muster, and thus something like a reckoning of the people is made. Each
soldier carries one spear, two assegais, a long dagger, and a shield,
bows and swords being unknown. When marching the host is accompanied by
women and children carrying spare weapons, provisions, and water. In
battle they fight to the sound of drums, which are beaten with sticks
like those of the Franks: should this performance cease, all fly the
field. Wars with the Wanyoro, the Wasoga, and other neighbours are
rendered almost chronic by the policy as well as the pleasure of the
monarch, and there are few days on which a foraging party does not march
from or return to the capital. When the king has no foreign enemies, or
when the exchequer is indecently deficient, he feigns a rebellion,
attacks one of his own provinces, massacres the chief men, and sells off
the peasantry. Executions are frequent, a score being often slain at a
time: when remonstrated with concerning this barbarity, Sana declared
that he had no other secret for keeping his subjects in awe of him, and
for preventing conspiracies. Sometimes the king would accompany his army
to a battue of game, when the warriors were expected to distinguish
themselves by attacking the most ferocious beasts without weapons: even
the elephant, borne down by numbers, yielded to the grasp of man. When
passing a village he used to raise a shout, which was responded to by a
loud flourish of horns, reed-pipes, iron whistles, and similar
instruments. At times he decreed a grand muster of his soldiery: he
presented himself sitting before his gate, with a spear in the right
hand, and holding in the left the leash of a large and favourite dog
resembling an Arab suluki or greyhound. The master of the hounds was an
important personage. Suna took great pleasure in witnessing trials of
strength, the combatants contending with a mixture of slapping and
pushing till one fell to the ground. He had a large menagerie of lions,
elephants, leopards, and similar beasts of disport, to whom he would
sometimes give a criminal as a ‘_curée_:’ he also kept for amusement
fifteen or sixteen albinos; and so greedy was he of novelty that even a
cock of peculiar or uniform colour would have been forwarded by its
owner to feed his eyes.”
Suna when last visited by the Arabs was a “red man,” aged about
forty-five, tall, robust, and powerful of limb, with a right kingly
presence and a warrior carriage. His head was so shaven as to leave what
the Omani calls “el Kishshah,” a narrow crest of hair like a cock’s
comb, from nape to brow; nodding and falling over his face under its
weight of strung beads, it gave him a fierce and formidable aspect.
This tonsure, confined to those about the palace, distinguishes its
officers and inmates, servile as well as free, from the people. The
Ryots leave patches of hair where they please, but they may not shave
the whole scalp under pain of death, till a royal edict unexpectedly
issued at times commands every head to shed its honours. Suna never
appeared in public without a spear; his dress was the national costume,
a long piece of the fine crimped mbugu or bark-cloth manufactured in
these regions, extending from the neck to the ground. He made over to
his women the rich clothes presented by the Arabs, and allowed them to
sew with unravelled cotton thread, whereas the people under severe
penalties were compelled to use plantain fibre. No commoner could wear
domestics or similar luxuries; and in the presence, the accidental
exposure of a limb led, according to the merchants, to the normal
penalty--death.
Suna, like the northern despots generally, had a variety of names, all
expressing something bitter, mighty, or terrible, as, for instance,
Lbare, the Almighty (?); Mbidde and Purgoma, a lion. He could not
understand how the Sultan of Zanzibar allowed his subjects treasonably
to assume the name of their ruler; and besides mortifying the Arabs by
assuming an infinite superiority over their prince, he shocked them by
his natural and unaffected impiety. He boasted to them that he was the
god of earth, as their Allah was the Lord of Heaven. He murmured loudly
against the abuse of lightning; and he claimed from his subjects divine
honours, which were as readily yielded to him as by the facile Romans to
their emperors. No Mgándá would allow the omnipotence of his sultan to
be questioned, and a light word concerning him would have imperilled a
stranger’s life. Suna’s domestic policy reminds the English reader of
the African peculiarities which form the groundwork of “Rasselas.” His
sons, numbering more than one hundred, were removed from the palace in
early youth to separate dungeons, and so secured with iron collars and
fetters fastened to both ends of a long wooden bar that the wretches
could never sit, and without aid could neither rise nor lie. The
heir-elective was dragged from his chains to fill a throne, and the
cadets will linger through their dreadful lives, unless wanted as
sovereigns, until death release them. Suna kept his female children
under the most rigid surveillance within the palace: he had, however, a
favourite daughter named Nasuru, whose society was so necessary to him
that he allowed her to appear with him in public.
