Letters arrive at last. Sore intelligence. Death of an old
friend. Observations on the climate. Arab caution. Dearth of
missionary enterprise. The slave trade and its horrors.
Progressive barbarism. Carping benevolence. Geology of Southern
Africa. The fountain sources. African elephants. A venerable
piece of artillery. Livingstone on Materialism. Bin Nassib. The
Baganda leave at last. Enlists a new follower.
[And now the long-looked for letters came in by various hands, but with
little regularity. It is not here necessary to refer to the withdrawal
of the Livingstone Relief Expedition which took place as soon as Mr.
Stanley confronted Lieutenant Dawson on his way inland. Suffice it to
say that the various members of this Expedition, of which his second
son, Mr. Oswell Livingstone, was one, had already quitted Africa for
England when these communications reached Unyanyembé.]
_27th June, 1872._--Received a letter from Oswell yesterday, dated
Bagamoio, 14th May, which awakened thankfulness, anxiety, and deep
sorrow.
_28th June, 1872._--Went over to Kwikuru yesterday to speak about
pagazi. Nkasiwa was off at M'futu to help in the great assault on
Mirambo, which is hoped to be the last. But Mohamad bin Seyed promised
to arrange with the chief on his return. I was told that Nkasiwa has the
head of Morukwé in a kirindo or band-box, made of the inner bark of a
tree, and when Morukwé's people have recovered they will come and redeem
it with ivory and slaves, and bury it in his grave, as they did the head
of Ishbosheth in Abner's grave in Hebron.
Dugumbé's man, who went off to Ujiji to bring ivory, returned to-day,
having been attacked by robbers of Mirambo. The pagazi threw down all
their loads and ran; none were killed, but they lost all.
_29th June, 1872._--Received a packet from Sheikh bin Nasib containing a
letter for him and one 'Pall Mall Gazette,' one Overland Mail and four
Punches. Provision has been made for my daughter by Her Majesty's
Government of 300_l._, but I don't understand the matter clearly.
_2nd July, 1872._--Make up a packet for Dr. Kirk and Mr. Webb, of
Zanzibar: explain to Kirk, and beg him to investigate and punish, and
put blame on right persons. Write Sir Bartle Frere and Agnes: send large
packet of astronomical observations and sketch map to Sir Thomas Maclear
by a native, Suleiman.
_3rd July, 1872._--Received a note from Oswell, written in April last,
containing the sad intelligence of Sir Roderick's departure from among
us. Alas! alas! this is the only time in my life I ever felt inclined to
use the word, and it bespeaks a sore heart: the best friend I ever
had--true, warm, and abiding--he loved me more than I deserved: he looks
down on me still. I must feel resigned to the loss by the Divine Will,
but still I regret and mourn.
Wearisome waiting, this; and yet the men cannot be here before the
middle or end of this month. I have been sorely let and hindered in this
journey, but it may have been all for the best. I will trust in Him to
whom I commit my way.
_5th July, 1872._--Weary! weary!
_7th July, 1872._--Waiting wearily here, and hoping that the good and
loving Father of all may favour me, and help me to finish my work
quickly and well.
Temperature at 6 A.M. 61°; feels cold. Winds blow regularly from the
east; if it changes to N.W. brings a thick mantle of cold grey clouds. A
typhoon did great damage at Zanzibar, wrecking ships and destroying
cocoa-nuts, carafu, and all fruits: happened five days after Seyed
Burghash's return from Mecca.
At the Loangwa of Zumbo we came to a party of hereditary hippopotamus
hunters, called Makembwé or Akombwé. They follow no other occupation,
but when their game is getting scanty at one spot they remove to some
other part of the Loangwa, Zambesi, or Shiré, and build temporary huts
on an island, where their women cultivate patches: the flesh of the
animals they kill is eagerly exchanged by the more settled people for
grain. They are not stingy, and are everywhere welcome guests. I never
heard of any fraud in dealing, or that they had been guilty of an
outrage on the poorest: their chief characteristic is their courage.
