230 SOCUL CONDITION OF AFRICA. 



raised, but only in favourable situations, and for the tables 

 of the more opulent. Perhaps the greatest exertion of 

 agricultural industry is that bestowed upon the culture of 

 the manioc, which forms the main article of food in Congo 

 and some of the insular territories. Considerable care is 

 required in rearing it, and cleaning the ground round the 

 plants ; after the root, which is the valuable part, has been 

 dug up, it must be ground in a species of mill, and dried in 

 small furnaces, before it can be used as flour. The process 

 is represented in the accompanying plate. 



Manufactures, in a country where men are contented 

 with the simplest accommodations, cannot attain any high 

 importance. There are, however, certain fine fabrics pc 

 culiar to Central Africa; of which the most general is 

 cotton cloth, produced in several districts of a very beauti- 

 ful texture, dyed blue with fine indigo, and receiving from 

 the processes employed a very brilliant gloss. Leather in 

 Houssa is dressed and dyed in the same rich and soft style 

 as in Morocco ; and probably, in both cases, the manufac- 

 ture is native. Mats, used both for sitting and sleeping on, 

 are the staple manufacture in many parts of Western 

 Africa. Gold and silver ornaments are made with some 

 taste ; and iron is generally fabricated, though with a vary- 

 ing and imperfect degree of skill. 



The tribes of Africa have scarcely in any instance ar- 

 rived at the first rudiments of maritime commerce. The 

 circuit of that continent presents no spacious inlets of the 

 sea, — no deep bays to cherish the growth of infant naviga- 

 tion. Even the great lines of river-course are little if at 

 all subservient to the purposes of inland communication, 

 but are often so situated as to obstruct the career of the 

 traveller, who crosses them in canoes hollowed out of a 

 single tree, or on slight and dangerous rafts. Almost all 

 the commerce of Africa is carried on by land. Caravans, 

 kafilas, or coffles, cover all the routes, and connect the most 

 distant extremities of the continent. These are formed by 

 a union of travellers, an arrangement strictly necessary for 

 mutual aid amid the difficulties and perils by which almost 

 every track is beset. The native traders do not employ 

 camels, which have been introduced by a foreign race from 

 Arabia into the northern deserts, for which they are per- 

 fectly a;daf ted. The wagon, and indeed every species of 



