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Challenges to African
Entrepreneurship
in the 21st Century

Edited by Darko Opoku

and Eve Sandberg
Challenges to African Entrepreneurship
in the 21st Century
 Darko Opoku • Eve Sandberg
Editors

Challenges to African
Entrepreneurship
in the 21st Century
Editors
Darko Opoku Eve Sandberg
Africana Studies Department Politics Department
Oberlin College Africana Oberlin College
Studies Department Oberlin, Ohio, USA
Oberlin, Ohio, USA

ISBN 978-3-319-60999-7    ISBN 978-3-319-61000-9 (eBook)

DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-61000-9

Library of Congress Control Number: 2017955009

© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2018

This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of
translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on
microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval,
electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now
known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are
exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information
in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the
publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to
the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The
publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and
institutional affiliations.

Cover Image: © Mile 91/Ben Langdon / Alamy Stock Photo

Cover Design: Tom Howey

Printed on acid-free paper

This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by Springer Nature

The registered company is Springer International Publishing AG
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
 Acknowledgments

This has been a joint project and thus the editors of the volume are cited in
alphabetical order. The editors thank the anonymous readers secured by the
publisher for their insights and suggestions that improved this manuscript.
The editors thank Sandy Austen, Help Desk Coordinator at the Center
for Information Technology of Oberlin College, for her assistance and
counsel regarding formatting problems that appeared as we grappled with
contributions from various authors. Eve Sandberg is also grateful to the
J.D. Lewis Teaching and Research Portfolio Fund for the financial support
it provided to ready this manuscript.
The editors are most grateful to Molly Johnson whose help in prepar-
ing this manuscript was invaluable in bringing the project to completion.
Molly harmonized all the citations from the contributing authors to meet
formatting specifications, found and chased down missing citations, pro-
vided expert copyediting, and much more. The product is both much
improved as well as complete due to Molly’s work.
Eve Sandberg thanks Sandy Zagarell with whom she has shared her
professional and personal life for more than twenty-five years. Sandy’s
encouragement and support throughout this project are gratefully
received. Eve also thanks Kasha, Nina, and Kingston for contributing to a
loving and caring environment in which to live and work.
Darko Opoku would like to acknowledge the steadfast love, support,
and dedication of his wife, Adwoa Boahemaa, without whom his contribu-
tion might never have seen the light of day. Darko also acknowledges the
support, enthusiasm, and encouragement of his daughter, Bour Opoku,

v
vi ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

who has been understanding during the many absences in the course of
collecting data and writing. Finally, he would like to thank his mother,
Akosua “Nyamekye” Frimpomaa, for teaching him the invaluable lessons
that continue to guide and inspire him every day.
 Contents

1 Introduction to Analyzing African Entrepreneurs1

Eve Sandberg

2 Government-Business Relations and the Business

Environment in Ghana39
Darko Opoku

3 Ambivalent Union: State-Business Relations and

Economic Development in Post-­Independent Nigeria79
Samuel O. Oloruntoba

4 South African Women Entrepreneurs: Challenges

and Coping Strategies97
Mmapula Brendah Sekatane

5 Nigerian Entrepreneurship in the Twenty-­First Century:

Corporate Social Responsibility Challenges and Coping
Strategies of Nigerian Male and Female Entrepreneurs117
Adebimpe Lincoln

vii
viii Contents

6 Small-Scale Ghanaian Miners and the Textiles

and Garment Industry in the Age of Chinese
Economic Onslaught147
Darko Opoku

7 Challenges to African Entrepreneurship

in the Twenty-First Century179
Eve Sandberg

Author Index203

Subject Index209
 Notes on Contributors

Adebimpe Lincoln LLB and LLM in Commercial Law from Cardiff

University; MBA in International Business and PhD in Entrepreneurship
and Business Development from the University of South Wales. Lincoln
has held positions in Cardiff University, University of South Wales, and
was a Senior Lecturer in Law at Cardiff Metropolitan University before
her current position as an Assistant Professor in Saudi Arabia. Lincoln also
works with University of Liverpool online Masters in Law programs as
well as being an external examiner for Manchester Metropolitan University.
Her research and publications focus on women entrepreneurship, small-
and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), leadership practices of Nigerian
entrepreneurs, corporate governance, board diversity, and Corporate
Social Responsibility among Nigerian SMEs.
Samuel Ojo Oloruntoba PhD in Political Science from University of
Lagos, Nigeria, is a Senior Lecturer and the Coordinator of the Research
cluster on Innovation and Developmental Regionalism at the Thabo
Mbeki African Leadership Institute, University of South Africa, Pretoria,
South Africa. He was previously a Visiting Scholar at the Program of
African Studies, Northwestern University and a Fellow of Brown
International Advanced Research Institute, Brown University. His most
recent co-authored publication is: “Course Correction and Failed
Rationales: How Comparative Advantage and Debt Are Used to
Legitimise Austerity in Africa and Latin America” (Third World Quarterly,
2016). Oloruntoba is the author of Regionalism and Integration in
Africa: EU-ACP Economic Partnership Agreements and Euro-Nigeria

ix
x Notes on Contributors

Relations (Palgrave Macmillan, 2016) and a co-edited book, Regenerating

Africa: Bringing African Solutions to African Problems (AISA Press,
South Africa, 2016). His research interests include: regional integration
and development in Africa, resource governance, global governance of
trade and finance, democracy, and development. He is also the co-editor
of a forthcoming Palgrave Handbook on African Politics, Governance
and Development.
Darko Opoku PhD in Political Studies from the School of Oriental and
African Studies, University of London, is an Associate Professor of Africana
Studies at Oberlin College. He has published in Development and Change,
Africa Today, Journal of Contemporary African Studies, and Commonwealth
and Comparative Politics. He is the author of The Politics of Government-
Business Relations in Ghana, 1982–2008 (Palgrave Macmillan, 2010).
Opoku’s research interests include African and international political
economies, state-business relations in Africa, IMF and World Bank-
inspired neoliberal economic reforms, and pan-Africanism.
Eve Sandberg PhD in Political Science from Yale University, is a Professor
of Politics at Oberlin College. Her most recent publications are: Eve
Sandberg and Kenza Aqertit, Moroccan Women, Activists, and Gender
Politics an Institutional Analysis (Lexington Books/Rowman & Littlefield,
2014) and Eve Sandberg and Seth Binder, “The Moroccan Spring and
King Mohammed VI’s Economic Policy Agenda: Evaluating the First
Dozen Years” in The Birth of the Arab Citizen and the Changing Middle
East, eds. Stuart Schaar and Mohsine El Ahmadi (Interlink Publishing,
2016). Sandberg’s research interests include comparative democracy
building, political economy in late-industrializing countries, international
politics, and gender studies. Sandberg has consulted overseas for govern-
ment officials, NGOs, and/or political parties in Zambia, Tanzania,
Namibia, Morocco, and Jordan on issues of development, democracy
building, and civil society, as well as with candidates and ballot issues in
the United States.
Mmapula Brendah Sekatane PhD in Economics from North-West
University, South Africa, is a Policy Analyst at the Parliamentary Budget
Office, in the Parliament of the Republic of South Africa. Sekatane cur-
rently provides technical advice, analysis, and research on government
policy priorities and supports parliamentary committees in discharging
their duties in the budget- making process and fiscal oversight over the
 Notes on Contributors 
   xi

executive arm of state. Her research interests include understanding

poverty through household-based studies, and the socio-economic
­
dynamics of low-income areas in a South African context. More specifi-
cally, her focus is on child poverty, child-headed households, female- and
grandmother-­headed households, food security, unemployment, and local
economic development.
 List of Table

Table 4.1 Statistical profile: women workforce representation

across organizations102

xiii
 CHAPTER 1

Introduction to Analyzing African

Entrepreneurs

Eve Sandberg

This chapter traces the scholarly literature on black African entrepreneur-

ship from the colonial period through the first fifteen years of the twenty-
first century. Sandberg explores the alternative debates about why no
substantial capitalist class developed in Africa during the colonial period
and in the decades following independence. She then explores the puzzle
that the “varieties of capitalism” literature and methodological research
that have been so popular in analyzing business’ challenges in Europe have
not been widely applied to the African context. African scholarly literature
and debates focus mainly on state developmentalism (both import substi-
tution and the East Asian models) and neo-liberal approaches to African
political economic development (especially globalization, austerity pro-
grams with their curtailing of inputs, undermining transport and other
infrastructure, and problematic access to credit). She highlights the related
topics of entrepreneurs forming business organizations, seeking mentors,
attempting to maintain practices of social responsibility, and the particular
challenges for women that inform the chapters of the volume. She under-
scores that many chapters argue that those entrepreneurs who cope best
with the challenges they face seem to have the closest relations with African
state officials.

