which are separated by walls made of red clay, very well erected,
and they can make and keep them as shiny and smooth by washing
and rubbing as any wall in Holland can be made with chalk, and
they are like mirrors. The upper storys are made of the same sort
of clay; moreover, every house is provided with a well for a
supply of fresh water."

Before going any further with this description, it may be well to
state that the description of the nature and character of the finish
of the walls given here is substantiated by accounts of travelers in
these parts as late as the end of the nineteenth century. Captain
Boisragon, one of the two survivors of the ill-fated white expedition
to Benin in 1897, in comparing the houses of Benin with those of
another nearby city, says that "the chief of Gwatto's house was very
much superior; the walls, which were very thick, being polished till
they were nearly as smooth and shiny as glass."[11] Mr. Cyrl Punch,
who traveled in Yorubaland in the eighties of the nineteenth century,
gives us a hint of the widespread practice of this sort of wall
polishing even so late as forty-five years ago, and furnishes us with
a very interesting account of how the polished effect was produced.
"For giving a high polish to the clay walls in Yorubaland," says
Punch, "the leaves of the _Moringa pterygosperinia_ are mashed up and
rubbed over the clay." Of a certain house in the town Brohemi he
continues to say that "the walls were better polished than any in
Benin. They were like marble."[12]

In comparing the earlier descriptions of Benin and other African
cities in this general area with the descriptions of later writers, an
important fact stands out, namely, that these cities had already
reached their highest point of development before the coming of the
white man; for in a description of Benin by another Dutchman,
Nyendall, which appeared in 1704, we read the following: "Formerly the
buildings in this village were very thick and very close together, and
in a manner it was over-populated, which is yet visible from the ruins
of the half remaining houses; but at present the houses stand like
poor men's corn, widely apart from each other." His description
otherwise is very similar to those previously given, yet his account
does bring out an additional point which is worthy of note, namely,
the reason for the use of clay in building. "The houses are large and
handsome," he writes, "w