the sea. The most of Rho
 desIa is rolling plateau and as far as l can see much of it will some day be | covered with the homes of white men.
 From Bera to the Capital l came to Salisbury from the Indian
 ocean by the Rhodesia railway. This be- gins at Beira, and after crossing Portu- i, guese East Africa runs across Rhodes a
 to Bulawayo. where it connects with the
 main line of the Cape to Cairo railroad
 The distance to Salisbury Is s74 miles,
 and it took us two days to make 1t on
 account of the recent floods of some of the rivers Our first POO miles was