The New York Herald Newspaper, January 16, 1874, Page 4

4 ASHANTEE. Herald Special Letter from “Cape Coast Castle. SIR GARNET WOLSELEY AND THE PRESS, ——_+—_—_ Our Correspondent’s Cruise Along the Gold Coast, GRAPHIC DESCRIPTION OF HIS TRIP. Beauty and Diversity of the Scenery as Seen from the Ocean. THE PROCESS OF LAND-MAKING. Method of Christianizing the Gold Coast. ACCRA AND ADDA. Cape Coast CastiE, GoLp Coast, } West Coast oF AFRICA, Dec. 1, 1873. It was dreary waiting at Cape Coast Castle for news, waiting the arrival of the rea coats from England, expecting day after day to see the pale- faced heroes of Her Majesty the Queen, who are said to be coming to destroy Coomassie, the capital of the ferocious King of Ashantee. Inactivity and ennui were rapidly sapping every ounce of energy and vitality. Correspondents like myself, accus- tomed to the display of human powers, of deadly pyrotechnics, to hearing much noise and fanfaro- nade, found it hard work to live week after week 4na Fantee tent situated in a malarious valley, doing nothing but smelling the abominations around us or counting the minutes which must elapse before being prostrated by another attack ol fever, listening to the tweedle-dee and tweedle- dum of Fantee music, staring in a kind of lack- Justre eyed way at the antics of sireless little nig- gers, who seem to have been born God knows how. Ii one went in a desperate strait to head- quarters seeking news it was ever the same surly agate “SoTHING NEW." If one met an officer, and, judging by his face that he would be likely to impart something, one | ‘would say, “Good morning, good morning; how do | tyoudo? Giad tosee youlook so well. Anything | new this morning #? the answer would inevitably | be, “Good morning, good morning; quite well, | ‘shanks. No, notuing new. Ta-ta, oid feliab.’ The question “Anything new ?” as soon as ut- Nered seemed to annihilate all courtesy, cordiality and good feeling. Mind you, not that there was | really anything to impart; not that the officer was | jan possession of State secrets and regarded the snan who had the audacity to ask him for any witu | distrust, but because General Wolseley has so thor- NEW YORK HERALD, FRIDAY, JANUARY 16, 1874—TRIPLE SHEET. antp ts coming. She may be here to-morrow or any | and breathing space with its neighbor ¢hrough day, and it wouidn't do for me to be absent. If you were only going to Accra now and coming straight back, why, then, I think, { could go.” “What do yousay, Mr. Correspondent t"' “Well, you see, if Mr. Agent was going to Adda ‘where Glover is { wouldn't mind going, because he knows the whole coast. But going to Accra doesn’t tempt me at all, besiaes I should only be Catting over the side the whole way. No, 1 don’t think I can go." “Very well, Mr. Agent, we shall go down to Acera, and if I can get the information I need there I shall come back at once’ Will that suit your book!” The new arrangement suited Mr. Agent, though it evidently was a labor to get his mind up to the travelling pitoh, as he begged me to defer starting until next morning. You must know that the ageut of the great Lon- don house ta kind of a king on the Gold Coast, He has sub-agents everywhere, all of whom keep very hospitable houses, He is the man whom we ex- pect witli cash our bilis by and by, when ready money is gone, and he is the man who could fur- nish me with more coal if I required any, It was, therefore, a matter of policy to submit to the ca- Prices and humors of such an important man. At seven o'clock A. M. we proceeded on board the Dauntless, and were about to weigh anchor when I asked the agent if we had remembered the oil cans. No, he had not; he would send men immediately alter the ot!, which he did, after damning himself considerably for the possession of @ bad memory, Tt was no light matter to have forgotten the oil for the engines, neither was it a light matter to send a boat back through that awful surf, which the apathy of the English has left to be a curse and an anpoyance to all who seek this part of the Gold Coast. We had both, in coming through the frantic surf, been drenched to the skin by a vicious wave, which had simply wetted us for spite, though it might have drowned us had we made any mistake and submitted the boat to its power. The caprice of the agent had induced me to send my owa en- gineer ashore fora rest and ship an engineer in his employ for the trip, and the neglect of the ol, Was lus mistake, ALL ABOARD! Patience, mixed with @ little under-carrent of fuming and fretting, obtained its reward finally. ‘The oil cans came on board, we cut adrift from the surf boat, we sounded our whistle fora parting signal, we up anchor and steamed to “‘leeward”— that 1s, towards the east, along the African shore. at the rate of nine knots per hour, The eyes of the whole fleet, consisting of eight vessels-of-war, Were On us; the glasses of the Cas- tie garrison were levellea at us; aleng the crests of the seven hills were seen spectators gazing to- wards the little HERALD yacht Dauntless, plunging | Qaunutlessly through the lang, rolling, surfy waves @ the Atlantic. 1 was failing—not falting, but gradually sinking— into a delicious stupor, a soft, quiet ecatacy—being luiled into @ day dreaming unconsciousness, or listlessness, rather—by the gentle cradung of the deep, by the soft, pure, healthy breezes which stole whisperingly under our awning; by the luxu- riant scenery of the tropics, which was banked up on our left in palm-ciad hummocks and low ranges, We had reached Annamaboe, about ten miles ; from Cape Coast Castie, within a very short time, it seemed to me, when I was awakene@ from the repose of mind and body and the infuence of the wind, the sky and thescenery, by a gurgling sound Proceeding from my friend the agent, through whose good offices I expected to have my note- book full of interesting notes respecting the war. oughly imbued bis subs with his own peculiar no- ‘tions of special news gatherers, and sstamped his | own?) idiosyncraciés and eccentricities on almost { every member of his staff Socially, then, there is | nota disagreeable man here, at least I have not | metany. Meetany of them