I have just had a long talk with Mr. Frederick J. Jackson, the acting governor and commander-in-chief of this big territory which John Bull owns in the heart of East Africa. Mr. Jackson came out here to hunt big game years ago, and he has been on the ground from that time to this. He has long been employed by the British Government in the administration of Uganda and of the protectorate of East Africa, and he is now lieutenant-governor in the absence of Colonel Sadler, the acting governor of the country.

Let me give you some idea of this vast region which the British are opening up in the midst of the black continent. This country altogether is larger than the combined states of Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, and Wisconsin. It has a population of four million natives, most of whom not so long ago were warring with one another. Some of the tribes made their living by preying upon their neighbours. Slavery was everywhere common, and one of the great slave routes to the coast was not far from the line where the Uganda railway now runs. To-day all these evils have been done away with. The warlike tribes have been conquered, and are turning their attention to stock raising and farming. Slavery has been practically abolished, and peace prevails everywhere. The whole country is now kept in good order by only about eighteen hundred police and less than two thousand English and East Indian soldiers. A large part of the region along the line of the railroad has been divided into ranches and farms. Small towns are springing up here and there, and in time the greater part of the plateau will be settled.

There is no doubt that white men can live here. The children I see are rosy with health, and the farmers claim that, with care, they are as well as they were when back home in England. There are some Europeans here who have had their homes on the highlands for over twelve years, and they report that the climate is healthful and invigorating. They are able to work out of doors from six until ten o’clock in the morning and from three to six o’clock in the afternoon, and during a part of the year all the day through. As a rule, however, the sun is so hot at midday that one should not go out unless his head is well protected. The heat here is dry. The nights are usually so cool that a blanket is needed. Notwithstanding the fact that we are almost on the Equator, at any altitude above eight thousand feet ice may be found in the early morning. Nearer the coast the land drops and the climate is tropical. For two hundred miles back from the Indian Ocean there are practically no white settlers, except at Mombasa, for it is only on this high plateau that they are as yet attempting to live.

But let me continue my description in the words of the man who governs the country. My conversation took place in a long, blue, iron-roofed building known as the Commissioner’s office, situated on the hill above Nairobi. I had asked as to the colony’s future. Mr. Jackson replied:

“It is all problematical. We have an enormous territory and millions of people. We have not yet prospected the country, nor have we dealt long enough with the natives to know what we can do with the people. We have really no idea as yet as to just what our resources are, or the labour we can secure to exploit them.”

“How many inhabitants have you?”

“We do not know. We can get some idea from the taxes, for most of the provinces have to pay so much per hut. In other places the natives have hardly been subdued, and of no province have we an accurate census. The number has been estimated at from two to four millions, but I believe it is nearer five millions, and possibly more.”

“How about your white settlers? Will this country ever be inhabited by Caucasians?”

“That, again, is difficult to say,” replied the conservative governor. “We have a few European settlers already, but whether we can make this colony a second South Africa remains to be seen. I have lived here for over twenty years, and I am not sure as to how much hard manual labour any white man can do in this latitude. It is true we are more than a mile above the sea, but nevertheless we are on the Equator, and the climate on the Equator is not suited to the white man. The only Europeans who will succeed here will be those who bring some money with them, and who will use the native labour in their work. I don’t think any settler should come to East Africa without as much as three thousand dollars, reckoning the amount in your money. He should have enough to buy his land, stock it, build his house, and then have something to go on. He should not start out with a very small tract. Much of the grazing land is now being divided up into tracts of five thousand acres. If a man takes the first thousand and pays for it, the other four thousand are held for him subject to certain improvements and developments upon the first thousand. After these are completed he may buy the remaining tract at the price of the first thousand acres.”

“I understand much of your land is being taken up in large holdings.”

“That is so to a certain extent,” replied Mr. Jackson, “but we are now discouraging such allotments, and would rather have the land apportioned in tracts of from six hundred and forty acres to about five thousand acres each. If the land is for grazing the larger area is desirable. If it is for grain farming or dairying, it is better that it should be small. As to our large landholders, the British East African Company owns about five hundred square miles, Lord Delamere has about one hundred thousand acres, and Lord Hindlip a little less. There are a number of settlers who have twenty thousand acres or more.”

“How about your ranching possibilities? I understand that your stock growers expect to found a great meat industry here which will crowd our Chicago packers out of the markets of England.”