Their hunting is the bravest thing I ever saw. Each canoe is manned by
two men; they are long light craft, scarcely half an inch in thickness,
about eighteen inches beam, and from eighteen to twenty feet long. They
are formed for speed, and shaped somewhat like our racing boats. Each
man uses a broad short paddle, and as they guide the canoe slowly down
stream to a sleeping hippopotamus not a single ripple is raised on the
smooth water; they look as if holding in their breath, and communicate
by signs only. As they come near the prey the harpooner in the bow lays
down his paddle and rises slowly up, and there he stands erect,
motionless, and eager, with the long-handled weapon poised at arm's
length above his head, till coming close to the beast he plunges it with
all his might in towards the heart. During this exciting feat he has to
keep his balance exactly. His neighbour in the stern at once backs his
paddle, the harpooner sits down, seizes his paddle, and backs too to
escape: the animal surprised and wounded seldom returns the attack at
this stage of the hunt. The next stage, however, is full of danger.
The barbed blade of the harpoon is secured by a long and very strong
rope wound round the handle: it is intended to come out of its socket,
and while the iron head is firmly fixed in the animal's body the rope
unwinds and the handle floats on the surface. The hunter next goes to
the handle and hauls on the rope till he knows that he is right over the
beast: when he feels the line suddenly slacken he is prepared to deliver
another harpoon the instant that hippo.'s enormous jaws appear with a
terrible grunt above the water. The backing by the paddles is again
repeated, but hippo. often assaults the canoe, crunches it with his
great jaws as easily as a pig would a bunch of asparagus, or shivers it
with a kick by his hind foot. Deprived of their canoe the gallant
comrades instantly dive and swim to the shore under water: they say that
the infuriated beast looks for them on the surface, and being below they
escape his sight. When caught by many harpoons the crews of several
canoes seize the handles and drag him hither and thither till, weakened
by loss of blood, he succumbs.
This hunting requires the greatest skill, courage, and nerve that can be
conceived--double armed and threefold brass, or whatever the Æneid says.
The Makombwé are certainly a magnificent race of men, hardy and active
in their habits, and well fed, as the result of their brave exploits;
every muscle is well developed, and though not so tall as some tribes,
their figures are compact and finely proportioned: being a family
occupation it has no doubt helped in the production of fine physical
development. Though all the people among whom they sojourn would like
the profits they secure by the flesh and curved tusks, and no game is
preserved, I have met with no competitors to them except the Wayeiye of
Lake Ngami and adjacent rivers.
I have seen our dragoon officers perform fencing and managing their
horses so dexterously that every muscle seemed trained to its fullest
power and efficiency, and perhaps had they been brought up as Makombwé
they might have equalled their daring and consummate skill: but we have
no sport, except perhaps Indian tiger shooting, requiring the courage
and coolness this enterprise demands. The danger may be appreciated if
one remembers that no sooner is blood shed in the water than all the
crocodiles below are immediately drawn up stream by the scent, and are
ready to act the part of thieves in a London crowd, or worse.
_8th July, 1872._--At noon, wet bulb 66°, dry 74°. These observations
are taken from thermometers hung four feet from the ground on the cool
side (south) of the house, and beneath an earthen roof with complete
protection from wind and radiation. Noon known by the shadows being
nearly perpendicular. To show what is endured by a traveller, the
following register is given of the heat on a spot, four feet from the
ground, protected from the wind by a reed fence, but exposed to the
sun's rays, slanting a little.
Noon. Wet Bulb 78° Dry Bulb 102°
2 P.M. 77° 99°
3 P.M. 78° 102°
4 P.M. 72° 88° (Agreeable marching now.)
6 P.M. 66° 77°
_9th July, 1872._--Clear and cold the general weather: cold is
penetrating. War forces have gone out of M'futu and built a camp. Fear
of Mirambo rules them all: each one is nervously anxious not to die, and
in no way ashamed to own it. The Arabs keep out of danger: "Better to
sleep in a whole skin" is their motto.
_Noon_.--Spoke to Singeri about the missionary reported to be coming:
he seems to like the idea of being taught and opening up the country by
way of the Nile. I told him that all the Arabs confirmed Mtesa's
cruelties, and that his people were more to blame than he: it was guilt
before God. In this he agreed fully, but said, "What Arab was killed?"
meaning, if they did not suffer how can they complain?
6 A.M. Wet Bulb 55° Dry Bulb 57° min. 55°
9 A.M. 74° 82°
Noon. 74° 98° (Now becomes too hot to march.)
3.30 P.M. 75° 90°
_10th July, 1872._
6 A.M. 59° 65° min. 55°
Noon. 67° 77° shady.