The principal officers under the despot of Uganda are, first, the Kimara
Vyona (literally the “finisher of all things”): to him, the chief
civilian of the land, the city is committed; he also directs the kabaka
or village headmen. The second is the Sakibobo or commander-in-chief,
who has power over the Sáwágánzí, the life-guards and slaves, the
warriors and builders of the palace. Justice is administered in the
capital by the sultan, who, though severe, is never accused of
perverting the law, which here would signify the ancient custom of the
country. A Mhozi--Arabised to Hoz, and compared with the Kazi of el
Islam--dispenses in each town criminal and civil rights. The only
punishments appear to be death and mulcts. Capital offenders are
beheaded or burned; in some cases they are flayed alive; the operation
commences with the face, and the skin, which is always much torn by the
knife, is stuffed as in the old torturing days of Asia. When a criminal
absconds, the males of his village are indiscriminately slain and the
women are sold--blood and tears must flow for discipline. In money suits
each party begins by placing before the Mhozi a sum equivalent to the
disputed claim; the object is to prevent an extensive litigiousness.
Suna used to fine by fives or tens, dozens or scores, according to the
offender’s means; thus from a wealthy man he would take twenty male and
twenty female slaves, with a similar number of bulls and cows, goats and
kids, hens and even eggs. One of his favourites, who used constantly to
sit by him on guard, matchlock in hand, was Isa bin Hosayn, a Baloch
mercenary of H. H. Sayyid Said of Zanzibar. He had fled from his
debtors, and had gradually wandered to Uganda, where the favour of the
sovereign procured him wealth in ivory, and a harem containing from 200
to 300 women. “Mzagayya,”--the hairy one, as he was locally called, from
his long locks and bushy beard--was not permitted, nor probably did he
desire, to quit the country; after his patron’s death he fled to
independent Unyoro, having probably raised up, as these adventurers
will, a host of enemies at Uganda.
Suna greatly encouraged, by gifts and attention, the Arab merchants to
trade in his capital; the distance has hitherto prevented more than
half-a-dozen caravans travelling to Kibuga; all however came away loudly
praising his courtesy and hospitality. To a poor trader he has presented
twenty slaves, and an equal number of cows, without expecting any but
the humblest return. The following account of a visit paid to him in
1852, by Snay bin Amir, may complete his account of the despot Uganda.
When the report of arrival was forwarded by word of mouth to Suna, he
issued orders for the erection of as many tents as might be necessary.
The guest, who was welcomed with joyful tumult by a crowd of gazers, and
was conducted to the newly-built quarters, where he received a present
of bullocks and grain, plantains and sugar-canes. After three or four
days for repose, he was summoned to the Barzah or audience hall, outside
of which he found a squatting body of about 2000 guards armed only with
staves. Allowed to retain his weapons, he entered with an interpreter
and saluted the chief, who, without rising, motioned his guest to sit
down in front of him. Suna’s only cushion was a mbugu; his dress was of
the same stuff; two spears lay close at hand, and his dog was as usual
by his side. The Arab thought proper to assume the posture of homage,
namely, to sit upon his shins, bending his back, and, with eyes fixed on
the ground--he had been cautioned against staring at the “god of
earth,”--to rest his hands upon his lap. The levee was full; at a
distance of fifty paces between the king and the guards sat the
ministers; and inside the palace, so placed that they could see nothing
but the visitor’s back, were the principal women, who are forbidden to
gaze at or to be gazed at by a stranger. The room was lit with torches
of a gummy wood, for Suna, who eschewed pombe, took great pleasure in
these audiences, which were often prolonged from sunset to midnight.
The conversation began with a string of questions concerning Zanzibar,
the route, the news, and the other staple topics of barbarous
confabulation; when it flagged, a minister was called up to enliven it.