E. Sandberg (*)
Oberlin College, Oberlin, OH, USA

© The Author(s) 2018 1

D. Opoku, E. Sandberg (eds.), Challenges to African
Entrepreneurship in the 21st Century,
DOI 10.1007/978-3-319-61000-9_1
2 E. SANDBERG

Entrepreneurs play critical roles in the development of any country’s

political economy. In this study, we are concerned with small- and medium-­
sized (SME) black African business actors as they are influenced by African
political officials, foreign business representatives, expatriate business
owners living in African states (increasingly from India and China), non-­
governmental organizations, and foreign donors. The European Union,
World Bank, and World Trade Organization define SMEs as having less
than fifty employees.1 The chapters in this volume offer rich explorations
of the challenges these African businesspeople face in the first decades of
the twenty-first century.
In this volume, Challenges to African Entrepreneurship in the 21st
Century, we ask why have SME black African businesses been so difficult
to establish and sustain? SME African entrepreneurs could be playing criti-
cal roles in the development of the political economies of African states. In
the advanced Western industrial countries, we recognize the role played
by such businesses. In the United States, for example, Peter F. Drucker,
the prominent author and teacher of management, reminded us that “it is
no longer news that small and new businesses provided most of the
twenty-­
­ odd million new jobs generated from 1970 to 1980 by the
American economy.”2 With regards to Africa, Goran Hyden has noted,
“Africa’s primary challenge is how to break out of its pre-capitalist cocoon.
History suggests the most probable strategy is to strengthen the bour-
geoisie by encouraging the establishment of indigenous manufacturers
and merchants.”3 After carefully studying Asia’s state developmental
model, Joseph E. Stiglitz argues that there even was an important place for
entrepreneurs within the programs of state-directed planning and indus-
trial policy-­making that led to the accelerated growth of East Asian states.4
But the ability of black Africans to found new businesses and create
new jobs has been undermined by many factors. Black African business
people are constrained by domestic markets often dominated by state
actors and state-allied actors, by large foreign companies accustomed to
operating in a globalizing world, and by expatriates who have launched
businesses that previously were reserved mainly for small-scale African
entrepreneurs in their own states. Black African entrepreneurs have also
been constrained by neoliberal austerity policies imposed by Western capi-
talist donors and International Financial Institutions (IFIs) whose prom-
ises had given hope to local African entrepreneurs, but whose practices
had dashed those hopes for many.
The effects of African austerity programs of the late twentieth century
continue into the twenty-first century for many in the private sector
 INTRODUCTION TO ANALYZING AFRICAN ENTREPRENEURS 3

because the “stickiness” of the institutional changes that were imple-

mented continues to contribute to a country’s business environment. As
some authors in this volume note, the austerity programs of the 1980s and
1990s had unintended consequences that influenced the domestic rela-
tions of African business owners and state officials. These programs simply
did not introduce technical changes for business and state sectors as gen-
erally was suggested when the austerity programs were first introduced.
In this volume we argue that, in the early decades of the twenty-first
century, African states’ domestic political networks, not their economic
markets, are the primary variables that determine the success of African
businesses. This volume also argues that SME black African businesses in
the twenty-first century are facing an array of extraordinary challenges and
we identify the nature of those challenges. Thus, African business leaders
have had to adopt creative strategies for coping with their states in order to
ensure the survival of their enterprises; they have had to assume responsi-
bilities that previously were undertaken by their states’ public institutions,
and in some cases, by non-governmental organizations.
To illustrate the dilemma of today’s African entrepreneurs as analyzed
in this volume, consider a few of this volume’s findings. African states’ rul-
ing officials often demand political contributions for their campaigns or
payoffs after their campaigns from African company officials. African com-
pany officials, in turn, seek out bureaucrats and political officials in order
to secure the proper licenses to operate, and hope not to be hounded
unfairly by tax collectors. African state austerity programs and state budget
cuts in service delivery areas have required some African businesses to dig
and maintain their own transport roads and water wells. Some African
entrepreneurs must produce their own electricity due to the lack of
resources and gross mismanagement by state-run energy enterprises. Our
chapters also demonstrate that black African firms confront these chal-
lenges in the face of competition from foreign firms that often are able to
secure advantages that domestic African businesses cannot secure.
It should be noted that the challenges for African entrepreneurs today
that the authors of the chapters of this volume identify are not analyzed
within some contrived “Afro-pessimism” framework. Rather, the volume’s
analysis offers a dispassionate investigation of the present-day environ-
ment that African business entrepreneurs must navigate.
Moreover, it is important to evaluate the past as well as the present
constraints on black African entrepreneurs in order to understand both
business and personal expectations among African entrepreneurs. Thus,
this introductory chapter offers an historical context through which we
4 E. SANDBERG

can understand the evolving status of Africa’s entrepreneurs. It also reviews

the evolving scholarly literature on black African entrepreneurship to
which this volume hopes to contribute.

The Scholarly Literature

African capitalist entrepreneurship has received relatively little attention
compared to other subfields of African studies. Three or four academic
publications might emerge in a decade. Additionally, in previous decades, a
focus on African capitalism was often a vehicle to discuss African labor
struggles.5 Other publications that focused on African capitalism investi-
gated international trade and multinational corporations operating within
African states.6 These works made important contributions to African stud-
ies, but clearly black African entrepreneurship requires its own undertaking
as a subfield related to the more general studies of capitalism in Africa.
Previously, authors debated the context for African entrepreneurs and
whether or not an African capitalist sector operating in a market economy
was necessary in order for African countries to develop. In 1994, Berman
and Leys produced an edited volume, African Capitalists in African
Development, that offered a range of views on this topic.7 Such studies also
demonstrated that, in some cases, African capitalists could compete
against foreign firms by courting African state leaders for protection
against foreign firms. But other studies revealed that in other cases African
entrepreneurs often were constrained by African state officials and the
predation of such officials.
During the late 1980s and 1990s, scholars and practitioners also argued
whether or not a significant African capitalist sector was a necessary precon-
dition for African state transitions to democracy, and, additionally, whether
such a sector was needed to sustain democracies. These debates drew on
the more general work from the 1950s and 1960s from authors such as
Seymour Lipset and Barrington Moore.8 Lipset argued that economically
affluent countries would more likely sustain democratic practices. Moore
succinctly noted, “no bourgeoisie, no democracy.” Moore wrote about an
independent urban class of producers and merchants who were interested
in their own accumulation, which could best be achieved through guaran-
teeing property rights, avoidance of unfair taxation, defending due process
in the courts, and sustaining a democratic parliament to defend urban mer-
chant and production interests against tyrannical monarchs. Moore further
argued that when the bourgeoisie was the “senior partner” in any struggle
against a monarch, a democracy was likely to result. When the bourgeoisie
 INTRODUCTION TO ANALYZING AFRICAN ENTREPRENEURS 5

was a junior partner in alliance with the military or peasant and laboring
classes, another form of authoritarianism (such as fascism or communism)
would likely replace the monarchical system of authoritarian governance.
Then, during the 1980s and 1990s, those writing in the Lipset and
Moore traditions were countered by others who warned of overemphasiz-
ing the role that capitalists’ economic activities in the economy play in
sustaining democracy. For example, Charles Edward Lindblom warned of
the “privileged position of business” by capitalists in liberal democracies
and the dangers that they posed.9 Lindblom noted the advantages held by
business owners as opposed to ordinary citizens. Two such advantages
illustrated Lindblom’s point. Businesses already had organized their
citizens/employees who were interested in the success of the business and
could function as an interest group. Additionally, businesses generally
­possessed greater resources to use to support allies who engaged in political
contestation than did an individual citizen. An individual citizen who
sought to advocate politically or influence policy started from a less privi-
leged position than did a business owner.
David Apter also warned that too many democratic demands (including
those of capitalist business owners) on state leaders of newly industrializ-
ing and democratizing states (most of which lacked adequate resources)
contributed to an overload of expectations. When the state could not fulfil
those expectations, a newly democratic state and its officials would become
illegitimate in the eyes of its citizens. In the short term, the project of
creating democratic processes likely would be undermined.10 Apter also
noted that, beyond the material factors that influenced a state’s legitimacy,
the bounded discourse of development practitioners within the popular
mytho-logics of their time limited officials’ abilities to craft effective devel-
opment policies as they publicly reproduced the constraining mytho-­logics
in their own documents and policies. And, with rare exceptions, African
state leaders emphasized a discourse that privileged recalling the fight for
independence over a discourse that offered a clear plan for development or
articulated any role for black African capitalists.
Other analysts of economic development and democratic institutions
argued that capitalist industrialization and Western political institutions
could be attained quickly by newly independent African states, depending
on the choices made by African leaders. During the 1960s when most
African countries secured their independence, modernization theorists
argued that late-industrializing countries needed to shed their traditional
practices and adopt Western institutions, especially capitalist and liberal
democratic institutions, as well as the West’s norms, so that late-­industrializing
6 E. SANDBERG

states could quickly move through the steps that had been taken in the
West’s industrialization path.11 In its day, this was considered a politically
progressive intellectual position because modernization theorists argued
that white Westerners had not accomplished anything that other peoples
around the world could not accomplish if they applied the learned practices
of industrialization.12 Modernization theorists had come of age during
World War II, a time when German and other eugenics theorists had argued
for the merits of white supremacy and also made race claims that the West
had superior gifts that other races and ethnicities in other parts of the globe
lacked. Modernization theorists argued that this was not the case; rather, all
peoples would increase their technology, their cosmopolitanism, and
increase their countries’ industrial development and likely would pass
through the same steps to achieve modernization.
Dependency theorists opposed modernization theorists, with depen-
dency analyses becoming more complex throughout the 1970s and early
1980s. Initially, dependency theorists warned that multinational capitalists
were stealing the resources needed for development in late-industrializing
states, including those of Africa, through international trading structures
that produced and reproduced inequalities of trade.13 Multinational capi-
talism was an obstacle preventing the development of African states.
Later, more complex dependency theories argued that multinational
capitalists often “bought” local capitalists or state officials through class
alliances across states, ignoring the needs of the public in late-­industrializing
countries and shipping valuable resources to the North.14 Dependency
theorists often drew upon the work of Alexander Gerschenkron’s con-
cerns with uneven development paths. Gerschenkron argued that an
“economically backward” state (Russia was his example) that engaged in
industrialization likely would not follow a British model because when
Britain had undertaken industrialization, it was not “economically back-
ward” compared to other states in its world. Additionally, Immanuel
Wallerstein’s insights on the dynamics of our evolving capitalist world sys-
tem and the roles that different countries and regions fulfill as that world
system evolves also provided important supports for dependency theo-
rists.15 Both Gerschenkron’s and Wallerstein’s work suggested that what
the modernization theorists proposed, a process of states passing through
similar paths to development, was not accurate.
Debates from the late 1980s that continue today address the contribu-
tions of African capitalists to national development. They mainly are con-
ducted within the overarching debates concerning whether or not African
 INTRODUCTION TO ANALYZING AFRICAN ENTREPRENEURS 7

