[1] I cannot guess why Bartema decided "Barbara" to be an island, except
that he used "insula" in the sense of "peninsula." The town is at very
high tides flooded round, but the old traveller manifestly speaks of the
country.
[2] These are the four martello towers erected, upon the spot where the
town of huts generally stands, by the Hajj Sharmarkay, who garrisoned them
with thirty Arab and Negro matchlockmen. They are now in ruins, having
been dismantled by orders from Aden.
[3] The former is an Arab craft, the latter belongs to the Northern Coasts
of Western India.
[4] A turban.
[5] The wild animals have now almost entirely disappeared. As will
afterwards be shown, the fair since 1848 has diminished to one third its
former dimensions.
[6] This subject has been fully discussed in Chap. IV.
[7] The old Persians.
[8] Especially the sea-board Habr Gerbajis clans,--the Musa Arrah, the Ali
Said, and the Saad Yunis--are interested in asserting their claims.
[9] Yunis and Ahmed were brothers, children of Nuh, the ninth in descent
from Ishak el Hazrami. The former had four sons, Hosh Yunis, Gedid Yunis,
Mahmud Yunis, and Shirdon Yunis; their descendants are all known as the
Ayyal or progeny of Yunis. The Ayyal Ahmed Nuh hold the land immediately
behind the town, and towards the Ghauts, blend with the Eesa Musa. The
Mikahil claim the Eastern country from Siyaro to Illanti, a wooded valley
affording good water and bad anchorage to wind-bound vessels.
[10] In the centre of the gap is a detached rock called Daga Malablay.
[11] It was measured by Lt. Herne, who remarks of this range that "cold in
winter, as the presence of the pine-tree proves, and cooled in summer by
the Monsoon, abounding in game from a spur fowl to an elephant; this hill
would make an admirable Sanitarium." Unfortunately Gulays is tenanted by
the Habr Gerhajis, and Wagar by the Eesa Musa, treacherous races.
[12] This part of Somali land is a sandy plain, thinly covered with thorns
and bounded by two ranges, the Ghauts and Sub-Ghauts. The latter or
maritime mountains begin at Tajurrah, and extend to Karam (long. 46° E.),
where they break into detached groups; the distance from the coast varies
from 6 to 15 miles, the height from 2000 to 3000 feet, and the surface is
barren, the rock being denuded of soil by rain. The Ghauts lie from 8 to
40 miles from the sea, they average from 4000 to 6000 feet, are thickly
covered with gum-arabic and frankincense trees, the wild fig and the
Somali pine, and form the seaward wall of the great table-land of the
interior. The Northern or maritime face is precipitous, the summit is
tabular and slopes gently southwards. The general direction is E. by N.
and W. by S., there are, however, some spurs at the three hills termed
"Ourat," which project towards the north. Each portion of the plain
between these ranges has some local name, such as the "Shimberali Valley"
extending westwards from the detached hill Dimoli, to Gauli, Dinanjir and
Gularkar. Intersected with Fiumaras which roll torrents during the
monsoon, they are covered with a scrub of thorns, wild fig, aloe, and
different kinds of Cactus.
[13] The climate of Berberah is cool during the winter, and though the sun
is at all times burning, the atmosphere, as in Somali land generally, is
healthy. In the dry season the plain is subject to great heats, but lying
open to the north, the sea-breeze is strong and regular. In the monsoon
the air is cloudy, light showers frequently fall, and occasionally heavy
storms come up from the southern hills.
[14] I quote Lieut. Cruttenden. The Berberah water has acquired a bad name
because the people confine themselves to digging holes three or four feet
deep in the sand, about half-a-mile from high-water mark. They are
reconciled to it by its beneficial effects, especially after and before a
journey. Good water, however, can be procured in any of the Fiumaras
intersecting the plain; when the Hajj Sharmarkay's towers commanded the
town wells, the people sank pits in low ground a few hundred yards
distant, and procured a purer beverage. The Banyans, who are particular
about their potations, drink the sweet produce of Siyaro, a roadstead
about nineteen miles eastward of Berberah.
[15] The experiment was tried by an officer who brought from Bombay a
batch of sparrows and crows. The former died, scorbutic I presume; the
latter lingered through an unhappy life, and to judge from the absence of
young, refused to entail their miseries upon posterity.
