Equatoria

“ Something over three thousand slaves, it is estimated, are imported into Morocco every year, most of them being brought by the terrible desert routes from Equatoria and the Sudan, the trails of the slave caravans being marked by the bleaching bones of the thousands who have died on the way from heat, hunger, or exhaustion. ”

“ They are no idlers, these pioneers of the desert, the jungle, and the veldt; they live with danger and hardship for their daily mates; they die with their boots on from snake-bite or sleeping-sickness or Somali spear; and remember, please, they are making new markets and new playgrounds for you and me. Morocco, Algeria, Tripolitania, Equatoria, Rhodesia, the Sahara, the Sudan, the Congo, the Rand, and the Zambezi ... ”

“ Equatoria.—In the Equatorial Province, which extended from the Albert Nyanza to Lado, Emin Bey, who had a force of 1300 Egyptian troops and 3000 irregulars, distributed among many stations, held out, hoping for reinforcements. In March 1885, however, Amadi fell to the dervishes, and on the 18th of April Karamalla arrived near Lado, the capital, and sent to inform Emin of the fall of Khartum. Emin and Captain Casati, an Italian, moved south to Wadelai, giving up the northern posts, and opened friendly relations with Kabarega, king of Unyoro. ”

“ There are deserts where no rain ever falls, and there are stretches of coast line where no day ever passes without rain. It is a country where all climates can be found. As the northern part of the continent is equatorial the greatest degree of heat is there experienced, while the south stretches its length toward the Pole Quito, the capital of Ecuador, is on the equator, and Punta Arenas, in Chile, is the southernmost town in the world.
For hundreds of years Spain and Portugal exploited and ruled with an iron hand their new and vast possessions. ”

“ Just as with regard to the alleged want of appetite experienced by Europeans in the tropics, we ought to see that the general public is more correctly informed as to the supposed fertility of Equatorial Africa, and so saved from forming extravagant notions of the brilliant future in store for our colonies. ”

“ Most of us think that Eastern Equatorial Africa, considered as a field for colonization, is as much virgin soil as Togo, Kamerun and German South-West Africa, or the greater part of our possessions in the South Seas. ”

“ If with the same amount of land the continents had been so grouped as to occupy a considerable portion of the equatorial oceans—such as would have been the case had Africa been turned so as to join South America, and Asia been brought to the south-east so as to take the place of part of the equatorial Pacific, then the great ocean-currents could have been but feeble or have hardly existed. ”

“ Composed of a mainland portion and five inhabited islands, Equatorial Guinea has been ruled by ruthless leaders who have badly mismanaged the economy since independence from 190 years of Spanish rule in 1968. ”

“ The second thought is that, considering what we know of the conditions under which the native races of Equatorial Africa have been developed during an unrecorded series of ages, and of the subsequent conditions during several generations of slavery, the surprising thing is that the differences should not be far greater than they are. ”

“ We were now beginning to relieve ourselves of the ammunition, to carry the sick refugees from the Equatorial Province.
On the 11th we passed out of Karagwé territory, and because of the complimentary introductions from Ndagara we were welcomed in Ihangiro, and were escorted from village to village until we halted at Kavari. But here was the end of the free living. Every grain and banana would have to be purchased henceforward. From the Albert Nyanza to this first important district in Ihangiro, nearly 600 miles, the Expedition had been supplied gratuitously and abundantly. ”

“ I don’t mean ordinary murders or single-handed burglaries, of course, but”—a modest ring of professional pride betrayed the quiet enthusiast—“real First-Class Crimes.”
“The State Antonio Five per cent. Bond Coupons?” suggested Carrados.
“Ah, you are right, Mr Carrados.” Beedel shook his head sadly, as though perhaps on that occasion someone ought to have looked. “A man has a fit in the inquiry office of the Agent-General for British Equatoria, and two hundred and fifty thousand pounds’ worth of faked securities is the result in Mexico. ”