without the 1ace of | quisitiveness and the nose of @ news gath- | ever and the eye of an itinerant newspaper | yuan, and you Will find them as genial souls as auy whoever called themselves Engilsn gentle- | amen. The Genera) himsell is chiefest and best of ‘them, as hospitable and as kindly mannered as he | can be; but onthe matter of iuraisbing news to newspapers he entertains most peculiar ideas, which are by this time patent to all the world. | inthe meantime it was dull, dreary waiting for | tue arrival of the troops, One’s eye became jaun- dived looking at the same objects, one’s ear be- | came tired with the meaningless bum and babble of peopie on the verge of inanity. Even the stir- | ring items of “Ashantee in retreat, “Two * Hioussa’s killed, four of the allies wounded,” failed | to attract, and news such as “Another officer down | With fever,” “One of tue staf has a dysenteric | affection,” “A marine has bad a svustroke,” | tvough they might be full of interest to a British penny-a-ltner, began to pall on me, for! bad al- veady written several columns upon such subjects. NO ACTIVITY. Tf letters had to be written upon such themes as | these I feared that the Anglo-Ashantee war, with | its tedious, small, uninteresting details, would soon | be placed on a par with the ever-enduring Carlist | ‘War as the most uninteresting campaign ever | planned, Of course the faust is not with the coun- | try or with the campaign; it lies with the news | papers for sending their commissioners two montis too soon. Well, 1 said it was dull, dreary waiting for the | Aroops, It was becoming positively sickening; for | already about fifty per cent o! the oficers who had | ‘een attached to the prospective expedition were down with fever, Mostly ail the correspondents | Thad been ull; some wore ill; others expected to be | a. | mat’ | | CRUISE OF THE DAUNTLESS, I proposed one evening that we should proceed | ‘Gown the coast to Accra in the HxgaLp steamer, | he Dauntiess, and find out how things were pro | @ressing to leeward with Glover's expedition. | fhe time was after dinner; stomachs were | | more than usually full of a good din- mer; eyes were a littie brighter, and maces were a little more animated ‘with the good wine that was drank. There were our of us; one was the agent of a great London ‘house; one waa a special correspondent of a Lon- don daily, @ man of some importance; the third was 8 partner of the agent aloresaid; the fourth was your obedient servant, Said the London special, with eyes lit up with Mervor kindled by wine, and the picture of what | ood fortune was in store for us if we went, which ff drew for him, “My dear feliow, this is really very kind of you. I whould have thought you would have considered jme a@ rival, but then the Heap always dues gen- terous things.” Answered I, “The HERALD 1s never selfish. It se happens to have a littie steamer here, and you, myself, want to go down the coast to gather | mews. Permit me, then, in the name o! the Henan, s€0 Offer you a passage. If I considered you asa wival I would not do it,” ‘Then spoke the agent, “Oh, we can manage it @asily enough, It witi only take us ten hours to go ‘to Accra, thence six hours more will take us to Adda at the mouth of the Volta. I¢ will be impos- wile to cross the bar with the steam launch, but rwe can hail @ surf boast and go ashore. If Glover s there our journey is at an end. If he is not there ywe shall bave tomanage somehow toenter the jes to go after him, Ome day will be enough tor hat. His partner chimed in all the agent said, and the Special was extravagautly anticipative of pleasure. J assure you We ail feit uncommonly brave, un- asually energetic, youthtuily sanguine, What we were going to do and what we were not going to do, were themes which were fertile and talkable. It was left for me to provision and coal the Daunt- Ness, they Were simply to consider themselves as sruests, It was finally resolved that we should set ont on Our adventurous cruise at evening of the ppext day. ‘The morning of the day dawned, noon came and the afternoon was rapidly drawing toward eyen- ing when the gentiemen who were to be my pag- ngers were seen advancing toward my house. When they had come im and been grected, I said, “I suppose you are all ready to start r? “No-0-0," drawied the agent, Witb not one twen- th of the assurance or the audacious fire which ted his face the night before. ‘You see, 1 have reckoning up my time pretty Closely, and [ | wheo “What is the matter, my iriend,” I asked. “Sick? eh? 1t will do you good.” “ub, much good; bile, you see, collects so quickly in these tropical countries that really when one in- hales tresa sea air the whole system seems to re- volt at the tax laid upon it by the vicious bile ashore, and gladly frees itself trom that which choked and impeded the machinery of— igh—ugh—agh—the body. I feel much better ai- ready, Bat what in the name of iortune is the r with the engine ?? ¢ what’ Of course we have considerably engineer was at once questioned imperious}; npoh this subject. He answered that he himse’ been wondering what the matter could be, and he bad been anxiously askimg bimseif the question, besides examining carefully THE ENGINE AND MACHINERY. ‘The cause was (ar beyond hia Ken, but he feared the boiler was not adapted for salt water. He had started with eighty pounds of steam, butit had gradually got lower and lower until he had no more than fifteen pounds left, and, thougn there was a splendid fire, he gould mot increase the steam power. The yacht was going at the rate of about two knots an hour. My friend tue agent was perfectly miserable trom the disagreeability imposed on him by Neptune. The sky iost its cerulean aspect and asscmed @ gloomy color, wuich I was assured by the agent, who knew the coast weil, was the fore- runuer of a tornado. “My God,” said he, “T would not be overtaken bya tornado in this little thing for the world. Nothing would save us. We are only 500 yards irom the beach, and if she can’t do better than this she would be driven ashore in no time. I vote we go back before It is too late.” I turned her head around, inwardly vowing that once I lanaed