LEWIS, ESTELLA A. 



LIBERIA. 



429 



he treated them was always remarkably kind, 

 and, whenever occasion offered, more remark- 

 ably generous. To some among them, confined 

 to a bed of sickness, or otherwise disabled for 

 work, he continued the salary's full payment 

 for months. One, being in a delicate state of 

 health, he sent to Europe as a better means to 

 recruit, taking upon himself the charge of all 

 traveling expenses, besides continuing to pay 

 the traveler's salary in full. He provided for 

 the widow and children of another; and, gen- 

 erally, whenever any of his employees hap- 

 pened to die, leaving their families destitute, 

 Frank Leslie made it his especial care to sup- 

 ply their wants. 



LEWIS, Mrs. ESTELLA ANNA, best known to 

 the world of letters by her nom deplume of 

 " Stella," was the widow of Sydney 13. Lewis, 

 the intimate friend of Edgar Allan Poe. She 

 was born in Maryland, the daughter of Mr. 

 del Monti, a wealthy planter. While yet a 

 schoolgirl, she translated the " JEneid " into 

 English verse. She wrote a ballad, ** The For- 

 siken," which Poe lauded extravagantly. Still 

 very young, she published "Records of the 

 Heart," a volume which had a wide circula- 

 tion. Lamartine, who probably admired the 

 woman better than he understood her poetry, 

 called her the " Female Petrarch," as Poe had 

 spoken of her as the rival of the poetess of 

 Lesbos. She was well received in the literary 

 circles of Paris, and by Napoleon III at the 

 Tuileries. While in Italy she wrote her trage- 

 dy of u Helernar," which was published after 

 her return to America in 1864. She was en- 

 couraged to begin " Sappho," her best dramatic 

 work. It has reached a seventh edition, and 

 has been translated into Romaic, and played 

 at Athens. Mrs. Lewis was a writer of society 

 letters for the papers, and love-stories for the 

 magazines. Her latest work was a series of 

 sonnets, defending Poe from his slanderers. 

 She died on November 24th in London. 



LIBERIA, a negro republic in Western Af- 

 rica. President, Anthony W. Gardner, as- 

 sumed office January 7, 1878, reflected in 1880. 

 Vice-President, D. B. Warner. The Cabinet 

 consisted, in 1880, of the following members : 

 Secretary of State, G. W. Gibson; Secretary 

 of State and of War, W. H. Roe ; Secretary of 

 Interior, E. W. Blyden ; Attorney-General, W. 

 M. Davis. 



The Senate consists of eight members, each 

 of the four states or counties, Montserrado, 

 Grand Bassa, Since, and Maryland, sending 

 two members to the Senate. The House of 

 Representatives is composed of thirteen mem- 

 bers. It is provided that, on the increase of 

 population, each ten thousand persons will be 

 entitled to an additional representative. 



The Liberian Consul-General in England an- 

 nounced, in February, 1880, that he had been 

 officially informed of the peaceable annexation 

 to Liberia of a large and important tract of land 

 known as the kingdom of Medina. The Con- 

 sul-General says of the new land that it has an 



abundance of the richest African products. 

 Thousands and thousands of acres of gold and 

 iron fields are found there ; the forests are full 

 of ebony wood, palms, gum, and gutta-percha 

 trees, while the well-known Liberian coffee- 

 tree grows wild in its native beauty up to 

 thirty and forty feet of height. With this new 

 acquisition, Liberia has opened still more wide- 

 ly the gate to Central Africa. The Medina 

 Bofora-Land, with its 700,000 inhabitants, will 

 constitute, with the exception of the rich coffee 

 plantation on the St. Paul River, the richest and 

 most densely peopled part of the republic. 



The area of Liberia, exclusive of the new ter- 

 ritory of Medina, is given by Boehm and Wag- 

 ner ("Bevolkerung der Erde," vol. vi, 1880) at 

 49,077* square kilometres. The extent of Me- 

 dina is not yet known. The population of 

 Liberia within its former boundaries was esti- 

 mated at 718,000, and that of Medina at 700,- 

 000. The capital, Monrovia, has about 3,000 

 inhabitants. 



The republic has concluded treaties with 

 Great Britain, Germany, France, Belgium, 

 Denmark, Italy, America, the Netherlands, 

 Sweden and Norway, Portugal, Austro-Hun- 

 gary, and Hayti. 



The public revenue is estimated to amount 

 annually to $85,000 in paper currency, and 

 the expenditures to $120,000. In August, 

 1871, the foundation of a public debt was laid 

 by contracting a loan of $500,000, at 7 per . 

 cent, interest, to be redeemed in fifteen years. 



The number of civilized negroes was estimat- 

 ed in 1873 at 20,000, and in 1878 at 19,000. 

 In 1830 the Government itself officially claimed 

 only 1 8,000. This shows a slight decrease dur- 

 ing the last seven years, a remarkable fact, if 

 it is taken into consideration that the Ameri- 

 can Colonization Society continues to encour- 

 age and to support emigration from the United 

 States. 



Ex-President Warner, in a letter dated De- 

 cember 6, 1878, gave the following account of 

 the educational institutions of the country : 



A fresh impulse to the educational department has 

 been given by^the reopening of the Methodist Episco- 

 pal seminary in Monrovia, which admits between its 

 walls children of parents of the several denominations 

 of Christians. At Bassa, a graduate of Liberia College 

 has charge of a school in which the higher branches of 

 studies are pursued. This is giving marked satisfac- 

 tion in that country. The Alexander High School, 

 now located in Clay Ashland, under the supervision 

 and instruction of another graduate of Liberia College, 

 is also doing good work ; and the preparatory school 

 in the college is being carried on with commendable 

 energy and profit. The two schools at Arthington, 

 aggregating seventy-eight scholars, and the school at 

 Brcwerville, numbering thirty, supported by the 

 American Colonization Society, are in lively operation. 

 The Government schools are adding their quota of in- 

 struction to as many as will attend them. Many cir- 

 cumstances combine to render a compulsory system of 

 education here impracticable, but as the country rises 

 to a higher sphere of civilization, and awakens to a 

 keener sense of the great importance of an advanced 

 standard of education, and ot having an educated pop- 



* The "Gotha Almanac' 1 for 1881 gives 37,200 square kilo- 

 metrei, 18,000 civilized, and 1,050,000 uncivilized negroea. 



