Underwood of Cycadeæ. Peculiar mills of the Kredy. Wanderings in
the wilderness. Crossing the Beery. Inhospitable reception at
Mangoor. Numerous brooks. Huge emporium of slave-trade. Highest
point of my travels. Western limit. Gallery-woods near Dehm
Gudyoo. Scorbutic attack. Dreams and their fulfilment. Courtesy
of Yumma. Remnants of ancient mountain ridges. Upper course
of the Pongo. Information about the far west. Great river of
Dar Aboo Dinga. Barth’s investigations. Primogeniture of the
Bahr-el-Arab. First giving of the weather. Elephant-hunters from
Darfoor. The Sehre. Wild game around Dehm Adlan. Cultivated
plants of the Sehre. Magic tuber. Deficiency of water. A
night without a roof. Irrepressible good spirits of the
Sehre. Lower level of the land. A miniature mountain-range.
Norway-rats. Gigantic fig-tree in Moody. The “evil eye.” Little
steppe-burning. Return to Khalil’s quarters.
As time elapsed, and I considered the life that I was leading, I could
not help thinking that there was something in the lines of the Russian
poet that was not altogether inappropriate to myself:—
“_Two years had passed; the gypsies still
Their frank and lawless lives fulfil;
From heath to heath they push, nor stay,
But find new quarters every day,
All heed for culture cast away:
And Aleck of their guild is free,
Nor kith nor kin remain his joy,
New pastimes every hour employ,
For gypsy, heart and soul, is he!_”[75]
It was on the 22nd of January that I prepared to resume my wanderings.
In the evening I took my leave of Sheikh Seebehr, and attended by six
bearers, with which he had provided me, I departed from the Seriba.
My first destination was the settlement of one of the companies
associated with Kurshook Ali, which was situated on the Beery, about
twenty miles from Dehm Nduggo. The route for the most part was in a
south-westerly direction, over elevated ground that was channeled by no
less than ten running streams and khor beds, and along country that was
splendidly adorned with goodly forests. The defiles extended from the
south-east to the north-west, and stretched away towards the valley of
the Beery, which ran parallel to our course at a few miles’ distance to
the right.
The first irregularity in the soil which crossed our way consisted
of a deep river-course, which was now quite dry and shaded over by
thick foliage; the second was made by the stream of the Uyeely, which,
flowing out from a narrow streak of thicket that corresponded very much
in its vegetation with the galleries of the Niam-niam, with deliberate
current passed onwards to the west. Midway between the Uyeely and the
next stream, called the Uyissobba (the native word for “a buffalo”),
which consisted of a series of pools that ranged themselves in a
continuous series along an open swamp-steppe, there stood a grove of
tall trees. I was much surprised to find the frequent occurrence of
the same species of Cycadea which I had observed in the Niam-niam
lands, but which here, through the absence of any underwood, made a
majestic upward growth, and expanded their noble fans at the summit of
a stately stem. The Kredy Nduggo call the encephalartus “kotto,” and
my attendants acquainted me with the fact that they could manufacture
a sort of beer out of the central portion of the stem, which was
marrowy and full of meal. Some of the specimens that I saw had great
cylindrical stems two feet high, a contrast very decided to those that
I had previously seen, which were all quite low upon the ground. The
male flowering heads were often as many as eight or ten upon a single
stem. In the shadowy light admitted by the tall Humboldtiæ that towered
above, their stiff crowns had all the appearance of being alien to the
scene and a decoration imported from some foreign soil.
[Illustration: Kredy hut.]
[Sidenote: KREDY HUTS.]
After crossing a rippling brook we came to a village belonging to the
Kredy chief, Ganyong, on Seebehr’s territory. The fishing-nets, forty
feet long and eight feet broad, with their great meshes and floating
rims made of the stalks of the borassus, bore ample testimony, as they
hung outside the huts, to the productiveness of the Beery. Nets so
large as these I had never seen in the country, except among the tribes
that people the banks of the Dyoor.
The style of building amongst the Kredy appeared to me extremely
slovenly and inartistic. Most of the huts were entirely wanting
in substructure, and consisted merely of a conical roof of grass
raised upon a framework of hoops. They recalled to my mind the huts
of the Kaffirs. Ganyong had some corn-magazines of a very remarkable
construction. They were made very much upon the principle of the
“gollotoh” of the Bongo, having a kind of basket supported on posts and
covered with a large conical lid; but underneath the main receptacle
and between the posts there was a space left large enough for four
female slaves to do all the necessary work for converting the corn into
meal. A deep trench was cut, and, being firmly cemented over with clay,
formed a common reservoir into which the corn fell after it had passed
from the murhagas or grindstones. The stones were arranged so as to
form a cross. The women who were employed sang merrily as they worked,
and in the course of a day the quantity of corn they ground was very
considerable.
[Illustration: Interior of Kredy hut.]
At the next hollow, which appeared to have been a marsh that was
now dry, was a kind of defile rather thickly sprinkled over with
huts, where we found the native women busily engaged in gathering
the Lophira-nuts that they call “kozo,” and use for making oil. The
succeeding brook was named the Uyuttoo, and was lined on either side by
avenues of trees; it was not much more than a trench, but it was full
of water. Farther on, right in the heart of the wood, we made a passage
over a khor, and having for a while mistaken our way, we made a halt
at a rivulet that was but eight feet wide, but abundantly supplied
with running water. It was already quite dusk, and we were obliged to
abandon all hope of getting as far as the Seriba that day. I sent my
bearers, therefore, to make the best investigation they could of the
surrounding country, and to find out some settlement where we could
encamp for the night, as it appeared to be quite impossible for us to
bivouac with any degree of comfort in the midst of the still vigorous
growth of grass. During the Khareef these thickets must be absolutely
impenetrable.
[Sidenote: THE RIVER BEERY.]
Just in time a village belonging to Kurshook Ali was discovered, and,
after making a circuitous route to the south-east, we fixed upon a
convenient resting-place for the night. Next morning we proceeded
down to the river over very irregular ground, up hill and down hill
and repeatedly broken by deep fissures. The dimensions of the Beery
in this district were anything but important: it flowed towards the
west, making a good many bends and curves, and after a while turning
short off to the north. At this date it extended over about two-thirds
of the width of its channel, the depth of the stream varying from one
to two feet, and the water flowing at the rate of about one hundred
feet a minute. The banks were about eight feet high, and were crowned
on either hand by trees that, rising some fifty feet, threw out their
boughs and overhung the stream to a considerable distance with a leafy
canopy. I found a place in the most shadowed portion of the wood where
the river had formed a deep basin, and I took a bath, which I found
something more than refreshing, and with the temperature at 68° Fahr. I
was obliged to take a good run to get warm again.
A mile to the south of the river there was an extensive tract of land
covered by farmsteads, merely separated from each other by hedges, and
inhabited principally by some Gellahbas who had settled there and by
some of the black soldiers. Just beyond these, in a deep depression,
the rivulet of the Rende made its way towards the north-west. Facing
the settlement and towards the south, the valley sank very low, whilst
towards the west and south-west, the country rose considerably in
prominent wall-like ridges.
The controller of the place was named Mangoor, but he was unwell and
out of temper, and consequently had no hospitality to show me, and
allowed me and my people to start next day with empty stomachs and
without any contribution of supplies. Nor was much to be got out of
the native local overseer, Gassigombo, who had the supervision of such
of the Kredy tribe of the Jongbongo who had settled there; the country
was so impoverished that he had neither goats nor poultry to part with.
