Hotels and cafes,
better than any one finds in the older settlements along the coast,
are arranged on the water-front, and there is a church capable of
seating the entire white population at one time. If the place is to
grow, it can do so only through trade, and when trade really comes
all these palaces and cafes and barracks which occupy the entire
water-front will have to be pushed back to make way for warehouses
and custom-house sheds. At present it is populated only by
officials, and, I believe, twelve white women.
[Illustration: The Late Sultan of Zanzibar in His State Carriage.]
You feel that it is an experiment, that it has been sent out like a
box of children's building blocks, and set up carefully on this
beautiful harbor. All that Dar Es Salaam needs now is trade and
emigrants. At present it is a show place, and might be exhibited at
a world's fair as an example of a model village.
In writing of Zanzibar I am embarrassed by the knowledge that I am
not an unprejudiced witness. I fell in love with Zanzibar at first
sight, and the more I saw of it the more I wanted to take my luggage
out of the ship's hold and cable to my friends to try and have me
made Vice-Consul to Zanzibar through all succeeding administrations.
Zanzibar runs back abruptly from a white beach in a succession of
high white walls. It glistens and glares, and dazzles you; the sand
at your feet is white, the city itself is white, the robes of the
people are white.
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