him I should continue my voyage Without him. In @ couple of hours we were abreast of the fleet we had leit some three hours before full of hap- piest anticipations, Everything seemed cljanged in thatshorttime. Our own thoughts were Bullen, BAFFLED HOPES turned the mind sour, the sky was of ky biackness, the sea was dark, the land appeared oerhung with a murky pall, there was no pleas- antnesa in anything, looked we inwardly or out- wardly, Suddenly the iunnei gave @ roar, and before we could recover from our astonishment the engineer shouted through tne rising breeze: “I's all right now, sir; the damper was up, that’s all, sir. She will go now, sir. She will beat any- thing about this neighborhood." “Shall we go back, Mr. Agent? Wonld it not be better for us to continue the voyage’ The engineer bas found the secret out,” I said. “all right,” he answered. “If yon think there are ho More secrets that may wreck us I’m willing to prosecute the voyage.” Considering that the gentleman was miserably seasick and that advancing tornadoes are not to be sneezed at On this coast when on doara a tiny steamer like ours, the answer was a plucky one, worthy of the best John Bull that ever became sea- sick. The little yacht was now throbbing through every | beam in her, the steam sizzed and swished vigor. ously, the funnel roared in concert, while the fan | kicked upatoamiug wake behind in quite an ex. bilarating style. We were going a steady | EIGHT KNOT PACE, | and soon fighted Annamaboe'’s ochrish-colored | Jort, situated on a spur sloping from a paim-clad | range to the sea. As We continned our journey gitmpses of an- Tivalied, steady vistas of paims, shrubs, plantains and tall, arrowy silk cotton trees met the ravished eyes, 1t was such a change to ace real nature once more, after all the dreary waiting for active life at Cape Voast Castie, The tornado clouds van. ished over the horizon, the sky regained its tropic tints, the shores emerged out of the black gloom, the sea vied with the sky in its blueness; the sart, ever frantic, ever roaring, ever piunging, reared on the sinuous besch With a noise almost dealen- ing. THE DAUNTLESS, as trim a little yacht as ever bent to surging wave, raised her head prondly and gracefully and despite the uproar on her lee, cleared the Gold Coast's sea, as if she cared naught for rock or reef or wreck, By hugging the shore closely wo were enabied to dctect beauties that are never seen by passengers | traveling on the steamers, tiny nut-brown villages | modestly hiding under @ depth of green plantain fronds and stately silk cotton trees, which upheld their glorious crowns of vivid green follage more than fifty feet above the tailest palm-tree, depths of "t see how I can spare eight days, for it will take @ight days and no less, this trip of yours, and wy strabbery whereia everv nlant stram@led for life its myriad crests of snowy foam aud dastied itseit | which the eye attempted to penetrate in vain beyond a few feet, tracts of tal wavy grasses, tiger, spear and came, Mt lurking places for any wild beast of prey, varied by bosky dolls, lengthy winding ravines, literally choked with vegetation, and hills on the slope of which perhaps rested the village of @ timid suspicious sub-tribe, And if the eye, ever in search of the picturesque and novel, ever roving for stranger scenes, chanced to fall on the long line of suri, and, as the ear listened to its sonorous, deep sounding thunder, the mind re- curred to the Psalmisv’s expressive words—‘They that go down to the sea in snips, that do business in great waters; these see the works of the Lord and His wonders in the deep,” THE SURF ON THE AFRICAN CoasT is ever a wonder and a danger. There is no coast 1n any part of the world which possesses less ports or harbors of refuge, You may travel 1,000 miles almost without finding a cove or harbor where a ship could anchor quietly without being rocked by the surf waves, Try along the whole of the grain, the ivory, the gold and the slave coasts, and there is not one port. But, fortunately for ships trading ‘to these places, there is seldom @ hurricane or a gale blowing, so.that they are able to anchor about @ mile from shore, There is nover any dead calm, though the sea in the morning ts stirred up into Wavelets by the breeze from oceanward, During the night it is moved by the land breeze, so that ships anchoring in the roadsteads are ever to be seen rolling uneasily, they are never at rest. Unceasingly the long lines of waves are to be traced rolling onwards toward the shore, gather- ing strength as they advance nearer until, re- ceiving the ebbing waters fewing from the beach from preceding seas, there is a simultaneous coiling and rolling, and at once the long line of waters is precipitated with a furious roar on the land. Where the water meets a rock a tall tower of spray and foam is suddenly reared, the wave line is broken, and is in maa confusion, Where the beach is smooth and of sand you may trace a straignt, unbroken line of foam, nearly a mile long. You can eastiy understand, then, the trouble and annoyance TRADE undergoes on such an inhospitable coast, An or- inary ship’s boat is useless; 1t would be a drown- ing matter for a crew of sailors unaccustomed to this surf to attempt to iand anywhere along tie coast between Sherbro and Lagos, a distance of nearly 1,200 miles. The mouths of the insignifi- cant rivers which feed the sea along this distance offer just as dangerous impediments to an ordi- nary ship’s boat as the beach does. 4 LONG LINE OF MIGHTY BREAKERS runs across the mouth of each river, and forms a bar which 1s almost certain death to cross except 1n boats specially constructed for the peculiar work and native canoes. These surf boats have no straight stems or sterns; the keel is in the shape of an immense bow, which allows the advancing wave to well under the boat before its crest lifts it aloft to precipitate it into the deep trough left in ita track. A straight stemmed boat cats the Wave, and its divided crest as it falia unites and Swamps her, Many and many & poor sailor, igno- rant of these things, has lost the number of his mess on this coast, and the history