“ This is the most fertile and productive part of Ecuador, especially on the higher lands near the Cordillera. The Trans-Andine region is similar to the neighbouring territories of the upper Amazon basin occupied by Colombia, Brazil and Peru—a great forest-covered plain descending gently toward the east, broken on its western margin by short spurs from the Andes enclosing highly fertile valleys, and by low, isolated ranges between the larger river courses, and traversed by large rivers flowing into the Napo and Marañon. ”

“ The Khalifa has sent me the answer, and has informed me that the said Governor of the Equator has fallen into our hands, and is now one of the followers of the Mahdi. The Khalifa sent steamers to the Equator, commanded by one of our chiefs, named Omar Saleh. They reached Lado, and on their arrival{249} they found that the troops of the said Governor, who were composed of military men and officers, had seized the Governor, with a traveller who was with him. They put them in chains and delivered them into the hands of our chief. ”

“ The eastern part of this territory is also claimed by Peru, which would have the effect, if allowed, of restricting Ecuador to a comparatively small area covered by the Andes and western Cordillera and the narrow plain on the Pacific coast. From the Santiago river, a western affluent of the Marañon, the boundary line runs south-west and west across the Andes to the head waters of the Macara, down that stream to the Chira, or Achira, whose channel marks the frontier down to about 80° 17′ W., where a small stream (the Rio Alamo) enters from the north. ”

“ Ecuador is, in point of population, the weaker nation: perhaps her claims have not been considered in a sufficiently generous spirit. [229] The law of uti possidetis alone holds. But an outlet to the great navigable affluents of the Amazon is a question of paramount importance in this forested region, cut off as it is from the Pacific by the huge rampart of the Andes, and—without prejudice to the historical aspects of the boundary question—this matter should receive full consideration. ”

“ Father Velasco praises Ecuador as "the noblest portion of the New World." Nature has doubtless gifted it with capabilities unsurpassed by those of any other country. Situated on the equinoctial line, and embracing within its limits some of the highest as well as lowest dry land on the globe, it presents every grade of climate, from the perpetual summer on the coast and in the Orient to the everlasting winter of the Andean summits, while the high plateau between the Cordilleras enjoys an eternal spring. ”

“ Travellers from Valparaiso are filled with admiration and delight when their eyes rest upon the sea-board of Ecuador and Colombia, for after the arid monotony of the Chilian and Peruvian coast-lines, where scarcely ever a drop of rain falls to freshen the verdure, the change is to a tropical paradise. The expanse of glorious greenery refreshes the vision—an exhilarating exchange from the dun-coloured vistas which have been left behind. Guayaquil, the principal port of Ecuador, is one of the best situated on the whole of the Pacific littoral, but, unfortunately, is perhaps the most unhealthy. ”

“ Imagine fifty mountains as high as Etna, three of them with smoking craters, standing along the road between New York and Washington, and you will have some idea of the ride down this gigantic colonnade from Quito to Riobamba. If, as Ruskin says, the elements of beauty are in proportion to the increase of mountainous character, Ecuador is artistically beautiful to a high degree. ”

“ We have seen that in Colombia the mountain ranges are so close to the shore as to leave little space for cities or agriculture, while in Peru and Chile for the most part the mountains are visible from the sea. Further, a good portion of Ecuador’s coastal zone resembles in some respects the Amazon section, while in Peru the two are utterly different. Ecuador is the only country favored on the Pacific side with rivers navigable to any considerable extent, and the dense tropical vegetation of much of the coast is in striking contrast to the Peruvian deserts. ”

“ Ecuador (1,271) , a republic of S. America, of Spanish origin, created in 1822; derives its name from its position on the equator; lies between Columbia and Peru; is traversed by the Andes, several of the peaks of which are actively volcanic; the population consists of Peruvian Indians, negroes, Spanish Creoles; exports cocoa, coffee, hides, and medicinal plants; the administration is vested in a president, a vice-president, two ministers, a senate of 18, and a house of deputies of 30, elected by universal suffrage. ”

