Various Flavors of Coffee (18 page)

like an iron bar. A choice of women then paraded before me in a line. They were mostly on the plump side—apparently the dancing girl is chosen for her looks and dancing abilities, while the
poules de luxe
are chosen for their superior abilities in the bedroom. I insisted on having the dancer, which caused much merriment—I was, I suppose, behaving in their eyes like a typical greenhorn. And so we went upstairs, to a room draped with woven silks, with a window open to the night breeze and the shouts of the people in the street just below us. She had to shoo a litter of kittens off the bed before we got down to it, then she crouched over a silver basin to wash. My first dark-skinned girl. Completely shaven, incidentally. She was pleasantly flexible, I thought, in comparison to London girls, though a little dry.

If you want to write to me, the best place is via Aden. I’ll be there in a fortnight—we have to wait here for a Suez boat, a delay which is bothering my traveling companion greatly, and me somewhat less so.

Best, Wallis

Dear Frog,

*

Hotel Pension Collos

Alexandria 27th June 1897

Greetings—I write to you these quickly scribbled lines Composed in what are sometimes called “Alexandrines.”

Actually I don’t do anything of the sort—an Alexandrine is much too difficult and tedious for a letter. And I don’t have the energy to think of rhymes today: it is far too hot.

There was an old man of Peru Whose poems all stopped at line two.

Instead, I shall tell you about Alexandria.We landed here very early on Friday morning, just as the muezzin were calling the faithful to prayer. All the passengers were up at first light to see the city. First the inky blue-black of the sea, with just a few twinkling lights on the horizon.The sky lightening... the salmon-colored mist of an African dawn... an impression of towers and minarets; palaces with onion-shaped windows... and then, instantly, the sky brilliantly and fierily alight as the sun hoisted itself like a huge sail over our heads, while before us the great white city of the East slipped serenely past our bow. As we edged into harbor a host of tiny black children dived for the sixpences we tossed into the water.The gangplank was quickly surrounded by dozens of rubbery-lipped camels, gargling and spitting and being beaten about the head by yelling Arab gentlemen in long white shirts. Most of the women go about veiled, but that is as far as their modesty extends: it is considered no more shocking here to show your breasts than it would be for us to go bare-headed.

Today I saw a man who had stuck iron spikes through his chest; on the end of each spike he had placed an orange, though whether this was to prevent anyone else from accidentally piercing themselves, or because it was a convenient place to keep his lunch, I could not say.

With best regards,

Your future brother-in-law, Robert

Dear Mr. Pinker,

*

Hotel Pension Collos

Alexandria 28th June 1897

I am writing this preliminary report from Alexandria, where we are awaiting the next stage of our transport. I have busied myself cupping various coffees, and also testing the efficacy of the Guide.The local beans are predominantly arabica, with a small amount of African longberry

available in the better markets. I bought all I could find of the latter, as its quality is very fine. Most of the coffee for sale here is good, although every merchant seems to keep back a quantity of inferior stuff for the sole purpose of fleecing European visitors—an inquiry for the “finest lot you have” will instigate a lengthy pantomime, in which the shop or stall is closed up with many looks to left and right, as if fearful that a competitor will spot what is going on; then a storeroom is unlocked, a sack is dragged out from the back and opened with great ceremony. A handful of beans is placed on a silver dish and passed to you for your approval—but not before the merchant has smelled them himself, his eyes closed in ecstasy, informing you in bad French that this particular lot is more precious to him than his own children. He then offers you the chance to taste them, and a brew is prepared, usually by an assistant. No instructions are given, but the factotum knows exactly what to do: the beans in front of you may resemble a handful of rancid rat’s droppings—and smell as if they had lately been swept off the merchant’s floor—but the sample cup that is presented a few minutes later will taste as if it contains the very finest coffee that Yemen can supply, as indeed it probably does. All the while the merchant will be making conversation, inquiring after your journey, your family, where you have embarked from and so on, and generally treating you like a long-lost friend.When confronted with the accusation that beans and brew are entirely dissimilar, he will appear mightily offended, and claim that you have insulted him. One merchant even went so far as to “discover” that his assistant had been swapping the sacks around, whereupon he cudgeled him soundly about the head! Quite why they persist in this performance is a mystery, since they have a perfectly good supply of high-quality moccas available. It is almost as if attempting to short-change the White Man has become a ritual.

The Guide has already proved itself useful. One is overwhelmed with such a plethora of unfamiliar scents, tastes and other sensations here that it is quite easy to forget what, say, a simple slice of fresh apple tastes like.Yesterday I found in the market a grand lot of mocca, which I

cupped in my hotel. Scents of blueberry, cedar, and peat smoke—I ordered three hundredweight. I have also been on the lookout for some of that remarkable coffee you and I tasted back in Limehouse, though as yet my nose has not led me to any.