of trade on it is Iraught with many a dolefal tale, Beyond Annamaboe, Agrah is seen nestling com- fortably in the lap of palm-clad hills, a smail, un- pretentious village, and soon rises to view the five hill cones of Cromantine. A mass of white buildings glistens in contrast to green palm fronds, an old fort struggles into view and a@ tall tower also rutned catches the eye. Cromantine was evi- dently a place of some importance once. Its posi- tion is admirable; the range behind it augurs well fof THE SALUBRITY OF THE CLIMATH and the fine, tall, singular bills just aback of the Tange would have been well adapted for sanatoria if the authorities of Cromantine were acquainted With sanative principles when the town was pros- perous, Cromantine has a history. I wisn I could give you the plain, simple story, that one its stones in the ruined fort could tell, had it a tongue to speak I dare say it would be one of the most pathetic stories that could be told connected with the Goid Goast. It has the merit of having been the first settlement which the English made on the coast. Admiral de Ruyter wrested it rom the English in 1663, and calied it Fort Amsterdam, alter his beloved natal place. It wasa great slave mart once, Human cattle have filled the square of the fort after tramping long, weary leagues, from far Gando-and Sokoto, op the eastern bank of the great Niger. Descendants of the Moorish trader and his Fellatah slave now inhabit the town of wicked memories and in the olive, bright-eyed mulatto of Cromantine you may recognize the seed of the Dutchman, However, it is all very pretty to look at from the sea, with the picturesque old fort, which never re- gained its pride of strength since the Ashantees plundered it in 1807, and the strong tower lording it from their heignts over the more peaceful Jook- ing mercantile houses, which, for business’ sake, have sought the neighborhood of the beach, with the vivid green mdge and hill cones beyond, which seem in the shadows they darkly give out to cherish and soothe what remains of tie once stirring settlement of Cromantiue, Beyond the old town a few miles the range dips down into A BROAD ALLUVIAL VALLEY, formed by the Amissa and the Nacqua rivers, which, never in the dry season and seldom even in the rainy season, empty themselves into the sea. This is another feature peculiar to the west coast of Africa. There are numerous small rivers within the bank of comminuted shell and sand which the Atiantic waves have forced up; but very few of them have current enough to withstand the resistle force of the surf. Rivers, such as the Assinie, the Prah and the Volter have volume suffictent to clear the surface to a superficial depth of the sand the action of the sea heaves up, but the smaller rivers with their feebler currents fina themselves imprisoned by a bank of sand aver- aging from a few yards to a Jew miles in breadth, consequently, finding their natural debouchures barred up, they form iagoons, which, as in the lagoons of Grand Bassam, Voita an’ Lagos, are many scores of miles in length. Lagoons of lim- ited extent are here called salt ponds, such as the galt ponda near Cape Coast Castle, Aumamaboe, Cromantine, Babli Point and Accra and a score of other places. The alluvial deposits conveyed by the small rivera settie down in the lagoons, the bottom of which In the course of ages will bave become of the same altitude as the beach. The rivers then overran their barriers, eat out a chan. nel, to be again imprisoned by a new bank of sand, to again form lagoons and to again create new land, and thus THE PROCESS OF LAND MAKING, Ihave no doubt, has been going on for ages here. The soll trom Cromantine to the distant iow lying cape of Tantamquarry, for which we now point our little steamer, must be very fertile. Large groves of cocoa-nut trees stand apart apparently only a few hundred yards from each other, within only a few feet from the utmost reach of the surf, with villages embosomed by the umbrageons shades they afford. Rounding Tantamquarry we saw another rnined fortiet, another evidence, if more were wanting, chat the Gold Coast was considered to be an im- portant acquisition and that a foreign power wi determined to guard what it had acquired, at all cost, at one time; and right in sight, a few miles away, rose atill another, that of Afain, once held by the Duteh, but destroyed by the Ashaatces in 1s. A truncated conical hill, of unusnal height anove its neighbors—possibly 1,000 leet above the sea— marks the neighborhood of Winnebal, an impor- tant settlement at one time, and yet the seat of some trade in palm oil, oll-nut kernels, and other customary articles of the African trade, The white-wasned houses of the merchants were soon visiple, situated on @ terrace overlooking the bend of the sbore, called its harbor. A river empties into the sea, close by, said to come irom a great distance inland, BARRACOE CarE was reached @ few hours later, and on rounding {t astretch of country was visible—which 1 found sSubsequentiy op my return to ba devaw of aor extraordinary features of scenery—extending, I was told, to Accra—the second most important settlement of the English on the Gold Coast. At two in the morning, after a tour of over seventy miles, we arrived opposite Accra, and, hailing a matt steamer—the King Bonny, Captain Hamilton, Just artived—irom leeward, were soon on board, reciptents of large minded hospitality from the galiant old Scotch skipper. A‘ seven o'clock I was waked by A HIDEOUS DIN OF HUMAN VOICES Jabbering alongside the ship in their suri boats, an unintelligible jargon of words such as no Christian lke myself could stand without nerves getting un- strung. I, therefore, looked upon What was called Accra with a very sullen face, and in no amtabie frame of mind. The scene ashore was that of & Straight beach, backed by a rude terrace, which stretched to the right and leit and rear of Accra for many miles, singularly open and clear, a3 seen from shipboard, Accra itself straggied in length nearly a mile on the edge of this terrace, overlooking the beach, many preten- tious houses, whitewashed, attracting atvention from their prominence