preposterous to publish descriptions of any European country from
information gathered ten years ago. But Africa moves slowly, and
thus we see that the results of an Abyssinian journey (M. Antoine
d'Abbadie's "Geodesic d'Ethiopie," which took place about 1845,
are not considered obsolete in 1873.

After a languid conviction during the last half century of owning
some ground upon the West Coast of Africa, England has been
rudely aroused by a little war which will have large
consequences. The causes that led to the "Ashantee Campaign," a
negro copy of the negroid Abyssinian, may be broadly laid down as
general incuriousness, local mismanagement, and the operation of
unprincipled journalism.

It is not a little amusing to hear the complaints of the public
that plain truth about the African has not been told. I could
cite more than one name that has done so. But what was the
result? We were all soundly abused by the negrophile; the
multitude cared little about reading "unpopular opinions;" and
then, when the fulness of time came, it turned upon us, and rent
us, and asked why we had not spoken freely concerning Ashanti and
Fanti, and all the herd. My "Wanderings in West Africa" is a case
in point: so little has it been read, that a President of the
Royal Geographical Society (African section of the Society of
Arts Journal, Feb. 6, 1874) could state, "If Fantees are cowardly
and lazy, Krumen are brave;" the latter being the most notorious
poltroons on the West African seaboard.

The hostilities on the Gold Coast might have been averted with
honour to ourselves at any time between 1863 and 1870, by a