3 P.M. 69° 81° cloudy.
5 P.M. 65° 75° cloudy.
_10th July, 1872._--No great difficulty would be encountered in
establishing a Christian Mission a hundred miles or so from the East
Coast. The permission of the Sultan of Zanzibar would be necessary,
because all the tribes of any intelligence claim relationship, or have
relations with him; the Banyamwezi even call themselves his subjects,
and so do others. His permission would be readily granted, if
respectfully applied for through the English Consul. The Suaheli, with
their present apathy on religious matters, would be no obstacle. Care to
speak politely, and to show kindness to them, would not be lost labour
in the general effect of the Mission on the country, but all discussion
on the belief of the Moslems should be avoided; they know little about
it. Emigrants from Muscat, Persia, and India, who at present possess
neither influence nor wealth, would eagerly seize any formal or
offensive denial of the authority of their Prophet to fan their own
bigotry, and arouse that of the Suaheli. A few now assume an air of
superiority in matters of worship, and would fain take the place of
Mullams or doctors of the law, by giving authoritative dicta as to the
times of prayer; positions to be observed; lucky and unlucky days; using
cabalistic signs; telling fortunes; finding from the Koran when an
attack may be made on any enemy, &c.; but this is done only in the field
with trading parties. At Zanzibar, the regular Mullams supersede them.
No objection would be made to teaching the natives of the country to
read their own languages in the Roman character. No Arab has ever
attempted to teach them the Arabic-Koran, they are called _guma_, hard,
or difficult as to religion. This is not wonderful, since the Koran is
never translated, and a very extraordinary desire for knowledge would be
required to sustain a man in committing to memory pages and chapters of,
to him, unmeaning gibberish. One only of all the native chiefs,
Monyumgo, has sent his children to Zanzibar to be taught to read and
write the Koran; and he is said to possess an unusual admiration of such
civilization as he has seen among the Arabs. To the natives, the chief
attention of the Mission should be directed. It would not be desirable,
or advisable, to refuse explanation to others; but I have avoided giving
offence to intelligent Arabs, who have pressed me, asking if I believed
in Mohamad by saying, "No I do not: I am a child of Jesus bin Miriam,"
avoiding anything offensive in my tone, and often adding that Mohamad
found their forefathers bowing down to trees and stones, and did good to
them by forbidding idolatry, and teaching the worship of the only One
God. This, they all know, and it pleases them to have it recognised.
It might be good policy to hire a respectable Arab to engage free
porters, and conduct the Mission to the country chosen, and obtain
permission from the chief to build temporary houses. If this Arab were
well paid, it might pave the way for employing others to bring supplies
of goods and stores not produced in the country, as tea, coffee, sugar.
The first porters had better all go back, save a couple or so, who have
behaved especially well. Trust to the people among whom you live for
general services, as bringing wood, water, cultivation, reaping, smith's
work, carpenter's work, pottery, baskets, &c. Educated free blacks from
a distance are to be avoided: they are expensive, and are too much of
gentlemen for your work. You may in a few months raise natives who will
teach reading to others better than they can, and teach you also much
that the liberated never know. A cloth and some beads occasionally will
satisfy them, while neither the food, the wages, nor the work will
please those who, being brought from a distance, naturally consider
themselves missionaries. Slaves also have undergone a process which has
spoiled them for life; though liberated young, everything of childhood
and opening life possesses an indescribable charm. It is so with our own
offspring, and nothing effaces the fairy scenes then printed on the
memory. Some of my liberados eagerly bought green calabashes and
tasteless squash, with fine fat beef, because this trash was their early
food; and an ounce of meat never entered their mouths. It seems
indispensable that each Mission should raise its own native agency. A
couple of Europeans beginning, and carrying on a Mission without a staff
of foreign attendants, implies coarse country fare, it is true, but this
would be nothing to those who, at home amuse themselves with fastings,
vigils, &c. A great deal of power is thus lost in the Church. Fastings
and vigils, without a special object in view, are time run to waste.
They are made to minister to a sort of self-gratification, instead of
being turned to account for the good of others. They are like groaning
in sickness. Some people amuse themselves when ill with continuous
moaning. The forty days of Lent might be annually spent in visiting
adjacent tribes, and bearing unavoidable hunger and thirst with a good
grace. Considering the greatness of the object to be attained, men
might go without sugar, coffee, tea, &c. I went from September 1866 to
December 1868 without either. A trader, at Casembe's, gave me a dish
cooked with honey, and it nauseated from its horrible sweetness, but at
100 miles inland, supplies could be easily obtained.
