fifty-eight miles broad, between the sea and the mountains. It
belonged to the Eesa, a tribe of Somali Bedouins, and how these
“sun-dwellers” could exist there was a mystery. On the second day we
reached a kraal consisting of gurgi, or diminutive hide huts. There
was no thorn fence as is required in the lion-haunted lands to the
west. The scene was characteristic of that pastoral life which
supplies poetry with Arcadian images and history with its blackest
tragedies. Whistling shepherds, tall thin men, spear in hand, bore the
younglings of the herd in their bosoms or drove to pasture the
long-necked camels preceded by a patriarch with a wooden bell. Patches
of Persian sheep with snowy bodies and jetty faces flecked the tawny
plain, and flocks of goats were committed to women dressed in skins
and boys who were unclad till the days of puberty. Some led the ram,
around whose neck a cord of white heather was tied for luck. Others
frisked with the dogs, animals by no means contemptible in the eyes of
these Bedouin Moslems. All begged for bori――the precious
tobacco――their only narcotic. They run away if they see smoke, and
they suspect a kettle to be a mortal weapon. So the Bachwanas called
our cannon, “pots.” Many of these wild people had never tasted grain
and had never heard of coffee or sugar. During the rains they lived on
milk; in the dries they ate meat, avoiding, however, the blood. Like
other races to the north and south, they would not touch fish or
birds, which they compared to snakes and vultures. “Speak not to me
with that mouth that has tasted fish!” is a dire insult.
The Eesa were a typical Somali tribe; it might have numbered one
hundred thousand spears, and it had a bad name. “Treacherous as an
Eesa,” is a proverb at Zayla, where it is said these savages would
offer you a bowl of milk with the left hand and would stab you with
the right. Their lives were spent in battle and murder.
The next march, a total of fifty-two miles, nearly lost us. Just
before reaching the mountains which subtend the coast, we crossed the
warm trail of a razzia, or cavalcade: some two hundred of the Habr
Awal, our inveterate enemies, had been scouring the country. Robinson
Crusoe was less scared by the footprint than were my companions. Our
weak party numbered only nine men, of whom all except Mohammed and
Guled were useless, and the first charge would have been certain
death.
Escaping this danger, we painfully endured the rocks and thorns of the
mountains and wilds. The third march placed us at Halimalah, a sacred
tree about half-way between this coast and our destination――Harar. It
is a huge sycamore suggesting the hiero-sykaminon of Egypt. The Gallas
are still tree-worshippers, and the Somali respect this venerable
vegetable as do the English their Druidical mistletoe.
We were well received at the kers (the kraals or villages). They were
fenced with large and terrible thorns, an effectual defence against
barelegged men. The animals had a place apart――semi-circular beehives
made of grass mats mounted on sticks. The furniture consisted of
weapons, hides, wooden pillows and mats for beds, pots of woven fibre,
and horse gear. We carried our own dates and rice, we bought meat and
the people supplied us with milk gratis――to sell it was a disgrace.
Fresh milk was drunk only by the civilised; pastoral people preferred
it when artificially curdled and soured.
We soon rose high above sea-level, as the cold nights and the burning
suns told us. The eighth march placed us on the Ban Marar, a plain
twenty-seven miles broad――at that season a waterless stubble, a yellow
nap, dotted with thorny trees and bushes, and at all times infamous
for robbery and murder. It was a glorious place for game: in places it
was absolutely covered with antelopes, and every random shot must have
told in the immense herds.
Here I had the distinction of being stalked by a lion. As night drew
in we were urging our jaded mules over the western prairie towards a
dusky line of hills. My men proceeded whilst I rode in rear with a
double-barrelled gun at full cock across my knees. Suddenly my animal
trembled and bolted forward with a sidelong glance of fear. I looked
back and saw, within some twenty yards, the king of beasts creeping up
silently as a cat. To fire both barrels in the direction of my stalker
was the work of a second. I had no intention of hitting, as aim could
not be taken in the gloaming, and to wound would have been fatal. The
flame and the echoed roar from the hills made my friend slink away.
Its intention was, doubtless, to crawl within springing distance and
then by a bound on my neck to have finished my journey through
Somaliland and through life. My companions shouted in horror “Libah!
libah!”――“The lion! the lion!”――and saw a multitude of lions that
night.
After crossing the desert prairie, we entered the hills of the
agricultural Somali, the threshold of the South Abyssinian mountains.