No justice was administered nor present offered during the first
audience; it concluded with the despot rising, at which signal all
dispersed. At the second visit Snay presented his blackmail, which
consisted of ten cotton cloths, and one hundred fundo of coral, and
other porcelain beads. The return was an offering of two ivories and a
pair of serviles; every day, moreover, flesh and grain, fruit and milk
were supplied without charge; whenever the wish was expressed, a string
of slave-girls presently appeared bending under loads of the article in
question; and it was intimated to the “king’s stranger” that he might
lay hands upon whatever he pleased, animate or inanimate. Snay, however,
was too wise to avail himself of this truly African privilege. During
the four interviews which followed, Suna proved himself a man of
intelligence: he inquired about the Wazungu or Europeans, and professed
to be anxious for a closer alliance with the Sultan of Zanzibar. When
Snay took leave he received the usual present of provisions for the
road, and 200 guards prepared to escort him, an honour which he
respectfully declined: Suna offered to send with him several loads of
elephants’ tusks as presents to H. H. the Sayyid; but the merchant
declined to face with them the difficulties and dangers of Usúí. Like
all African chiefs, the despot considered these visits as personal
honours paid to himself; his pride therefore peremptorily forbade
strangers to pass northwards of his capital, lest the lesser and hostile
chiefs might boast a similar brave. According to Snay, an European would
be received with distinction, if travelling with supplies to support his
dignity. He would depend, however, upon his ingenuity and good fortune
upon further progress; and perhaps the most feasible plan to explore the
water-shed north of the Nyanza Lake would be to buy or to build, with
the permission of the reigning monarch, boats upon the nearest western
shore. Suna himself, had, according to Snay, constructed a flotilla of
matumbi or undecked vessels similar in shape to the Mtope or
Muntafiyah--the modern “Ploiaria Rhapta” of the Sawahili coast from Lamu
to Kilwa.
Few details were given by the Arabs concerning the vulgar herd of
Waganda: they are, as has been remarked, physically a finer race than
the Wayamwezi, and they are as superior in character; more docile and
better disciplined, they love small gifts, and show their gratitude by
prostrating themselves before the donor. The specimens of slaves seen at
Kazeh were, however, inferior to the mountaineers of Karagwah; the
complexion was darker, and the general appearance more African. Their
language is, to use an Arab phrase, like that of birds, soft and quickly
spoken; the specimens collected prove without doubt that it belongs to
the Zangian branch of the great South-African family. Their normal dress
is the mbugu, under which, however, all wear the “languti” or
Indian-T-bandage of goatskin; women appear in short kilts and
breast-coverings of the same material. Both sexes decorate their heads
with the tiara of abrus-seeds alluded to when describing the people of
Karagwah. As sumptuary laws impede the free traffic of cloth into
Uganda, the imports are represented chiefly by beads, cowries, and brass
and copper wires. The wealth of the country is in cattle, ivory, and
slaves, the latter often selling for ten fundo of beads, and the same
sum will purchase the Wasoga and Wanyoro captives from whom the despot
derives a considerable portion of his revenues. The elephant is rare in
Uganda; tusks are collected probably by plunder from Usoga, and the
alakah of about ninety Arab pounds is sold for two slaves, male or
female. The tobacco, brought to market in leaf, as in Ujiji, and not
worked, as amongst the other tribes, is peculiarly good. Flesh, sweet
potatoes, and the highly nutritious plantain, which grows in groves a
whole day’s march long, are the chief articles of diet; milk is drunk
by women only, and ghee is more valued for unction than for cookery. The
favourite inebrients are mawa and pombe; the latter is served in neatly
carved and coloured gourds, and the contents are imbibed, like sherry
cobbler, through a reed.
From Kibuga the Arabs have heard that between fifteen and twenty marches
lead to the Kivira River, a larger and swifter stream than the Katonga,
which forms the northern limit of Uganda, and the southern frontier of
Unyoro. They are unable to give the names of stations. South of Kivira
is Usoga, a low alluvial land, cut by a multitude of creeks, islets, and
lagoons; in their thick vegetation the people take refuge from the
plundering parties of the Waganda, whose chief built, as has been told,
large boats to dislodge them. The Wasoga have no single sultan, and
their only marketable commodity is ivory.
