cemetery now in use, and I remember well my first visit to it
under the guidance of a gloomy Government official, who
said he always walked there e v e ry afternoon, “ so as to get
used to the place before staying permanently in it,”— a rank
waste of time and energy, by the way, as subsequent events
proved, for he is now safe off the Gold Coast for good and
all.
He took me across the well-kept grass to two newly dug
graves, each covered with wooden hoods in a most business-like
way. Evidently those hoods were regular parts of the cemetery’s
outfit. He said nothing, but waved his hand with a
“ take-your-choice,-they-are-both-quite-ready” style. “ Why:?f
I queried laconically. “ Oh! we always-keep two graves
ready dug for Europeans. We have to bury very quickly
here, you know,” he answered. I turned at bay. I had had
already a very heavy dose of details of this sort that afternoon
and was disinclined to believe another thing. So I said, “ It’s
exceedingly wrong to do a thing like that, you only frighten,
people to death. You can’t want new-dug graves daily.
There are not enough white men in the whole place to keep
the institution up.” “ We do,” he replied, -“ at any rate at this
season. Why, the other day we had two white men to bury
before twelve o’clock, and at four, Another dropped in on a
steamer.”
“ A t 4.30,” said a companion, an exceedingly accurate,
member o f ’ the staff, “ How you fellows do exaggerate!”'
Subsequent knowledge of the Gold Coast has convinced me
fully that the extra funeral being placed half-an-hour sooner
than it occurred is the usual percentage of exaggeration you
will be able to find in stories relating to the local mortality^
And at Accra, after I left it, and all along the Gold Coast,
came one of those dreadful epidemic outbursts sweeping away
more than half the white population in a few weeks. It is
customary for the Government authorities to pooh-pooh the
mortality, or to allege that it is owing to the bad habits of the
white men ; but this latter. statement is far more untrue than
any fever story an old coaster will tell you. The authorities
at home, both of merchant firms and mission societies,
follow suit and make the same, statements. The true statistics
uxuicuii to get at m Enghsh colonies, because the Government
reports are as a general rule very badly prepared and
dodge giving important details like this with an almost
diabolical ingenuity. And, added to this, they come out so
long after the incidents referred to in them have taken place
s s & s , °:,y fit for the *■* E l g g
r o a ? ' M M t0 al°ng the Christiansborg
I d reached the castle> an exceedingly roomy
and solid edifice built by the Danes, and far better fitted for
on6 H °Ur modern dwellings, in spite of our supposed
advance m tropical hygiene. We entered by the
I great gate into the courtyard; on the right s H M m I m H m 22528?
Mecca like the t Dhikr’ etc towards
’ • J g Mohammedans these Haussas are
others winding themselves into their cummerbunds On the
I left hand was Sir Brandford Griffiths’ hobhv ■ ,
select little garden, o f ,„vely e u c h S i l i i i e s ^ t l v / n T h
I and rare and beautiful flowers brought W w r ’
Barbadian home; while shading- it and rL hlS
fine specimen of 'that s u p S *
i tree-glorious with its delicate-gfeen acTdaffiie f 2 3 6 5 I m a m m m M H t e z
| the upper part of the castle where6 the lD f f ig ^ C°Urtyard to
I the extensive series of cool tunnel-like I slave ha°°mS ^ °Ver used as store chambers ¡ill barracoons, now
large, and J o f tT o ^ p i . ^ » “ *
leverlasting surf br=ahing on the r„?ky spi, o n U t l h e I t
! hutTd y ts X ^ T u r f spmy bhUiI,' hn°W * “ >
on-shore evening breeze into every Si the I the whole building, and hence the cranny of
to an extent I K all mv® ? ‘S mouldy -m o u ld y
mould, West Africa, have never eiseth » ■ th“ paradise for
fng on a . fl00rs took a„ ¡mpmssmH? vo T ' Th' mati
- w f a i , wonid. Beneath articles o f furniture^ tte cryptogams