With best wishes,

Your future son-in-law, Robert Wallis

*

My dearest, dearest Emily,

SS Rutalin

30th June 1897

Your letter reached me just before we left Alexandria.Your exhortations are unnecessary, I assure you: I am being perfectly charming to Hector. Only last night at dinner I amused him by reciting nursery rhymes in a Scottish accent. And the day before we left Alexandria, I accompanied him on a shooting expedition into the desert—we shot cormorants and water-magpies, and lunched on dates we bought from a Bedouin. As we set off again on our camels an Arab trotted past us on a donkey, his feet nearly brushing the ground, calling out a greeting in his own language. Hector, I am sorry to say, was so affronted at being overtaken that he tried to make his camel go faster, fell off, and had to be hoisted back up by our porters. But just to show you how good I am being—I did not laugh once, even though the people at our table in the hotel thought it must have been very amusing when I described it to them, later.

And yes, I am sorry about that letter to the Frog. I promise not to mention ladies’ bare chests to her again. I suppose it was a bit indelicate, but really, if you see the lack of concern with which people display themselves here, you would understand why I did not think anything of it at the time.

Anyhow, we are now back on board ship, passing through Suez. One

of our new fellow passengers is a journalist called Kingston, who has written a fine piece describing us as “the lantern bearers of civilization, bringing their precious candles of light into the great darkness of Africa.” As he puts it, “some of the lights may flicker, and some will go out; but others will catch and become great beacons, lightening the darkness which currently envelops whole populations of savages.” I believe he has sent it to the
Telegraph
.

Talking of darkness, I have been watching some splendid dawns.

Every morning the sky is streaked with the colors of an English hedgerow—primrose pink and daffodil yellow: with the first glimpse of the sun all color is instantly burnt out; everything turns white, and soon the only colors to be seen are the dazzling green of the water and the dazzling silver-blue of the sky.The glare is so bright that one’s eyes hurt. Hector has taken to wearing an eyeshade, which makes him look a bit like a sickly parrot.

I only wish that you were here, but the thought of you is more than enough. My love for you will sustain me during the long years ahead.

Your ever-loving, Robert

Dear Mr. Pinker,

*

Grand Hôtel de l’Univers

Prince of Wales Drive

Aden 2nd July 1897

I have made contact with the coffee wholesalers here in Aden, as you suggested.The Bienenfeld brothers had some extremely good lots: the one that impressed most I rated
fr-1 bou-4 no-4:
a light mocca, small-beaned, mahogany brown after roasting, with notes of blueberry and lime and a very low acidity. Overall, I gave it a five. I purchased all they had, and ordered it shipped as soon as possible.

I am very keen to meet Ibrahim Bey: he has a reputation amongst the merchants here as being quite a character, although there are also rumors that his business is in some unspecified trouble. At present he is on a trading trip in the Interior: we may catch up with him when we cross to Zeilah, on the African side.

With best wishes, Robert Wallis

Dear Hunt,

*

Grand Hôtel de l’Univers

Prince of Wales Drive

Aden 2nd July 1897

You will see from this notepaper that I have arrived at the Grand Hôtel de l’Univers, which probably conjures up a vision of a pleasant palace set amidst rolling lawns. In which case, get out your atlas. Aden is that small pimple on the right buttock of Arabia, and the Grand Hôtel is nothing but a cockroach-infested shack. Honestly, this place is hell— an exposed expanse of volcanic rock, lying at sea level, sheltered from every breeze but utterly exposed to the pitiless glare of the sun.This is not even the hottest part of the year, and the mercury still reaches 130 degrees every day.There isn’t a blade of grass, or even a palm tree, in the whole damned place.

The truth is that the British are only here because it’s the mid-point between Africa, India, Australia and home—a sort of military-cum- mercantile staging camp for British Empire Incorporated. No one actually lives here, though some people will tell you they have been “stationed” here for a few years. Most are passing through—and yours truly is no exception.The quicker I can get out of this oven, the happier I’ll be. Even the locals call the straits here “Bab al Mandeb”—the Gate of Tears.