[16] The climate of Aden, it may be observed, has a reputation for
salubrity which it does not deserve. The returns of deaths prove it to be
healthy for the European soldier as London, and there are many who have
built their belief upon the sandy soil of statistics. But it is the
practice of every sensible medical man to hurry his patients out of Aden;
they die elsewhere,--some I believe recover,--and thus the deaths caused
by the crater are attributed statistically to Bombay or the Red Sea.
Aden is for Asiatics a hot-bed of scurry and ulcer. Of the former disease
my own corps, I am informed, had in hospital at one time 200 cases above
the usual amount of sickness; this arises from the brackish water, the
want of vegetables, and lastly the cachexy induced by an utter absence of
change, diversion, and excitement. The ulcer is a disease endemic in
Southern Arabia; it is frequently fatal, especially to the poorer classes
of operatives, when worn out by privation, hardship, and fatigue.
[17] The Abban is now the pest of Berberah. Before vessels have cast
anchor, or indeed have rounded the Spit, a crowd of Somal, eager as hotel-
touters, may be seen running along the strand. They swim off, and the
first who arrives on board inquires the name of the Abban; if there be
none he touches the captain or one of the crew and constitutes himself
protector. For merchandise sent forward, the man who conveys it becomes
answerable.
The system of dues has become complicated. Formerly, the standard of value
at Berberah was two cubits of the blue cotton-stuff called Sauda; this is
now converted into four pice of specie. Dollars form the principal
currency; rupees are taken at a discount. Traders pay according to degree,
the lowest being one per cent., taken from Muscat and Suri merchants. The
shopkeeper provides food for his Abban, and presents him at the close of
the season with a Tobe, a pair of sandals, and half-a-dozen dollars.
Wealthy Banyans and Mehmans give food and raiment, and before departure
from 50 to 200 dollars. This class, however, derives large profits; they
will lend a few dollars to the Bedouin at the end of the Fair, on
condition of receiving cent. per cent., at the opening of the next season.
Travellers not transacting business must feed the protector, but cannot
properly be forced to pay him. Of course the Somal take every advantage of
Europeans. Mr. Angelo, a merchant from Zanzibar, resided two months at
Bulhar; his broker of the Ayyal Gedid tribe, and an Arab who accompanied
him, extracted, it is said, 3000 dollars. As a rule the Abban claims one
per cent. on sales and purchases, and two dollars per head of slaves. For
each bale of cloth, half-a-dollar in coin is taken; on gums and coffee the
duty is one pound in twenty-seven. Cowhides pay half-a-dollar each, sheep
and goat's skins four pice, and ghee about one per cent.
Lieut. Herne calculates that the total money dues during the Fair-season
amount to 2000 dollars, and that, in the present reduced state of
Berberah, not more than 10,000_l._ worth of merchandize is sold. This
estimate the natives of the place declare to be considerably under the
mark.
[18] The similarity between the Persian "Gach" and this cement, which is
found in many ruins about Berberah, has been remarked by other travellers.
[19] The following note by Dr. Carter of Bombay will be interesting to
Indian geologists.
"Of the collection of geological specimens and fossils from Berberah above
mentioned, Lieut. Burton states that the latter are found on the plain of
Berberah, and the former in the following order between the sea and the
summits of mountains (600 feet high), above it--that is, the ridge
immediate behind Berberah.
"1. Country along the coast consists of a coralline limestone, (tertiary
formation,) with drifts of sand, &c. 2. Sub-Ghauts and lower ranges (say
2000 feet high), of sandstone capped with limestone, the former
preponderating. 3. Above the Ghauts a plateau of primitive rocks mixed
with sandstone, granite, syenite, mica schiste, quartz rock, micaceous
grit, &c.
"The fawn-coloured fossils from his coralline limestone are evidently the
same as those of the tertiary formation along the south-east coast of
Arabia, and therefore the same as those of Cutch; and it is exceedingly
interesting to find that among the blue-coloured fossils which are
accompanied by specimens of the blue shale, composing the beds from which
they have been weathered out, are species of Terebratula Belemnites,
identical with those figured in Grant's Geology of Cutch; thus enabling us
to extend those beds of the Jurassic formation which exist in Cutch, and
along the south-eastern coast of Arabia, across to Africa."