An Egyptian, who was the representative of the sick controller, was
really the person responsible for this ungracious reception, which
was by far the worst of all that I ever experienced at any of the
Khartoomers’ settlements. Between Nubians and Egyptians there goes on a
continual jarring, and their mutual animosity is extremely bitter. The
Nubians call the genuine Egyptians by the name of “Wollad-er-Reef,” the
designation being given to them in distinction to the other residents
on the Nile, although its real meaning is simply a Nile-dweller; the
word “Reef,” in fact, is the name of the Nile throughout its course in
Egypt.
The icy stolidness of my angry servants and the crabby resentment of
the Egyptian, whom they had somehow managed to offend, gave me a vast
fund of amusement in spite of my melancholy plight. On the following
morning I found myself thoroughly unwell, and so weak that I hardly
knew how I should hold out during the next stage of our progress to
the next Dehm. I had now double cause to regret the loss of all my
stock of tea, for although I tried to compensate for the want of it
by taking an extra quantity of coffee, it did me but little good, and
was comparatively useless in bracing up my nervous system. I made it,
however, as strong as I could, and took it with me to sustain my
flagging energies and keep up my elasticity as I went along.
[Sidenote: THROUGH WOODS AND OVER BROOKS.]
The Dehm Gudyoo, to which I was directing my steps, was about
twenty-two miles distant, and was one of the chief establishments of
the slave-traders who had settled in the country. There were no less
than ten brooks to be crossed, of some of which the channels were
partially dried up; every one of them without exception flowed from
west to east towards the Beery, which lay from this point onwards
upon our left hand, apparently following a southerly direction. The
altitude above the sea, which hitherto upon the route from Dehm Nduggo
had been tolerably uniform, began to increase considerably. The region
was less thickly covered with trees, but light brushwood took their
place, whilst the monotony of the steppes was broken by dwindling
watercourses. These seemed to flow from north to south, and were
described to me under the following names: the first was the Rende, and
had a tolerably strong current; the next was the Buloo, flowing along
in a deep rift between walls of red rock; then came the Zembey, a mere
meadow-brook; to this succeeded the Kungbai, flowing in its channel
along the open steppe; next in order was the Ramadda, a swamp-khor,
that had but little current, on the banks of which a number of little
springs were constantly yielding their fresh supply.
After this, the way began to ascend, blocks of hornblend and schist
occurring every now and then to vary the uniformity of the general
configuration of the soil. As we again descended we came to another
series of brooks. The first was named the Biduleh, and ran rapidly
along, its banks being clearly indicated by rows of Raphia-palms; the
next was of similar character, called the Gatwee, its borders again
lined by the Raphia: then came the Gobo, a much smaller stream that
murmured along its red granite channel; and then the Kadditch, shut in
by a kind of gallery vegetation. The last of the series, by which we
passed the night, was a stream fifteen feet wide with a rapid current,
the water of which was up to our knees; it was the Gresse, a feeder of
the Beery, and here it had an aspect that very much resembled the Beery
as we observed it at the unfriendly Dehm. It was now full 30 feet wide,
and made its way amongst blocks and over flats of gneiss between lofty
banks that slanted down abruptly to the stream. The declivity, amidst
the openings of the thickets, revealed the red rock of the swamp-ore in
many places, whilst down below, the flats of the gneiss were everywhere
apparent.
From the Gresse we had still eight miles to march along very rising
ground before we reached Dehm Gudyoo. As well as being one of the
oldest halting-places of the slave-dealers of Dar Ferteet, and in
number of huts quite equal to Dehm Nduggo, this town contained a Seriba
of Agahd’s company, and served as the headquarters of a division of
Khartoom soldiers, who made annual expeditions to the territory of
the Niam-niam king Mofio, in the west. Gudyoo himself, formerly a
Kredy chief and a great patron of the slave-dealers, had now settled
down to the east on the banks of the Beery as an ordinary sheikh of
Agahd’s possessions. Dehm Gudyoo formed the most westerly and, with
the exception of Mount Baginze, the highest point that I visited in
all my travels in Central Africa. The altitude of the Dehm was about
2775 feet, and not much less than 500 feet higher than Dehm Nduggo.
From various indications in the character of the soil I seemed to have
no alternative than to conclude that these elevations continue to rise
still more decidedly beyond Dehm Gudyoo, and that most probably a
considerable watershed would be found in the region in that direction.
The character of the vegetation reminded me in more than one respect
of the flora of the Niam-niam lands. Dehm Gudyoo stretches itself
out on the northern declivity of a valley, and consists of huts and
farmsteads, which, rising one above another in a kind of amphitheatre,
gave an imposing aspect to the scene. Probably the number of huts
exceeded 2000. From a spring close to the lowest tier of houses issued
a considerable brook, named the Kobbokoio, which was shadowed over
with tall trees and thick bushwood that gave the borders very much the
appearance of the Niam-niam galleries. In the farther environs of this
Dehm there were a good many instances of plants that were very nearly
allied to those of the Niam-niam, and the dualism which characterised
the vegetation was very marked, and ever and again recalled what I had
observed before. On the higher parts of the hill-slopes I found the
_Albizzia anthelmintica_ in considerable quantities, the bark of which
is the most effectual remedy that the Abyssinians are acquainted with
for the tapeworm.
[Sidenote: SCORBUTIC ATTACK.]
Although I had cause to congratulate myself upon the hospitable
reception that I found at Agahd’s Seriba, and appreciated the
hospitality that was extended to me, my condition altogether was so
wretched that I might almost as well have been left in the wilderness.
A kind of scorbutic affection, that had for some little time been
lurking in my system, probably in consequence of my having been
deprived for so many months of proper vegetable diet, now broke out
with some violence, my gums becoming so sore and the whole inside of
my mouth so inflamed that I could not take anything but water without
experiencing the greatest pain. The restricted supply of provisions in
the place naturally aggravated my condition. As it happily fell out,
Faki Ismael, the superintendent of the establishment, made me a present
of some sweet potatoes, which he had just received from Dar Benda:
at this season they were very scarce, but they were very acceptable,
and were the only food of which I could venture to partake. In spite
of my ailments, however, I did not suffer my three days’ residence in
Dehm Gudyoo to pass away without employing them as profitably as I
could: I made a collection of words in the Kredy dialect, and carefully
inspected all the most interesting plants in the district.
Large quantities of the Ashantee pepper are found on the Kobbokoio, and
just at this season the stem of the trees were so beautifully decorated
with its red clusters that they gleamed from amongst the thickets
almost as brightly as a flame of fire. The Kredy might in this place
alone, without any difficulty, gather hundredweights of this pepper,
which amongst them bears the name of Dehre. The Nubians who had taken
up their quarters here had not the least idea of the useful properties
of the plant, and it had never occurred to them that the red berries,
after they were dried, would become black pepper-corns. My disclosure
seemed to give them the greatest delight, and without delay they set
to work to gather the pepper, which they designed to be sent off to
Khartoom, a novelty in the way of their commerce. In the bank-woods I
found some muscat-nuts which, in the previous year, I had not found on
the Assika until the month of March. The straight growth of its stout
stem never failed to attract attention.
