The northeastern boundary of Uganda is formed by the waters of the lake whose name Sir Samuel Baker chose for the title of one of his fascinating books on African travel, the Albert N’yanza.  Baker was a keen observer and he had abundant experience on which to base the following conclusions (148): 

“There is no such thing as love in these countries, the feeling is not understood, nor does it exist in the shape in which we understand it.  Everything is practical, without a particle of romance.  Women are so far appreciated as they are valuable animals.  They grind the corn, fetch the water, gather firewood, cement the floors, cook the food, and propagate the race; but they are mere servants, and as such are valuable....  A savage holds to his cows and to his women, but especially to his cows.  In a razzia fight he will seldom stand for the sake of his wives, but when he does fight it is to save his cattle.”

The sentimentalist’s heart will throb with a flutter of hope when he reads in the same book (240) that among the Latookas it is considered a disgrace to kill a woman in war.  Have these men that respect for women which makes romantic love possible?  Alas, no!  They spare them because women are scarce and have a money value, a female being worth from five to ten cows, according to her age and appearance.  It would therefore be a waste of money to kill them.

I may as well add here what Baker says elsewhere (Ismailia, 501) by way of explaining why there is no insanity in Central Africa:  there are “no hearts to break with overwhelming love.”  Where coarseness is bliss, ’twere folly to be refined.

NO LOVE AMONG NEGROES

Let us now cross Central Africa into the Congo region on the Western side, returning afterward to the East for a bird’s-eye view of the Abyssinians, the Somali, and their neighbors.

In his book Angola and the River Congo (133-34) Monteiro says that negroes show less tenderness and love than some animals: 

“In all the long years I have been in Africa I have never seen a negro manifest the least tenderness for or to a negress....  I have never seen a negro put his arm round a woman’s waist or give or receive any caress whatever that would indicate the slightest loving regard or affection on either side.  They have no words or expressions in their language indicative of affection or love.  Their passion is purely of an animal description, unaccompanied by the least sympathetic affections of love or endearment."[145]

In other words, these negroes not only do not show any tenderness, affection, sympathy, in their sexual relations, they are too coarse even to appreciate the more subtle manifestations of sensual passion which we call caresses.  Jealousy, too, Monteiro says, hardly exists.  In case of adultery “the fine is generally a pig, and rum or other drink, with which a feast is celebrated by all parties.  The woman is not punished in any way, nor does any disgrace attach to her conduct.”  As a matter of course, where all these sentiments are lacking, admiration of personal beauty cannot exist.