“I do not think there is room for alarm about that matter as yet,” replied the official. “This country is just in the making, and we know practically nothing about it. We realize that we have some of the richest grasses of the world—grasses which have supported vast herds of game, and upon which cattle, sheep, goats, and hogs will thrive. But we do not know whether we can conquer the diseases and insect pests which attack all the animals we have so far imported. We seem to have every disease to which cows, horses, or sheep are subject in other parts of the world, and I believe we have some peculiarly our own. We have ticks by the millions and flies by the myriads. So far, however, our experiments with cattle are turning out well, and we know that we can produce excellent beef and good butter. We hope to find our first market for our meats and dairy products in South Africa, and later on to ship such things to Europe. The creation of an industry of that kind, though, is a matter of gradual development. We shall have to arrange about proper transportation, which means cold-storage cars and cold-storage ships. We have not gone far enough as yet to be able to predict what we can do.”

“What other possibilities have you?” I asked.

“I think we may eventually be able to raise coffee, and we are already exploiting certain fibres which grow well between here and the coast. The plant which produces the Sansivera fibre is indigenous to this country and is being exploited by Americans who are working not far from the station of Voi, about one hundred miles from the Indian Ocean. I have no doubt we can raise sisal hemp, and know that we can grow ramie without cultivation.

“As to minerals, a great deal of prospecting has already been done, but the results have not been satisfactory. We know that we have gold, silver, and copper, but the deposits so far discovered have not been valuable enough to pay for their mining. This whole country is volcanic. We lie here in a basin surrounded by volcanoes. We have Mt. Kenya on the north, Kilimanjaro on the south, and Mt. Elgon away off to the northwest. The eruptions of these mountains have been so comparatively recent that some believe that they have buried the precious metals so deep down in the earth that we shall never get at them.”

“How about your timber?”

“We have fine forests, containing both hard and soft woods, among them a great deal of cedar such as is used for making cigar boxes and lead pencils. Most of such wood, however, is inland and at long distance from streams upon which it could be floated down to the sea. At present, our timber resources are practically inaccessible by railroad.”

Speaking of the possibilities of this East African colony, it may be one of the coffee lands of the future. Several plantations which have been set out not far from here are doing well. There is one coffee estate within five miles of Nairobi which belongs to the Catholic Mission of the Holy Ghost. Yesterday I rode out on horseback over the prairie to have a look at it. The way to the estate is through fenced fields, which are spotted here and there with the sheet-iron cottages of English settlers. As I rode on I saw many humped cattle grazing in the pastures. The grass is everywhere tall and thick, and the red soil, although not much cultivated as yet, seems rich.

Arriving at the plantation, I was met by Father Tom Burke and walked with him through his coffee plantation. It covers something like fifteen acres, and has now more than eight thousand trees in full bearing. The yield is so good that the plantation is supplying not only the town of Nairobi with all the coffee it needs, but is shipping several tons every year to Europe. Father Burke tells me that the coffee trees begin to bear at a year and a half, and that they are in full bearing within about four years. As the ripening season is long, the berries have to be picked many times. I saw blossoms and green and ripe berries on the same tree. In one place the natives were picking, at another they were hoeing the plants, while in a third place they were pulping the berries in a pulper turned by hand. The trees seem thrifty. Father Burke says that the young plants grow easily, and that where the birds carry the berries away and drop the seeds the plants will sprout up of themselves. There is a plantation near by of thirty thousand trees, and I am told that there is a fair prospect of a considerable coffee industry springing up.

I saw many Negroes at work in the fields. They were Kikuyus, and were really fine-looking fellows. They were clearing up new ground, chopping down the weeds with mattocks, and digging up the soil and turning it over. The sweat stood in beads upon their brows and backs and ran down their bare legs. I asked the priest what wages they got, and was told that they each received the equivalent of about five cents for a day of ten hours. I suggested to the reverend father that the pay was small, but he said that the natives could not earn more than that sum and even at those wages it was difficult to keep them at work.

I hear this same statement made everywhere. The English people here think that the native Africans are well enough paid at the rate of a half cent per hour or of a rupee per month. If you protest they will say that that sum is sufficient to supply all the wants of a black man and ask why he should be paid more. Think of it, ye American toilers who belong to our labour unions. Think of five cents a day for carrying bricks or stone, for chopping up ground under the eyes of a taskmaster, or for trotting along through the grass, hour after hour, with a load of sixty pounds on your head! Think of it, and you may get an idea of how the English white man here is carrying the black man’s burden! Indeed, as the Frenchman says, “it is to laugh!”