At Dehm Gudyoo I learnt a great many details about the aspect of
the land still farther west that had been traversed by the various
companies of Agahd, Bizelly, Idrees Wod Defter, and Seebehr Adlan. When
we took our departure I found that our road had a decline. In order to
reach the Bongo territory again I proposed to proceed in a kind of arc
towards the south-east down to the Dehm Bekeer, where the extensive
establishments of the Gellahbas, stretching away for miles, were
collected, and where Kurshook Ali was in possession of one of the most
important strongholds which he had inherited from his father-in-law. In
a straight line the distance between Dehm Gudyoo and Dehm Bekeer would
not exceed five-and-thirty miles, but our deviations were so frequent
and so long that it took us two days of exceedingly hard marching to
reach our destination. The entire district, a thoroughly unbroken
wilderness, was the true source-land of the Beery and the Kooroo,
both of these rivers at the points where we crossed them being in the
incipient condition of mere brooks; nor did they seem to surpass the
other streamlets, thirteen in number, which we had to cross, in their
supply of water.
[Sidenote: A SERIES OF STREAMS.]
The universal direction which the streams took was from south to
north. Reckoning them in their order after leaving Dehm Gudyoo, the
first was the Domwee, quite a little channel filled with a flowing
current: after a considerable rise in the land, we came to the Ghessy
Beery (_i.e._, the Little or Upper Beery), with its broad water almost
stagnant and shadowed over by an extensive gallery-wood; then came
a dried-up channel at the bottom of a broad and outspread valley,
of which the western slopes were marked by crests of hills some 400
or 500 feet in height; to this succeeded an uphill march, which led
to a soil so elevated that it opened an ample prospect into the far
distant east, embracing at least the chief landmarks for some eighty
miles round; next succeeded a brook called the Yagpak, of which the
waters, still deep, were hemmed in by thick shrubberies; next came
a little watercourse with languid stream; and then a rivulet twenty
feet wide, full of water, and named the Gulanda, where we spent the
night, the direction of which was indicated by the bushes on the
banks. The level of the soil was here about 400 feet lower than it
had been at Dehm Gudyoo. Farther on, close following upon each other,
came two dried-up khors; after which the land once more began to rise
again in alternate flats of gneiss and lofty eminences of swamp-ore,
hills named Bakeffa and Yaffa lifting themselves up conspicuously on
the east; next we reached a small dried-up course that intersected a
valley made up of gneiss flats, bounded on the west by the elevation
of a hill, called the Fee-ee; then, at about equal distances one from
another, were crossed four khors, now dry, that gave an undulated
character to the ground; proceeding onwards we came to the half-dry,
half-swampy depression known as the Ohro; and last of all we arrived
at an inconsiderable water-channel of which the stream was deep, but
apparently stationary, and was described by the Kredy as being the
upper course of the Kooroo, distinguished here by the name of the Mony.
The district over which we thus had travelled very much resembled the
northern regions of the Kredy lands in its wooded character and in the
absence of meadow-lands and steppes; only it was utterly wanting in
that distinctive abundance of springs which is so marked in latitudes
below lat. 8° N. The deficiency of water, in comparison to what we
had before experienced, made itself very obvious. The flora offered
some few novelties; in particular I was surprised at the cabbage-like
Euphorbia (_Tithymalus_), which, though common in our zone, is quite a
rarity in Tropical Africa.
In the dried-up watercourses I frequently saw one of the rodentia which
had hitherto been little known to me: this was the reed-rat, called by
the Foorians the “Far-el-boos.” I had the good fortune to bring down
three of them, and, after having been limited for three days to a diet
of soaked sweet potatoes, I very much appreciated a meal from their
delicate and tender flesh.
Never shall I forget the hospitable reception which Yumma, Kurshook
Ali’s Vokeel, showed me at this Seriba, nor the circumstances under
which it transpired. My gratitude was all the more keen because the
discourtesy and inhospitality which I had experienced from Mangoor
were still fresh upon my memory. I was really worn-out by the fatigue
of marching, and very much debilitated by my compulsory abstinence
in consequence of my scorbutic attack, when in the early evening we
reached the Dehm. We wandered about for a considerable time amongst
the scattered homesteads, and had some difficulty in discovering the
palings of the Seriba. After we succeeded in getting inside, we found
all the huts perfectly quiet, and it appeared almost as if invisible
hands had prepared the coffee which was handed me as soon as I had
taken my seat upon the “angareb” in the reception-hall. The ruler
of the Seriba happened that evening to be absent somewhere in the
environs, and it was not known for certain whether he would return that
night. Feeling that it was quite a matter of speculation what kind of
entertainment I should have on the following day, I threw myself down
without taking any supper, and composed myself for my night’s rest.
[Sidenote: A TRAVELLER’S DREAMS.]
Whoever has wandered as a lonely traveller in the untrodden solitudes
of a desert likes to tell his dreams: in them the true situation of a
man often mirrors itself; for, unrestrained by any control of reason,
images arise from the obscurity of the past, so that, at times, it
seems as if a painful vividness was being stamped upon recollections,
which, as reproduced, are really very contradictory to the actual
facts. It happened to me very much in this way at Dehm Bekeer, only I
had the compensation that the visions that I saw were not disproved,
but confirmed, by my experience.
Weary and worn-but as I was, and no longer master of my faculties,
I seem very soon to have fallen asleep. Memory, unshackled from the
guardianship of reality, began to revel in the ideal delights of a
material world. I fancied that I was in a spacious tent that was
glittering with the radiancy of countless lamps, that the tables were
groaning under the most tempting viands, and that troops of servants
in gorgeous livery were in attendance upon the guests, to whom they
brought the mellowest and rarest of wines. And then it was race-time
at Cairo, and the entertainment was sumptuous with all the splendour
of the fairest imagery of ‘The Arabian Nights,’ the host no less than
the Governor of Egypt himself. And then I seemed all at once to wake,
and was quite bewildered in trying to decide whether I was in the
smoke-clouds that envelop the interior of an African grass-hut or
whether in truth I was reclining under the shelter of a royal marquee.
My frame of mind enhanced the force of my fancy: but soon the delusion
took a more distinct phase, and I seemed to divine that there was
really about me a group of well-dressed servants, and that whilst some
were bringing in various dishes and sparkling goblets which they placed
beside my lowly couch, others were running about with tapers and lamps,
and others with embroidered napkins under their arms were conveying the
choicest dainties in lordly dishes or offering lemonade and sherbet
from the brightest crystal. I rubbed my eyes. I took a draught of what
was offered me. I surveyed the scene deliberately, and came to the
surprised conviction that what I had been dreaming was a reality!
Yumma, the controller of the Seriba, had returned home late in the
evening. No sooner was he informed of my arrival than he had had all
his retinue of cooks aroused from their night’s rest to give me an
entertainment worthy of his rank. He was more than half a Turk, and
acquainted far beyond the other superintendents of the Seribas with
the elegancies and comforts of a Khartoomer’s household. Everything
he possessed in the way of valuable vases or tasteful table ornaments
was brought out and exhibited in my honour. He set before me bread
of pure white flour, maccaroni, rice, chickens served with tomatoes,
and innumerable other delicacies which I could hardly have supposed
had ever found their way to this distant land. It was quite midnight
before the preparations for the impromptu banquet were complete, and
then, whether I wanted or not, I was bound to partake. My tortures
were the tortures of Tantalus; however eagerly I might covet the food,
the inflammation in my gums put an emphatic veto upon my enjoyment,
and it was only with the acutest suffering that I could get a morsel
of meat or a drop of fluid between my lips. As soon, however, as
I was somewhat better, the improved diet told favourably upon my
constitution, and after a few days I was ready to start afresh upon my
travels with renovated energy and recruited strength.