above tne clay-brown huts amongst them. Almost to the extreme left was the commandant’s house, aloof and exclusive as it should be, belug an oMcial residence, its wide verandas denoted luxurious coolness, its wide space around it informed you that at one time or another some occupant of it had been assiduous to peocure unpolluted alr. Away to the extreme right was another large house, with wide veran- das and abundant grounds about it, This was the Basle Mission House, occupied by a singular com- munity of religious Swiss and Germans, who have banded together for the very sensible purpose of teaching the natives and making money by them by honest trade in palm oll and gold dust. Iu the very centre of the town, occupying a point very like the centre of an exaggerated parenthesis, was THE FORT AND LIGHTHOUSE OF ACCRA. Between these houses the body of the town of native and European buildings jammed itself. Some two miles to the east of the Basle Mission, occupying the end of the parenthesis, is the village of Christiansburg, @ picturesque mass of white- washed buildings, consisting of a ruined castle, a ruined martello tower and another large establish- ment of the enterprising Basle Misston. You would hardly believe it, perhaps, but what Thave described to you as Accra was in possession of two foreign powers at one and the same time— Great Britain and the Netherlands. The two por- tions of what appears to be a8 one town was known respectively as Jamestown and Dutch Accra, Each town had its own native king. King Kudo was under the protection of tne British; King Pakki owed allegtance to the Dutch, and at Christiansburg tnere reigned King Dawunah. In- deed tie same eccessive confusion reigned throughout the Gold Coast until the British pur- chased the Dutch out and out a couple of yeara ago. ASHORE. After breakfast I proceeded ashore in a surf boat manned by naked Accras. Please bear in mind what I have already told you of the difMiculties of landing on the Gold Coast. At Accra, however, the diMecnities are terri- ble, The boatmen urge their heavy, stout- built British boat with @ nonchalance which I share presently by Studying their faces and by re- minding myself with the fact that their whole lives almost have been passed doing the same duty upon which they are now engaged, though oy look- ing ahead at the awful confusion of the mad waves waich surge on the beach I could not teil, to save my life, how or where they proposed to land. Isee only long lines, apparently unbroken, of dark, damp rocks, and the confusing, bellowing, thundering, foamy. waves, in which—unless my men are true anc steadfast as steel—I shall be pres- ently enguiphea and swept high on these dark rocks a battered corpse. Pleasant, is it not? Destiny is inevitable, however. I must gaon. The boatmen’s paddles are lifted high and dashed em- phatically into the waves; their clear, sweet, bealthy toned voices rise in sonorous chorus, and the outer line of rocks are reached. It is only now that Iam made aware that there is a passage run- ning oblique through the rocky series, and the steersman astern deftly threads the way. Wave after wave, horrent and menacing, lift us higher, still higher. Ah, God of mercy! we— No, by George! that was a narrow escape. The boat's keel bites the beach of Accra, and we are safe. Iwill forbear giving you another version of my sentiments or opinions respecting what I think of the British government for leaving this place in the state of nature it has been left in, as every other piace on the West Coast of Africa. Re/erring tothe boatmen I will say that they valued their labor o! bringing me ashore at the very same rate I valued their deitness and skill, But L would not like to risk a frequent passage among THOSE ACCRA ROCKS, Tauch as Tadmire the Accra boatmen, nor, indeed, have I seen a European who did care to risk it often. When we were freed from the boat gang my chaperon condacted me to the oid fort ot the slave traders. Almost the very first thing I saw that 1 thought was interesting was a large mural tabiet near the gate, dedicated by @ man to the memory of his friend, whom he had to his eternal sorrow shot to death by accident. Both were English oilicers, accra’s Fort, like all the forts on the west coast of Africa, is a mere stuccoed or lime and mortar imitation of one, Its wails, comparatively speaking, are as thin as cardboard, and there are odds and ends and corners 80 weak that @ musket ball would al- most knock the whele down. It answers its pres- ent purpose very well, asi presume it answered its purpose in the antiquated times of twenty-iour- pounders. It seems as @ prison for relractory Accras and colored cuiprits, who were fed with kenuke balls, This kenke, which is the staple food of West Alricans, from Sierra Leone to the Congo, is coarse mush made of ground Indian corn. When itis served out two soup ladies iull folded in two plantain leaves form one man’s ration ior a day. ‘The digestion of this food is assisted by a fish or two. On. mounting the stone stairs leading to the battiements 1 am enabled to appreciate the change which has came over the fort since the town of Accra became wholly o British possession. The old cannon have been tumbled into dishonorable heaps over the wails, and now lie the prey and sport of the briny surf. There were, probably, 500 old pieces of artillery in the forts of St. George del Mina, Cape Coast Castle, Annamabre, Mumiord, Apam, Winneban, Accra and Cbristiansborg at the beginning of Sir Garnet Wolseley’s administra- torsaip of the Gold Coast, and it was seriougly in- tended to coilect and ship tiem to England to be recast, but when the authorities came to calculate the cost they found that the cost of shipment would be greater than the vaiue of the material, and the guns were accordingly dumped out of the forts of Elmina, Cape Coast Castie and Accra as rubbish. IN TRE TOWN. Having completed an examination of tois Danish slave fort we proceeded, throngh the intense heat, into the town. The huts of the natives have been established anywhere, without regard to order or any symmetrical arrangement, and the consequence is that the streets are uniformly