The expenses need not be large. Intelligent Arabs inform me that, in
going from Zanzibar to Casembe's, only 3000 dollars' worth are required
by a trader, say between 600_l._ or 700_l._, and he may be away three or
more years; paying his way, giving presents to the chiefs, and filling
200 or 300 mouths. He has paid for, say fifty muskets, ammunition,
flints, and may return with 4000 lbs. of ivory, and a number of slaves
for sale; all at an outlay of 600_l._ or 700_l._ With the experience I
have gained now, I could do all I shall do in this expedition for a like
sum, or at least for 1000_l._ less than it will actually cost me.
_12th July, 1872._--Two men come from Syde bin Habib report fighting as
going on at discreet distances against Mirambo.
Sheikh But, son of Mohamad bin Saleh, is found guilty of stealing a tusk
of 2-1/2 frasilahs from the Lewalé. He has gone in disgrace to fight
Mirambo: his father is disconsolate, naturally. Lewalé has been
merciful.
When endeavouring to give some account of the slave-trade of East
Africa, it was necessary to keep far within the truth, in order not to
be thought guilty of exaggeration; but in sober seriousness the subject
does not admit of exaggeration. To overdraw its evils is a simple
impossibility. The sights I have seen, though common incidents of the
traffic, are so nauseous that I always strive to drive them from memory.
In the case of most disagreeable recollections I can succeed, in time,
in consigning them to oblivion, but the slaving scenes come back
unbidden, and make me start up at dead of night horrified by their
vividness. To some this may appear weak and unphilosophical, since it is
alleged that the whole human race has passed through the process of
development. We may compare cannibalism to the stone age, and the times
of slavery to the iron and bronze epochs--slavery is as natural a step
in human development as from bronze to iron.
Whilst speaking of the stone age I may add that in Africa I have never
been fortunate enough to find one flint arrowhead or any other flint
implement, though I had my eyes about me as diligently as any of my
neighbours. No roads are made; no lands levelled; no drains digged; no
quarries worked, nor any of the changes made on the earth's surface that
might reveal fragments of the primitive manufacture of stone. Yet but
little could be inferred from the negative evidence, were it not
accompanied by the fact that flint does not exist in any part south of
the equator. Quartz might have been used, but no remains exist, except
the half-worn millstones, and stones about the size of oranges, used for
chipping and making rough the nether millstone. Glazed pipes and
earthenware used in smelting iron, show that iron was smelted in the
remotest ages in Africa. These earthenware vessels, and fragments of
others of a finer texture, were found in the delta of the Zambesi and in
other parts in close association with fossil bones, which, on being
touched by the tongue, showed as complete an absence of animal matter as
the most ancient fossils known in Europe. They were the bones of
animals, as hippopotami, water hogs, antelopes, crocodiles, identical
with those now living in the country. These were the primitive fauna of
Africa, and if vitrified iron from the prodigious number of broken
smelting furnaces all over the country was known from the remotest
times, the Africans seem to have had a start in the race, at a time when
our progenitors were grubbing up flints to save a miserable existence by
the game they might kill. Slave-trading seems to have been coeval with
the knowledge of iron. The monuments of Egypt show that this curse has
venerable antiquity. Some people say, "If so ancient, why try to stop
an old established usage now?" Well, some believe that the affliction
that befel the most ancient of all the patriarchs, Job, was small-pox.
Why then stop the ravages of this venerable disease in London and New
York by vaccination?
But no one expects any benevolent efforts from those who cavil and carp
at efforts made by governments and peoples to heal the enormous open
sore of the world. Some profess that they would rather give "their mite"
for the degraded of our own countrymen than to "niggers"! Verily it is
"a mite," and they most often forget, and make a gift of it to
themselves. It is almost an axiom that those who do most for the heathen
abroad are most liberal for the heathen at home. It is to this class we
turn with hope. With others arguments are useless, and the only answer I
care to give is the remark of an English sailor, who, on seeing
slave-traders actually at their occupation, said to his companion,
"Shiver my timbers, mate, if the devil don't catch these fellows, we
might as well have no devil at all."