On the north, the north-west, and the west of Uganda lies, according to
the Arabs, the land of Independent Unyoro. The slaves from that country
vaguely describe it as being bounded on the north-west by a tribe called
Wakede, who have a currency of cowries, and wear tiaras of the shell;
and the Arabs have heard that on the north-east there is a “people with
long daggers like the Somal,” who may be Gallas (?). But whether the
Nyanza Lake extends north of the equator is a question still to be
decided. Those consulted at Kazeh ignored even the name of the
Nyam-nyam; nor had they heard of the Bahri and Barri, the Shilluks on
the west, and the Dinkas east of the Nile, made familiar to us by the
Austrian Mission at Gondokoro, and other explorers.
The Wanyoro are a distinct race, speaking a language of the Zangian
family: they have suffered from the vicinity of the more warlike
Waganda, who have affixed to the conquered the opprobrious name of widdu
or “serviles;” and they have lost their southern possessions, which
formerly extended between Karagwah and Uganda. Their late despot
Chawambi, whose death occurred about ten years ago, left three sons, one
of whom it is reported has fallen into the power of Uganda, whilst the
two others still rule independently. The county is rich and fertile, and
magnificent tales are told concerning the collections of ivory, which in
some parts are planted in the ground to pen cattle. Slaves are cheap;
they find their way to the southern markets _viâ_ Uganda and Karagwah.
Those seen at Kazeh and Kirira, where the Arab traders had a large gang,
appeared somewhat inferior to the other races of the northern kingdoms,
with a dull dead black colour, flattish heads, brows somewhat
retreating, prominent eyes, and projecting lower jaws. They were
tattooed in large burnt blotches encircling the forehead, and in some
cases the inferior excisors had been extracted. The price of cattle in
Unyoro varies from 500 to 1000 cowries. In this country ten simbi
(Cypræa) represent one khete of beads; they are the most esteemed
currency, and are also used as ornaments for the neck, arms, and legs,
and decorations for stools and drums.
During my companions’ absence much of my spare time was devoted to
collecting specimens of the multitudinous dialects into which the great
South African family here divides itself. After some months of desultory
work I had learned the Kisawahili or coast language, the lingua Franca
of the South African coast: it is the most useful, because the most
generally known, and because, once mastered, it renders its cognates as
easy of acquirement as Bengali or Maharatti after Hindostani. The
principal obstacle is the want of instructors and books--the Kisawahili
is not a written language; and the elementary publications put forth in
Europe gave me the preliminary trouble of composing a grammar and a
vocabulary. Said Bin Salim, though bred and born amongst the Wasawahili,
knew but little of the tongue, and his peculiarities of disposition
rendered the task of instruction as wearisome to himself as it was
unsatisfactory to me. My best tutor was Snay Bin Amir, who had
transferred to the philology of East Africa his knowledge of Arabic
grammar and syntax. With the aid of the sons of Ramji and other tame
slaves, I collected about 1500 words in the three principal dialects
upon this line of road, namely the Kisawahili, the Kizaramo--which
includes the Kik’hutu--and the Kinyamwezi. At Kazeh I found a number of
wild captives, with whom I began the dreary work of collecting
specimens. In the languages of least consideration I contented myself
with the numerals, which are the fairest test of independence of
derivation, because the most likely to be primitive vocables. The work
was not a labour of love. The savages could not guess the mysterious
objects of my inquiry into their names for 1, 2, and 3; often they
started up and ran away, or they sat in dogged silence, perhaps thinking
themselves derided. The first number was rarely elicited without half an
hour’s “talkee-talkee” somewhat in this style:--
“Listen, O my brother! in the tongue of the shores (Kisawahili) we say
1, 2, 3, 4, 5”--counting the fingers to assist comprehension.
“Hu! hu!” replies the wild man, “_we_ say fingers.”
“By no means, that’s not it. This white man wants to know how thou
speakest 1, 2, 3?”
“One, two, three what? sheep, or goats, or women?”--expressing the
numerals in Kisawahili.
“By no means, only 1, 2, 3 sheep in thine own tongue, the tongue of the
Wapoka.”
“Hi! Hi! what wants the white man with the Wapoka?”