“ Commerce.—Ecuador has no merchant marine beyond a few small vessels engaged in the coastwise traffic, some eighteen or twenty river steamers on the Guayas and its tributaries, and a number of steam launches, towboats and various descriptions of barges engaged in the transportation of produce and goods on the rivers. The ocean-going foreign trade of the country is carried wholly in foreign vessels, for the regular lines of which Guayaquil is a principal port of call. Less frequent calls are made at Esmeraldas and some of the other small ports on the coast, of which there are nine in all. ”

“ That disintegration, that tendency for neighboring countries to hold no communication between each other, at which the American cannot but marvel in South America, was here in full evidence. Ecuador seemed as completely cut off from the country just over her southern boundary as from Europe. The cura of Oña had assured me that the one way to reach Peru from Loja would be to walk to Puerto Bolívar on the coast, take a costero to Guayaquil, then a “big steamer” to Paita or Pacasmayo! Only he who knows South American geography well can appreciate the unconscious humor of such advice. ”

“ In southern Ecuador and northern Peru the Andes break up and all but disintegrate. There are still plenty of mountains, but, true to their Latin-American environment, they lack team-work, and do not stick together sufficiently to give the traveler footing upon them. Directly before me Ecuador fell unfathomably away to the Macará, like an auburn hair across a painted landscape, while beyond, to appearances unattainable, Peru lay piled pell-mell into the southern sky. ”

“ The region covered by the Peruvian empire has not half as many people now as it had in the time of the Incas. Is it possible to imagine the present inhabitants of Ecuador, Peru, and Bolivia cultivating their soil with intelligent industry, building aqueducts five hundred miles long, and constructing magnificently paved roads through the rocks and across the ravines of the Andes, from Quito to Chili? ”

“ Their bitter tongues pierce like swords through the armour of stupidity, and the bill-hooks with trenchant edges are wielded most manfully, and the bright keen axes flash and sever the saplings, or slice a broad strip of bark from a tree, and the bush is pierced, and the jungle gapes open, and fast on their heels continuously close presses the mile-long caravan. ”

“ They are subjected to incredible abuses under Spanish colonial rule, their numbers being reduced to a fraction of the former population, and even yet they are subjected to a kind of debt-bondage which is slavery in all but the name. Notwithstanding all this they still represent from two-thirds to three-fourths of the actual population of Ecuador. East of the Andes the forests are inhabited by tribes of what are termed “aucas” or “infieles” (infidels) —Indians who are independent of both church and political control. ”

“ The silvered boles of ancient primeval giants long ago ringed by the axe and doomed to canker and decay, and the great gaunt far-spreading arms and branchlets had been clothed by vines a hundred-fold until they seemed like clouds of vivid green, which, under the influence of sudden gusts, streamed with countless tendrils, or swayed like immense curtains. ”

“ In Ecuador Nature might seem to have thought to display her powers after the manner of a model, with every grade of climate, topographical form and species of plant and animal life; to have set up, within a measurable compass, an example of her powers in the tropical world. ”

“ Guayaquil, a city of about 50,000 inhabitants, is Ecuador’s principal seaport, and, next to Valparaiso and Callao, the busiest and most important on the Pacific side of the continent. All the way up from Callao the steamer hugs the shore as closely as safety will permit. ”

“ Seven different States or entities to-day comprise this zone of territory of Central America, washed on the one hand by the Caribbean and on the other by the Pacific, whose people dwell in one of the most beautiful and interesting part of the earth's surface—Guatemala, with its coffee plantations and lavish fruits, Honduras of the rugged surface, and British Honduras, Nicaragua with its great lake, Costa Rica, the one-time "Rich Coast," Salvador, most populous and advanced of all, Panama, the land of the famous Canal. ”

“ Climate.—Climatic conditions in Ecuador are very largely contingent on altitude, and the transition from one climate to another is a matter of only a few hours’ journey. Although the equator crosses the northern part of the republic, only 15 m. north of the city Of Quito, a very considerable part of its area has the temperature of the temperate zone, and snow-crowned summits are to be seen every day in the year from its great central plateau. ”