narrow, crooked and oppressive, from the fithy habits of the natives. The principal merchant of the town is a Mr. Croker, the agent of the great mercantile house of F. A. Swanzy Brothers, sons of the famous Swanzy, who founded the legitimate West African trade. Mr. Croker's house, of a glaring ‘white, raises its tall head above a mass of dingy gray thatches, so that the outlook from the win- dows of the second story takes in, perhaps, 100 of these thatched roofs, in all stages of straw-decay and nattve improvidence. From the third story, however, the eyes ate delighted with the views of sea, shipping in the roadsteaa, the area of the ill- planned town, the houses of the European resi- dents and a vast stretcn of plain country, covered with cactus and gums and thorns and ripe indi- gestibie grass, and a winding lagoon of gray-green water, on which Mr, Croker, who 1s an intelligent and energetic Briton, finds pleasure sometimes in paddling hia Rob Roy canoes, to the shamo of half a dozen sallow-faced and moriband European clerks. EYPROT OF THE CLIMATE. Tt is really pitiful to look at the faces of young Suropeans who have been out here only a couple | of years or so. Their color is that of a pallid yel- low. They seem to bear on their features that stamp of despair which only those deprived of all hope ofhealtn can have. Though the oldest is not twenty-tnree years old, I should judge, yet one of them is already as gray as a manof Mfty. They all look like old young men, with their jaundiced complexions, from which every freshness of youth has departed, their lack-lustre eyes and lan- guid movementa, The trade in which these Euro- peans, under Mr, Croker, are engaged is that of purchasing palm oil, goid dust and gum copal, while the Basle Mission buys not only palm oil, gold dust and gum copal, but black monkey skins, cotton, India rubber gum and almost everything that can be turned into money remuneratively tn Europe, When the merchants have finished boil- ing the paim oil they pour tt into great puncheons containing over 150 gallons, whitewash both ends of the puncheons, and ship them to Europe. THE CURRENCY of the Gold Coast 1s gold dust, and, in some parts, cowrte shells are still used, though they are veing rapidly superseded by British silver coin, An ounce of gold dust is sold for £3 12s. The natives frequently exchange among themselves the weight ofeven asmail bead in the precious dust, which they call a pessua—a trifle as insignificant to the Accras as a picayune would be to us, THE BASLE MISSION HOUSE, on closer inspection, is @ large, roomy building, of two lofty stories, surrounded by broad verandas. The yards about the building resound wiih the hammering of the coopers making up puncheons, with the tattle of the gossipy traders in palm oil, who have just arrived from the interior somewhere with scores of black earthen pota, full of the yel- low, buttery palm oll, Puncheons are being rolied about, palm ol) pots are being shifted, black people are in the height of business in a heat which threatens to strike the frst European who dares it unprotected dead, I see that a little store also is kept in the lower story, and I’m thinking that these Swiss-Germans are making much money by these African pupils and converts of theirs, when the superintendent informs me that the principal educational establishments are at Christiansborg and on the sea, a few miles lower down, and at Akropong in the interior. 1 will not doubt the gentleman, and, after a look at his own breezy quarters up stairs, I proceed to Cnristians- borg in a carriage drawn by fourteen hali-naked Krumen on the run. It is a very large establishment at Christians- borg which the Basle Miasion has put up for trade with and conversion and education of the natives. It is very large indeed, In its yards are numbers ofworkmen at work upon puncneons and palm oil. Trade I fear is uppermost here also, though the superintendent tells me he has eighty children in doors of both sexes under the tuition of male and female teachers. Idid not see them being instructed, but what I did seo will, I fear, be deemed very libellous by the religious portion of your readers. The truth must be published, however; I saw numbers of mulatto children— probably twenty boys and girls—which, I must say, Indicates considerable attention on the part of the Swiss-German missionaries to the mora! wants of African women. It may be also—this singular fact of two mulatto ciiidren being at the mission J mean—the very best method of conversion that could be tried, only it is such a verv SLOW PROCESS OF CHRISTIANIZANG @ continent, unless missionaries come out here in greater numbers. A million robust, heajtby prime missionaries—be they Germans or Swiss-Germans matters not—might do some effective good in this way out here, and if any society for the propagu- tion of the Caucasian species have such a supply of missionaries on hand there is surely ample space within the illimitable compass of the conti- nent of Africa. iM Two balidings, made in Germany anil shipped to and erected here a little behind the village of Christiansborg, contain the pupils now under pro- cess of Christianizing. Their very aspect promises that within their walls the divinity of Christ is | being taught the students, and taken in connec- tion with the fact that at Akropong the college of the mission with a mode! farm, &c., Is situated, the Basle Mission, let us hope, have a more brilliant fu- tare than the past las been, and that the members of it will go on doing a vass amount of good, spirit- ually and temporally, to ail concerned. When lcome to speak of tue political and war news collected at Accra by your correspondent [ am reminded by a glance fit the number of my page above how very brief I wust be. CAPTAIN GLOVER, formerly of the royal navy, but for some years past connected with the civil service, has imparted a de- gree of confidence in his powers of administrator- ship and fighting, among whites and blacks, which is quite extraordwary. He must be a Wellington in strategy and the very model of an administrator. A white trader on this coast does not ‘eel comfort- able when he meets a