The pastoral scene now changed for waving crops of millet, birds in
flights, and hedged lanes, where I saw with pleasure the dog-rose.
Guided by a wild fellow called Altidon, we passed on to the Sagharah,
the village of the Gerad, or chief, Adan. He had not a good name, and
I was afterwards told he was my principal danger. But we never went
anywhere without our weapons, and the shooting of a few vultures on
the wing was considered a great feat where small shot is unknown. “He
brings down birds from the sky!” exclaimed the people.
I must speak of the Gerad, however, as I found him――a civil and
hospitable man, greedy, of course, suspicious, and of shortsighted
policy.
His good and pretty wife Kayrah was very kind, and supplied me with
abundance of honey wine, the merissa of Abyssinia. It tasted like
champagne to a palate long condemned to total abstinence, without even
tea.
We were now within thirty direct miles of Harar, and my escort made a
great stand. The chief Adan wanted to monopolise us and our goods. My
men, therefore, were threatened with smallpox, the bastinado, lifelong
captivity in unlit dungeons, and similar amenities.
On June 2nd, 1855, sent for our mules. They were missing. An
unpleasantness was the consequence, and the animals appeared about
noon. I saddled my own――no one would assist me. When, mounted and gun
in hand, I rode up to my followers, who sat sulkily on the ground, and
observing that hitherto their acts had not been those of the brave, I
suggested that before returning to Aden we should do something of
manliness. They arose, begged me not to speak such words, and offered
to advance if I would promise to reward them should we live and to pay
blood-money to their friends in case of the other contingency. They
apparently attached much importance to what is vulgarly termed
“cutting up well.”
Now, however, we were talking reason, and I settled all difficulties
by leaving a letter addressed to the Political Resident at Aden.
Mohammed and Guled were chosen to accompany me, the rest remaining
with the Gerad Adan. I must say for my companions that once in the
saddle they shook off their fears; they were fatalists, and they
believed in my star, whilst they had the fullest confidence in their
pay or pension.
The country now became romantic and beautiful――a confusion of lofty
stony mountains, plantations of the finest coffee, scatters of
villages, forests of noble trees, with rivulets of the coolest and
clearest water. We here stood some five thousand five hundred feet
high, and although only nine degrees removed from the Line, the air
was light and pleasant. It made me remember the climate of Aden, and
hate it.
We slept _en route_, and on January 3rd we first sighted Harar City.
On the crest of a hill distant two miles it appeared, a long sombre
line strikingly contrasting with the whitewashed settlements of the
more civilised East, and nothing broke the outline except the two grey
and rudely shaped minarets of the Jami, or Maritz (cathedral). I
almost grudged the exposure of three lives to win so paltry a prize.
But of all Europeans who had attempted it before me not one had
succeeded in entering that ugly pile of stones.
We then approached the city gate and sat there, as is the custom, till
invited to enter. Presently we were ordered to the palace by a
chamberlain, a man with loud and angry voice and eyes.
At the entrance of the palace we dismounted by command, and we were
told to run across the court, which I refused to do. We were then
placed under a tree in one corner of the yard and to the right of the
palace. The latter is a huge, windowless barn of rough stone and red
clay, without other insignia but a thin coat of whitewash over the
doorway.
Presently we were beckoned in and told to doff our slippers. A curtain
was raised, and we stood in the presence of the then Amir of Harar,
Sultan Ahmed bin Sultan Abibaki.
The sight was savage, if not imposing. The hall of audience was a dark
room, eighty to ninety feet long, and its whitewashed walls were hung
with rusty fetters and bright matchlocks. At the further end, on a
common East Indian cane sofa, sat a small yellow personage――the great
man. He wore a flowing robe of crimson cloth edged with snowy fur, and
a narrow white turban twisted round a tall conical cap of red velvet.
Ranged in double ranks perpendicular to the presence and nearest to
the chief were his favourites and courtiers, with right arms bared
after the fashion of Abyssinia. Prolonging these parallel lines
towards the door were Galla warriors, wild men with bushy wigs.
Shining rings of zinc on their arms, wrists, and ankles formed their
principal attire. They stood motionless as statues; not an eye moved,
and each right hand held up a spear with an enormous head of metal,
the heel being planted in the ground.
I entered with a loud “As ’salem alaykum”――“Peace be upon ye!”――and
the normal answer was returned. A pair of chamberlains then led me
forward to bow over the chief’s hand. He directed me to sit on a mat
opposite to him, and with lowering brow and inquisitive glance he
asked what might be my business in Harar. It was the crisis. I
introduced myself as an Englishman from Aden coming to report that
certain changes had taken place there, in the hope that the “cordial
intent” might endure between the kingdoms of Harar and England.