[Sidenote: A LINE OF HILLS.]
The environs of the Dehm are inhabited partly by the Golo and partly
by the Sehre. Amongst the natives the town itself is known by the name
of Dehm Dooroo, called so after a deceased chieftain of the Golo.
The present native overseer of the Golo population is called Mashi
Doko. To the south and south-west of the town, the ground gradually
rises, and in the main might be called hilly in all directions, as
right away to the horizon there are continued series of hill-crests
and ridges. Above the general undulation of the land these rise
high enough to form conspicuous landmarks, and afford the wayfarer
considerable assistance in the direction of his journey; many of them
present an appearance that is quite analogous to that of the hill-caps
which have been mentioned as characteristic of southern Bongoland;
generally they consist of bright masses of gneiss. The shape of these
hills is defined in the Arabic of the Soudan as “Gala;” the Bongo
call it “Kilebee.” They are quite isolated, and are always rounded
elevations of grey gneiss projecting, sometimes like flat plateaux and
sometimes like raised eminences, from the swamp-ore around, and they
give the landscape the aspect so characteristic of Central Africa.
They may readily be supposed to be associated in character with those
gneiss flats which are scattered all over the land in every variety
of shape and size, and any one must involuntarily become subject to
the impression that they indicate a spot where in bygone ages there
were the summits of mountains that have long since been worn down by
the tooth of time, and that these elevations were the ridges that had
separated the channels of the very rivers that I had discovered, which
by various agencies, chemical and mechanical, were now conspiring
to carry off the _débris_ of the mountain mass and convey it to
the distant ocean. All along the way there were the most striking
evidences of how, in the operations of nature, it had been brought
about that every valley should be exalted and every mountain and hill
made low. The problem over which antagonists may wrangle and refuse to
be reconciled has been successfully solved by Nature, whose function
has ever been to establish a balance between opposites ever since the
days of her own early youth, before as yet a living creature existed
to give animation to the scenes of earth. As instances to illustrate
the certainty of these earlier chains of mountains, I may mention the
following, which the reader will easily trace upon the map: The Taya,
between the Beery and the Kooroo; the Bakeffa, the Kosanga, and the
Ida, between the Kooroo and the Pongo; and the Kokkuloo, the Yaffa, and
the Atyumen, between the Pongo and the Wow.
On leaving Dehm Bekeer, a mile south from the Seriba, we reached a
small stream called the Ngudduroo, and on the farther side of it, after
traversing a hilly tract for about two miles, we came to another stream
which in winter could only boast of a very weak current, although even
then the breadth of its bed was fifteen feet, thoroughly covered with
water. The banks were about eight or ten feet in height, and stood out
dry above the stream. Yumma, who accompanied me, declared that it was
the upper course of the river of Damoory and Dembo, consequently that
it was the Pongo, and he affirmed that, in his frequent marches along
its banks, he had distinctly followed it right into that district. Both
the Golo and the Sehre throughout the environs called it the Djee, and
as I proceeded along my way I derived fresh confirmation for Yumma’s
statement about the river from the circumstance that it is also called
the Djee by those Sehre who reside on the farther side, at Dehm Adlan.
All along my route back, moreover, towards the east, I did not come
across any river large or small which could possibly be identified as
the upper portion of what is the Pongo at Damoory.
[Sidenote: MOFIO AND SOLONGOH.]
Some four or five leagues to the north-west of Dehm Bekeer there is
stationed one of Kurshook Ali’s subsidiary Seribas. The natives of the
district are Golo, and the Seriba has been established upon the banks
of the Hahoo, a little stream that subsequently joins the Kooroo. Two
leagues to the south-west of the Dehm rises a hill, steep in every
aspect, it is designated the Kokkuloo, and commands a wide view of the
country around. I found a number of intelligent people in this locality
whose information about the neighbouring Niam-niam was of considerable
service to me in ascertaining various facts, and by comparing and
combining their separate accounts I was able to gain a fairly accurate
idea of the country. The particulars that I gathered were for the most
part appertaining to the territories of the two Niam-niam chieftains
Mofio and Solongoh. Mofio’s residence was described as being situated
to the W.N.W. of our present position, and that, in consequence of the
number of streams that had to be crossed and the deserts that had to be
traversed, it could not be reached in less than twelve days, even if
the march were urged on with all possible speed, whilst at an ordinary
pace it would take fifteen days at least; there was, however, a way
from Dehm Nduggo which was less circuitous, and did not offer the same
difficulties in furnishing the bearers with supplies: this could be
accomplished in about eight days. The home of Solongoh, who was a son
of Bongohrongboh, was not distant more than a five days’ march to the
S.S.E., and only separated from the domain of Kurshook Ali in the lands
of the Golo and Sehre by one of the desolate frontier wildernesses.
There was a third independent Niam-niam chief, whose territory,
however, was of insignificant extent. He was called indifferently
Yapaty or Yaffaty, and was the son of Mofio’s brother Zaboora: he had
his mbanga three days’ journey to the south-west of Dehm Bekeer.
At the period of my visit Yumma was on terms of open enmity with
Solongoh, his territory being constantly threatened by that powerful
prince, whose sway extended as far as the Bellandah, who are bordering
upon the land of Aboo Shatter. Just before this, in fact only a few
days previously to my arrival, Solongoh had been repulsed in an attack
which he had made, although he had summoned his full force and had
advanced within a couple of days’ march of Dehm Bekeer. As Yumma
foresaw that another engagement was imminent, he would not permit me
to remain any longer in his Seriba, because he saw he could not be
responsible for the issue, and it was in vain that I begged him not to
have any apprehension on my account. But the audacity of the Niam-niam
was so gross that it was intolerable, and must be suppressed at all
hazards. To such a pitch had this shameless daring grown that even the
arms of the soldiers had been stolen by people sent by Solongoh into
Dehm Bekeer for the purpose. Under cover of night they had contrived to
get into the Seriba, and had managed to purloin several guns whilst the
unsuspecting owners were sound asleep.
My researches in Dehm Gudyoo enabled me to gather certain information
which is of some consequence as affecting the proper hydrographical
delineation of the countries through which I was travelling. Six days’
journey south-west by west from the spot at which we were sojourning
stood a Seriba, which was Idrees Wod Defter’s principal repository
of arms and ammunition; it was situated, as I was informed, upon the
banks of a river that flowed to the north-east, and afterwards joined
another river that was so much larger that the passage over it could at
all seasons only be effected in boats. To this river the Khartoomers
give the name of Bahr Aboo Dinga; it is said to be about two and a half
days’ journey beyond Dar Benda, where Idrees maintains another Seriba.
It is a river that is likewise well known to the company of Seebehr
Rahama, which makes a yearly visit to the country that is inhabited by
the Aboo Dinga, a distinct negro people, quite different alike to the
Kredy and to the Niam-niam. The direction of the stream Aboo Dinga was
reported to be E.N.E. or due east, and all the statements concurred in
making it identical with the Bahr-el-Arab, which intersects the country
of the Baggara-el-Homr.
[Sidenote: THE BAHR ABOO DINGA.]