states should pursue market-based democracies or adopt the state devel-

opmentalism models championed at various times by Japan, South Korea,
and China.
Scholars like Adams, Collier, Gondwe, et alia, argue that despite prom-
ises of accountability to their citizens by younger African post-­independence
leaders who took the reins of power in the 1990s, efforts to reform African
business-state relations and replace its widely recognized patronage sys-
tems have largely failed.16 They argue that African state planning has
merely prolonged African states’ habits of preventing resources from ben-
efiting the many in favor of lining the pockets of a largely political ­minority.
The majority of Africans still experience little economic development or
benefits from any development.
But Tim Kelsall, together with David Booth, Diana Cammack, Brian
Cooksey, Mesfin Gebremichael, Fred Glolooba-Mutebi, and Sarah Vaughan,
have countered that, despite notorious evidence of neo-­ patrimonialism
across Africa that undercuts development through cronyism and inefficien-
cies by state actors, African state leaders need to create and pursue ambitious
state industrial policies. They acknowledge, however that this can be done
only after African state leaders have established and are prepared to adhere
to certain regulatory contexts and frameworks that promote technology
development, correct for possible market failures, and stimulate growth.17
After investigating the causes of the East Asian states’ economic devel-
opment, Joseph E. Stiglitz, the Nobel laureate, noted there had been an
important place for entrepreneurs within programs of state-directed plan-
ning and industrial policy-making.18 The East Asian Miracle Economic
Growth and Public Policy was a 1993 World Bank policy research report in
which Stiglitz and the other authors concluded that the Asian “miracle”
was made possible because the East Asian states had promoted “savings,
education, technology, and entrepreneurship” as well as regulated the
financial sector to “ensure markets served the needs of society.”19
Another cluster of studies on African capitalism and entrepreneurs
consists of biographies of highly successful African business people and
their rise to prominence. Often these accounts focus on the personal sto-
ries and journeys of the entrepreneurs with only a few of these volumes
giving attention to any candid discussion of an entrepreneur’s strategies
for success, especially those with regard to the state.20 Moky Makura’s
work offers a range of such accounts and identifies some of the political
work that entrepreneurs must undertake with regards to their relations
with state leaders. Thus, she quotes Wale Tinubu, a Nigerian luminary
8 E. SANDBERG

entrepreneur with a commercial reach in billions of dollars across West

Africa: “You have to win politically to get included on the bidding list and
then you have to win convincingly on the bid to get the contract.”21
It is interesting to note that studies largely are lacking with regard to
Africa’s private sector as seen through the lens of the “varieties of capital-
ism” literatures that are so important to scholars of the political economies
of European states. The “varieties of capitalism” debates in Europe fol-
lowed the perceived failures of the classical liberal economy models that
were imposed by International Financial Institutions during the 1980s and
later the 1990s as well as imposed by right-of-center political leaders such
as Reagan, Thatcher, and Kohl. These policies were widely known as
International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank Structural Adjustment
Programs (SAPs) or austerity programs.
As has been widely recounted by now, in the early 1990s, following the
fall of the Soviet Union, pristine classical liberal economic policies were
imposed on Eastern European and African countries as well as any other
state that borrowed from the IMF and/or World Bank to pay down its
debts, pay its civil servants, and provide state services. Africa’s debt largely
was created by OPEC’s spikes in oil prices, the inequalities of trade with
advanced industrial countries, the theft of public monies by corrupt
African officials, corporations and individual citizens that found ways to
avoid their assessed taxation, general mismanagement of African public
business enterprises, and the inability of African officials to properly regu-
late their domestic financial sectors. The SAPs or austerity policies became
known as the “Washington Consensus” policies because the meetings and
talks concerning austerity policies largely took place in Washington, DC
where the main officials that supported the SAPs were based.22 The SAPs
major proponents worked at the IMF, the World Bank, and, for the United
States, in the US Treasury Department and the United States Agency for
International Development (USAID), especially during President Ronald
Reagan’s administration.
As Francis Fukayama famously argued, this period was to be the “end
of history,” because neoclassical economic policies operating without any
state interference in a free capitalist market, as well as the adoption of
multiparty political institutions would now guide the development of
nation states globally, since the Soviet Union’s state-led alternative had
been discredited and eliminated. For Fukayama, the evolution of, and
experimentation with, state and market forms that rivalled or challenged
free market capitalist and liberal political institutions was at an end.
 INTRODUCTION TO ANALYZING AFRICAN ENTREPRENEURS 9

The International Financial Institutions’ (IFIs) policies accomplished

some important changes in the political economies of states, especially in
those African states that had enacted few modern economic practices previ-
ously.23 But the SAP austerity measures designed to save the states produced
a backlash among a state’s citizenry, eventually including its local business
sector. Ordinary citizens and business people suffered greatly from the
withdrawal of state activities that SAP loan agreements had required as cost-
cutting measures. Especially in the areas of health care, education, trans-
port, jobs, and the availability of credit, SAP austerity ­policies produced
tremendous hardship. Opoku and Sandberg, as well as dozens of other
authors, have written on some of the disturbing effects of the IFIs’ austerity
programs in Africa, as well as on some of the achievements of those
programs.24
With regard to African entrepreneurs, austerity programs presented a
number of challenges. Austerity programs undermined the possibilities for
local consumer demand, because jobs in the public sectors were cut and
many large companies laid off workers due to lack of local demand from
citizens who no longer had discretionary income because they were out of
work. Additionally, foreign competition entered the country when auster-
ity programs mandated that protective tariffs for local producers should be
eliminated. In Zambia, for example, nineteen milling companies shut
down as cheap clothing imports and second-hand clothes from the United
States and Europe ended Zambian demand for locally milled garments.
Though citizens were urged to start their own enterprises, with the discre-
tionary income of former wage earners drastically reduced or eliminated,
there was little demand structure for new products or services offered by
aspiring entrepreneurs.
Additionally, most of the austerity programs in the 1990s included
requirements for the devaluation of local currencies. That meant that the
cost of imported goods for local populations increased dramatically
because the local African currency no longer purchased as much foreign
currency as previously was the case. To counter this inflation, officials over-
seeing the austerity programs urged central bankers in Africa to maintain
high interest rates so there would be less money circulating, and presum-
ably less inflation. That made bank loans prohibitively expensive for aspir-
ing entrepreneurs just as free-market forces were being introduced into
their national economies. It also meant that should an entrepreneur need
an imported input to start his or her business, the cost of such imports had
just skyrocketed due to the devaluation of the national currency.
10 E. SANDBERG

Rural citizens, not just urban workers who lost their jobs in state and
commercial enterprises, were also hit hard. In what have been called “land
grabs,” foreign companies came into African states and displaced peasants
who had worked the land, often with permission of national government
officials and often by paying off local chiefs. Generally, these foreign com-
panies produced goods for export to Western countries where workers
with jobs had discretionary income and could afford to purchase imported
goods. They exported coffee or flowers, for example. The rural producers,
who were forced off the land that they had traditionally worked, then had
no food for their families to eat, nor food to sell at market. In turn, they
could not make purchases from those entrepreneurs who offered goods
and services such as brick making, cooking oil, and hand hoes, to name a
few examples of goods that previously had been designed for rural mar-
kets. As a result of such foreign investment under neo-liberal capitalist
principles, many rural Africans suddenly lacked food and could not earn
money either to purchase food or to buy the goods of any entrepreneur
offering products rural residents might desire.
Critics believed the austerity programs were not even designed to save
the states, but rather to save the Western banks, Western corporations, and
Western governments who had failed in their fiduciary investment obliga-
tions and extended huge loans to governments that could not repay those
loans. These critics have been even more censorious in arguing that the
poor in late-industrializing and medium-sized industrial countries should
not have paid for the errors of elite Western investors.25 So in the 1990s
and 2000s, when Marxism no longer posed a credible alternative to capi-
talism, not all citizens around the globe were supportive of the neoliberal
austerity SAPs.
By the late 1990s and into the twenty-first century, those who studied
political economies in Europe began to challenge the image of an evolving
single model of a Western-inspired political economy, arguing instead,
that even among Western European states many variations in the forms of
capitalism could be found. A variety of entrepreneurs and corporations
were important actors and institutions in those studies. As analyses of the
varieties of capitalism increased, according to Bob Hancké, the business
firm remained the central unit of analysis.26 Scholars analyzed the firms’
relations with labor, the state, those in the market who purchased the
firms’ goods and services, the banks and other sources of capital from
whom the firms borrowed, the suppliers of goods (mainly tools and tech-
nology) to firms, and the markets for purchasing those goods which firms
needed in order to produce their own products.27
 INTRODUCTION TO ANALYZING AFRICAN ENTREPRENEURS 11

