Ugly Botany: Africa

The British and the "Civilized" powers referred to Africa as "The Dark Continent" and yet Britain was this foggy, grim-strewn hellhole. London, especially. Our protagonists in this book come from Cambridge; this intellectual haven. They are supposed to be beyond patriotic jingoism instead they are swallowed up by it. The Africa they see as ugly, all shadowy and grimy, is in fact how Victorian London and Britain really look.