In conversing with a prince at Johanna, one of the Comoro islands lying
off the north end of Madagascar, he took occasion to extol the wisdom of
the Arabs in keeping strict watch over their wives. On suggesting that
their extreme jealousy made them more like jailers than friends of their
wives, or, indeed, that they thus reduced themselves to the level of the
inferior animals, and each was like the bull of a herd and not like a
reasonable man--"fuguswa"--and that they gave themselves a vast deal of
trouble for very small profit; he asserted that the jealousy was
reasonable because all women were bad, they could not avoid going
astray. And on remarking that this might be the case with Arab women,
but certainly did not apply to English women, for though a number were
untrustworthy, the majority deserved all the confidence their husbands
could place in them, he reiterated that women were universally bad. He
did not believe that women ever would be good; and the English allowing
their wives to gad about with faces uncovered, only showed their
weakness, ignorance, and unwisdom.
The tendency and spirit of the age are more and more towards the
undertaking of industrial enterprises of such magnitude and skill as to
require the capital of the world for their support and execution--as the
Pacific Railroad, Suez Canal, Mont Cenis Tunnel, and railways in India
and Western Asia, Euphrates Railroad, &c. The extension and use of
railroads, steamships, telegraphs, break down nationalities and bring
peoples geographically remote into close connection commercially and
politically. They make the world one, and capital, like water, tends to
a common level.
[Geologists will be glad to find that the Doctor took pains to arrange
his observations at this time in the following form.]
A really enormous area of South Central Africa is covered with volcanic
rocks, in which are imbedded angular fragments of older strata, possibly
sandstone, converted into schist, which, though carried along in the
molten mass, still retain impressions of plants of a low order, probably
the lowest--Silurian--and distinct ripple marks and raindrops in which
no animal markings have yet been observed. The fewness of the organic
remains observed is owing to the fact that here no quarries are worked,
no roads are made, and as we advance north the rank vegetation covers up
everything. The only stone buildings in the country north of the Cape
colony are the church and mission houses at Kuruman. In the walls there
the fragments, with impressions of fossil leaves, have been broken
through in the matrix, once a molten mass of lava. The area which this
basalt covers extends from near the Vaal River in the south, to a point
some sixty miles beyond the Victoria Falls, and the average breadth is
about 150 miles. The space is at least 100,000 square miles. Sandstone
rocks stand up in it at various points like islands, but all are
metamorphosed, and branches have flowed off from the igneous sea into
valleys and defiles, and one can easily trace the hardening process of
the fire as less and less, till at the outer end of the stream the rocks
are merely hardened. These branches equal in size all the rocks and
hills that stand like islands, so that we are justified in assuming the
area as at least 100,000 square miles of this basaltic sea.
The molten mass seems to have flowed over in successive waves, and the
top of each wave was covered with a dark vitreous scum carrying scoriæ
with angular fragments. This scum marks each successive overflow, as a
stratum from twelve to eighteen inches or more in thickness. In one part
sixty-two strata are revealed, but at the Victoria Falls (which are
simply a rent) the basaltic rock is stratified as far as our eyes could
see down the depth of 310 feet. This extensive sea of lava was probably
sub-aerial, because bubbles often appear as coming out of the rock into
the vitreous scum on the surface of each wave: in some cases they have
broken and left circular rings with raised edges, peculiar to any
boiling viscous fluid. In many cases they have cooled as round pustules,
as if a bullet were enclosed; on breaking them the internal surface is
covered with a crop of beautiful crystals of silver with their heads all
directed to the centre of the bubble, which otherwise is empty.
These bubbles in stone may be observed in the bed of the Kuruman River,
eight or ten miles north of the village; and the mountain called
"Amhan," west-north-west of the village, has all the appearance of
having been an orifice through which the basalt boiled up as water or
mud does in a geyser.
The black basaltic mountains on the east of the Bamangwato, formerly
called the Bakaa, furnish further evidence of the igneous eruptions
being sub-aerial, for the basalt itself is columnar at many points, and
at other points the tops of the huge crystals appear in groups, and the
apices not flattened, as would have been the case had they been
developed under the enormous pressure of an ocean. A few miles on their
south a hot salt fountain boils forth and tells of interior heat.
Another, far to the south-east, and of fresh water, tells the same tale.