No one seemed able to decide the question where the Bahr Aboo Dinga
came from. I suspect its source is somewhere amongst the mountains of
Runga, to the south of Wadai, a spot of which various travellers have
given such reports as they have been able to gather. Barth,[76] in the
itinerary which he gives of his eastward route from Massena in Baghirmy
to Runga, makes an entry which may contribute something in the way of
elucidating the question. He says that he came “on the forty-second
day (_i.e._ one day’s journey to the south of the residence of the
prince of Runga) to Dar Sheela,[77] a mountainous district with a
river flowing to the east, beyond which lies Dar Dinga.” No one is
more conscious than I am myself how little stress is to be laid upon
a mere resemblance in the sound of names. Hundreds of times, and in
every diversity of place, I have found that any conjecture based upon
the apparent similarity is utterly worthless; but in this case the
resemblance was not a chance coincidence, for the assigned bearings
and distances (as reckoned from the two starting-points of Barth and
myself) so thoroughly correspond as to suggest the sense of a mutual
agreement between the scenes that we explored; it seems also very
probable that Barth’s river Kubanda is identical with my river Welle.
Various reasons, into which it is unnecessary to enter with more
minuteness here, might be alleged to show that it is in the highest
degree probable that the river in question is likewise identical with
a river which is affirmed by the two entirely independent witnesses,
Teïma[78] and Fresnel,[79] to exist in this district, and to which the
name of Bahr-el-Ezuhm, or Azzoum, is assigned.
Although these statements are only given in their main and essential
features, and not in detail, they will suffice to cast some degree of
clearness upon the source of the Bahr-el-Arab, that river which appears
hitherto to have been very much underrated in all the maps of the
country. The evidence which demonstrates that the river is entitled to
the rank of primogeniture amongst all the tributaries of the Gazelle
system, has already been collected in a previous page. We have only
to take account of the extraordinary length, as may be gathered from
the foregoing data, to which the Bahr-el-Arab extends, and we shall be
at once bound to concede that in all discussions connected with that
endless question of the sources of the Nile, the Bahr-el-Arab takes at
least an equal rank with the Bahr-el-Gebel.
Leaving the Djee at some little distance to our right, we continued
our return journey to the Wow and the Dyoor, starting in a N.N.E.
direction, and persevering for twenty-five miles until we reached
Dehm Adlan, just as it had been described to me by the same reliable
authorities to whom I was indebted for such detailed particulars about
the districts of Mofio and Solongoh. Nearly throughout the march the
country was quite destitute of inhabitants, and we crossed eleven
little streams all running from west to east and flowing into the Djee.
We had first to cross a half-dry khor, surrounded on all sides by open
steppes, and then proceeded to the farms of the Sehre sheik, Bereeah,
which were situated just beyond a considerable brook, of which the
water was nearly at a standstill, and which bore the name of Langeh.
[Sidenote: THROUGH WOODS AND OVER BROOKS.]
Our pathway now led us through bushwoods and over soil that was
generally rocky, till after accomplishing about two leagues we came in
sight of Bakeffa, a hill of which I had previously taken the bearings;
it reared itself so much above the flat table-land that it could be
seen from afar. All round the west, far as the horizon embraced the
view, the whole country was apparently one elevated plateau. For
a long time we had a river named the Gumende on our left, and at
intervals passed through the galleries of forest-wood that enclosed
its banks; after a while we had to cross the stream at a spot where
it was thirty feet wide and ten feet in depth. As surveyed from this
place, the horizon upon the north-east was shut out by the rising of
some steepish ground. The next brook that we reached was named the
Nyusseta; its water was nearly stationary, and beyond it were still
standing the dejected ruins of a previous Seriba of Bizelly’s. Having
traversed a rocky tract broken by repeated bushwoods, we next arrived
at the large brook Gopwee, of which the channel was deep, but the
waters nearly still, its banks being shrouded with very thick foliage.
Then we reached the Dibanga, of which we found that the bed was of
considerable depth; but at this season it was divided into a number
of separate pools. Farther on we passed a gallery-brook, in which the
water had no movement, and finally we came to a much larger stream, of
which the surface of the water was ten feet in breadth, the height of
the woody banks which shut in the channel varying from twenty-five feet
in some places to forty in others. Its name was the Ndopah. The woods,
which almost completely overshadowed it, were composed in a large
measure of great sterculiæ, which the Niam-niam call kokkorukkoo, and
to which I have already called attention as being so conspicuous in the
gallery-forests of the south.
Upon the banks of a little stream, by the sides of which the trees were
arranged as it were in avenues, and where a kind of glen was formed
amongst them, we came to an establishment of slave-dealers, who, in
company with some elephant-hunters from Darfoor, had taken up their
quarters at the place which the Khartoomers simply designate by the
name of Bet-el-Gellahba, or “the abode of the slave-dealers.” As we
were unable to reach the Dehm to which our steps were bent, we were
compelled to take up our quarters here for the night.
On the following morning, which was the 5th of February, I was
very much surprised at the singularly clouded aspect of the sky.
After a long interval the night had been warm, the atmosphere being
oppressively close, an indication that, just as might be anticipated at
the beginning of February, a change of weather was impending, and there
was about to ensue a transition from the coolness of winter to the heat
of summer without any interruption in the dryness of the air.
Before we arrived at the Dehm of Seebehr Adlan, who was a Seriba owner
associated with Agahd’s company, we had to journey over lands that
were under vigorous cultivation and to pass by numerous farmsteads
of the Sehre. On our way it was necessary to cross two considerable
brooks that flowed in the hollow of some deep depressions, and were
closely shut in by lofty trees. Beyond the second of these, which was
called Ngokkoo, on the steep side of a valley slope, lay the aforesaid
Seriba, in the immediate environs of which were clustered many groups
of Gellahbas’ farmsteads, numerous enough to constitute a Dehm, which,
however, was far smaller than any that we had previously visited. The
resident dealers in slaves were partly Foorians and partly Baggara,
and had an interest in the ivory traffic as well as in their living
merchandise. They conducted their business in the regular Bedouin
fashion, with sword and lance, disposing of their spoil at the nearest
Seribas, where their activity was much appreciated. The Baggara, who
come into the country in the train of the slave-dealers (whether for
the purpose of tending the oxen which are wanted as beasts of burden or
of superintending the transport of the slaves), are all of the tribe of
the Rizegat, the Homr being the most irreconcilable enemies of all the
Gellahbas, no matter whether these come from Kordofan or Darfoor, or
whether they be natives of Khartoom or other Nubians.
[Sidenote: THE RIVER DJEE.]
At the distance of a mile from the Seriba, towards the east, the Djee
had already expanded into a river some forty feet broad; its bed was
full of water, which, however, did not exceed two feet in depth; it
flowed deliberately towards the north, between lofty walls of swamp-ore
and over moss-grown clumps of gneiss that half obstructed its flow
along its bed. The embankments on either side seemed to be equally
inclined to the base of the valley, which they overtopped by an
altitude of nearly 600 feet; so prolonged was the depression, spreading
outwards for several miles, that the aspect of the locality was quite
remarkable. The affluents of the river joined the main-stream by gorges
in the soil, which sank perpendicularly to the bottom; and the land had
the singular appearance of having been regularly parcelled out into
distinct allotments.
The contented little community of the Sehre had established itself in
well-packed quarters, which were ranged for some distance around the
Seriba. The prospect all around was very diversified, the landscape
presenting pleasing alternations of light and shade, the dense woods
being relieved by the recurrence of the culture-lands and homesteads of
the natives.