[20] These animals are tolerably tame in the morning, as day advances
their apprehension of man increases.
[21] Lieut. Cruttenden in considering what nation could have constructed,
and at what period the commerce of Berberah warranted, so costly an
undertaking, is disposed to attribute it to the Persian conquerors of Aden
in the days of Anushirwan. He remarks that the trade carried on in the Red
Sea was then great, the ancient emporia of Hisn Ghorab and Aden prosperous
and wealthy, and Berberah doubtless exported, as it does now, ivory, gums,
and ostrich feathers. But though all the maritime Somali country abounds
in traditions of the Furs or ancient Persians, none of the buildings near
Berberah justify our assigning to them, in a country of monsoon rain and
high winds, an antiquity of 1300 years.
The Somal assert that ten generations ago their ancestors drove out the
Gallas from Berberah, and attribute these works to the ancient Pagans.
That nation of savages, however, was never capable of constructing a
scientific aqueduct. I therefore prefer attributing these remains at
Berberah to the Ottomans, who, after the conquest of Aden by Sulayman
Pacha in A.D. 1538, held Yemen for about 100 years, and as auxiliaries of
the King of Adel, penetrated as far as Abyssinia. Traces of their
architecture are found at Zayla and Harar, and according to tradition,
they possessed at Berberah a settlement called, after its founder, Bunder
Abbas.
[22] Here, as elsewhere in Somali land, the leech is of the horse-variety.
It might be worth while to attempt breeding a more useful species after
the manner recommended by Capt. R. Johnston, the Sub-Assistant Commissary
General in Sindh (10th April, 1845). In these streams leeches must always
be suspected; inadvertently swallowed, they fix upon the inner coat of the
stomach, and in Northern Africa have caused, it is said, some deaths among
the French soldiers.
[23] Yet we observed frogs and a small species of fish.
[24] Either this or the sulphate of magnesia, formed by the decomposition
of limestone, may account for the bitterness of the water.
[25] They had been in some danger: a treacherous murder perpetrated a few
days before our arrival had caused all the Habr Gerbajis to fly from the
town and assemble 5000 men at Bulhar for battle and murder. This
proceeding irritated the Habr Awal, and certainly, but for our presence,
the strangers would have been scurvily treated by their "cousins."
[26] Of all the slave-dealers on this coast, the Arabs are the most
unscrupulous. In 1855, one Mohammed of Muscat, a shipowner, who, moreover,
constantly visits Aden, bought within sight of our flag a free-born Arab
girl of the Yafai tribe, from the Akarib of Bir Hamid, and sold her at
Berberah to a compatriot. Such a crime merits severe punishment; even the
Abyssinians visit with hanging the Christian convicted of selling a fellow
religionist. The Arab slaver generally marries his properly as a ruse, and
arrived at Muscat or Bushire, divorces and sells them. Free Somali women
have not unfrequently met with this fate.
[27] The Habr Tul Jailah (mother of the tribe of Jailah) descendants of
Ishak el Hazrami by a slave girl, inhabit the land eastward of Berberah.
Their principal settlements after Aynterad are the three small ports of
Karam, Unkor, and Hays. The former, according to Lieut. Cruttenden, is
"the most important from its possessing a tolerable harbour, and from its
being the nearest point from Aden, the course to which place is N. N. W.,
--consequently the wind is fair, and the boats laden with sheep for the
Aden market pass but one night at sea, whilst those from Berberah are
generally three. What greatly enhances the value of Kurrum (Karam),
however, is its proximity to the country of the Dulbahanteh, who approach
within four days of Kurrum, and who therefore naturally have their chief
trade through that port. The Ahl Tusuf, a branch of the Habertel Jahleh,
at present hold possession of Kurrum, and between them and the tribes to
windward there exists a most bitter and irreconcileable feud, the
consequence of sundry murders perpetrated about five years since at
Kurrum, and which hitherto have not been avenged. The small ports of
Enterad, Unkor, Heis, and Rukudah are not worthy of mention, with the
exception of the first-named place, which has a trade with Aden in sheep."