The Amir smiled graciously. I must admit that the smile was a relief
to me. It was a joy to my attendants, who sat on the ground behind
their master, grey-brown with emotion, and mentally inquiring, “What
next?”
The audience over, we were sent to one of the Amir’s houses, distant
about one hundred paces from the palace. Here cakes of sour maize
(fuba), soaked in curdled milk, and lumps of beef plenteously powdered
with pepper, awaited us. Then we were directed to call upon Gerad
Mohammed, Grand Vizier of Harar. He received us well, and we retired
to rest not dissatisfied with the afternoon’s work. We had eaten the
chief’s bread and salt.
During my ten days’ stay at Harar I carefully observed the place and
its people. The city was walled and pierced with five large gates,
flanked by towers, but was ignorant of cannon. The streets――narrow
lanes strewed with rocks and rubbish――were formed by houses built of
granite and sandstone from the adjacent mountains. The best abodes
were double storied, long and flat roofed, with holes for windows
placed jealously high up, and the doors were composed of a single
plank. The women, I need hardly say, had separate apartments. The city
abounded in mosques――plain buildings without minarets――and the
graveyards were stuffed with tombs――oblongs formed by slabs placed
edgeways in the ground.
The people, numbering about eight thousand souls, had a bad name among
their neighbours. The Somali say that Harar is a “paradise inhabited
by asses”; and “hard as the heart of Harar” is a byword. The junior
members of the royal family were imprisoned till wanted for the
throne. Amongst the men I did not see a handsome face or hear one
pleasant voice. The features were harsh and plain, the skin was a
sickly brown, the hair and beard were short and untractable, and the
hands and feet were large and coarse. They were celebrated for laxity
of morals, fondness for strong waters, much praying, coffee-drinking,
and chewing tobacco and kat, a well-known theme plant. They had a
considerable commerce with the coast, which was reached by a large
caravan once a year.
The women were beautiful by the side of their lords. They had small
heads, regular profiles, straight noses, large eyes, mouths almost
Caucasian, and light brown skins. The hair, parted in the centre and
gathered into two large bunches behind the ears, was covered with dark
blue muslin or network, whose ends were tied under the chin. Girls
collected their locks, which were long, thick, and wavy――not
wiry――into a knot _à la Diane_; a curtain of short close plaits
escaping from the bunch fell upon the shoulders. The dress was a wide
frock of chocolate or indigo-dyed cotton, girt round the middle with a
sash; before and behind there was a triangle of scarlet with the point
downwards. The ornaments were earrings and necklaces of black buffalo
horn, the work of Western India. The bosom was tattooed with stars,
the eyebrows were lengthened with dyes, the eyes were fringed with
antimony, and the palms and soles were stained red. Those pretty faces
had harsh voices, their manners were rude, and I regret to say that an
indiscreet affection for tobacco and honey wine sometimes led to a
public bastinado.
At Harar was a university which supplied Somaliland with poor scholars
and crazy priests. There were no endowments for students――learning was
its own reward――and books (manuscripts) were rare and costly. Only
theology was studied. Some of the graduates had made a name in the
Holy Land of Arabia, where few ranked higher than my friend Shaykh
Jami el Berteri. To be on the safer side he would never touch tobacco
or coffee. I liked his conversation, but I eschewed his dinners.
Harar――called Gay or Harar Gay by her sons――is the capital of Hadiyah,
a province of the ancient Zala empire, and her fierce Moslems nearly
extirpated Christianity from Shoa and Amara. The local Attila Mohammed
Gragne, or the “Left-Handed,” slew in 1540 David III., the last
Ethiopian monarch who styled himself “King of Kings.”
David’s successor, Claudius, sent imploring messages to Europe, and D.
Joao III. ordered the chivalrous Stephen and Christopher da Gama, sons
of Vasco da Gama, to the rescue. The Portuguese could oppose only
three hundred and fifty muskets and a rabble rout of Abyssinians to
ten thousand Moslems. D. Christopher was wounded, taken prisoner, and
decapitated. Good Father Lobo declares that “where the martyr’s head
fell, a fountain sprung up of wonderful virtue, which cured many
hopeless diseases.”