newspaper wan until he has conversed about Glover’s genius, his Clivelike abiil- ties and energy. On the other hand, J have no- ticed & faint attempt at depreciating him on the part of the military officers who acknowledge Sir Garnet as chief. Either the man must be a great and skilful leader or he is one of ordinary calibre, unfit to be a leader, but capable of conducting a small, insignificant business tolerably well, Which isit? The British government has entrusted to him ® most importaut duty—second only to Sir Garnet, if not as arduous. I be- lieve it to be myself a very important and @ very arduous task, and 1 hope sincerely be will bear out the high praise I have heard spoken of him. Captain Glover has been entrusted with the duty of con- quering the contumacious Volta tribes, and of col- iecting @ force many thousand strong to take the Ashantees by the right fank by marching north- west from the Volta River, He has succeeded very well 80 far, but not quite so well asis gen- erally believed. For weeks he waited at Accra for the 5,000 men promised him by the King of Western Axim, until in high displeasure he satied, with some 1,800 men, to Adda, at the mouth of the Volta, where he has made his camp of rendezvous. The 5,000 reinforcement of his force which he had waited for 80 patiently drew near Accra at last, only to be tempted by the offers of Sir Garnet J. Wolseley. It is not quite cecided yet whom the King of Akim will join. If he joins Sir Garnet, then Captain Glover is considerably weakened, and the full measure of success which he expected may not be given bim, though his energy ts such, 1t is said, that he would not stand passive and see himself robbed of all the laurels, but would march upon Coomassie with the 2,000 native troops he has been able to secure. Before starting on his expedition he nas to dis- tinguish himself by MARCHING UPON THE sQUAMOOS and Annumahs, on the right bank of the Volta, and crashing them, lest, when he is absent on the expedition wo Coomassie, these warlike tribes snould overran the country of tne tribes who are his allies, The Aquamoos were formerly allies of Engiand, but they were the guilty tribe ge imvited the Ashantees to attack the British Protectorate in 1867, The Duffas and the Ulas are also to be sum- marily suppressed in the same manner and for the same reasons by Glover. He has a steamer, the Lady of the Lake, and several steam Jaunches to asaist him in his enterprise at the Volta, He bas also several able young English officers to | assist him, Nothing as yet, however, has been done, thongh he will attempt something shortly. Both Glover and Sir Garnet 1t seems are waiting, a dreary thing enough in this fervid, unhealthy climate, Ifouna it to be, at Cape Coast Castle, This is how the first cruise of the HiRaLD steamer, the Dauntless, ended, I have just re- varned to Cape Coast to wait another opportunity of getting news. Until the white troops arrive, of course, I am bound to avail myself of every chance of informing you of the nature of the country and the political and war news connected with it, BAILBOAD OQNSOLIDATION. omen * Boston, Jan, 15, 1874. At @ special meeting of the directors of the Taunton Branch Railroad Company here to-day it was unanimously voted to accept the proposal TT ee the New Bedford Ratiroad Com; wo consolidate with the latter on the basis that iour shares of the Taunton Branch should ve equal to three spares iy the consol TOihe L, are ST. DOMINGO. General Baez’s Fall from Power and Retreat to Foreign Territory. Horald Special Interview with the Ex-Ruler- What He Says of the Samana Bay Lease— Convention with the Revolutionists end Latest Words to the People. St. THowas, Jan. 4, 1876. The French war steamer Kersaint, Captain Aubrey, bas just arrived from St. Domingo city, bringing as passengers the following pe: —_ Buenaventura Baez, ex-President of the St Domingo Republic. Generale Ricardo Curicl, Valentine R. Baez ana Francisco Baez, Colonel Felix Martinez. On the 8ist of December, at San Carlos, a treaty was entered into between Bacz and General Villanueva, of the revolutionary for.es, a copy of which I enclose, On the 2d of January President Baez issued an address to the inhabitants of St. Domingo, and leit, with the above named generals, the same day for St. Thomas. To-day being Sunday, and the steamer for Havana just leaving, | am unable to give further details. INTERVIEW WITH GENERAL BAEZ. Ihave had an interview with President tow who appears ill and careworn. He has not yel decided whether he will proceed to Europe or te the United States. Ex-President Baez states that the principal thing urged agaiust him by the revolutionary party was the lease of Samana. Bay, but that he is personally o! opinion that 1t is only a pretext, and that the new government, as soon as itis seated, wiil also advocate the leasing of the bay. A new President has pot yet been chosen, Baez's opinion is that it will be either General Gonzales or Villanueva—probably the iormer. This revolution is entirely different irom the Cabral-Luperon laction, and has been started by Baoz’s own adherents. Convention Between President Baez and the Dominican Revoiationts: Convention celebrated between the government of President Baez and the citizen General Pablo Villanueva, Minister of War and Superior Chief of the operations of the revolutionary troops, by means of the intervention of the respected Consuls of France, Denmark, Holiand, the United States ef America and Germany. With the patriotic ovjeot of avoiding the effusion of blood, and all kinds of ill will that might serve as an obstacle to the cordial reconciliation of all a the following convention has beem made :— AXTICLE 1.—President Baez will lay down his command to the hoporable Senate of the Republic. Ant, 2.—The honorapie senate will continue exer- cising their fanctions until the new organization is formed, In the same manner the judges of the Supreme Court o! Justice and other tribunals and public officers will retain their places. ART. 8.—The proper authorities who may be designated for that purpose wili make @ formal delivery of the city, its iortifcutions, material of war and arms. Art. 4.