Subsequently to the period of gigantic volcanic action, the outflow of
fresh lime-water from the bowels of the earth seems to have been
extremely large. The land now so dry that one might wander in various
directions (especially westwards, to the Kalahari), and perish for lack
of the precious fluid as certainly as if he were in the interior of
Australia, was once bisected in all directions by flowing streams and
great rivers, whose course was mainly to the south. These river beds are
still called by the natives "_melapo_" in the south, but in the north
"_wadys_," both words meaning the same thing, "river beds in which no
water ever now flows." To feed these a vast number of gushing fountains
poured forth for ages a perennial supply. When the eye of the fountain
is seen it is an oval or oblong orifice, the lower portion distinctly
water worn, and there, by diminished size, showing that as ages elapsed
the smaller water supply had a manifestly lesser erosive power. In the
sides of the mountain Amhan, already mentioned, good specimens of these
water-worn orifices still exist, and are inhabited by swarms of bees,
whose hives are quite protected from robbers by the hardness of the
basaltic rocks. The points on which the streams of water fell are
hollowed by its action, and the space around which the water splashed is
covered by calcareous tufa, deposited there by the evaporation of the
sun.
Another good specimen of the ancient fountains is in a cave near
Kolobeng, called "_Lepélolé_," a word by which the natives there
sometimes designate the sea. The wearing power of the primeval waters is
here easily traced in two branches--the upper or more ancient ending in
the characteristic oval orifice, in which I deposited a Father Mathew's
leaden temperance token: the lower branch is much the largest, as that
by which the greatest amount of water flowed for a much longer period
than the other. The cave Lepélolé was believed to be haunted, and no one
dared to enter till I explored it as a relief from more serious labour.
The entrance is some eight or more feet high, and five or six wide, in
reddish grey sandstone rock, containing in its substance banks of well
rounded shingle. The whole range, with many of the adjacent hills on the
south, bear evidence of the scorching to which the contiguity of the
lava subjected them. In the hardening process the silica was sometimes
sweated out of this rock, and it exists now as pretty efflorescences of
well-shaped crystals. But not only does this range, which stands eight
or ten miles north of Kolobeng, exhibit the effects of igneous action,
it shows on its eastern slope the effects of flowing water, in a large
pot-hole called Löe, which has the reputation of having given exit to all
the animals in South Africa, and also to the first progenitors of the
whole Bechuana race. Their footsteps attest the truth of this belief. I
was profane enough to be sceptical, because the large footstep of the
first man Matsieng was directed as if going into instead of out of this
famous pot-hole. Other huge pot-holes are met with all over the country,
and at heights on the slopes of the mountains far above the levels of
the ancient rivers.
Many fountains rose in the courses of the ancient river beds, and the
outflow was always in the direction of the current of the parent stream.
Many of these ancient fountains still contain water, and form the stages
on a journey, but the primitive waters seem generally to have been laden
with lime in solution: this lime was deposited in vast lakes, which are
now covered with calcareous tufa. One enormous fresh-water lake, in
which probably sported the Dyconodon, was let off when the remarkable
rent was made in the basalt which now constitutes the Victoria Falls.
Another seems to have gone to the sea when a similar fissure was made at
the falls of the Orange River. It is in this calcareous tufa alone that
fossil animal remains have yet been found. There are no marine
limestones except in friths which the elevation of the west and east
coasts have placed far inland in the Coanza and Somauli country, and
these contain the same shells as now live in the adjacent seas.
Antecedently to the river system, which seems to have been a great
southern Nile flowing from the sources of the Zambesi away south to the
Orange River, there existed a state of fluvial action of greater
activity than any we see now: it produced prodigious beds of
well-rounded shingle and gravel. It is impossible to form an idea of
their extent. The Loangwa flows through the bed of an ancient lake,
whose banks are sixty feet thick, of well-rounded shingle. The Zambesi
flows above the Kebrabasa, through great beds of the same formation, and
generally they are of hard crystalline rocks; and it is impossible to
conjecture what the condition of the country was when the large
pot-holes were formed up the hillsides, and the prodigious attrition
that rounded the shingle was going on. The land does not seem to have
been submerged, because marine limestones (save in the exceptional cases
noted) are wanting; and torrents cutting across the ancient river beds
reveal fresh-water shells identical with those that now inhabit its
fresh waters. The calcareous tufa seems to be the most recent rock
formed. At the point of junction of the great southern prehistoric Nile
