338 



NATURE 



\^Fcb. 29, 1872 



BURTON'S ZANZIBAR 

 Zanzibar : City, Island, and Coast. By Richard F. 

 Burton. In 2 vols. (London : J. Murray, 1872.) 



IN these two bulky volumes Captain Burton gives us, 

 after a lapse of thirteen to sixteen years, a narrative 

 of his adventures and explorations in the island of 

 Zanzibar, the neighbouring smaller islands, the adjacent 

 coast of the mainland, and the Highlands of Eastern 

 Africa intervening between the coast and the great Victoria 

 N'yanza, the publication having been delayed by a series of 

 remarkable accidents. As in everything else that Captain 

 Burton has written, the volumes are full of graphic delinea- 

 tions of the natural features and inhabitants of the countr)-, 

 combined with not a few details of a personal character 

 which have not the same interest for the general reader. 



In 1856 Captain Burton laid before the Royal Geo- 

 graphical Societ)' his desire once more to explore 

 Equatorial Africa ; a committee was formed to assist him 

 in his undertaking, a grant of 1,000/. was obtained from 

 Lord Clarendon, then Secretary of State for Foreign 

 Affairs, and on September 1 6th the enterprising tra- 

 veller received formal permission, " in compliance with 

 the request of the Royal Geographical Society, to be 

 absent from duty as a regimental officer under the 

 patronage of Her Majesty's Government, to be despatched 

 into Equatorial Africa, for a period not exceeding two 

 years, calculated from the date of departure from Bombay, 

 upon the pay and allowances of his rank." On December 

 26th in that year he landed at Zanzibar, the first view of 

 v/hich is thus attractively described : — 



" Earth, sea, and sky, all seemed wrapped in a soft and 

 sensuous repose, in the tranquil life of the Lotos-caters, 

 in the swoon-like slumber ot the Seven Sleepers, in the 

 dreams of the Castle of Indolence. The sea of purest 

 sapphire, which had not parted with its bUie rays to the 

 atmosphere — a frequent appearance near the equator — 

 lay basking, lazy as the tropical man, under a blaze of 

 sunshine which touched every object with a dull burnish 

 of gold. The wave had hardly energy enough to dandle 

 us, or to cream with snowy foam the yellow sandstrip 

 which separated it from the underwood of dark metallic 

 green. The breath of the ocean would hardly take the 

 trouble to ruffle the fronds of the palm, which sprang like 

 a living column, graceful and luxuriant, high above its 

 subject growths. The bell-shaped convolvulus 'Jponia-a 

 ina}'iiima), supported by its juicy bed of greenery, had 

 opened its pink eyes to the light of day, but was languidly 

 closing them, as though gazing on the face of heaven were 

 too much exertion. The island itself seemed over-indolent 

 and unwilling to rise ; it showed no trace of mountain or 

 crag, but all was voluptuous with gentle swellings, with 

 the rounded contours of the girl-negress, and the brown- 

 red tintage of its warm skin showed through its gauzy 

 attire of green. And over all bent lovingly a dome of 

 glowing azure, reflecting its splendours upon the nether 

 world, whilst every feature was hazy and mellow, as if 

 viewed through ' woven air,' and not through vulgar 

 atmosphere." 



A residence, however, of some months in the island by 

 no means est.ablished the impression which its first ap- 

 pearance might convey, of its being a terrestrial paradise. 

 The city of Zanzibar itself is a miserable, ill-built place, 

 fcetid and unhealthy ; while the personal appearance and 

 habits of the natives are repulsive in the extreme. The 

 climate is remarkably uniform as to temperature, the 

 result of nine months' observation showing a range of 



iS' — 19° F. only. The medium temperature of January 

 is 83 '5° ; of February, the hottest month in the year, about 

 85° ; and the mean gradually declines till July, the coolest 

 month, 77°. The mean average of the year is between 

 79° and 80°. The barometer is almost uniformly sluggish 

 and quiescent, a few tenths above or below 30 in. repre- 

 senting the maximum variation, even under the influence 

 of a tornado. Uniform, however, as is the temperature, the 

 degree of humidity of the atmosphere varies excessively. 

 At certain seasons the amount of moisture exceeds that 

 of the darhpest parts of India, and the annual rain-fall is 

 in some years double that of Bombay, varying from 100 

 to 167 inches. The Msika, or principal rainy season) 

 lasts from April to June ; the island is enveloped in a blue 

 mist, and the interior becomes a hot-bed of disease ; the 

 hair and skin are dank and sodden ; shoes exposed to the 

 air soon fall to pieces ; paper runs and furniture sweats ; 

 the houses leak ; books and papers are pasted together ; 

 ink is covered with green fur ; linens and cottons grow 

 mouldy ; and broadcloths stiffen and become boardy. 

 This excess of damp is occasionally varied by the extreme 

 of dryness. During the prevalence of the dry wind cotton 

 cloth feels hard and crisp, hooks and papers curl up and 

 crack, and even the water is cooled by the excessive evapo- 

 ration. Earthquakes are all but unknown in Zanzibar, a 

 single shock being recorded as having been felt in 1846. 

 Tornadoes are frequent, but the cyclones and hurricanes 

 of the East Indian islands rarely extend to this coast. 

 During fourteen years there was but one tourbilloa strong 

 enough to uproot a cocoa-nut tree. 



The prosperity of Zanzibar depends almost entirely on 

 its vegetable productions, and chiefly on the cocoa-nut and 

 the clove. The former supplies the natives with nearly all 

 their wants — food, wine, spirit, cords, mats, strainers, 

 tinder, firewood, timber for houses and palings, boats and 

 sails ; and Captain Burton calculates that in 1856 

 1 2,000,000 nuts were exported for the soap and candle 

 trades. The sugar-cane might be grown to great advant- 

 age, but for the constitutional indolence of the inhabitants. 

 Cotton has been tried, but does not thrive ; and coffee has 

 not been cultivated to any extent. The fruits in greatest 

 request by the islanders are the mango, the orange, the 

 banana or plantain, the pine-apple, and the bread-fruit — 

 all, however, with the exception of the banana and an 

 inferior kind of orange, being introduced exotics ; the 

 pine-apple has become perfectly naturalised. The most 

 important production of the island is the clove, which does 

 not, however, produce crops comparable to those of the 

 East Indies either in quantity or quality, owing to want 

 of skill and intelligence in its cultivation. The copal of 

 commerce is obtained chiefly from the neighbourhood of 

 Saadani,on the opposite coast of the mainland ; and Cap- 

 tain Burton entirely confirms the account of its production 

 already communicated to the Linncan Society by Dr. 

 Kirk, that it is a gum, or resin, exuding from wounds in 

 the stem of a small tree or large shrub [Hymcna-a verru- 

 cosa) belonging to the order Leguminos;e. 



Captain Burton's first expedition from Zanzibar was to 

 the smaller island of Pemba, lying to the north, and thence 

 to Mombasah, on the coast 4° south of the line, the capital 

 of Northern Zanzibar, the best harbour on the Zanzibar 

 coast, land-locked by coral islands. The town itself is 

 built on the largest of these islands, where the climate is 



