08 REPORT OF THE HARVARD AFRICAN EXPEDITION 
These figures, however, can only be a rough estimate. Some recent writers like 
Maugham and Jore! suggest that the population numbers between six and 
seven hundred thousand. Buell? points out that if Liberia has the same popu- 
lation density as Sierra Leone, namely 56.2 per square mile, the total number of 
its inhabitants would be two million, three hundred and fifty thousand. No 
census of any kind has been made in the country, and the election returns are 
to an extraordinary degree fictitious. For example, the number of property 
owners eligible to vote in Liberia has been estimated at about six thousand, 
but in the presidential election it was said that there was a total of fifty-one 
thousand votes cast, of which the President-elect received forty-five thousand. 
In 1927 it was stated that the majority of the President was one hundred and 
twenty-five thousand votes. 
The Americo-Liberians live almost entirely on the coast, for comparatively 
few of the government officials, with the exception of the District Commissioners, 
reside in the interior of the country. Some five thousand of them reside in 
Monrovia. More than half of them live either in the capital or in the county 
of Mesurado, particularly in the St. Paul River settlements. The greater part 
of the remainder are found in the half dozen other more important towns and 
villages on the coast, — Grand Bassa, Sino, Sangwin, Grand Cess, Cape Palmas, 
and Cape Mount. 
The character of the towns on the coast and the life and customs of the 
people in them are in many respects similar. Monrovia, however, being the 
capital, is the most important center politically and also commercially. The 
town is built along five streets running parallel with the Mesurado Lagoon; 
the lower part where most of the business is conducted is built on the lowest 
of the streets which run along the waterfront. These five streets are crossed 
approximately at right angles by four others, which are usually hilly and uneven 
and by which one ascends sometimes by rude stone steps to the residential 
section of the town, some two or three hundred feet higher up. Only one is 
paved; the remainder have more or less grass or low vegetation growing in 
them, and some are rocky and uneven in places. There are no pavements but 
at the sides of the streets are gutters which at some seasons of the year contain 
water and serve as breeding places for the mosquitoes which transmit malaria, 
yellow fever and filariasis. 
Most of the residences are of two stories (exceptionally of three), built 
generally of wood, though sometimes of brick, and have corrugated iron roofs 
or sides. They usually have wide verandas which are covered for protection 
against rain and sun. Many of the houses have small flower gardens. A num- 
ber of them, particularly in Monrovia, are of fine appearance and good construc- 
tion, and are comfortable as residences, as, for example, the executive mansion, 
which is the most striking and imposing residence in Liberia (No. ZL): “Wi 18, 
however, not owned by the government but is rented by it for $1200 a year. 
A number of foreign business firms and some of the diplomatic representa- 
1 Jore: La République de Liberia, Paris (1912), p. 28. 
? Buell: “The Native Problem in Africa’’ (1928), Vol. II, p. 705. 
