In another hour, making a total of six miles from Inyenapoli, we reached
our destination, Arabokasu, or 'One Stone for Top.' We lodged our
belongings in the bamboo-house newly built by Mr. Grant, finding it
perfectly fit for temporary use. Before I left Axim Mr. C. C. Robertson
landed there, instructed by the Izrah Company to choose a fair site for a
frame-house mounted on piles. It was presently made in England, but
unfortunately not after the Lagos fashion, with the bed-rooms opening upon
a verandah seven to nine feet broad, and a double roof of wood with
air-space between, instead of thatch and corrugated iron. The house
measures 52 x 32 feet, and contains four bed-rooms, a dining-room, and the
manager's office. A comfortable tenement of the kind costs from 300_l_. to
500_l_., an exceptional article 700_l_.
We at once set out to cast a first glance upon the Izrah mine. The word is
properly Izia, a stone, also the name of the man who began gold-digging on
the spot. This style of nomenclature is quite 'country-fashion.'
Apparently Izia became Izrah to assume a 'Scriptural' sound; if so, why
not 'go the whole animal' and call it the Isaiah?
This fine concession is a rectangular parallelogram, whose dimensions are
2,000 yards long from north to south, by a breadth of half.
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