In general appearance the Sehre may be said to bear a striking
resemblance to the Niam-niam, except that they are not tattooed.
Originally they were a tribe of slaves subject to the Niam-niam
chieftains, but recently they have migrated farther north, very
probably encouraged to that movement by the depopulation of the land
in consequence of the large and perpetual capture of the people
for slaves. However, many of the Sehre still remain subject to the
dominion of the Niam-niam prince, Solongoh. The prolonged intercourse
that has existed between the two people has done a great deal towards
obliterating the nationality and peculiar customs of the Sehre and to
assimilate them to the Niam-niam; but to a large extent they retain
their own dialect, which, as might be expected, has many points of
resemblance with the Zandey. Many of the Sehre are quite accustomed to
the Zandey tongue and speak it fluently. The long hair is precisely
like what is found among the Niam-niam, and the mode of arranging it
in tufts and twists is identical. Their complexion is a dark chocolate
colour.
The Sehre are a robust and well-built race, and in this respect
they more resemble the Golo and the Bongo. Their ethnographical
independence, however, does not admit of a question. Their huts attest
the interest which their owners take in them, and the amount of care
that is bestowed upon the management of their households is larger than
what is anywhere to be observed amongst the Golo, not to mention those
of the poor degenerate Kredy. The peculiar huts appropriated to boys,
which I have mentioned as being adopted by the Niam-niam and called
“bamogee,” are found here, and are always built in a style that is most
symmetrical. But their most remarkable structures are their corn-bins,
which are of a shape that I never saw elsewhere. They are made in the
form of a drinking goblet, and are nearly always artistically decorated
with mouldings and with a series of rings almost as perfect as though
they had been produced with the aid of a lathe. They are always built
on a pedestal, which must be climbed in order to push aside the
projecting lid.
Among the Sehre I never saw either goats or dogs, and, as far as I
could judge, their residences had no other live-stock about them but a
few cocks and hens.
[Sidenote: THE SEHRE.]
There is nothing very remarkable about the arms of the Sehre;
their lances resemble those of the Bongo, and are very rare and
quaint-looking weapons. The bows and arrows are considerably smaller
than those of the Bongo, the arrows in particular being of that short
and stumpy make that I had noticed amongst the Bellanda.
The women’s attire consists of bunches of grass or leaves, fastened
to their girdle before and behind, and very like what is worn by the
Bongo; it is also generally adopted by the women of the Golo and Kredy.
There is the same partiality for inserting bits of straw in the sides
of the nostrils that is so common amongst the Bongo women, but the
example here is to a certain extent followed even by the men. Many
of the women have the circular plate let into their upper lip like
the Mittoo women. At the Dehm Adlan I observed several women who had
an appendage hanging from the lower lip in the shape of a piece of
lead several inches long. The teeth, both of men and women, are left
unmutilated, the only disfigurement being that an artificial separation
is made between the two central incisors. According to the ordinary
fashion of Central Africa, infants at the breast are carried in a
girth, similar to a saddle-girth, worn over the shoulders just in the
same way as amongst the Monbuttoo women.
Hunting in the neighbouring wildernesses, which cannot extend much
less than twenty miles in every direction, and which appear to be
entirely void of inhabitants, must be a very productive pursuit. In
all my travels I never came across such numerous and abundant hunting
trophies as here amongst the homesteads of the Sehre; they were
contrived out of branches of trees resting one against another and
self-supported like the guns of soldiers in camp, and were crowded
with the skulls and horns of animals that the natives had secured.
Hundreds of buffalo-horns, including a surprising number of those of
the females, were attached to the structures which stood in front of
well-nigh every hut, and were as numerous as though hunter vied with
hunter in his separate display. Every variety of horn was represented:
intermingled with the buffalo-horns were those of the eland-antelope,
the water-bock, the hartebeest, and the bastard-gemsbock, whilst skulls
of wart-hogs, and occasionally even skulls of lions, were not wanting
to help adorn the trophy.
The proprietor of the Seriba happened to be absent on an excursion to
the western districts of the Niam-niam, but his Vokeel did his utmost
to provide me with a hospitable reception; and taking into account the
impoverishment of the land and the general deficiency of provisions
that prevailed, I am bound to award him my best thanks for his courtesy
and attention.
Beyond the Kooroo, and just half-way between Dehm Adlan and Dehm
Gudyoo, there stands a hill of considerable altitude, named Taya. The
whole distance required two days’ hard marching to get over, the road
being straight through uninterrupted wilderness until it reached the
farmsteads of the Kredy sheikh, Gudyoo, on the banks of the Beery.
Shortly after midnight on the 8th of February there came on such
a violent storm that I was aroused from my sleep, although I was
sheltered by one of the best protected of the huts. A complete change
of wind ensued, and for the first time this season the south-west wind
set in afresh and for some time maintained its position for the greater
part of the day. The nights in consequence became so much warmer that
any covering for the bed could easily be dispensed with. We tarried
here three days, and then started for another three days’ march on our
return to Bongoland, over a country all but destitute of water, for the
Pongo may be described as a river that separates a district full of
springs from one that is just as barren of them, although the change
in the level of the country comes on so gradually that it can hardly
be said to be observable. In the course of our journey we had to
cross the three running brooks known as the Ngokurah, the Simmere, and
Ngonguli, and to pass by several villages of the Sehre, of which the
sheikhs were respectively called Kombo, Villeke, Badja, and Barraga.
The last huts and the last water were left behind about four miles
after quitting the Pongo, and henceforth water for drinking had to be
sought for with considerable trouble, as all the pools and marshes that
supplied any were only to be found scattered at wide intervals one from
another.
[Illustration: “Karra,” the magic tuber.]
[Sidenote: KARRA, THE MAGIC TUBER.]
We spent our first night close to the farms of Barraga, a spot which
seemed especially remarkable for the clusters of trophies, all covered
with the skulls of baboons. Everywhere there seemed to be an extensive
cultivation of cassava, a product of the soil that seems hardly known
at all to the Bongo. Many things that I saw in their cultivation
bore evidence to their comparatively recent migration from the
country of the Niam-niam. Sweet-potatoes were as common as cassava,
and in addition to this were the ricinus, the edible solanum of the
Niam-niam, here called “dyooyo,” and the horse-bean (_Canavalia_),
which here bears the name of “nzerahno.” I also found a very peculiar
creeper, with a double horny or finger-shaped tuber attached to the
axils of the leaves, like the edible helmia, to which genus of plants
it doubtless belongs. It is transplanted by the natives from the
woods and trained in the neighbourhood of the huts, and is known
under the name of “karra.” I had already noticed this plant in the
Kredy villages on the Beery, where I was told that the tubers were
very much used as a purgative medicine; but amongst the Niam-niam,
who likewise occasionally cultivate it, I heard a different account.
There it was said that the tubers are looked upon as a sort of charm,
and it is believed that a good show of them upon the leaves is an
infallible prediction of a prolific hunting season. It was, moreover,
affirmed that if a huntsman wants to render his bow unerring in its
capabilities, he has only to hold it in his hand while he “slaughters”
one of the tubers over it, that is, takes a knife and cuts off the end
and chops it in pieces.
