Liberia <•- 



necessary, as very little has been done to prevent offal of all 

 descriptions from being thrown from the houses into the streets. 

 Owing, however, to the industrious pigs, who keep pace with 

 the untidiness of the inhabitants, the upper town is fairly clean of 

 aspect, and would be really smart but for the excessive growth of 

 herbage in places where the cattle cannot keep it under.^ The 

 houses for the most part are spacious and prettily coloured, 

 more or less surrounded with gardens and handsome trees. 

 There are five large and spacious churches (and one still 

 unfinished), some handsome Government buildings, and at a 

 little distance from the main town rises the gaunt iron-and- 

 brick structure of Liberia College. 



On Mamba point, near the lighthouse, is an unfinished 

 fort, with the ancient historic guns of the settlement. 



There is a large and sad-looking cemetery outside 

 Monrovia, with a view of the sea-beach below. The con- 

 siderable number of graves testifies to the mortality among 

 the American settlers. Amongst the interments are those of 

 wealthy or important Kru people from the native town, mostly 

 the wives of leading Krumen. These graves are marked by 

 slabs or crosses of wood on which rude inscriptions have been 

 painted, probably by the Kru widower. One of these reads 

 somewhat as follows : " Here lies my dear wife, Qpsidedown," 

 the adverb being really the name of the Kruman, John Up- 

 sidedown. Between the cemetery and the town is an undrained 



' My last stay in Monrovia, hov^ever, has convinced me that pubHc municipal 

 spirit in that town should be aroused, not only to do away with the vegetable 

 growth on waste land and the refuse-heaps in back yards (which breed mosquitoes, 

 sandflies, and cockroaches), but also to abate the farmyard nuisance of the 

 domestic animals. Sleep is often interrupted at night by the incessant barking of 

 dogs, the squeals of fighting boars, lowing of cattle, baaing of goats, miauing of 

 cats, crowing of cocks, to say nothing of gunfiring by watchmen, musical serenades 

 at untimely hours, loud talking, whistling, and singing. Some of these noises are 

 inseparable from town life ; but the pigs and dogs might be restrained. 



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