Western “varieties of capitalism” theorists investigated the markets and

state institutions that structured relations and markets for firms, in order
to determine which forms among the existing varieties of capitalism led to
the best outcomes for a firm’s success in the modern globalizing economy,
or for innovations that enabled a firm to continue to compete. But ulti-
mately, what was at stake in these investigations, as David Coates has
noted, is “why some … capitalist economies have performed better than
others.”28
Colin Crouch, however, observed that while the varieties of capitalism
debates may have evolved with an emphasis on the firm, “theories of capi-
talist diversity… usually originated in studies of the labour market and
social policy” as well as studies of “institutionalism.”29 Further, Crouch
noted, based in part on the varieties of capitalism research, the World Bank
and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
(OECD) argued that only those countries with business, state, and labor
institutions that remained “close to the market” provided the dynamism
needed for a country’s economic development.30 This further reinforced
the IFIs’ commitment to structural adjustment and austerity programs as
a condition of lending.
Soon, investigations of the varieties of capitalism were occurring along-
side the work of other theorists who redirected the unit of analysis away
from the success of the firm. Some varieties of capitalism theorists were
concerned with the lives of workers and trade unions within various states,
while others began to ask how the varieties of capitalism in a globalizing
world were now affecting middle-management individuals in large firms
and the human resources practices in those firms.31
Soon another research agenda emerged in the subfield of the study of
capitalism and entrepreneurship. Scholars like Jeffrey Hart grappled with
globalization’s impact for both the “regulated state,” proposed and prac-
ticed by those who rejected neoclassical structures of the IFIs’ capitalist
state, as well as globalization’s impact on the “developmental states,” for
those who believed the regulated state did not intervene far enough to
spur national manufacturing and industrialization. In 2015, Paul Dragos
Aligica and Vlad Tarko set out to evaluate much of the empirical data
about alternatives to capitalism, especially alternatives to entrepreneurial
capitalism, and also to identify the varieties of capitalism debates within
the scope of its historical place and epistemological parameters.32 Aligica
and Tarko analyzed four forms of states (state capitalism, crony capital-
ism, regulatory capitalism, and entrepreneurial capitalism), as well as
examined the older debates concerning strong left parties and generous
12 E. SANDBERG

welfare states and strong labor unions and generous welfare states and
also strong left parties without strong labor unions and generous (or not)
welfare states.33
In one of their most illuminating chapters, Aligica and Tarko analyzed
the evolving “entrepreneurship capitalist” economy within a globalizing
world with “oligopolistic market structures.” They argue that even large
firms such as Walmart and Amazon adopted decentralized management
structures and changing communications practices that employed lessons
learned from those who promoted small-scale entrepreneurship.34 Thus it
seems that the practices of capitalist entrepreneurs for spurring national
development and economic success remain an important concern for
many in the twenty-first century.35
In today’s world, however, the capitalist entrepreneur faces some
unique challenges, as well as some that are seen to be inherently part of
any capitalist formation during any period. In Africa, where state actions
still dominate national political economies despite decades of the IFIs’
structural adjustment policies, many indigenous, independent, African
entrepreneurs, as well as African workers, remain marginalized compared
to the foreign entrepreneurs and Africa’s political and military leaders.
This volume then gathers together a group of authors who have
researched African entrepreneurs and businesses within the contempo-
rary, evolving political economy of Africa. In fact, some of our authors
are scholars who have already published full-length manuscripts in the
newly growing subfield of black African entrepreneurs. In light of the
(chapter) contributions of our authors, we argue that African independent
businesspeople face extraordinary domestic and foreign pressures, and
that the role of businesses within the African state formation is diversify-
ing, with some African businesses assuming unusual responsibilities pre-
viously undertaken by the state, public institutions, and in some cases, by
non-­governmental organizations.36 We also argue that African states’
domestic political networks largely determine the success or failure of its
entrepreneurs.
This introductory chapter begins our volume’s exploration of black
African business actors and their strategies by contextualizing the evolving
roles of African-owned businesses. We begin by exploring the past in order
to offer context to the circumstances of African entrepreneurs today.
Therefore, this chapter first asks why were there so few indigenous African
entrepreneurs during the colonial period? Next, it investigates the condi-
tions that African entrepreneurs faced in the post-independence decades of
 INTRODUCTION TO ANALYZING AFRICAN ENTREPRENEURS 13

the 1960s, 1970s, and during the 1980s. Then, in the following chapters,
the contributing authors to this volume identify some of the major chal-
lenges faced by African entrepreneurs, and the strategies they have
employed in order to cope with African state leaders and the African state
political formations that have evolved within the globalization of the late
twentieth and early twenty-first centuries. The final chapter of this volume
summarizes the challenges facing black African entrepreneurs today.

Why Was an Indigenous African Capitalist Class

Slow to Develop During the Colonial Period?
The political economies of the fifty-two African states differ in the specific-
ity of their endowments and needs, as well as by the evolution of the
structural frames that constrain or assist their political and private sector
leaders. One of the most striking similarities across states, however, can be
found in the legacy of colonization, as a result of which every African
country produced only a small black capitalist cohort. This fact derives
from the differential laws and rules for black Africans and foreigners, espe-
cially where colonial populations settled—whether the settlers migrated
from Europe, South Asia, or the Middle East. Additionally, colonial
restrictions on the property rights, education majors, and entry into pro-
fessional sectors by black Africans were based not simply on the laws of the
colonial power, but also on the particular administrator who happened to
be the official in charge for a colonial power during the final years of colo-
nization. Moreover, as John Iliffe, an important scholar on the develop-
ment of capitalism in Africa, has argued, the political and economic
protections that white missionaries and colonial officials provided to white
settler capitalists largely excluded aspiring black Africans (although there
were exceptions such as in the West African planter economies of Côte
d’Ivoire, Senegal, and Togo) and so indigenous African business practices
were constrained.37 Iliffe also argued that during the colonial period the
component of wage labor, one of the major prerequisites for capitalism,
was hindered from emerging because slaves, family labor, and political
clientelism precluded it.
Other scholars have emphasized associated, independent variables in
their explanations of why few capitalist sectors evolved in African states.
Samir Amin, drawing on the work of Fernand Braudel, Boubacar Barry,
and others, argued that the switch from trade in gold and gum and other
such commodities to slaves altered both the state building and the path to
14 E. SANDBERG

capitalism that African societies might have followed. Ultimately, those

Africans with whom the foreigners could trade for slaves were armed
through their external trades and they then claimed both political and
economic benefits vis à vis their African rivals.38
Amin argues that up until the seventeenth century, black Africa was not
“on the whole more backward than the rest of the world,” and that the
“process of disintegration of the primitive village community” was in evi-
dence.39 In what Amin identifies as Africa’s pre-mercantilist trade with
Europe that was centered largely around the Italian city states, African
gold and other exports were traded among equals (Europeans and
Africans) and so strengthened African elites and contributed to state build-
ing.40 Later, the growing slave trade was dominated by the Atlantic
European states. The changes in what was being traded changed the
impact of trade in Africa and promoted the emergence of two important
aspects of capitalist production: 1) the accumulation of wealth in the form
of money and 2) a decline of feudal relationships, which gave way to the
rise of those engaged in crafts, whose labor was later commoditized, and
which enabled the rise of a proletariat.41
Islamic leaders of the time sought to stop the external slave trade while
maintaining internal slavery, but largely failed. After decades of rivalry
among African traders and militaries, the French tipped the balance of
power by supporting allies who engaged in external slave trades.42 Amin
argues that it was the expansion of the slave trade across most of Africa
that undermined African central authorities and state building.43
Amin builds on Iliffe’s research in identifying the indigenous forms of
pre-capitalism that included African craftspeople who originally crafted
pieces directly for clients. Early on, merchants purchased a craft person’s
products, not their labor.44 Then, over time, those merchants (who had
purchased cloth made by individuals) created new processes to produce
textiles so that multiple paid laborers could perform routinized tasks and
skilled craftspeople were no longer needed.45 Amin argues that it is this
paid labor that characterizes the rise of African capitalism. Commercial
activity around both the textile merchants and craftspeople included some
merchants, who were outsiders and so able to make purchases drawing
from pools of wealth outside of any producing community. Bruce Berman
and Colin Leys also argued that during the colonial period, those who had
outsider status were the ones who could accrue the personal accumulation
necessary to engage in capitalist activities.46
Thus far, the arguments as to why an African capitalist class was slow to
develop across the continent during the pre-colonial and colonial period
 INTRODUCTION TO ANALYZING AFRICAN ENTREPRENEURS 15

focus on the undermining roles of slavery, the limited role of wage labor,
and the lack of access to capital accumulation by Africans at a time when
foreigners could secure access to capital outside the continent. An
­additional variable concerning why African capitalism and an African busi-
ness class able to play a strong role vis à vis the state did not arise prior to
independence has to do with the white settler population. White settlers
across Africa crowded out most aspiring black entrepreneurs and also
helped to achieve the conditions for state-led, capitalist enterprises in post-­
independent states.
Basically, there is agreement among scholars that a colonial settler com-
munity in a given colonial territory facilitated a colonial power’s invest-
ment in the infrastructure necessary for production and trade in that
territory. After independence was attained, those countries with large set-
tler populations often had more advanced capitalist enterprises than coun-
tries with fewer white settlers. The major exception of course can be found
in the mining sector where outside investors did not require a settler pop-
ulation to encourage their investment. An additional impact of a white
settler population was that it provided a target market for commercial
trade from capitalists in foreign countries.
US corporations, for example, changed the nature of their exports to
Southern Africa according to the needs of the white colonizers and also
according to the pace of industrialization in the United States. Whereas in
the first half of the 1800s US exports to Africa (especially Southern Africa)
were comprised largely of agriculture, by end of the 1800s and after its
industrialization revolution, the United States exported mass-produced,
cheap products to Southern Africa.47 Singer sewing machines, American
firearms, agricultural tools such as the reaper/harvester, barbed wire and
kerosene were leading US exports to Africa, especially South Africa, in the
late 1800s and were purchased largely by white Boer farmers and British
officials and colonists.48 This provided Boer and British South Africans
with the proper equipment to engage in medium- and large-scale produc-
tion with which black Africans could not compete.
Colonial settlers demanded that colonial powers develop infrastructure
in their colonies because infrastructure was necessary to accelerate capital-
ist production and distribution. The settlers maintained access to distribu-
tion networks for themselves and largely precluded the development of
black African-led businesses. But even where black Africans might have
been able to avail themselves of the transport routes within an African
country for distribution of goods, the lack of a banking structure pre-
vented Africans from accessing capital as foreigners could do. Without
16 E. SANDBERG

