ACROSS WIDEST AFRICA* 



An Account of the Country and Peoples Seen During 



a Journey Across Africa from Djibuti 



to Cape Verde 



By A. Henry Savage Landor 



The following article has been abstracted by the Editor from a very note- 

 worthy contribution to geography, "Across Widest Africa," by A. Henry Savage 

 Landor, recently published by Charles Scribner's Sons. The journey described 

 in this work was over 8, §00 miles in length and occupied 364 days. "Pleasure," 

 says Mr Landor, "was its sole object. No zvhite person accompanied the author, 

 who bore the entire cost of the expedition." 



In this brief summary it is possible to give only a few of the many strange 

 sights seen by Mr Landor during his remarkable trip through zvhat is probably 

 the most disease-ridden and inhospitable section of the Dark Continent. The 

 illustrations are all from actual photographs taken by Mr Landor, and are re- 

 published here, together with the extracts from the book, through the courtesy of 

 the author, by whom the entire work is copyrighted. 



THE start was made from Djibuti, appearance quite devoid of extra flesh, 

 on the Gulf of Aden, January They are of a nervous temperament, ex- 

 6, 1906. The most attractive of tremely sober and moral — when not de- 

 all the people in French Somaliland are moralized by European ways — dignified 

 possibly the Somali. They are quite and faithful in a high degree to their 

 of a superior type to any I found on my leaders. There is no bravado about them, 

 journey across Africa from east to west, but they are somewhat cruel by nature, 

 except the Senegalese, on the West They can endure hardships silently and 

 Coast. Although not superior in intelli- stand impassive in case of danger, 

 gence, they are superior to the Senegalese Of the great number of men I em- 

 in physical appearance. They are tall, ployed during my journey across Africa 

 thin, and well proportioned, with well- it was only a Somali — a French Somali — 

 chiseled limbs and features, a good who remained faithful to the very end. 

 arched nose, with rather finely modeled notwithstanding the severe hardships and 

 nostrils, and the lips, although developed, sufferings which he had to endure. (See 

 are not so offensively full as with most illustration, page 695.) 

 of the negro tribes of the central zone The Greeks, who were very numerous 

 of Africa. all over Abyssinia, have a wonderful fa- 

 Their skin is of a smooth, delicate tex- cility for learning languages quickly, 

 ture, with no superabundance of oily They also thoroughly understand the 

 excretion, as in most negroid races, and ways of the natives, and they are patient 

 their active life gives them a wiry, supple to a degree where a European would lose 



* Across Widest Africa : An Account of the Country and People of Eastern, Central, and 

 Western Africa, as seen during a twelve-months' journey from Djibuti to Cape Verde. By A. 

 Henry Savage Landor. With 160 illustrations from photographs and one large map showing 

 route. 2 vols. Pages 396, 508. 7 by 9^ inches. Imported by Charles Scribner's Sons, New 

 York. 



