Liberia: Description, History, Problems

PHYSIOGRAPHY--1. There are various inherent difficulties in African Geography. The population of the Dark Continent is composed of an enormous number of separate tribes, each with its own name, each with its own language. Most of these tribes are small and occupy but small areas. For a mountain, or other conspicuous natural landmark, each tribe will have its own name. What name is given by a traveler to the feature will be a matter of accident, depending upon the tribe among which he may be at the time that he inquires about the name; different names may thus be easily applied to the same place, and confusion of course results. Even within the limits of a single tribe different names in the one language may be applied to the same place; thus, it is regular for rivers to have different names in different parts of their course; it is nothing uncommon for the same river to have four or five names among the people of a single tribe, for this reason. Throughout Negro Africa, towns are generally called by the name of the chief; when he dies, the name of the town changes, that of the new chief being assumed. Again, throughout Africa, towns change location frequently; they may be rebuilt upon almost the same spot as they before occupied, or they may be placed in distant and totally new surroundings. For all these reasons, it is difficult to follow the itinerary of any traveler a few years after his report has been published. All these difficulties exist in Liberia, as in other parts of Africa. More than that, Liberia has itself been sadly neglected by explorers. Few expeditions into the interior have been so reported as to give adequate information. Sir Harry Johnston says that the interior of Liberia is the “least known part of Africa.”

2. Liberia is situated on the west coast of Africa, in the western part of what on old maps was known as Upper Guinea. Both Upper and Lower Guinea have long been frequented by European traders; different parts of the long coast line have received special names according to the natural products which form their characteristic feature in trade; thus we have the Grain Coast, Ivory Coast, Slave Coast, Gold Coast. Liberia is the same as the old Grain Coast and was so called because from it were taken the grains of “Malagueta Pepper,” once a notable import in Europe. Liberia has a coast line of some 350 miles, from the Mano River on the west to the Caballa River on the east and includes the country extending from 7° 33′ west to 11° 32′ west longitude, and from 4° 22′ north to 8° 50′ north latitude. Its area is approximately 43,000 square miles--a little more than that of the state of Ohio.

3. The coast of Liberia is for the most part low and singularly uninteresting. Throughout most of its extent a rather narrow sandy beach is exposed to an almost continuous beating of surf; there is not a single good natural harbor; where rivers enter the sea there is regularly a dangerous bar; here and there, ragged reefs of rocks render entrance difficult. There is no place where vessels actually attempt to make an entrance; they regularly anchor at a considerable distance from the shore and load and unload by means of canoes and small boats sent out from the towns. At Cape Mount near the western limit of the country a promontory rises to a height of 1068 feet above the sea. It is the most striking feature of the whole coast. There is no other until Cape Mesurado, upon which the city of Monrovia stands; it is a notable cliff, but rises only to a height of 290 feet. At Bafu Point, east of the Sanguin River, there is a noticeable height. These three, diminishing from west to east, are the only three actual interruptions in the monotonous coast line.

4. Five-sixths of the total area of the Republic is covered with a forest, dense even for the tropics. Almost everywhere this forest comes close down to the sandy beach and the impression made upon the traveler who sails along the coast is one of perpetual verdure. The highest lands are found in the east half of the country. In the region of the Upper Caballa River just outside of Liberia, French authorities claim that Mount Druple rises to a height of 3000 meters. The same authorities claim that the highest point of the Nimba Mountains, which occurs within the limits of Liberia, is about 2000 meters (6560 feet). Further south is the Satro-Nidi-Kelipo mass of highlands bordering the Caballa basin on the southwest; Sir Harry Johnson claims that it offers nothing more than 4000 feet in height. Northeast of the Caballa are Gamutro and Duna which rise to 5000 feet. There are no heights comparable to these found in the western half of the Republic, though there are peaks of significance among the upper waters of the St. Paul’s River and its tributaries. In the lower half of this river’s course there is a hilly or mountainous region known as the Po Hills, where possible heights of 3000 feet may be reached. In the northwestern part of the country the forest gives way to the Mandingo Plateau, high grass-land. Benjamin Anderson, a Liberian explorer, says that he emerged from the forest at Bulota where the ground rose to the height of 2253 feet. This plateau region is open park-like country of tall grass with few trees.