capital, black Africans could not purchase land, equipment, or employ

others. Colonial banks tended to support their own colonial nationals.
Lacking local capital, both indigenous Africans and competing foreigners
from countries other than the colonial power had difficulty doing business
in an African country. Hull notes that, after 1889, even US companies
could not thrive in their South African dealings if they did not achieve
working relations with British imperial banks on the continent. The boom
and bust of credit during South Africa’s gold rush saw three imperial banks
purchase smaller banks and then direct credit toward British nationals,
largely to the exclusion of US companies, non-British white settlers, and
black South Africans.49
Paul Kennedy reminds us that when looking back at the colonial period,
dependency theorists argued that inequalities of trade and the export of
capital were largely to blame for the lack of an African capitalist cohort
that could jump start African development.50 Kennedy also reminds us
that some theorists argued that the colonial powers’ deliberately allowed
local chiefs and clan lineage societies, particularly those in the rural areas,
to maintain pre-capitalist relations within their areas of control. These
theorists argued that Africa’s rural areas were prevented from being incor-
porated into evolving international capitalist structures, in order to pro-
vide a place for the relocation of those laborers who worked in the mines
and plantations when they became ill, old, or were no longer needed by
the mine or plantation owners.51
Black African women played a dual role in supporting the maintenance
of pre-capitalist conditions in rural areas in Africa. First, they remained in
the rural areas ready to take in returning miners. Second, African men
extended their control of women and women’s labor in the rural areas. The
men retained that control even when they moved to urban areas to work in
the mines. The evolving African sexual division of labor allowed the mine
owners to hire black African male workers because the women in the rural
areas carried the burdens of readying them for the mines, and caring for
their lands, children, elders, and possessions in their absence.52 African
women’s unpaid labor, like other female labor around the world, made
male African workers available to Africa’s mining capitalist enterprises. Yet
most black African miners accumulated little capital. The mining towns
either required or tempted many miners to spend their earnings there.
Whether through the resistance of African communities or by colonial
design, many rural areas did not develop a currency-based economy. For
most theorists, the development of a currency-based economy is a precon-
dition for the development of capitalism, because, it is argued, merchant
 INTRODUCTION TO ANALYZING AFRICAN ENTREPRENEURS 17

capitalism cannot break up pre-capitalist formations in the way that indus-

trial capitalism can.53 With Africa being incorporated into the world econ-
omy for its commodity and other trading, not for its industrial production,
those living and working in pre-capitalist formations were strong enough
to block any aspiring African capitalists from fighting for and winning
political authority.54
Kennedy, however, notes that in the years just prior to independence,
there was a late switch from merchant capital to industrial capitalism that
opened up possibilities for the development of black African capitalists.
And here we find one of Paul Kennedy’s arguments that counters other
authors. Kennedy maintains that while the above economic-based inter-
pretations of obstacles to the development of African capitalism may be
true, they are not sufficient to explain the lack of an African capitalist sec-
tor. Kennedy also rejects many cultural arguments as unconvincing—that
somehow African culture is not suited to capitalism due to indigenous
moral preferences for economic equality, or that Africans disdain great dif-
ferences in wealth, or that Africans do not make good entrepreneurs by
nature. Kennedy also rejects the liberal economic argument that a free
market is the major precondition for the development of entrepreneurial-
ism and national capitalists. According to Kennedy, a major variable that
has been neglected in our understanding of the lack of the development of
African capitalism is the institutional legacy of the colonial state.
Kennedy argues that the actions of the colonial institutions that fos-
tered monopolies, as well as bureaucracies that regulated those not allied
with state officials and their goals, were structures and practices that were
continued by independence governments. The new states with their inher-
ited institutions and practices thus undermined many aspiring African capi-
talists, not only by regulating them in ways that precluded their success,
but also by keeping production as a monopoly of the state and its allies.55
In sum, a common colonial legacy for all African territories, a legacy
that carried over into Africa’s newly independent states, was that only a
small black African group had the resources and technical abilities to
become private sector leaders. It is little wonder, then, that Africa’s early
state leaders embraced a state-centered economy. Clearly, the white and
other colonists had engineered structures and procedures to allow the
settlers to continue to dominate the private sectors of African states even
after independence, and to continue to exclude aspiring black African
entrepreneurs. Black Africans in newly independent states worried about
“flag independence” in which black leaders led the political institutions
Another random document with
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fancy that the explanation of the miracle lies in the hypothesis I have
suggested, the long wall on which the minarets are built having
probably settled, and so, having no communication with the side
walls, being no miracle, but merely bad building. We saw the
miracle, expressed our wonder, thanked “the hereditary functionary,”
and went home sadder and wiser than we came.
Vaccination is now happily appreciated in Persia. On my first
arrival it was unknown, and inoculation was regularly practised.
Another plan, too, was common, and the future native pastor of the
Protestant Armenians lost a child by its practice. He put his own child
in bed with a child having small-pox, that it might take the disease in
a benign form; confluent small-pox of the most virulent type resulted,
and the poor child died, to the great grief of the parent, a most
deserving and honest fellow.
This man and one other are the only teetotalers of Julfa, which
may dispute the palm with any Scotch town for capability of
swallowing liquor on a Sunday.
So common is drunkenness here, that an old cook of mine, an
English-speaking Armenian, used to say to me on Sunday night—
“Dinner finished, sir; if you no orders, I go get drunk with my
priest.” Needless to add, that they both did get drunk, and that it was
at the cook’s expense. Happily, there are some few exceptions
among the Julfa priests, for all India, Persia, and Batavia are
supplied with priests for their Armenian communities from Julfa.
Spirits are supposed to deaden pain, and a Yezdi, a guebre (fire-
worshipper), who had lodged some slugs and iron in his hand, prior
to my removing them, swallowed a quart of strong spirit without my
knowledge. I supposed him to become suddenly delirious, but he
was only suddenly drunk.
Our first care was to make a road for our little dog-cart. The gates
separating the parishes were mostly too narrow to let it pass, and we
finally made one six feet wide at the narrowest, having three bridges
without parapets (which we widened), and one was at a sharp angle,
and a deep ditch the whole way on one side, and a wall on the other.
This was capital for a small two-wheel thing, as long as the horse
didn’t jib or shy, or we didn’t meet any one. Happily, it did not in our
time, but when we got a bigger trap, a park phaeton, with a pair of
horses, the pleasure of our drive was somewhat damped by the
possibility of a capsize at night in the dark! But the cherub that
always keeps a watch over poor Jack must have been on duty, for
we never did have an accident. It was Hobson’s choice, that road or
none.
Crossing the river at Marnūn became our favourite ride, and here
one could canter for miles on a good road, the greater part of which
was shaded by the gardens and orchards on either side. A great
deal of firewood, too, is grown in this neighbourhood, water is
plentiful, and so firewood is a staple crop. Getting out beyond the
gardens, on a small mountain standing by itself on the plain, was the
ruin of an ancient fire-temple. It was merely built of mud bricks, but
here at Ispahan these remain for centuries, and it was only on
climbing up to it that one perceived that it was not all quite modern,
and a small portion built of very large bricks on an ancient wall. A
grand view was got from it, as it commanded the entire plain.
Several large plane-trees are to be seen in the villages, many with
platforms built round them, where the villagers sit and smoke in the
evenings. A sort of semi-sacred character is attached to some of
them, particularly to one which is called the “plane of Mortaza Ali.”
A striking feature at Julfa is the so-called racecourse at Ferhabad.
A couple of walls enclose a straight run of over a mile. These walls,
which are in ruins, and of mud, have at intervals various pavilions,
some of the rooms of which are still almost perfect. At the end is a
large square, having many rooms round it in a still better state. The
road turned at a right angle towards the village of Julfa; but as this is
intersected by wells and watercourses, it is not used as a cantering
ground. The place is supposed to have been the summer palace of
the Afghan conquerors.
Ruins and ancient buildings, when built of burnt bricks, rapidly
disappear in Persia. It is for a very simple reason. It is cheaper to
demolish an old building, and carry off the good seasoned bricks by
donkey-loads, than to make and burn new ones, which often
crumble.
In my own time a large and handsome college near the Char Bagh
of Ispahan has utterly disappeared, the prince having given an order
for its demolition, and that the material be used in making the new
one he has now completed. The very foundations were grubbed up.
In Ispahan itself every third house is a ruin, and in Julfa the walls of
gardens and orchards often contain the bare inner walls of ancient
houses, which retain the brightness of their painting and gilding in
the dry and pure air.
Donkeys, as beasts of burden, are much employed in a country
where there are no carts or wheeled vehicles; save in the capital, the
donkeys do all the ordinary work of vehicles. Earth, manure,
produce, firewood, charcoal, grain, are all carried on these beasts or
on mules. Each animal has his pack-saddle, in which he lives and
sleeps. It is only removed when the donkey gets a rare and very
occasional curry-combing from a very primitive sort of instrument,
having jangling rings, which produce a music supposed to be
soothing to a donkey’s soul. Every villager has his donkey; if more
than one he is well-to-do. The ordinary wage of a man is one keran,
a man and donkey one keran and a half, and each additional donkey
half a keran. They work from sunrise to sunset, with an hour’s
interval for feeding.
Julfa is a particularly healthy place, for the cesspools are
constantly kept clean by the market-gardeners, who pay for the
privilege of removing the manure. By mixing the contents of the
cesspools with ashes, a dry and portable manure is produced of the
highest efficacy, and odourless. It is removed on donkeys, and
stored in the fields until required.
In the very depth of the winter, when snow and ice had rendered
the ride to the town highly dangerous for horses, I was summoned in
haste to see my old patient the Zil-es-Sultan, now the most important
man in the kingdom next to the king. I went, though risking my
horse’s knees, and was rather disgusted to find that I was sent for to
see if he was ill or not, as he was not sure. I found him in a hot room,
temperature eighty (by the thermometer), wrapped in furs, being
shampooed by three attendants, while a fourth was reading poetry to
him. He was, I told him, in a fair way to get ill, and that air and
exercise were all he needed. He took my advice, and returned to his
usual very active life.
He showed me an armoury of some eight hundred rifles, with a
proportionate amount of fowling-pieces and pistols. I expressed the
desired amount of admiration. I suppose the time will come when his
Royal Highness will make an effort for the throne, probably on the
present Shah’s death. It will be a lucky day for Persia if he succeeds,
as he is clever, tolerant, and a good governor. His personal
popularity is very great, and his luck as a governor proverbial. He
has a dislike to deeds of blood, but is a severe governor, like his
uncle, the late Hissam-u-Sultaneh, whose virtues he emulates.
The Valliāt, or heir-apparent, on the contrary, is physically weak,
and mentally imbecile, being a bigot in the hands of a few holy men,
and as impracticable as he is obstinate. No doubt if he ever does
reign a black time will set in for the country, for religious persecution
on a gigantic scale will commence, and the future of Iran be very
sad.
The Zil-es-Sultan had just got two bull-terriers from England. He
was convinced of their ferocity; and certainly the dog, very short-
faced, and almost a bull-dog, was of terrific appearance. His Royal
Highness caused them to be let into the courtyard, cautioning me to
be very still, as not knowing me they might attack me, and providing
me with a lump of sugar to appease them. Of course nothing of the
sort took place, but the dogs ran about and smelt the various
grandees, to their great disgust. The prince made great pets of them,
feeding them with sugar. I was surprised to find that though these
dogs had not seen an Englishman for months, yet on my speaking to
them in English they followed me about, fawning on me, and
neglecting the prince, and the dog-man who was their valet.
Since this time the prince has procured two huge half-bred Dutch
mastiffs, in which he greatly rejoices, and these animals, though not
fierce, are certainly very powerful dogs. Strange that the love of
animals in a man like the Zil-es-Sultan should so overcome the
Mussulman dislike of the unclean beast. The dogs were in the habit
of licking the prince’s hand.
This particular winter was an unusually severe one. There was
much snow, and it was impossible to get out for rides for a fortnight;
and two store-rooms of my huge house fell in, from the heavy mud
roofs being soaked with water, and breaking their supports by the
enormous increase of weight.
On one occasion in the early spring we had ridden out to the
garden palace of Haft Dust, and were preparing to take tea, when
with great noise the Zil-es-Sultan rode into the place with some fifty
horsemen. No sooner did he see and recognise my servants than he
asked if I was alone. On hearing that my wife (“my house,” as my
man put it) was with me, he rode out, taking all his followers with
him, and sending me a message to “go on with my tea, that he
trusted I should enjoy my visit, that the place was mine as long as I
pleased,” etc.
Europeans avoid the Persians when with ladies, as very ridiculous
scenes are at times the result. One gentleman, whose wife was not
in her first youth, on meeting the prince when riding with her, instead
of avoiding him, stopped to speak.
It was one of his rude days, for he calmly asked, in defiance of the
rules of Persian politeness, which demand the ignoring of the
existence of any female:
“Is that your wife?”
“Yes, my wife.”
“Well, I wouldn’t have a wife so old and ugly as that. Get a young
one.”
The situation for both lady and gentleman was embarrassing.
 CHAPTER XXXIV.
JOURNEY TO AND FROM TEHERAN.