with an ancient fresh-water lake near Buchap, and a few miles from
Likatlong, a mound was formed in an eddy caused by some conical lias
towards the east bank of this rent within its bed, and the dead animals
were floated into the eddy and sank; their bones crop out of the white
tufa, and they are so well preserved that even the black tartar on
buffalo and zebra's teeth remain: they are of the present species of
animals that now inhabit Africa. This is the only case of fossils of
these animals being found _in situ_. In 1855 I observed similar fossils
in banks of gravel in transitu all down the Zambesi above Kebrabasa; and
about 1862 a bed of gravel was found in the delta with many of the same
fossils that had come to rest in the great deposit of that river, but
where the Zambesi digs them out is not known. In its course below the
Victoria Falls I observed tufaceous rocks: these must contain the bones,
for were they carried away from the great tufa Lake bottom of Seshéké,
down the Victoria Falls, they would all be ground into fine silt. The
bones in the river and in the delta were all associated with pieces of
coarse pottery, exactly the same as the natives make and use at the
present day: with it we found fragments of a fine grain, only
occasionally seen among Africans, and closely resembling ancient
cinerary urns: none were better baked than is customary in the country
now. The most ancient relics are deeply worn granite, mica-schist, and
sandstone millstones; the balls used for chipping and roughing them, of
about the shape and size of an orange, are found lying near them. No
stone weapons or tools ever met my eyes, though I was anxious to find
them, and looked carefully over every ancient village we came to for
many years. There is no flint to make celts, but quartz and rocks having
a slaty cleavage are abundant. It is only for the finer work that they
use iron tongs, hammers, and anvils and with these they turn out work
which makes English blacksmiths declare Africans never did. They are
very careful of their tools: indeed, the very opposites to the flint
implement men, who seem sometimes to have made celts just for the
pleasure of throwing them away: even the Romans did not seem to know the
value of their money.
The ancient Africans seem to have been at least as early as the
Asiatics in the art of taming elephants. The Egyptian monuments show
them bringing tame elephants and lions into Egypt; and very ancient
sculptures show the real African species, which the artist must have
seen. They refused to sell elephants, which cost them months of hard
labour to catch and tame, to a Greek commander of Egyptian troops for a
few brass pots: they were quite right. Two or three tons of fine fat
butcher-meat were far better than the price, seeing their wives could
make any number of cooking pots for nothing.
_15th July, 1872._--Reported to-day that twenty wounded men have been
brought into M'futu from the field of fighting. About 2000 are said to
be engaged on the Arab side, and the side of Mirambo would seem to be
strong, but the assailants have the disadvantage of firing against a
stockade, and are unprotected, except by ant-hills, bushes, and ditches
in the field. I saw the first kites to-day: one had spots of white
feathers on the body below, as if it were a young one--probably come
from the north.
_17th July, 1872._--Went over to Sultan bin Ali yesterday. Very kind, as
usual; he gave me guavas and a melon--called "matanga." It is reported
that one of Mirambo's chief men, Sorura, set sharp sticks in concealed
holes, which acted like Bruce's "craw-taes" at Bannockburn, and wounded
several, probably the twenty reported. This has induced the Arabs to
send for a cannon they have, with which to batter Mirambo at a distance.
The gun is borne past us this morning: a brass 7-pounder, dated 1679.
Carried by the Portuguese Commander-in-Chief to China 1679, or 193 years
ago--and now to beat Mirambo, by Arabs who have very little interest in
the war.
Some of his people, out prowling two days ago, killed a slave. The war
is not so near an end as many hoped.
* * * * *
[Mtesa's people on their way back to Uganda were stuck fast at
Unyanyembé the whole of this time: it does not appear at all who the
missionary was to whom he refers.]
* * * * *
Lewalé sends off the Baganda in a great hurry, after detaining them for
six months or more till the war ended, and he now gets pagazi of
Banyamwezi for them. This haste (though war is not ended) is probably
because Lewalé has heard of a missionary through me.
Mirambo fires now from inside the stockade alone.
_19th July, 1872._--Visited Salim bin Seff, and was very hospitably
entertained. He was disappointed that I could not eat largely. They live
very comfortably: grow wheat, whilst flour and fruits grace their board.
Salim says that goat's flesh at Zanzibar is better than beef, but here
beef is better than goat's flesh. He is a stout, jolly fellow.
_20th July, 1872._--High cold winds prevail. Temperature, 6 A.M., 57°;
noon, on the ground, 122°. It may be higher, but I am afraid to risk the
thermometer, which is graduated to 140° only.
_21st July, 1872._--Bought two milch cows (from a Motusi), which, with
their calves, were 17 dotis or 34 fathoms. The Baganda are packing up to
leave for home. They take a good deal of brandy and gin for Mtesa from
the Moslems. Temperature at noon, 96°.