Very little as yet is known of the geology of Liberia. On the whole, its rocks appear to be ancient metamorphic rocks--gneiss, granulite, amphibolite, granites, pegmatite, all abundantly intersected by quartz veins. Decomposition products from these rocks overlie most of the country. The material and structure of the coast region is concealed by deposits of recent alluvium and the dense growth of forest; a conspicuous lithological phenomenon is laterite which covers very considerable areas and is the result of the disintegration of gneiss. As yet little is known of actual mineral values. Gold certainly occurs; magnetite and limonite appear to be widely distributed and are no doubt in abundant quantity; copper, perhaps native, certainly in good ores, occurs in the western part of the country; various localities of corundum are known, and it is claimed that rubies of good quality have been found; companies have been organized for the mining of diamonds, and it is claimed that actual gems are obtained.

5. There are many rivers in Liberia and the country is well watered. Several of these rivers are broad in their lower reaches, but they are extremely variable in depth and are generally shallow. Few of them are navigable to any distance from their mouth, and then only by small boats; thus the St. Paul’s can be ascended only to a distance of about twenty miles, the Dukwia to a distance of thirty (but along a very winding course, so that one does not anywhere reach a great distance from the coast), the Sinoe for fifteen miles, but by canoes, the Caballa (the longest of all Liberian rivers) to eighty miles.

A notable feature in the physiography of Liberia is the great number of sluggish lagoons or wide rivers, shallow, running parallel to the coast behind long and narrow peninsulas or spits of sand; there are so many of these that they practically form a continuous line of lagoons lying behind the sandy beach. These lagoons open onto the sea at the mouths of the more important rivers; smaller rivers in considerable numbers enter them so that in reality almost every river-mouth in Liberia may be considered not the point of entrance of a single river, but of a cluster of rivers which have opened into a common reservoir and made an outlet through one channel. As good examples of these curious lagoons, we may mention from west to east the Sugari River, Fisherman’s Lake, Stockton Creek, Mesurado Lagoon, Junk River, etc., etc.

Inasmuch as the rivers are the best known features of Liberian geography, and as they determine all its other details, we shall present here a complete list of them, in their order from west to east, together with a few observations concerning the more important.

Mano--Mannah: Bewa, in its upper course; the western boundary of the country; flows through a dense forest; no town at its mouth; not navigable to any distance; Gene, a trading village, twenty miles up; Liberian settlements a few miles east of the mouth.

Shuguri, (Sugary), Sugari, only a few miles in length; extends toward the southeast, parallel to the coast.

Behind the peninsula upon which Cape Mount stands is a lagoon called Fisherman’s Lake, which parallels the coast for a distance of ten miles; this shallow, brackish, lagoon is about six miles wide at its widest part, and is nowhere more than twelve or thirteen feet in depth; it is so related to the Marphy and Sugari Rivers that it is said of them, “These rivers with Fisherman’s Lake have a common outlet, across which the surf breaks heavily”; where these three water bodies enter the sea by a narrow mouth there is but three feet depth of water.

Half Cape Mount River, Little Cape Mount River, Lofa (in its upper part). Of considerable length; in the dry season a bank of sand closes its mouth; the village of Half Cape Mount is here.

Po, Poba. Small stream eight miles from last; here are the Vai village of Digby and the Liberian settlement of Royesville.

St. Paul’s, De; Diani, further up. This great river, the second of Liberia, rises on the Mandingo Plateau, about 8° 55′ north latitude; it is perhaps 280 miles long; it receives several important tributaries. There is a bar at its mouth, and it is not directly entered from the sea; it is navigable, after once being entered through Stockton Creek, to White Plains, about twenty miles from its mouth.

Mesurado River (Mesurado Lagoon) enters the sea at Monrovia and lies behind the high ridge on which that town is built. Through the same mouth with it Stockton Creek enters the sea, and through Stockton Creek, which runs across to the St. Paul’s, the latter is accessible for boats from Monrovia and the sea, although at low water there is but two feet of depth. At White Plains the St. Paul’s River is broken by rapids which occur at intervals for a distance of about seventy miles. Above these rapids it is probably possible to ascend the St. Paul’s and its tributary Tuma, Toma, might be navigable for a combined distance of about 150 miles. There are many Liberian settlements on the lower St. Paul’s River, and it is said that “quite half the Americo-Liberian population is settled in a region between Careysburg and the coast.”

Junk River parallels the coast and nearly reaches Mesurado Lagoon; a long, winding tidal creek; at its mouth three streams really enter the sea together--the Junk, Dukwia, and Farmington. On account of the near approach of this river to the Mesurado Lagoon, Monrovia is almost on an island thirty miles long and three miles wide, surrounded by the Mesurado, Junk, and the sea.

Dukwia. Very winding; navigable for thirty miles; source unknown; at its mouth is the settlement of Marshall; one of the worst bars of the coast is here.

Little Bassa, Farmington. As already stated, enters the sea together with the Junk and the Dukwia.