Proceed to Teheran—Takhtrowan—Duties—Gulhaek—Lawn-tennis—Guebre
gardener—A good road—The Shah—Custom of the Kūrūk—M. Gersteiger—
Cossack regiments—Austrian officers—New coinage—Count Monteforte—
New police—Boulevard des Ambassadeurs—English Embassy—Tile gates—
Summer palaces—Bazaars—Russian goods—Demarvend—Drive to Ispahan
—Difficulties of the journey—Accidents—Danger of sunstroke—Turkeys—
Keeping peacocks—Armenian tribute of poultry—Burmese and Japanese
embassies—Entertainment and fireworks—Cruel treatment of Jews—Oil
paintings—Bahram and his queen—Practice makes perfect—Pharaoh and the
Red Sea—Pharaoh and the magicians.

After an eighteen months’ stay in Julfa (Ispahan) I received orders

to proceed to Teheran “to act” (for my chief).
We started, my wife travelling in a “takhtrowan” (moving bed). This
consists of a box with doors and windows, six feet long, three feet
wide, and four feet high. A thick mattress is placed in it, and plenty of
pillows. Where the road is fairly level, as from Ispahan to Teheran, it
is not a bad way of travelling for a lady. The great cause of
satisfaction to her was that she had her baby with her. Water was
kept out of the machine by a waterproof sheet being tacked to the
top, and a thick carpet was lashed over the roof when travelling in
strong sun. At each end of the box are shafts, and between each
pair a mule. The movement is at first rather sickening, but this is
soon got over, and the traveller sleeps the greater portion of the
stage.
Although we travelled as lightly as possible, we were forced to
take twenty-four mules, and were heartily glad when our journey,
which was twelve long stages, and without incident of any kind, was
over. I hired a little house at Gulhaek, the village where are situated
the summer quarters of the English Embassy, and where lives the
chief of my Department, in the summer.
In addition to my own work I was in charge of the staff of the Indo-
European Telegraph Company’s line who lived in Teheran. Our own
signalling staff too lived in the town. As however we had an
exceptionally healthy summer, the duties were very light.
I was also placed in medical charge of the Russian Embassy by
the Russian Ambassador, M. Zenoview, for the greater part of my six
months’ stay, their own physician having gone to Russia for a time
on private business.
Gulhaek is one of the villages at the foot of the mountains
bounding the Teheran valley, and by prescriptive right the English
Legation go to Gulhaek, the Russians to the next village, Zergendeh,
and the French to another a couple of miles higher, called Tejreesh.
These places are delightfully cool, and if the signallers of the
Department and of the Company could be moved to them, it would
be a great boon to the men, for it is terribly hot and unhealthy in the
town, and the expense would not be great: in fact it ought to be
done.
Lawn-tennis, when we arrived, was in high vogue, and was played
every afternoon on a level ground (a lawn in Persia is nearly
impossible) mudded over with what is termed “kah gil,” a mixture of
“kah” (cut straw) and “gil” (mud). This forms a sort of sheet of smooth
and springy ground, which gives a good foothold, and dries rapidly.
The tennis was justly popular, and was the most pleasant means of
obtaining exercise, and consequently health.
Our own comfort was increased by the arrival of an English nurse,
whom we had engaged to come out for a certain three years.
I was enabled to buy a small park-phaeton and a pair of well-
broken horses from a German, the master of the Shah’s mint, who
was leaving because he declined to debase the coinage, which was
contrary to the terms of his agreement.
In the garden next to ours lived a Guebre. A few of these men
have been under the protection of the English Embassy time out of
mind. He kept us supplied with strawberries at tenpence a plateful;
and as we had not tasted them since leaving England, they were a
great luxury, particularly in a warm climate.
The greater part of the road from Gulhaek to Teheran, being the
way to the Shah’s favourite summer residences, is planted on both
sides with trees and shrubs. These give a grateful shade; and as the
road is in good order, it is pleasant driving; but, when thronged, the
dust rises and covers everything, so that it is like a very dusty return
from the Derby, but with no excitement, and hotter. Still, a good road
in nearly roadless Persia was a thing to be taken advantage of.
Several times when out driving we met the Shah, and invariably
drew on one side to allow him to pass. His Majesty was always very
polite, and returned our salutes. On our passing the first time he sent
a man to inquire who we were. The Prime minister, too, was
particular in behaving in a civilised manner, but the ragamuffin
attendants on the royal ladies always used to shout “Begone,” “Be
off,” and their postilions would always drive as close as possible, and
pass one as if they wished a collision, or to take a wheel off.
The custom of the kūrūk is dying out. It used to be death for any
man to be in the neighbourhood of the royal wives when on their
numerous outings. The people always fled, or stood with faces to the
wall; and Europeans, when they saw the eunuchs’ procession
approaching, and heard the cry of “Gitchen” (Turkish “Begone”), to
avoid unpleasantness and possible rows, used to turn down the first
street. A very eccentric Austrian, the Baron Gersteiger Khan (the
latter title being, of course, a Persian dignity; for many years
instructor to the Persian army, and at last general; principal officer of
engineers, and constructor of roads, in which latter work he has
really left some striking marks of his success), on meeting the ladies
when he was on foot, turned his face to the wall like a native, and as
each carriage passed, deliberately saluted from the back of his head.
This delighted the ladies, and they informed the Shah. The Shah
sent for Gersteiger, and made him repeat his salutes, and after
laughing a good deal, gave him a handsome present.
 The king generally travelled in a carriage very like a sheriff’s, with
eight pairs of horses harnessed to it, with postilions. They went at a
fair pace, were always preceded by the royal runners (“shatirs”), clad
in their ancient Persian dress of red, with the curious turreted hat,
like a fool’s cap and bells, and each bearing a gold baton. These
men were all good runners, and some six or eight ran in front, while
one or two always kept at his Majesty’s side.
When we were in Teheran a number of Russian officers were
engaged in forming some so-called Cossack regiments. They
engaged horsemen, whom they regularly paid, and seemed to be
teaching these men their drill successfully. These so-called
Cossacks were the Shah’s favourite toy of the moment, and he was
never tired of reviewing them. They were well but plainly dressed,
well horsed and well armed, and the Russian officers were very
popular both with Shah and soldiers.
A large contingent of Austrian officers had also arrived to instruct
the infantry and artillery; but though these gentlemen were well paid,
they did not find Persia the El Dorado they expected. Some of them
resigned while I was there. They also fought among themselves; and
all have now, I fancy, left the country. The capital was ever rather a
rowdy place; murders and burglaries were common; and, as in other
towns of Persia, the “darogas,” or police-masters, and their
dependants were so mercenary, that the townspeople preferred
being robbed to complaining to them, on the principle of two evils to
choose the less.
The manufacture of false money had become a national evil, and
forgeries of the royal seals were frequent. The first evil was sought to
be got over by calling in the old rough coinage, which was hammer-
struck, and substituting a handsome series of medals in gold and
silver, having milled edges. These were introduced with great
success, and the new coinage was handsome and popular. But it
was soon counterfeited, and when the nuisance had attained its
height the Count Monteforte arrived with special credentials from the
Emperor of Austria, and was installed as head of police. This
gentleman seemed to be exactly the right man in the right place. He
got on with the natives, in a few weeks established a character for
honesty and shrewdness, detected many offenders, recovered much
stolen property, and established a regiment of policemen, well
drilled, well dressed, honest, polite, and who refused bribes. As
bribes are to the Persian what beef is to the Englishman, these
phenomena have probably ere this been either shelved or corrupted;
but when we were in Teheran in 1880, they were in full swing, and
the wonder and admiration of foreigners and natives.
Just one street in Teheran is very much Europeanised; it is fairly
paved, and lighted by lamp-posts containing candles. It is called the
Boulevard des Ambassadeurs, and as it is a wide street, the view
from the bottom is somewhat striking, ending as it does in the green
hills and black mountains covered on their tops with snow.
At the top, approached by an ornamental gate of great size, is the
palace of the English Ambassador. This has been recently erected at
enormous cost, partly from designs by the late Major Pierson, R.E. It
is surrounded by trees, and the edifice meets the requirements of the
country, and is very original in appearance. It stands in a magnificent
garden of great size, in which are placed the houses of the
secretaries, built like English villas of the better class. The interior of
the Embassy is furnished with great splendour with English furniture,
and our ambassador to the Court of Persia is lodged as he should
be, en prince.
The rest of the town is wholly Oriental. Dead walls of mud and
brick are seen in every direction. The streets are mud in winter and
dust in summer.
The principal feature in Teheran is the numerous tiled gates.
These structures, covered with floridly-coloured tiles in elaborate
patterns, mostly geometrical, having centre-pieces of
representations of scenes from the mythology of Persia, were
certainly novel and curious. As a rule, the modern tile-work is in
striking contrast to the ancient, which is much chaster, and in better
taste.
Of the many palaces none were worth description, of those that I
visited, which were all mere summer retreats. They were gaudy,
much painted and gilt, and the white plaster-work, decorated with
mirrors, was the only kind of ornamentation having the slightest
pretence to be artistic. The dry climate, however, enables this
effective style of decoration to be used for exteriors, and it retains its
pristine whiteness in the clear air for many years. Many large
buildings seen from a distance in Teheran have a great appearance
of magnificence, and it does not strike the beholder at first that they
are merely plaster-of-Paris over mud bricks. To them the term
“whitened sepulchre” is particularly appropriate; but the insecurity of
property must be considered, and a man would be unwise to build an
expensive edifice which would expose him to jealousy.
The bazaars are good, and sufficiently curious; of course much
inferior in size and richness to those of Stamboul (Constantinople).
Most of the goods exposed, not of native manufacture, are Russian.
[36]

