10,006 Abibisika (Black Gold) Points

Rank: Unranked Obibini

Arab encampments for carrying on a wholesale trade in this terrible commodity are now established all over the heart of Africa. They are usually connected with wealthy arab traders at Zanzibar and other places on the coast and communication is kept up by caravans which pass at long intervals from one to the other. Being always large and well supplied with the material of war these caravans have at their mercy the feeble and divided native tribes through which they pass and their trail across the Continent is darkened with every aggravation of tyranny and crime. They come upon the scene suddenly they stay only long enough to secure their end and disappear only to return when a new crop has arisen which is worth the reaping. Sometimes these arab traders will actually settle for a year or two in the heart of some quiet community in the remote interior. They pretend perfect friendship, they molest no one, they barter honestly. They plant the seeds of their favourite vegetables and fruits – the arab always carries seeds with him as if they meant to stay forever. Meantime they buy ivory, tusk after tusk until great piles of it are buried beneath their huts and all their barter goods are gone. Then one day suddenly the inevitable quarrel is picked. And then follows a wholesale massacre. Enough only are spared from the slaughter to carry the ivory to the coast. The grass huts of the village are set on fire, the arabs strike camp and the slave march worse than death begins

Tropical Africa, Henry Drummond (1889) pg 70-71