Page:Travels in West Africa, Congo Français, Corisco and Cameroons (IA travelsinwestafr00kingrich).pdf/38

 covered with creeping plants, and inhabited by colonies of creeping insects.

Some of the stores and churches are, it is true, built of stone, but this does not look like stone at a distance, being red in colour—unhewn blocks of the red stone of the locality. In the crannies of these buildings trailing plants covered with pretty mauve or yellow flowers take root, and everywhere, along the tops of the walls, and in the cracks of the houses, are ferns and flowering plants. They must get a good deal of their nourishment from the rich, thick air, which seems composed of 85 per cent. of warm water, and the remainder of the odours of Frangipani, orange flowers, magnolias, oleanders, and roses, combined with others that demonstrate that the inhabitants do not regard sanitary matters with the smallest degree of interest.

There is one central street, and the others are neatly planned out at right angles to it. None of them are in any way paved or metalled. They are covered in much prettier fashion, and in a way more suitable for naked feet, by green Bahama grass, save and except those which are so nearly perpendicular that they have got every bit of earth and grass cleared off them down to the red bed-rock, by the heavy rain of the wet season.

The shops, which fringe these streets in an uneven line, are like rooms with one side taken out, for shop-fronts, as we call them, are here unknown. Their floors are generally raised on a bed of stone a little above street level, but except when newly laid, these stones do not show, for the grass grows over them, making them into green banks. Inside, the shops are lined with shelves, on which are placed bundles of gay-coloured Manchester cottons and shawls, Swiss clocks, and rough but vividly coloured china; or—what makes a brave show—brass, copper, and iron cooking-pots. Here and there you come across a baker's, with trays of banana fritters of tempting odour; and there is no lack of barbers and chemists. Within all the shops are usually to be seen the proprietor and his family with a few friends, all exceedingly plump and happy, having a social shout together: a chat I cannot call it.