The Russian goods are liked in the Eastern market. They are very
cheap, and very strong; in fact, are suited to the country; they are
also, alas! very ugly. The tremendous land journey from Trebizonde,
or that from the Persian Gulf, or the alternative from Baghdad viâ
Kermanshah, closes the Persian market at Teheran to the English.
Fortunes, however, are made there, an importer of French goods
(which are particularly appreciated by the Persians) having retired
with a large one. About four hundred per cent. is generally charged,
which covers the heavy freight and the duty, and leaves about cent.
per cent. profit.
We found a great deal of gaiety at Teheran. A weekly dinner at the
Embassy, generally a daily drive, and the society of many Europeans
of different nationalities, was of course a great break in the
monotony of our life in Persia. But our pleasures after four months
were interrupted by the serious illness of my wife. Our second little
boy was born, and we were lucky in having a reliable nurse.
The view of Teheran is made very unique by the great semi-extinct
volcano, Demarvend, in the distance, which gives it great grandeur,
towering, as it does, over the valley, with its top covered in eternal
snows, and taking innumerable lovely tints at the rising and setting of
the sun.
 We came to Teheran by the longer way of Natanz, thus avoiding
the great Kohrūd pass, a particularly unpleasant stage when there is
much snow; and as my wife was really an invalid, we determined to
return to Ispahan driving—a thing no one has done before, and I
fancy no one will do again. I had a new set of wheels made specially
strong and heavy, and with very strong tyres. I succeeded in buying
a second pair of half-broken horses, in case my own pair came to
grief, and we left in the autumn for Ispahan, the nurse and babies
occupying the takhtrowan, while my wife and I went in the trap.
We drove through the town with some trouble, and as soon as we
were clear of the fortifications the road became broad and level, and
we reached Hadjiabad, a garden, where we stopped the night.
The next day we crossed a rocky mountain, having to drag the
phaeton by hand some miles, and then, locking the wheels with
ropes, we got it down a very steep place. The rest was plain sailing;
the roads were generally fairly good. My wife had to get out only
some four times on a fifteen days’ journey, and it was only on getting
into or out of villages, where there were at times deep ditches, but
plenty of willing helpers, that we had any difficulty.
On our last stage but three we mistook the road, and came forty-
eight miles instead of twenty-four. We, however, only used our
second pair once, as they were very unsafe; and our horses, strange
to say, did the whole journey well, and arrived in fair condition.
At the last stage but two a ridiculous accident occurred. We had
frequently snapped the heads of bolts, and even the bolts
themselves, by going over very rough places, the jolt breaking the
heads off, as they were steel. These we generally detected and
replaced by others, which we had caused to be made in Teheran.
But Mūrchicah is a big village, with numerous twists and turns
between dead walls ere one gets to the post-house. We had come a
long stage, were very tired, and very anxious to get in, and, instead
of going over a deep dry ditch which we had to pass, and which was
very narrow, in a careful way, I was foolish enough to try to pass it
quickly. The result was a snap of all three bolts that fixed the trap to
what is, I fancy, technically termed the fore-carriage. The thing hung
together till we had got the hind wheels out of the ditch, and then the
horses, pole, and two front wheels went on, the carriage itself
remaining behind and falling forward; and, had not the apron been
up, we should have been shot out. Fortunately the reins were long,
and the horses easily pulled up. They were probably unaware of the
accident. Though we were in the village there was no one about. The
servants were either in front with the bedding, or behind with the
loads, yet in five minutes the bolts were replaced by fresh ones, and
we were proceeding on our way.
At this stage our little boy was taken very ill, and we both felt that
another march in the sun in the “kajawehs,” with his man-nurse,
might be fatal to him. So next morning we started very early, and
taking him in the trap, which had a hood and an opening with a cut
leather curtain behind, that made it very cool: we hurried over the
twenty-two miles, and did it in two hours and twenty minutes through
deep sand.
The next day’s stage was a very bad one, as, though short, we
had to pass through the town, and had to take the horses out twice,
and I dreaded our own very narrow and dangerous road to the
house. However, we got in without accident, by starting at dawn,
before ten; and the child, by rest and nursing, was soon himself
again.
The sun in Persia is a very insidious enemy. Many cases of sun-
apoplexy each year are seen, and I had a fixed rule that, except for
evening rides, my wife and I always wore an Elwood’s sun-helmet,
and this is the only real way to preserve oneself. All other things but
the topi are valueless, unless one uses the hideous pith hat, or
resorts to the turban. Of course in India these precautions are still
more necessary. I don’t know if these sun hats are made for children.
They are very necessary if children are allowed to go at all in the
sun, and they will go, and natives will let them. But really good-
looking riding-hats are turned out for ladies. My wife had a solar
riding-hat à la Gainsborough, that was almost becoming; so that
ladies at least have no excuse. I was constantly warning those under
my care of the danger of little caps, billycocks, etc., but in many
cases I was looked on as a “Molly,” though I felt it my duty to press
my warnings. Of another thing I am convinced, that the powerful
effect of the sun is much lost sight of in Europe, and I look on a
bright helmet of metal, unless air-chambered, as an invention of the
devil, and pity the poor Life Guards, etc.; the horsehair, however,
happily saves them a little.
On our journey down, at a place called Sinsin, we saw a big
turkey, and succeeded in buying a pair for fifty kerans, supposing
them to be the only pair. We found afterwards that the head-man of
the neighbouring village had a hundred birds, and the price
afterwards fell to eight shillings a bird.
We were very successful in the rearing of the young turkeys, the
hens sitting on their own eggs, and proving good mothers. So many
poults did we have, that, when we left Ispahan eighteen months
afterwards, we ate two a week for nearly six months. The turkeys
were of two varieties, the ordinary black ones, as seen in Europe,
and of large size, and a smaller bird, of lighter colour, and more
delicate, some of which latter were almost pure white.
Peacocks are much valued in Persia, and supposed only to be
kept by royalty: the English Minister has several fine birds, and the
privilege of keeping them is jealously guarded.
We brought a quantity of tame ducks down from Teheran; these
increased and multiplied amazingly, and bred with some wild ducks
of the common kind. We brought also three geese. Geese, ducks,
and turkeys were common long ago in Julfa when Ispahan was the
capital, but the Armenians, finding that they had to pay a yearly
tribute of fat birds, allowed them to die out, and so escaped the
exaction. However, when we left Julfa, all the Europeans had turkeys
and ducks, and there were plenty of geese at Soh, three stages off:
so, doubtless, by now (two years) they are plentiful.
We were glad to get back to our own home, for though Teheran
gave us most of the joys of civilisation, still we felt that our home was
in our big house at Julfa. And how we did enjoy not having to start as
usual the next morning!
 Our stay in Ispahan was not chequered by any very exciting
events, save those personal to ourselves.
During our sojourn, two ambassadors passed through it. One, the
Burmese, an old and cheery man with huge ears, accompanied by a
staff of attachés, one of whom spoke English well, and had been
educated at King’s College. He was supposed to be carrying rubies
for disposal through Europe. He had a ring with him as a present
from the King of Burmah to the Shah. Hoop, collet, and all, were cut
out of one solid and perfect ruby of the first water—a truly barbarous
present. These Burmese all wore the national apology for
unmentionables—a handsome sheet of silk, termed a “langouti.” This
is wrapped around the waist, and depends nearly to the feet; their
heads were bound with fillets of muslin. The Zil-es-Sultan gave an
entertainment in their honour, to which we were all invited. A fair
dinner was followed by fireworks; these in Persia are always fairly
good, the only thing being that Persians do not understand coloured
fireworks, otherwise their displays are very good. One very good
feature is, that the public are always freely admitted. All the walls are
marked out with clay oil-lamps, and festoons of the same hang from
wires affixed to high poles: these are lighted after sunset, as soon as
it is dark. Music of a promiscuous character is played, all the
musicians and singers joining in to different airs. The military bands
strike up, each man playing his loudest at his own sweet will. A gun
is fired, and the huge golden rains from earthen cones light up the
whole scene, disclosing the shouting throng of good-tempered
Persians of the lower orders; all people of condition having been
provided with rooms and seats. All the roofs are thronged with
crowds of veiled women, flights of rockets are continually let off, and
the set-pieces soon commence. These are supplied in great
profusion, and, save for the want of colour, they are quite equal to
any effort of European pyrotechny.
A row of wretched Jews are now pushed into the tank—a
proceeding which always accompanies any official display of
fireworks. I know not why, unless it is to let the poor Jews feel, even
in times of rejoicing, the wretchedness of their position. Dancing
boys dressed as girls twirl and tumble, buffoons dance and pose
grotesquely, the noise of music and singing is at its loudest.
“Kūrbāghah” (frogs), a kind of water firework, are thrown in the tanks
in every direction, and, as the set-pieces are fading, the whole
concludes with a tremendous bouquet of fire as in Europe.
The Japanese ambassador, or rather commissioner, was received
with less ceremony, as he was proceeding incog. on his way to
Europe, having a mission to introduce Japanese goods to the notice
of Europeans generally. His attachés, too, spoke French and
English, and were funny little fellows; but, as the Persians put it, “too
ugly to have any value, even as slaves!”
We patronised art in Ispahan by having oil-paintings, executed by
native artists, of incidents in Persian life; some of these were
sufficiently curious. Among the subjects illustrated were “The Sticks,”
a very tragic picture indeed, where the expressions of pain, terror,
supplication, and ferocity were well shown.
Another amusing series were five pictures representing the history
of Bahram and his queen. The monarch is shown as pinning, with a
master-shot from his bow, the foot of an antelope to its side while it
was scratching itself.
“What do you think of that?” says the exulting king.
“Oh, practice makes perfect,” coolly remarked the lady.
They naturally separate; for it is a dangerous thing for a wife to
disparage her husband’s shooting. And here a curious parody of an
ancient classical legend occurs. Bahram hears of a lady of great
strength, who is in the habit of carrying a full-sized bull to the top of a
tower!
He goes to see the prodigy, and sees a lovely woman perform the
feat (scene depicted); his astonishment is manifested by his placing
his finger to his mouth—the typical gesture for this sensation in
Eastern art.
“Oh, that is nothing,” says the triumphant queen, “practice makes
perfect.” She then explains that she had commenced her feat when
the bull was a little calf. The king smiled, and took her back.
 Many of the subjects illustrated were the histories from the Koran.
Thus the passage of the Egyptians, and their subsequent fate in the
Red Sea, is shown; Pharaoh and his host drowning, while a green-
winged angel exhibits to the sinking monarch a divine scroll, on
which his sentence is written. The expiring Egyptians are good, and
the look of horror on the face of Pharaoh is well done. But a small
steamer is seen in the distance! Another picture was “The staff of
Aaron changed to a serpent, having devoured the serpents of the
magicians of Egypt.” Here the winged dragon (or serpent) of Aaron is
so tremendous, that Wagner would have been glad of him at
Bayreuth: he is vomiting fire, and is a bogey of the first water.
Pharaoh, his eyes starting from his head, is depicted in horror, while
Moses has the satisfied expression of a conjurer after a successful
tour de force. Another represents Iskender (Alexander the Great),
who, having conquered the world, proceeds to the regions of eternal
night, as according to Persian legend he did in fact. The conqueror
and his warriors are well and carefully drawn, many of the figures
carrying torches and cressets; but the eternal night is shown by
painting the whole of the figures, trees, etc., on a black ground, and
a curious effect is thus produced.
Solomon in all his glory (see Frontispiece) is a favourite subject.
Solomon, who had the power of speaking the languages of animals
and all created things, and who could command the spirits of the
earth and air, is seen seated on his throne. Above his head is the
fabulous bird, the simūrgh; to his right, on a perch, is his favourite
the hoopöe, below this are two tiny efreet. The Queen of Sheba is
seated in a chair of state, behind her are her female servants and
slaves, and two gigantic jinns (genii). To the king’s left, are his Vizier
Asaph (the author of the Psalms of Asaph, or possibly the person to
whom they were dedicated), and Rūstam, the Persian Hercules,
armed with his bull-headed mace. Behind them are four jinns of
terrible aspect. The air is full of birds; and the foreground of beasts,
reptiles, and insects. The tiny figures with crowns are angels,
servants of Solomon; the turbaned figures are courtiers and
servants.
 CHAPTER XXXV.
WE RETURN VIÂ THE CASPIAN.

