ABSTRACT
The land adjoining the Gold Coast to the east was open country known as the “Gap of Benin” where the savannah reached down to the coast. Aside from this broad savannah, bordered on both east and west by the tropical rainforests, the most prominent geographical feature of the region was the elaborate coastal waterway on the south. The waterway made it possible to navigate, by small local boats, from Accra on the Gold Coast to the great delta of the Niger river, which had its own complex of waterways that ultimately joined up to the Cross River and the border of what is today Cameroon. The waterway was composed of rivers and creeks that paralleled the coast (joined by several large rivers that ran north and south, of which the Volta was the most important on the west, and the Niger, of course, on the east), as well as large lagoons, the most important of which was the extensive Lagos Lagoon. Virtually none of this waterway was accessible to European sea-going vessels, and even the coast was difficult to reach, for the islands that defined the seaward side of the region had broad beaches and no harbours. Where there were gaps in the islands, the area was still inaccessible to large watercraft because of sandbanks.
