chorus Mboloam. They did not do so before because it is not
etiquette to distract people when they are engaged in the
crucial occupation of landing a boat or canoe. I am taken
possession of by a very comely-looking brown young lady,
gracefully attired in my favourite coloured cloth, bright pink
with a cardinal twill hem round it, and we go up the hill
together. I note that she wears a tight rope of large green
and white beads round her beautiful throat; she tells me
her name is Agnes and that she is a subtrader for Messrs.
Holt s factory at Eloby, and I find, thanks be ! she talks fluent
trade English, and further that on account of its European
planks the ostentatious house is regarded by these kindly
people as ipsa facto my fit and proper dwelling for the time
I may think good to stay at Cape Esterias. Its enterprising
builder and owner apologises for its unfinished state ; indeed,
when at close quarters with it, I see it has merely got its
walls up and its roof on. It is perched some four feet above
the ground, on poles, and the owner has not yet decided what
flight of stairs he will erect to the verandah. He has purchased
an old ready-made flight, and has himself constructed
a bamboo ladder, its cross pieces tied on to the uprights, I
need hardly say, with tie-tie. This being done he has got
both ladders lying on the ground beside each other, while he
thinks the matter well out as to their respective advantages.
O f course the additional fluster of my unexpected arrival
renders him more than ever incapable of coming to a decision
on their' rival merits. I relieve his mind by ignoring them
and swing up on to the verandah and enter the house.
The furniture consists of shavings, tools, the skeleton of a
native bedstead, and a bag of something which evidently
serves as a bed. The owner proudly displays the charms of
the establishment; he intends, he remarks, to paint the inside
of the walls white, with the door and window frames a bright
blue. . . . I recognise the good old cobalt in a pot. I applaud!
the idea, not that it is new on this Coast, but it is better than
all white, or dunduckety mud-colour paint, the-only other
colour schemes in vogue for domestic decoration, and worlds
an’ away ahead of varnish, which acts as a “ catch ’em alive oh ”
far all manner of insects, and your clothes when you hang
them against it I note there will be a heavy percentage of
blue here, because in the fifteen feet square living room there
are three doors and two windows— each one of which, from a
determination to be quite the white man, is fitted with a lock
and' a bolt. The next room, there are only two, is particularly
strong in windows, being provided with three. Out of the
two to the north there is a lovely view of wooded valleys and
low hills seen across that charming bright foreground of a
banana plantation. The window to the east commands the
line of back arrangements of one side of the little village, a
• view full of interest to the ethnologist, only just at present I
am too wet and tired for the soulful contemplation of science,
or of scenic beauty, so I close all three windows up with their
wooden shutters,— glass, of course, there is none— and having
got my portmanteau, and a pudding basin of European
origin-—with a lively combination o f blue, maroon, and gas
greens all over it— full of water and, jo y ! a towel from Agnes,
I proceed to wash and dress in the dark. I hear, meanwhile,
great uproar in the next room ; the entire settlement seems to
be doing things and talking about i t ! On re-entering the
other apartment I find one kindly native has lent me a
four-legged table, and another an ivory bundle chair, and
the population of Cape Esterias has been enterprisingly employed
in hauling and hoisting the furniture on to the stairless
verandah and into the house, or standing by and giving advice
as to how this was to be done. Agnes also adds a slip of
new calico for a table cloth, and I am exceedingly grateful,
but, Allah! how stiff and bruised and tired! ^So after having
.some food and a cup of sugarless and milkless coffee, I excuse
myself and go and lie down on the most luxurious bed, that
bag of old salt sack stuff, filled with sweating sea-weed, just
a bit over-populated, perhaps, with fleas, but very enjoyable,
•on the plank floor.
It is 5 o’clock when I awake, and I am still thirsty; not
liking to bother Agnes for more coffee and being mortal
frightened of raw water, I ask her for a “ paw-paw.” She gets
me some unripe ones, explaining “ that those nasty boys done
gone chop all them ripe one”— such is the universal nature of
boys ! I regretfully decline the hard fruit, and as they attract