--No person, whether @ member of the government or its emipioy¢ in any or the branches: of te public adiinistration, whether relat iriend, &c., i8 in any way obliged to absent hi from the country, or to remain in it contrary to his interests; but be has absolute liberty to stay in the country or to absent himself and return when he chooses, Hvery one in general is assured. of the most ample liberty and guarantees, which the chieis of the revolution well know how to make effective, ART. 5.—In the same way the most absolute liberty is assured as security provided for person and property, and m the inevitanle case of mat forcible requisitions it will be done by giving aii indemnity. Arr. 6.—Although the war ships Monte Cristo and Capotillo form a part of what 1s to be turned over, 1n case the outgoing government should need them to transport some individuals or jam- lies to a neighboring part of the Antilles, it is isugreed that one or both cf the soips may be used, With the precise condition of returning 16 (or them) in a reasonable time, taking Into Be- count the distance, Ant. 7.—General B. Baez will be in full tberty to remain inthe country; in which case every con- sideration Que to the person of the former Chief of the State will be granted him, aud ho 1s at ouce assured of the most ampie guarantees; or in case ot absenting himsel, he may return when he pleases. The samme course will be observed in re- spect to his Ministers, by ‘ Art, 8.—The citizen General Villanueva promises to maintain the strictest order tn.ull Lis line, so a@ to opviate every Kind of conflict, ART, 9—The coutracting parties to this conven- tion, express their deliberate will, and Nes wish that its good faith and exact compliance shall pe guarantees to the agents of friendly nations; and in proof Of 1t they sizn this in quintuplicate, ArT, 10,—(Additional.)—lhe troops under the command of General Villanueva can make ther entry into the capital on the 3d day of January, 1874, at eleven o'clock in the day, R. CURIEL, Minister of War, for the govern- ment of President Baez, PABLO L, VILLANUEVA, MARION LANDALs, Consul of France. A, COEN, Consul of Denmark, FisHEk W. adsies, U.S. 0. A! J. M., LEYBA, Consul of Holland. MIGUEL POU, Consul of the German San CaKLos, Dec. d1, 1873. Empre. Baez’s Address to the People. Sr. DOMINGO, Jan. 2, 1874, ‘To THE HONORABLE SENATE OF THE REPUBLIC OF Dominica:— HONORABLE SENATORS :--When, in 1868, I was called by the majority of the country I found it pros- trated bya series of intense evils. My desire to Save it impelicd me’ not to recede from the task, and I gave myself uotiringly to seck measures that would lift it to @ better fate. ‘Toe paper money had culminatea in bankruptey, public credit had disappeared, and a point of de- parture to reach @ social reconstruction could not be discerned. Protected by Providence Lassamed the dificult missions of facing that social chaos, I have had the happiness of governing six years without the cancer of paper money; that of having paid an immense debt contracted since the restoration; that of reanimating public confldenc», protecting the interests of our then ruiged commerce, estab- lishing the principle of authority and o1 sacin, perpetual factions tnat in various places rai ‘their standard, saving order and toe principles of sociality and of future agyrandizement. ‘Touching the last three months of my Presiden- tial period, and aster the factions that had brokem out on the northeast fronuer nad been defeated in the Loma, near the Matas de Santa Cruz, an eleo- toral revolution came about which presented high funtionaries of the government us candi- dates. Later on arms were resorted to instead of waiting jor triumph ut the polis, From that moment the question changed ite aspect in my eyes, uot oniy on account of its per- sonal nature, but also because 01 the sacredness of political interests. J thought myseli sufilc! strong to repulse with arias the enemy; butl never try to use these Jorces in breaking i arty, 80 that it mighi be torn into shreds. fore everything it is Lecessary to preserve intact its primitive integrity. ‘Theretore, if I ordered the march of the columns towaras Cibao, it was with no other object than that of pacity ing the ah il it were possible, and of assuring myself that which was ap- proaching Was a reoellion or @ real revolution. As a servant of tue people, and before shedding their blood, I will accept any sacrifice. In virtue Of this Icome beiore the legisiative power of the nation to lay down the comma: with which I find myself invested. Deign, then, to accept tt, together with the fervent wishes which 1 address to Heaven to cement in our country the true prin- cipies ol order and sociality that the sigted for renee Of ee pane may save the luture of country. oT nave the honor, to ys é 0 he sentiments most distinguished consideration. sy SSULNAVENTURA BAEZ, General of Diviston, Grand Citizen and President of the Repubite of inca, THE MASSACHUSETTS FISHERIES, GLOovOESTER, Jan. 15, 1874, ‘There have been busy times the past two weeks in fitting away the Western Banks fishing feet on halibut voyages, About jorty vessels have aircady sailed and afew more are nearly ready. The fish- ing business this season wili be as extensively prosecuted as ever, notwithstanding the many severe losses of 1873. New vessels have been pur- chased and others contracted Jor to take the place of the vessels lost. The number of vessels en- d in the Western Banks halibut fishery will be trom forty-five to flity, againgt thirty-five last year. The new catch of Georges Banks will be much inquired after, as the market is nearly atri ‘The very few on hand are held at~$6 26. is 000 barrels of mackerel comprise the stock on the market, Which ts light for the season, and these are fast being disposed 0/ at an advanceon last month’s quotations. Late caught bay No. 1 mack- erel are held at $15 a $16 per barrel, During the jast week three of the halibut fleet arrived, with medium fares, Sales were made on Monday at eighteen cents per pound for white and ten cents tor gray by the trip. An active sasaan ja axnected ‘tp all Drauchaa 0} ihe fighery-