Another nest of wagtails flown. They eat bread crumbs. The whydahs are
busy pairing. Lewalé returns to-day from M'futu on his own private
business at Kwikuru. The success of the war is a minor consideration
with all. I wish my men would come, and let me off from this weary
waiting.
Some philosophising is curious. It represents our Maker forming the
machine of the universe: setting it a-going, and able to do nothing more
outside certain of His own laws. He, as it were, laid the egg of the
whole, and, like an ostrich, left it to be hatched by the sun. We can
control laws, but He cannot! A fire set to this house would consume it,
but we can throw on water and consume the fire. We control the elements,
fire and water: is He debarred from doing the same, and more, who has
infinite wisdom and knowledge? He surely is greater than His own laws.
Civilization is only what has been done with natural laws. Some foolish
speculations in morals resemble the idea of a Muganda, who said last
night, that if Mtesa didn't kill people now and then, his subjects would
suppose that he was dead!
_23rd July, 1872._--The departure of the Baganda is countermanded, for
fear of Mirambo capturing their gunpowder.
Lewalé interdicts them from going; he says, "You may go, but leave all
the gunpowder here, because Mirambo will follow and take it all to fight
with us." This is an afterthought, for he hurried them to go off. A few
will go and take the news and some goods to Mtesa, and probably a lot of
Lewalé's goods to trade at Karagwé.
The Baganda are angry, for now their cattle and much of their property
are expended here; but they say, "We are strangers, and what can we do
but submit?" The Banyamwesi carriers would all have run away on the
least appearance of danger. No troops are sent by Seyed Burghash, though
they were confidently reported long ago. All trade is at a standstill.
_24th July, 1872._--The Bagohé retire from the war. This month is
unlucky. I visited Lewalé and Nkasiwa, putting a blister on the latter,
for paralytic arm, to please him. Lewalé says that a general flight from
the war has taken place. The excuse is hunger.
He confirms the great damage done by a cyclone at Zanzibar to shipping,
houses, cocoa-nut palms, mango-trees, and clove-trees, also houses and
dhows, five days after Burghash returned. Sofeu volunteers to go with
us, because Mohamad Bogharib never gave him anything, and Bwana Mohinna
has asked him to go with him. I have accepted his offer, and will
explain to Mohamad, when I see him, that this is what he promised me in
the way of giving men, but never performed.
_27th July, 1872._--At dawn a loud rumbling in the east as if of
thunder, possibly a slight earthquake; no thunder-clouds visible.
Bin Nassib came last night and visited me before going home to his own
house; a tall, brown, polite Arab. He says that he lately received a
packet for Mr. Stanley from the American Consul, sealed in tin, and sent
it back: this is the eleventh that came to Stanley. A party of native
traders who went with the Baganda were attacked by Mirambo's people, and
driven back with the loss of all their goods and one killed. The
fugitives returned this morning sorely downcast. A party of twenty-three
loads left for Karagwé a few days ago, and the leader alone has
returned; he does not know more than that one was killed. Another was
slain on this side of M'futu by Mirambo's people yesterday, the country
thus is still in a terribly disturbed state. Sheikh bin Nassib says that
the Arabs have rooted out fifty-two headmen who were Mirambo's allies.
_28th July, 1872._--To Nkasiwa; blistered him, as the first relieved the
pain and pleased him greatly; hope he may derive benefit.
Cold east winds, and clouded thickly over all the sky.
_29th July, 1872._--Making flour of rice for the journey. Visited Sheikh
bin Nassib, who has a severe attack of fever; he cannot avoid going to
the war. He bought a donkey with the tusk he stole from Lewalé, and it
died yesterday; now Lewalé says, "Give me back my tusk;" and the Arab
replies, "Give me back my donkey." The father must pay, but his son's
character is lost as well as the donkey. Bin Nassib gave me a present of
wheaten bread and cakes.
_30th July, 1872._--Weary waiting this, and the best time for travelling
passes over unused. High winds from the east every day bring cold, and,
to the thinly-clad Arabs, fever. Bin Omari called: goes to Katanga with
another man's goods to trade there.
_31st July, 1872._--We heard yesterday from Sahib bin Nassib that the
caravan of his brother Kisessa was at a spot in Ugogo, twelve days off.
My party had gone by another route. Thankful for even this in my
wearisome waiting.