Severely hustled and horribly shaken up, we ran down the little valley of
the Avin streamlet. It comes from afar, heading, they say, in Abasakasu, a
region where gold abounds. In three-quarters of an hour we had cleared the
four short miles which separate Axim from the Ancobra ferry. This is the
line of a future tramway, which will transport goods from the port to the
river; at present they must be shipped in bar-boats, which cost much and
carry little. The ground divides itself into three sections--the red clay
north of Axim; the sands, whose green-grown upper levels are fitted to
support iron-pot sleepers; and the Avin valley, which debouches upon the
left bank of the Ancobra. The first and the last divisions are safe for
creosoted wood. My friend Mr. Russell Shaw would, I doubt not, take the
contract for 4,000_l_., and a macadamised cart-road could be made for
500_l_.

This would be the beginning of a much-wanted change. At present the prices
of transport are appalling. The French mines pay from 2_l_. to 2_l_.
10_s_. per ton from England to Axim; from Axim to Tákwá, forty miles by
river and thirty by land, costs them 600 francs (24_l_.) per ton.
Moreover, native hands are not always forthcoming.

The Ancobra River, the main artery and waterway of this region, must not
be written after the Jonesian or modern mode, 'Ankobra' and 'Ankober,' nor
with Bosman 'Rio Cobre' (River of Copper). It has evidently no connection
with Abyssinian Ankober. To the native name, 'Anku' or 'Manku,' the
Portuguese added Cobra, expressing its snaky course. Bowdich, followed by
many moderns, calls it Seënna, for Sánmá or Sánumá, meaning 'unless a gale
(of wind).' The legend is that a savage and murderous old king of the
Apollonians, whose capital was Atábo, built a look-out upon a tall
cocoanut-tree, and declared that nothing but a storm could lay it low.