Along the Coast 
in Africa, 1 failed to meet any one who had ever 
seen a Kroo slave. For a living, they follow the 
sea only; and from their very infancy, they are 
as much at home in the ocean as if it were their 
native element. 1 have seen ebony tots form a 
line along the beach and plunge head foremost 
beneath a great roller. They would then appear 
like black specks on the foaming water until it 
scattered them, squirming and yelling, along the 
sandy beach. After they are older they will dive 
beneath a shark and stab it to death. They are 
among the most skillful boatmen in Africa. Few 
ships trading along the coast, can afford to do 
without them, and there are few places of impor¬ 
tance on the west coast where some of them are 
not temporarily settled, though all return to 
Palmas periodically. 
The Kroos live almost entirely on rice, and the 
quantity they can eat at a single sitting, is quite 
incredible. 1 once saw a party take breakfast 
and I shall never forget the incident. Several 
Kroos formed a circle around a vessel full of 
steaming hot rice. The leader put in his hand, 
took a quantity, tossed it over and over until it 
assumed the form of a ball about the size of a 
baseball and then pitched it into his widely dis¬ 
tended mouth. As he was swallowing the mass, 
13 