The first tract that we passed in our still eastward return route was
a uniformly thick wood, without any declivity at all in the ground,
or anything to indicate that it was ever broken by a watercourse or
standing pool of rain. About midday we made a halt at a marshy brook
named Kanda, now dry, and set to work to explore the neighbourhood
in the hopes of discovering some water, for, after a march of eleven
miles in the heat, we began to be suffering from thirst. After a long
search my people succeeded in meeting with a puddly slough, from which
the dirty superficies had to be carefully removed in order to get at a
little clear water. It was a disgusting swamp, the haunt of buffaloes
and wild boars, full of excrements and reeking with filth, a compound
of mould and ammonia. It was not until it had been strained through
handkerchiefs and well-boiled that the water was purified of its odious
smell. Only three miles farther on we had the good luck to find the
watercourse of the Telle, overshadowed by thick foliage and running in
a tolerably bright stream: a sufficient inducement to make the spot our
resting-place for the night.
On the third day of our march we again passed several dry khors that
had little pools of water in them, but very inadequate to our needs.
In one of these there was lurking a herd of hartebeests, which by the
greyish fawn-colour of their winter coats had quite an exceptional
appearance. Hundreds of maraboo-storks were congregated around a marshy
pond, where they were fishing for snails and worms.
[Sidenote: NO ROOF OVER-HEAD.]
At dinner we were again obliged to put up with the most abominable and
revolting of water; our stock of provisions was miserably short, and
although I had knocked over a few guinea-fowl, I had neither water in
which to boil them, nor grease in which to fry them. In the afternoon
we were startled by a storm, which, coming up from the north-east,
rolled away towards the south. We endeavoured to get shelter in the
wood beneath the thick foliage of the numerous great Lophira-trees, but
it was all in vain; for, after having waited till daylight was waning,
we were obliged to proceed in the darkness, and, thoroughly drenched to
the skin, marched for a couple of hours till we came to the banks of a
rivulet, where we were again overtaken by the rain.
A tedious, trying night, spent without a roof over my head, seemed to
fill up the cup of bitterness which I was destined to drink upon this
tour of privation. In the darkness no grass could be discovered, and
on account of the dampness of the atmosphere no fire could be kindled,
so that it was entirely without protection from the wet and cold that
I had wearily to await the following morning, when, half-perished
by exposure, in spite of the continued storm, I resumed my way, now
become more arduous than ever, because, as a result of the rain, it had
become exceedingly slippery. The rain of this night had been quite an
exception, and was very transient; it passed away, and the prevalence
of the north wind, during the last three days overpowered by a current
from the south-west, was for a time restored.
Never do I recollect having seen a more cheerful little people than
the Sehre, if I may judge them by those who acted as my bearers. No
mischance, no fatigue, no hunger nor thirst, seemed ever to take the
smallest effect upon the happy temperament of these poor negroes. As
soon as we halted they began their jokes and pranks. There was not a
woe-begone countenance to be seen; groans and sighs were utterly alien
to their disposition, and no sooner was their work over, toilsome as it
was, than they began to play, like a lot of boys fresh out of school.
Sometimes one would pretend to be a wild animal, and was chased by the
others; or sometimes they would contrive and carry out some practical
joke. Nothing seemed to entertain them more than to act the part of a
great clumsy tortoise, and to waddle about on all-fours, accompanying
their movements by all kinds of grunting and clacking noises. And all
this jocoseness went on while their stomachs were empty. “If we are
hungry,” they would say, “we sing, and forget it.”
We proceeded thirteen miles still eastward from the Telle, and then the
wooded country, which had continued in an unbroken succession of thick
trees of every variety all the way from the Pongo, came to an end. It
was succeeded by extensive steppes and marshy lowlands, which every
here and there was relieved by clusters of Terminaliæ. The lowland was
bounded towards the east by a range of hills, the base of which we
reached about four miles farther on. The direction of the elevated land
lay from the south-east to the north-west.
Deviating now from the east a little more to the north, our route
conducted us towards Ngulfala, a Seriba in Bongoland, about fourteen
miles away. We had to make our way through a complicated system of
rounded caps of gneiss, and to wind round flat-topped hills that gave
the district the aspect of being a miniature mountain-chain, the
source-land probably of the Ghetty and the watershed between that
stream and the Pongo. The rise in the ground was very obvious. The
highest of the rounded eminences, named Atyumm, was about 200 feet
above our path, and at least 500 feet above the adjacent steppe below;
it had a semi-spherical form, very like that of Gumango, near Bendo’s
village, in the Niam-niam country.
[Sidenote: NGULFALA.]
Before reaching Ngulfala we had to cross the Ghetty, here a meagre
stream, corresponding to the absorbing nature of the soil through which
it flows. The distance between the spot and where we had crossed it at
Bizelly’s Seriba is about forty miles, but the river presented just the
same aspect—a broad, deep rift in the earth, with its water almost
stationary in its pools. A considerable number of maraboo-storks were
seen, either standing upon the banks or dipping into the water-holes
for fish and mollusks (_Anodontæ_).
The altitude of the Seriba above the level of the sea was 1905 feet,
about 500 lower than Dehm Adlan; but it should be observed that an
accidental rise in the ground is made simply by the hill-system of
Atyumm, itself nearly 500 feet, so that (without allowing anything for
the cutting of the stream) the gradual descent of the land during the
thirty or thirty-five miles that it extends eastwards from the Pongo
must amount altogether to just about 1000 feet.
The lower level of the soil becomes more obvious still over the next
stretch of country. The nearest Seriba in Bongoland, called Moody,
belonged, like the one before it, to the possessions of Agahd; and the
thirteen or fourteen miles that led us there brought us over a tract of
perpetual marshes, the flat steppes that divided them being traversed
by five khors that we found perfectly dry. The names of these khors
were reported to me as the Mingangah, the Bolongoh, the Boddoowee, the
Doggolomah, and the Koddahirara, of which, if the testimony of my Bongo
bearers is to be trusted, the two former take their course northwards
to the Ghetty, and the three latter make their way southwards to the
Wow.
In Moody I took a day’s rest, as I had done in Ngulfala. I required it
very much, as I had taken a violent cold, and felt altogether weak and
out of sorts. Throughout the time we halted there was a strong north
wind blowing, very keen and chilly.
[Illustration: A Bongo concert.]
Feeling somewhat better towards evening, I took a short ramble amongst
the homesteads of the place. It was here that I came across the grave
of the departed Bongo chief Yanga, with its monumental erection, of
which I have already[80] given an illustration. The Bongo here seemed
to show a remarkable originality in their contrivances. In their huts
I was continually finding some furniture or implements which in other
parts of the country had long become obsolete. The variety of their
musical instruments, as I have described them in the chapter devoted
to their manners and customs, is very great, and to exemplify the use
of them, I may here introduce a sketch which represents four young men
whom I saw in Moody, and who had met together to while away the evening
by performing quartets.
[Sidenote: NORWAY RATS.]
The controller at Moody was in possession of a couple of
caracal-lynxes, which he had caught when they were quite young, and
which he was training, intending to send them when full-grown to
Khartoom. One of the Bongo men was employed in attending to them,
and in order to keep them supplied with food he was obliged to spend
the greater portion of his time in catching rats. He used to bring
them home, tied up in dozens, from the banks of the neighbouring
river-course. These rats were of a reddish-brown colour, with white
bellies, and were called “luny” by the Bongo; except that they are
smaller in size, they are very like what we know as “Norway rats.”