New Year’s presents—Shiraz custom—Our cook’s weaknesses—He takes the

pledge—And becomes an opium-eater—Decide to go home—Dispose of kit—
Start for Europe—Our own arrangements—Diary of our journey home—
Arrival.

A severe winter, diversified with occasional fine weather, when the

days were even hot in the sun, brought the No Rūz (or Persian New
Year) and the commencement of spring. Our servants brought their
plates of sweetmeats to mark the day, and duly received a month’s
pay, or clothes to that amount. The woman-servant Bēbē brought her
mistress an earthen water-bottle, around the ledge of which was
sown barley, the grains being held on by a bandage, and the porous
jar keeping them constantly wet; the result was a number of rings of
bright grass, the whole forming a very pretty and original, if useless,
present. It is a common custom to do this in Shiraz at the New Year,
and even the poorest has his water-pot covered with brilliant green.
Our cook is giving some trouble just now; for though a capital chef,
and though he has been with me fourteen years—having begun at
eight shillings a month, and arrived for the last five years at forty and
the spending of all the money—yet he has his vices. When he was
first with me as a youth of nineteen, he was perpetually getting
married, and as frequently getting divorced; then he took to getting
continually arrested for debt; next drink became his foible, and this
endured for about four years; dismissal, the bastinado (by the
authorities), fining, were all tried without avail: at length, in despair, I
sent him to the head of religion in Ispahan, with a note to the Sheikh,
in which I apologised for troubling him, but stated that the man was a
very old servant in whom I had a great interest, and would he make
him take the pledge? The cook, who took the note himself, had no
idea of the contents. He told me that the Sheikh read it and told him
to wait; when the large assembly that always throngs the Sheikh’s
house had disappeared, the old gentleman produced a Koran, and
proposed that the cook should take the pledge. He dared not refuse.
After swearing to take no wine or spirits, a formal document was
drawn up, to which the cook attached his seal. The Sheikh wrote me
a very polite note, and assured me that the man would keep the
pledge.
It appeared that he exhibited a tremendous “taziana,” or cat-o’-
nine-tails, to my man, as what pledge-breakers are punished with.
The cook now was for weeks as sober as a judge, but he was
becoming a fool; the dinners were spoiled, or incongruous, or both:
in fact, as he must do something, he had become an opium-eater.
Opium, though habitually used by the aged of both sexes, is seldom
taken to excess, save by “lutis,” or confirmed debauchees.
At last, finding it impossible to cure this determined offender, I
gave my reluctant consent to his proceeding to Kermanshah, his
native place, where he wished to stay at least a year. I never saw
him again.
I don’t know if the last straw was the loss of our cook, or if we had
come to the conclusion that definitely Persia was not the place for a
lady, but we decided to go home on two years’ leave, to which I was
now entitled; and as we felt that it was very probable we should
never return, we determined to sell off our entire kit. We accordingly
drew out a catalogue of our worldly goods in Persia, and distributed
it among the telegraph officials. By a couple of months everything
was disposed of but the rubbish. This was sold by auction, and
produced a keen competition among the Armenians.
I was enabled to get rid of our phaeton without loss, for a Persian
of wealth, the “Mūllavi,” gave me within forty pounds of what I gave
for it and the horses; and the severe work we had had out of trap
and horses for two years was well worth the difference.
Captain W⸺, who was expecting his sisters out, viâ Russia, took
all our road kit and saddlery, and my wife’s mare and the
“takhtrowan,” all to be given over at Resht, on the Caspian, so we
were quite free to start.

OUR JOURNEY HOME.

March 28th, 1881.—Ispahan Julfa.—At last I hear that a muleteer
is found who will go direct to Resht, by way of Kūm, Hajeeb, and
Kasvin, avoiding the capital. I go to the house of a Baghdad
merchant in Julfa, and find the muleteer, who is being regaled with
pipes; he is the head-man of the neighbouring village of Se Deh
(three villages), and the proprietor of a hundred mules. I am told that
his son-in-law will go with the mules, and am introduced to a young
fellow some six feet high and thickly built, who is a Tabrizi, and
speaks good Turkish and bad Persian. He is wearing the large heavy
sheepskin cap of Tabriz, with the wool long. The merchant informs
me that he thinks the hire should be sixty kerans per mule. This is
said in English, and he then turns to the elder man and says:
“You will, of course, give this sahib mules at forty kerans per
mule?”
The old man replies: “I have, after much persuasion, got Jaffer
Kūli, my son-in-law, to agree to eighty.”
The young man, with many vows, raises his hands to heaven and
demands eighty-five. “Why do you throw words into air, Jaffer Kūli?
as I am this merchant’s friend let us say eighty, and the sahib will
have had mules for nothing. Of course we get a present?”
I here get up, saying, “These fellows are quite mad; let us talk to
men.”
They in turn rise and say, “Our last word is seventy-five.”
So we talk for an hour. Then, and not till then, the ceremony of
agreement is gone through, and the articles strictly drawn up by the
merchant, after much chaffering. At last he begins to read in a sing-
song drawl, for our mutual edification, the following: