The household in Nigeria, and indeed, all over West Africa, is by no means the complicated affair that one has to cope with in India, and housekeeping is reduced to the greatest simplicity.

The staff consists of a cook, with an attendant satellite, called a ‘cook’s mate,’ a steward, or ‘boy,’ with usually, in a married household at least, an under steward, or perhaps a couple of small boys to assist generally in the housework and table service. There may be an orderly attached, but his duties consist rather in the airing of clothes and boxes, cleaning of guns and boots, and carrying of letters, etc.

Each pony has his own ‘doki-boy,’ whose duties are fully described in the chapter on the stable, and the mistress may, in her enthusiasm, decide to employ a regular gardener. All these good people live in the compound, the only outside servant being the laundress. This lady is only to be found at headquarters (she is usually a Coast woman), in out-stations, and in the bush the washing is done—generally with inconspicuous success—by one’s own boys, or the wife of a doki-boy. It is distinctly useful to bring out from home one or two flat-irons, and make a point of ‘getting up’ one’s most cherished muslin blouses, etc., oneself.

Wages are high, absurdly so, but the demand for fairly capable servants is so great, and the supply so small, that there is little prospect of the present scale of pay being reasonably reduced. Also, alas! in many bachelor establishments, the standard of excellence in service is not high enough to produce a really good class of servants, and I am quite certain that any Englishwoman who has kept house in India would absolutely gasp at the quality and quantity of work done by a highly paid ‘boy,’ in possession of most eulogistic testimonials from previous masters. The following is a fair average of wages paid, per month, all over the country: in some cases, servants of an undesirable kind may be engaged for less, but this is no real economy, while in some other cases even higher wages are paid.

Roughly £100 a year, for the services of seven people, all lazy and stupid, mostly untruthful, and frequently dishonest, ignorant of the first principles of order and cleanliness, and, unmistakably, considering Missis rather a bore when she insists on trying to inculcate these.

My personal experience with house servants is not a very varied one, as we still have some of those we engaged on first coming to West Africa five years ago; but, in fairness to them, I must not omit to say that I have only very rarely found any one of them in the least degree untruthful, and that I know them to be absolutely honest; they have never stolen a single article or a halfpenny from either of us during these years.

Servants may be of all languages and tribes, and they have no ‘caste.’ Some are Mahomedans, some Pagans, some professing Christianity, but their religious convictions do not appear to affect any of them very seriously. One important point for the new-comer is, that one servant, at least—the head steward for choice—should speak good, intelligible English; most of the Coast boys, and those trained by the Roman Catholic missionaries at Onitsha, can do so.

With the exception of the cook and steward, our household is required absolutely to speak Hausa, and nothing else, to us and each other, which saves endless confusion, and gives a comfortable sense of security that one’s orders are correctly transmitted to doki-boys, gardener, etc.

It is the custom to pay a certain percentage of the wages weekly, usually two shillings per head, for ‘chop money’ (subsistence allowance), and the balance at the end of each month, which arrangement shows ingenuously what a solid, clear profit the household makes. This balance of pay is generally expended, on the spot, in the acquiring of such luxuries as a gaily striped umbrella, or a smart pair of ‘English’ boots.

The majority of servants are reckless gamblers, and a perfect network of lending, borrowing, and extorting of an exorbitant rate of interest, prevails amongst them, in spite of strictest prohibitions on the subject.

The Cook and His Kitchen

The Nigerian kitchen is arranged on the Indian plan—apart from the house, and just as much inspection and supervision will have to be exercised.

Kitchen appliances of a rough-and-ready kind can be bought at the local stores, but it is far more satisfactory to bring most of them direct from England, especially a nest of aluminium saucepans, their lightness being a great advantage while marching.

At headquarters, a kitchen table, some rough shelves and pegs will be available, and a meat-safe, which, however, has to be accommodated on the breeziest corner of the verandah.

The mistress will do well to walk into the kitchen, as a matter of course, at any hour of the day: the cook and his mate will, possibly, like to sleep there, and if the visit is made regularly, after breakfast, the beds or mats can be whisked out of sight, for the time being, and the malpractice never discovered. In Lokoja and Zungeru the kitchens are now fitted with very good little ranges, which are a great improvement on the open, brick fireplaces of earlier days. I remember well, the day that mine was first put in, going to the kitchen to see how it worked, and finding the cook, radiant with pride and pleasure, lighting the fire in the oven. The fuel consists entirely of wood. In out stations, the poor chef has a good deal to contend with, usually an open fire for ordinary cooking (on the floor) and for an oven, an ingenious arrangement of a large country pot half buried in the ground; into this, blazing wood is thrust until the interior is quite hot, when the fuel is hauled out, the cake or bread popped in, a flat piece of tin or iron laid on the top, and piled up with burning wood. It can be readily understood that an oven of this description makes successful baking a matter of some uncertainty.

The kitchen table must be scrubbed with soap and water daily, the pans and utensils scoured, and the walls occasionally whitewashed. You will find your cook slightly bored with your insistence on these small details, but always polite, cheerful and amenable. He is a teachable person, too, and takes a kindly interest in one’s making of cakes, sweets, etc., but his knowledge of cookery is strictly limited—the veriest tyro in India earning ten rupees a month is a cordon bleu compared with him.

Housekeeping in his department is of the utmost simplicity: he turns up immediately after breakfast, smiling genially, usually arrayed in a spotless white suit, or a suit of pyjamas of striking pattern and colouring, a jaunty straw hat in his hand, and immaculate white shoes on his feet. He gives you the account of the previous day’s marketing, you reproach him for the toughness of the mutton, the heaviness of the bread, and the total absence of the savoury; all of which he takes most philosophically, and explains glibly, to his own entire exoneration. You then give him half-a-crown (or, to save trouble, ten shillings twice a week), and indicate tentatively what you would prefer for luncheon and dinner. It is no use ordering dishes definitely; they never appear, and when you indignantly demand the devilled kidneys arranged for, the tranquil answer: ‘Cook say, kidney no live for market to-day,’ defeats without soothing you.

So you let him depart, to work his wicked will, stalking off under a patriotic sun umbrella, striped in sections of red, white and blue cotton, followed by the satellite, bearing the market basket, while you, the anxious housewife, must simply put your trust in Providence and hope for the best.

The average cook has little or no discrimination, if the menu is left entirely to him: we once found ourselves guests at a bachelor dinner-party, where the feast commenced with chicken soup, followed by stewed chicken, which was, in its turn, succeeded by minced chicken; finally, to our despair, the board was graced by a couple of roast chickens—and this with an unlimited supply of mutton and beef in the market.

You must be prepared to get very indifferent meat; the animals are badly slaughtered, and cut up without any regard to joints, etc., so that beef is really useless, except for making soup or mince, so tough is it. The mutton usually grows on a goat, and is also tough, which, I suppose, accounts in part for the eternal chicken taking so prominent a place in the day’s menu. Tough meat, by the way, can be much improved by wrapping the joint in paw-paw leaves for an hour or two; if left too long it will decay altogether, so personal supervision is necessary—the cook does not profess to understand such faddy nonsense! Turkeys can be reared in the compound quite easily, also ducks; both are excellent, and there is always a pleasant possibility of occasional additions to the larder, in the shape of guinea fowl, bush fowl, pigeons, and venison, which, when hung for twenty-four to forty-eight hours (according to the temperature), is absolutely delicious. The menu can always be kept from monotony by small dishes, such as sheep and ox tongues, brain cutlets, stuffed paw-paws—an excellent substitute for vegetable marrow—tomatoes, ‘farcies,’ or garden eggs, treated in the same way.

Personally, I do not care for native dishes, and ‘palm-oil chop’ is, to my mind, an abomination; but ground-nut soup is very good indeed, and should not be overlooked, especially as it is a delicacy that every cook understands how to make. Fish can nearly always be had, so that once one has taught the cook how to make real curries—as they are made in India—a fair variety can easily be had, with little or no assistance from odious and unwholesome tinned food.

I fear the chef will not be found a great hand at puddings: his inspirations do not soar much higher than banana fritters and cornflour mould. I remember a painful incident which occurred at the commencement of my career as a West African housekeeper, when the appearance of an unexpected guest caused me to order an impromptu pudding, a sweet omelette. When, in due course, the pudding appeared, looking deliciously light and frizzling hot, a curious smell accompanied it, and the first mouthful revealed it as a savoury omelette, highly seasoned with onions and fresh chilis, filled with apricot jam! I have since heard of an enterprising cook, who artistically tinted a cornflour mould bright blue, with indigo. He can be taught to make very fair tart pastry, but, as a rule, it is safer to confine oneself to fruit salads, trifles, and other cold sweets, which one can prepare oneself. The impossibility of getting fresh milk is, naturally, a great handicap in cooking, but ‘Ideal’ milk is quite useful in preparing mayonnaise and many other sauces, and the tinned cream (Golden Butterfly brand) sold by the Niger Company is almost as good as the fresh article, as it can be whipped quite stiff if kept in cold water for a few hours before opening.

Vegetables cannot be had regularly, unless the housekeeper is also a gardener, and grows them herself. There is, however, a native spinach, which is quite as good as the English kind, and grows like a weed. Country tomatoes, garden eggs, okros, sweet potatoes, green paw-paws, and yams are all of great use in supplying the table with the necessary green food; but I feel sure that the housekeeper who reads the chapter on Gardening will instantly decide to do better than tamely submit to limiting her household to country produce of this kind.

At a pinch (when touring in forest country) we have found young Indian corn, or maize, well boiled, not at all a bad substitute for other vegetables, and, when the corns are boiled, then lightly browned over the fire, they are excellent, eaten with butter, pepper and salt.

In the way of fruit, there are usually bananas to be had, pineapples in the spring and summer, and occasionally oranges. In Lokoja the mangoes are quite good, and I have had guavas and custard apples. The country abounds in tiny limes, which are sold in great quantities, very cheap, and make most delicious lemon squashes.

The Steward and his Duties

The head steward, or ‘boy,’ must be carefully chosen, and is worth training, for in his hands lies the greater part of your daily comfort, and to his shortcomings can be traced most of the irritability which is recognized as a natural weakness of the dweller in West Africa.

He will require endless patience, and daily insistence on small details of cleanliness and order, for he has a happy knack of carrying out an order for five or six days, then quietly discontinuing it, and trusting to his mistress’ preoccupation not to observe the omission. Never flatter yourself that any system you have introduced, with apparent success, will continue to work for a week without some supervision and inspection. The genus ‘head boy’ is a light-hearted, easy-going, tractable sort of creature; some are masterful and quarrelsome, some are placid and lazy, but all of them like to have one or two small boys about the house, to whom they can relegate most of their work, while they are swaggering in the market, in spotless raiment, with redundant watch-chain and a sun umbrella. Some, I am sorry to say, are bad, very, very bad, and I cannot help feeling most strongly that more than one vigorous, valuable young life has succumbed out here to sickness and death, mainly for the want of proper attendance—better cooking and the small comforts and niceties that every man requires, but is, usually, helpless to obtain and insist upon for himself. I have seen unspeakable habits of dirt and slovenliness prevailing amongst bachelors’ boys—yes, and dangerous ones too, tinned food kept for days in open tins, and served up again to the unfortunate master, cups and plates washed and wiped—well, it serves no purpose of mine to recount these horrors, and it is only fair to add that I have known boys whose skilful care, devotion and unselfishness towards sick masters could hardly be excelled. I only hope that every Englishwoman who spends even a few months in Nigeria will leave behind her two or three servants inoculated with habits of scrupulous cleanliness, thoughtfulness and common sense, to lighten the lot of some lonely man who now feels uncomfortably that in his mother’s house at home the table-cloth is not hideously grubby and crooked, the milk and jam served in messy tins, the glasses cloudy, and the forks and spoons more than doubtful, but vaguely supposes all this is necessary in West Africa—it isn’t!

As a rule, I suppose the Coast boy makes the best head steward: he speaks English, and has usually served a white master before. He acts as housemaid and parlourmaid in one, starts his day with energetic sweeping and some sketchy dusting, waits at table, cuts his master’s hair, acts as valet generally, and is the spokesman and middle man between his mistress and the rest of the household. He is responsible for the existence and condition, good or otherwise, of nearly all of your possessions; therefore, it really answers best to have the actual work of laying tables, cleaning knives, lamps, etc., performed by the under steward, so as to leave your major-domo free to superintend and investigate the working of the whole establishment, down to the stable, and report on it to his mistress; he should be taught to do this without fear or prejudice, or any suspicion of sneaking or mischief-making: obviously he cannot, with any show of dignity, rebuke the misdeeds of the cook or orderly; if he has to wash plates and scrub out the pantry, equally obviously he must be honest and, as far as possible, superior to bribery. Not being embarrassed with caste prejudices, he will concern himself with the feeding and washing of the dogs, the care of the poultry-yard, and our faithful head boy has, more than once, been employed to shoot a hopelessly sick pony.

There is little more to add on the subject of the household staff. The cook’s mate is but an embryo cook, who presently emerges from his modest position and blossoms into a cook, with a satellite of his own. I believe that, as a matter of fact, the cook’s mate does a fair share of the cooking: this will be readily ascertained when the cook gets helplessly drunk and dinner is forthcoming all the same!

The small house boys are equally budding stewards, and, if well looked after, it is amazing how they sprout, physically and mentally, and how soon they find out that a rise in pay is merited.

One word of advice to housekeepers, masculine and feminine—don’t beat the boys. There is still a prevailing idea that the master who wields the bulala (whip) with most vigour gets best served. But this I beg leave to doubt. For the time being, fear may make them move faster and remember longer, but there is, deeply implanted under every woolly, black scalp, the sacred duty of reprisals, and the boy who is frequently flogged will take it out somehow, sooner or later—be sure of that. Moreover, the servant who really needs constant hitting is not worth keeping; and, indeed, were he, through such a process, to be evolved into a perfect treasure, he would be bought too dear, at the cost of so much irritation and mental stress. For, it must be admitted, that for one occasion when a boy really deserves a flogging he gets bulala ten times, because Master is feverish or worried, or ‘jumpy’; and poor Master seldom thinks, till afterwards, of the spectacle he presents, pursuing a fleeing boy, and vociferating—because he cannot find his shirt-stud. Alas, for ‘British prestige’!

I was told, a short time ago, by one such master, whose naturally sweet disposition had doubtless been tried by time and circumstances, that he had had his boy severely flogged (‘six dozen’), because the salt on his dinner table was damp. As a rule, a little mild sarcasm, or a ridiculous nick-name bestowed is far more efficacious than a scolding, and if a severe reminder is necessary, judicious fining has the greatest effect, for the most sensitive bit of a house boy’s soul lives just underneath his belt: when this is done, the culprit must see the fine, in money, thrown into the river, or placed in the kitchen fire, and know that it is gone beyond recall, or else he merely credits you with making money out of him, and is rather shocked at your meanness.

We want, do we not, to raise their standard, not to lower our own, and though, of course, there are black sheep, many of them, I do believe that good treatment evokes good service. The householder who, remembering how comparatively new to the country the art of domestic service is, shows a little consideration, never breaks a promise, and does not scold or whack all round, because it happens to be a hot morning, will probably fare best, after all; moreover, on returning from leave, he or she will be sure to find ‘Audu’ or ‘Ibrahim’ smiling a welcome at Burutu, all anxious to take up service again with such a desirable Master or ‘Missis.’