They are never found except in the proximity of water, and appear to
be indistinguishable from those which infest the huts and granaries
in every respect but in colour. Whether the Norway rats in their
dispersion have ever reached as far as these remote districts is a
question that I cannot answer, as the investigation of the specimens I
brought with me has not yet been completed.
Two leagues to the south-east of Moody lies a subsidiary Seriba of
Kurshook Ali’s, named Moddu-Mabah; and three leagues farther on in the
same direction is the chief Seriba of Hassaballa, known amongst the
Bongo as Gellow. This is situated on the hither side of the Wow, and
at no great distance from it. The narrow strip of land between the Wow
and the Dyoor contains at least half a dozen smaller Seribas, which lie
along the route to the Bellanda, and which belong partly to Kurshook
Ali and partly to Hassaballa.
The little Seriba Moody, together with all its huts, was overshadowed
by a single fig-tree, of such enormous growth that it was quite a
magnificent example of the development which that tree may attain. It
belonged to the species named the _Ficus lutea_, the mbehry of the
Bongo. It was not that the height of the stem of this giant of Moody
was very excessive; the remarkable growth displayed itself rather in
the prodigious thickness and spreading habits of the powerful arms,
every one of which was so massive that it might stand a comparison with
the stoutest of our pines and firs. The peculiar bark only appears on
parts of the stem; its colour is light grey, and, like that of the
plane, it is scored with diagonal lines. All the boughs, right up to
the highest, are furnished with external pendant roots, that hang in
the air like a huge beard; they encompass the trunk of the tree with
a regular network, like rope and string. But it should be observed of
this species that its principal branches altogether fail in throwing
out those perpendicular roots, which, falling straight downwards, find
their way into the earth and give such a remarkable appearance to trees
like those venerable sycamores of Egypt, which stand as though they
made the pillared corridor of a stately coliseum.[81]
[Sidenote: EFFECT OF THE EVIL EYE.]
A singular story was associated with this noble tree at Moody, and I
found the entire population of the Seriba still under the influence
of the astonishment and alarm that had only recently been excited. It
appeared that one of the great branches, having become worm-eaten and
decayed, had fallen to the ground, and as it fell would inevitably have
utterly smashed in a contiguous hut if it had tumbled in any other
direction than it did. This fall of the huge bough was attributed by
the Nubians to the direct agency of an “evil eye,” which it was alleged
had been directed against the tree by a soldier who had happened to be
passing through the place the day before my arrival. Just as usual the
people had been collected in front of their huts under shade of the
tree, when the man in question, pointing significantly to the bough,
said, “That bough up there is quite rotten; it would be a bad business
if it were to come tumbling down upon your heads.” No sooner said than
done. The words were hardly out of the fellow’s mouth before there was
a prodigious cracking and creaking, and down came the huge branch with
a crash to the ground. There lay the fragments. I heard the testimony
from the very lips of eye-witnesses, and what could I say?
It took us two days more to accomplish our return journey to Wow.
The chief Seriba of Agahd’s company lay to the north-east of Moody,
and, allowing for a slight deviation from the direct route, was about
thirty-five miles distant. The country was clothed with light bushwood,
but in no part did it exhibit anything like the same richness of
foliage as the western lands that we had left behind. We had to pass
over two low-lying marsh-districts, Katyirr and Dumburre, where, hidden
amongst the tall, half-withered grass, we found several cavities filled
by springs of water. At Dumburre we came across traces of a deserted
settlement, which, according to the statements of the Bongo of my
party, were the remains of the very earliest Seriba that had been
established in the land. Our night was spent upon the borders of a
marshy stream called the Moll, and was very uncomfortable on account of
a heavy north-east gale which blew from ten o’clock.
The dogs that were with me were kept in a constant state of excitement
by the perpetual rushing that went on in the bushwood, and it was
impossible to restrain them from rushing off into the darkness, and
carrying on a hunting game on their own account. All through the
night they kept running in and out of the camp, very often returning
bespattered with blood. A farther indication of the abundance of wild
animals that existed in the neighbourhood was afforded by the continual
howling of hyænas, which, in a manner that was quite unusual, kept us
disturbed all through the night.
For our supper that evening we had had a couple of fine reed-rats
measuring just twenty-one inches from their snouts to the root of the
tail. Before leaving Dumburre I had had a small steppe-burning of my
own. By the help of my bearers, who were set to the work of beating the
bush, I had quite an interesting hunt, the produce of which had been
two zebra-ichneumons and the two far-el-boos (reed-rats), which had
been carried with us in triumph to the camp.
Beyond the Moll we entered upon a hilly region, the ground being much
broken by scattered shrubs. On both sides of the pathway lines of red
rocky hills emerged in the distance, varied occasionally by flats and
rounded projections of the ever-abundant gneiss. The next watercourse
to which we came was the Dabohlo, a marshy spot, but now nearly dry,
upon which we could discern the traces of a large number of buffaloes.
Here, also, we had a very prolific _battue_ of guinea-fowl; for the
early morning hours had tempted them to collect by hundreds around the
little puddles which were left standing every here and there within the
limits of the marsh.
Far as the eye could reach there was nothing to be seen but a
gently-sloping steppe, entirely void of trees, which it took the
bearers 3000 paces to get over; but this accomplished, we reached a
depression in the same marsh-lands (now, however, perfectly dry) that
were relieved in various places by groups of Terminaliæ. Beyond this
the ground began to take a considerable ascent, the valley upon the
far east being bounded by a range of hills that ran from south-east to
north-west; and the rise continued through the four remaining miles
that brought us to the Seriba.
[Sidenote: RETURN TO MY FRIEND KHALIL.]
Thus, after forty-nine days’ absence, and numbering 876,000 paces
in the interval, I again returned to the quarters of my good friend
Khalil. While I had been away he had, for my special accommodation,
most considerately erected some new and pretty huts, in which I was
very pleased to spend the remainder of my sojourn.
FOOTNOTES:
[75]
Zwei Jahre schwanden, immer wandern
Noch die Zigeuner friedlich fort
Von einer Steppe zu der andern
Und finden gastlich jeden Ort;
Der jeden Bildungszwang verachtet,
Aleko ist so frei wie sie.
Nicht die Familie, wie sie waren,
Nichts weiss er mehr von frühern Jahren,
Ganz zum Zigeuner ward er schon.
(_German translation from Puschkin’s_ ‘TZIGANI.’)
[76] Barth, vol. iii., p. 578.
[77] Some geographers fall into error with respect to
this place by making Dar Sheela identical with
the well-known Dar Sileh or Dar Silah, which is a
different negro Mohammedan country, many of the people
of which I have seen.
[78] _Vide_ De Cadalvene et de Breuvery L’Egypte,
vol. ii. p. 237, where the Orientalist König
has given his interpretation of a map, which
Teïma-Walad-el-Sultan-Messabani (Governor of Kordofan,
subject to the control of Darfoor) had himself
projected.
[79] Fresnel pursued his researches in Djidda in the years
1848 and 1849.
[80] _Vide_ vol. i., Chap. VII.
[81] A sycamore of this description is to be seen on the
island of Rodah in Cairo, in the garden of the Duke of
Dumont, where the formation of pillars (promoted by
hanging pitchers of water on the branches) consists of
two perfectly concentric circles that girdle the whole
stem. This sycamore is one of the most remarkable
natural curiosities of Egypt, and is well worth a
visit.
[Illustration: SLAVE-TRADERS FROM KORDOFAN.]