PREFACE
T he following pages record the result of my two
years’ explorations of the British East African coast-
lands, while specially employed to report on their
agricultural capabilities by the Directors of the late
Imperial British East Africa Company.
Since my return in 1893, I have strongly desired
to bring into public notice the great capabilities of
this still comparatively unknown portion of our East
African Empire.
In the anxious search for new markets, caused by
the Trade rivalry of the present day, the fact is not
sufficiently realized that, along the 400 miles of seaboard
within our sphere, there exists a wonderfully
fertile country only awaiting the advent of English
energy, capital, and enterprise for its development, and
the exploitation of such products as Rubber, Cotton,
Ivory, Copal, Jute, Fibres, Hides, Cereals, Oil-seeds,
Copra, etc., while the forests contain many valuable
woods. The climate varies from tropical on the Coast-
lands to bracing, frosty, and cold on the high inland
plateaux.