And so on till patience was almost impossible. But, like the Irish
shay-horse of days gone by, their tongues once started often hobbled on
without halting. The tame slaves were more tractable, yet even in their
case ten minutes sufficed to weary out the most intellectual; when the
listless and incoherent reply, the glazed eye gazing at vacancy, and the
irresistible tendency to gape and yawn, to nod and snooze, evidenced a
feeble brain soon overworked. Said Bin Salim would sit staring at me
with astonishment, and ejaculate, like Abba Gregorius, the preceptor of
Ludolph, the grammarian philologist and historian of Æthiopia, “Verily
in the coast-tongue words never take root, nor do they bear branches.”
The rest of my time was devoted to preparations for journeying. The
Fundi’s tent, which had accompanied us to Uvira, was provided with an
outer cover. The Sepoys’ “pal,” brought from Zanzibar, having been
destroyed by the ill-treatment of the villain Kannena, I made up, with
the aid of a blackguard Baghdadi, named ’Brahim, a large tent of
American domestics, which having, however, but one cloth, and that of
the thinnest, proved a fiery purgatory on the down-march eastwards. The
canvas lug-sail was provided with an extra double cloth, sewn round the
top to increase its dimensions: it thus became a pent-shaped affair,
twelve feet long, eight broad, and six feet high--seven would have been
better,--buttoned at the foot, which was semicircular, and in front
provided with blue cotton curtains, most useful against glare and
stare. Its lightness, combined with impenetrability, made it the model
of a tent for rapid marching. It was not, however, pegged down close to
the ground, as some explorers advise, without the intervention of ropes;
in these lands, a tent so pitched would rot in a week. The three tents
were fitted with solid male bamboos, and were provided with skin-bags
for their pegs, which, unless carefully looked after, disappear almost
daily. The only furniture was a kitanda or cartel: some contrivance of
the kind, a “Biddulph,” or an iron bed-frame, without joints, nuts, or
screws, which are sure to break or to be lost, is absolutely necessary
in these lands, where from Kaole to Uvira every man instinctively
attempts to sit and to sleep upon something that raises him above the
ground. Moreover, I have ever found the cartel answer the threefold
purpose of bed, chair, and table; besides saving weight by diminishing
the quantity of bedding required.
To the task of tent-making succeeded tailoring. We had neglected to
provide ourselves with the loose blanket suits, served out to sailors on
board men-of-war in the tropics: they are most useful in passing through
countries where changes of climate are sudden and marked. Besides these,
the traveller should carry with him an ample store of flannels: the
material must be shrunk before making up shirts, otherwise it will
behave as did the Little Boy’s mantle when tried by the frail fair
Guinever. A red colour should moreover be avoided, the dye soon turns
dark, and the appearance excites too much attention. Besides shirt and
trousers, the only necessary is a large “stomach-warmer” waistcoat, with
sleeves and back of similar material, without collar--which renders
sleeping in it uneasy--and provided with four flapped pockets, to
contain a compass and thermometer, a note-book, and a sketch-book, a
watch and a moderate-sized knife of many uses. The latter should contain
scissors, tweezers, tooth-pick, and ear-pick, needle, file, picker,
steel for fire, turnscrew, watch-spring-saw, clasp blade, and pen blade:
it should be made of moderate dimensions, and for safety be slung by a
lanyard to the button-hole. For the cold mornings and the noon-day
heats, I made up a large padded hood, bound round the head like the Arab
Kufiyah. Too much cannot be said in favour of this article, which in
eastward travel defends the eyes from the fiery glare, protects, when
wending westwards, the carotids against the solar blaze, and, at all
times, checks the intrusive staring of the crowd. I reformed my
umbrella, ever an invaluable friend in these latitudes, by removing the
rings and wires from the worm-eaten stick, and by mounting them on a
spear, thus combining with shelter a staff and a weapon. The traveller
should have at least three umbrellas, one large and water proof--white,
not black--in the shape of those used by artists; and two others of
moderate size, and of the best construction, which should be covered
with light-coloured calico, as an additional defence against the sun. At
Kazeh I was somewhat deficient in material: my lazy “Jack of all
trades,” Valentine, made, however, some slippers of green baize, soled
with leather, for me, overalls of American domestics for my companion,
and various articles of indigo-dyed cotton for himself and his
fellow-servant, who presently appeared tastefully rigged out like Paul
and Virginia in “Bengal blue.”