46 
MINUTES OF EVIDENCE TAKEN BEFORE SELECT COMMITTEE 
Maj. Gen. he thought if his brother rebelled he would want 
C. P. Righy. their assistance, and he paid them every year 
40,000 dollars as bribes in point of fact. The 
20 July present Sultan, having a friendly brother at 
1871. Muscat, will be under no obligation of that sort. 
586. As I understand, the only means which 
you suggest, with a view of suppressing the slave 
trade on the east coast of Africa, are, increased 
activity on the port of our squadron, and re 
quiring the Sultan to enter into a new treaty 
with us so as to put a stop to the internal slave 
trade?—Yes ; the chief point with regard to the 
squadron is to have an experienced naval officer 
in a permanent appointment there, who should 
have a command or supervision over the whole 
east coast, embracing the Mozambique and Ma 
dagascar coast, where there is a very large and 
increasing slave trade going on now. He should 
not be always required to reside at any one place, 
but to go about in the cruisers. In a short time 
he would have a thorough knowledge of where 
the slave trade was carried on in all its branches, 
and as each new cruiser came on to the ground, 
the commander would not be perfectly in the 
dark as he has been hitherto, sometimes taking 
vessels that are not slavers. All that would be 
avoided, and the mere fact of having an officer 
there acquainted with the coast and able to give 
instructions to the officers coming out, would cer 
tainly save the expense of two vessels there. 
587. Do you know anything of the expense 
which is now incurred in the support of liberated 
slaves ?—I have no recent knowledge upon that 
point. When I was at Zanzibar I emancipated 
about 6,000 slaves who had been held in slavery 
by British Indian subjects. I never had the 
slightest trouble in providing for them, and they 
never cost the Government a shilling. 
588. Did you obtain labour for them, or did 
they find it for themselves?—They found it for 
themselves. There was always a great demand 
for labour, not only in the plantations, but in the 
service of American and German and French 
houses. There is a great trade in cowries, which 
employs a great many people ; then labourers are 
required in sifting and washing the gum copal, 
and in husking the cocoa-nuts ; it constantly oc 
curred that I discovered slaves in the employ 
ment of those foreign merchants whose masters 
were British subjects. I sent for them and had 
them emancipated by the Arab judge, and they 
took their certificates of emancipation and went 
back to their work, the only difference being that 
instead of handing over all the pay to their 
masters, they kept the pay themselves. 
589. Do you attach importance to having con 
suls or vice consuls at other ports on the coast 
besides Zanzibar itself?—I do not think it would 
be possible. I know Mr. Churchill has recom 
mended that, but I do not think you would get a 
respectable class of men to undertake the office ; 
and if you could get them I do not think, on the 
average the men would live three months, the 
climate is so very unhealthy. I never knew a 
white man go there yet without getting one of 
the deadly fevers. I was on the coast myself, 
and I very nearly died. I caught a fever that 
lasted for eight months. 
590. Is Zanzibar itself unhealthy ?—The town 
is not, but it is almost certain death for any white 
man to sleep in the plantation. Some years ago 
the commodore went with several officers and a 
boat’s crew to one of the Sultan’s country houses 
in the interior of the island, a distance of about 
] 5 miles ; they only slept one night in the interior, 
and a few days afterwards the only one of the 
whole party alive was one who had slept in the 
boat, the vegetation is so dense and rank. 
591. Do the natives suffer from the climate ?— 
Not in the same degree, the Arabs do, very 
much ; I think very few Arabs of pure race 
reach manhood. 
592. Have you kept up your acquaintance with 
what has been going on in Zanzibar since 1861, 
when you left?—Yes; I have been in constant 
correspondence wilh people out there, Mr. 
Churchill and Dr. Kirk, and natives. I happen 
to have received last Monday some very interest 
ing letters, one of which was from the customs 
master complaining bitterly of the want of postal 
communication. 
593. Was your attention directed to that sub 
ject while you were there ?—It was a constant 
subject of correspondence with me the whole 
time I was there. 
594. Was there not at one time a suggestion 
made that tenders should be advertised for for a 
subsidised line of steamers ?—I made a report on 
the matter to the Government of Bombay. I 
had constantly represented the desirability of 
having a subsidised line, and when I came home 
on leave I had an interview with Sir Charles 
Wood, who was then the Minister for India, but 
nothing was done. When I went back to India 
I found that the subject had been noticed by the 
Bombay Chamber of Commerce in consequence 
of a good deal of trade which used to find its 
way to Bombay being intercepted by foreign 
merchants, and taken to Zanzibar ; for instance, 
Germans and Americans now send their ships to 
Muscat and to Bussorah for gums and hides, and 
to the coast of Mekrau for wool, tliereby cutting 
off very nearly all the w ool trade and the gum 
and hide trade from Kurrachee and Bombay ; that 
is all brought to Zanzibar, and sent away in Ger 
man and American ships. 
595. Lord jP. Cavendish.'] Bound the Cape ?—- 
Yes, since the opening of the Suez Canal, another 
change has taken place, and I think a good deal 
of trade is coming back to this country. 
596. Chairman.] Is that diversion of trade to 
which you have referred, attributable in any way 
to the want of postal communication ?—I consider 
it entirely due to that; perhaps I may be allowed 
to read a few remarks from the report which I 
made to the Government at the time, which ex 
press my views at the present moment. The 
Government of Bombay had been in communi 
cation with the Postmaster General upon this 
subject, and happening to be at Bombay at the 
time on my way to England, they referred the 
matter to me ; and this is my memorandum, dated 
the 3rd March 1867 : “During my residence at 
Zanzibar, I had many occasions of observing hoW 
very desirable a regular postal communication 
would be between that port and Bombay; and on 
my return to England, I brought this subject to 
the consideration of Sir Charles Wood, then 
Secretary of State for India, pointing out hoW 
the rapidly increasing commerce of Zanzibar was 
being monopolised by foreigners, and the trade 
ot Aden, Muscat, Bussorah, and the coast of 
Mekran being gradually diverted from Kurrachee 
and Bombay into foreign bottoms, owing to the 
German and American merchants at Zanzibar 
intercepting it, and carrying the coffee, gums, 
hides, &c., from Aden and Mocha ; the dates, 
hides, &c., from Muscat, and the wool from 
Mekran,