The fact is, my friend, I am at a bit of a low ebb. On the one hand, I suppose all this travel & experience will somehow be useful for my writing one day. On the other hand, I still cannot quite believe that I have blundered into the kind of bourgeois existence that I always absolutely swore I would avoid at all costs. I now seem to have all the responsibilities and disadvantages of marriage and employment, without even benefiting from the domestic comforts and financial rewards which should accompany them! How I am ever to become an artist while stuck in a fetid, stinking jungle I have no idea. It is enough to make one want to weep. If there were only somewhere to run away to, I think I should probably give it all up. But as my future father-in-law (a.k.a the jailer-in-chief ) would probably say, from this predicament one cannot be “sent down.”...

Yours in adversity, Robert

Dear Morgan,

*

SS Carlotta

Zeilah Creek

Africa! 7th July 1897

Thank you for your letter, which reached me in Aden.We have now left that hell-hole, thank God, in a tiny steamer barely bigger than a biscuit tin. It was quite a squeeze to get our luggage on board—we have accumulated enough for over thirty porters, including:

• fishhooks, beads, snuff, for dish-dash
  

• nails, for building me a bungalow
  

• a Remington rifle, for shooting me my lunch
  

• six bottles of beer, for washing said lunch down with—which by my reckoning works out at one-and-a-quarter bottles per year
  

• a bottle of Baillie Scotch Whisky, for emergencies
  

• a Gasogene Rechargeable Sodawater Maker, ditto
  

• a wooden lavatory seat
  

• white tie and tails, for entertaining foreign dignitaries
  

• Kuma, our cook. Kuma is a fine fellow, and comes with a letter of recommendation from one Captain Thompson of Bengal, who says, “Kuma is not the bravest of boys, and cannot be relied upon to hold your second gun should the animal you are engaged in stalking be simultaneously engaged in charging you, but he cannot be faulted in his ability to get hot food ready after a day’s march. Occasionally I believed him to be stealing from me, which he always denied.Twenty-five strokes from an ox-whip seemed to solve the problem. Please do not pay him more than one dollar a month, and leave him in Aden when you have finished with him, as I hope to return for another safari in a year or so’s time.”This “boy,” incidentally, is around forty years old. Kuma is remarkably unenthusiastic about returning to the Interior, which is, he says gloomily, “full of savages, sah.”
  

• my library.This consists of Pater’s
  Renaissance
  ; a volume entitled
  Coffee: Its Cultivation and Profit
  , which Hector assures me contains everything there is to know about that fine crop; an actor’s stage script of
  The Importance of Being Earnest
  ; six blank pocket-books; the
  Yellow Book
  for April 1897, and Francis Galton’s
  Hints to Travelers
  . From the last I learn that “a young man of good constitution, who is bound on an enterprise sanctioned by experienced travelers, does not run very great risks.
  

  Savages rarely murder newcomers; they fear their guns, and have a superstitious awe of the white man’s power: they require time to discover that he is not very different to themselves, and easily to be made away with.” What a good thing it is that I am only to be here five years. I also have a book, issued by the Society for the Propagation of the Christian Gospel, entitled
  Phrases in
  

  Common Use in East Africa:
  these include “Six drunken Europeans have killed the cook,” “You have no more brains than a goat,” and “Why has this body still not been buried?”
  

• a crate containing hoes, spades, axes, measuring lines, and other mysterious farming tools.
  

• a sturdy cash chest, with padlock, containing eight hundred silver dollars.These are Austro-Hungarian dollars bearing an image of the late Queen Marie-Thérèse, which for some unknown reason have become the universal currency hereabouts, possibly because each one is about the size of a small dinner plate. Amongst the British, rupees are also in use, although the natives sometimes grumble about taking them, since they have no intrinsic value anywhere except India.
  

• two alpaca bush-suits from Simpson’s, and a great quantity of trousers, both long and short, made out of flannel, which is considered to be the most hygienic material for hot climates. And my red velvet smoking jacket, of course.
  

• a medicine chest.This has been stocked as per Galton’s instructions, and contains many items which are mysterious to me, viz: (1) emetic, for poison, (2) Warburg drops, for fever, (3) Dover’s Sudorific Powder, for infections, (4) Chlorodyne, for wounds, (5) “one large roll of diachylon”—I have absolutely no idea what this is for, and Galton does not elucidate, (6) lunar-caustic, in a holder, “to touch old sores with, and for snake-bites,” (7) needles, to sew up gashes, (8) waxed thread, ditto, (9) Moxon’s mild effervescing aperient, and (10) a large bottle of Caldwell’s Preparation of Laudanum (full strength), for when other remedies (and flannel trousers) prove ineffective.
  

• Twelve very fine small Wedgwood coffee cups, white, of lustrous bone china, a present—surely ironic?—from my future father-in- law.
  

• Hector—who, it has to be said, becomes visibly more cheerful the