Eventually Gragne was shot by one Pedro Leao, a Portuguese soldier who
was bent upon revenging his leader’s fall. The Moslem’s wife,
Tamwalbara, prevented the dispersion of the army, making a slave
personate her dead husband, and drew off his forces in safety. A
strong-minded woman!
My days at Harar were dull enough. At first we were visited by all the
few strangers of the city, but they soon thought it prudent to shun
us. The report of my “English brethren” being on the coast made them
look upon me as a mufsid, or dangerous man. The Somali, on the other
hand, in compliment to my attendants, were most attentive. It was
harvest home, and we had opportunity of seeing the revels of the
threshers and reapers――a jovial race, slightly “dipsomaniac.”
Harar also was the great half-way house and resting place for slaves
between Abyssinia and the coast. In making purchases, the adage was,
“If you want a brother in battle, buy a Nubian; if you would be rich,
an Abyssinian; if you require an ass, a negro.”
I sometimes called upon the learned and religious, but not
willingly――these shaykhash, or reverend men, had proposed detaining me
until duly converted and favoured with a “call.” Harar, like most
African cities, was a prison on a large scale. “You enter it by your
own will; you leave it by another’s,” is the pithy saw.
At length, when really anxious to depart, and when my two Somali had
consulted their rosaries for the thousandth time, I called upon the
Gerad Mohammed, who had always been civil to us. He was suffering from
a chronic bronchitis. Here, then, lay my chance of escaping from my
rat-trap. The smoke of some brown paper matches steeped in saltpetre
relieved him. We at once made a bargain. The minister was to take me
before the Amir and secure for me a ceremonious dismission. On the
other part, I bound myself to send up from the coast a lifelong supply
of the precious medicine. We both kept faith. Moreover, after
returning to Aden I persuaded the authorities to reward with handsome
presents the men who held my life in their hands and yet did not take
it.
After a pleasing interview with the Amir, who did his best to smile,
we left Harar on January 13th, 1855. At Sagharah, where the villagers
had prayed the death-prayer as we set out for the city, we were
received with effusion. They now scattered over us handfuls of toasted
grain, and they danced with delight, absorbing copious draughts of
liquor. The “End of Time” wept crocodile’s tears, and the women were
grateful that their charms had not been exposed to the terrible
smallpox.
After a week’s rest we prepared to make the coast. I was desirous of
striking Berbera, a port south of Zayla, where my friends awaited me.
The escort consented to accompany me by the short direct road, on
condition of travelling night and day. They warned me that they had a
blood feud with all the tribes on the path, that we should find very
little water and no provisions, and that the heat would be frightful.
Truly, a pleasant prospect for a weary man!
But if they could stand it, so could I. The weaker attendants, the
women, and the camels were sent back by the old path, and I found
myself _en route_ on January 26th, accompanied by my two Somali and by
a wild guide known as Dubayr――the “Donkey.” My provaunt for five days
consisted of five biscuits, a few limes, and sundry lumps of sugar.
I will not deny that the ride was trying work. The sun was fearful,
the nights were raw and damp. For twenty-four hours we did not taste
water; our brains felt baked, our throats burned, the mirage mocked us
at every turn, and the effect was a kind of monomania. At length a
small bird showed us a well and prevented, I believe, our going mad.
The scenery was uniform and uninteresting――horrid hills upon which
withered aloes raised their spears; plains apparently rained upon by
showers of fire and stones, and rolling ground rich only in “wait a
bit” thorns, made to rend man’s skin and garment. We scrupulously
avoided the kraals, and when on one occasion the wild people barred
the way we were so intolerably fierce with hunger and thirst that they
fled from us as though we were fiends. The immortal Ten Thousand
certainly did not sight the cold waters of the Euxine with more
delight than we felt when hailing the warm bay of Berbera. I ended
that toilsome ride to and from Harar of two hundred and forty miles at
2 a.m. on January 30th, 1855, after a last spell of forty miles. A
glad welcome from my brother expeditionists soon made amends for past
privations and fatigues.
* * * * *
And now to recount the most unpleasant part of my first adventure in
East Africa.
Having paid a visit to Aden, I returned to Berbera in April, 1855,
prepared to march upon the head waters of the Nile.
But Fate and the British authorities were against me. I had done too
much――I had dared to make Berbera a rival port. They were not
scrupulous at Aden, even to the taking of life.
My little party consisted of forty-two muskets, including three
officers and myself. The men, however, were not to be trusted, but
after repeated applications I could not obtain an escort of Somali
policemen. Matters looked ugly, and the more so as there was no
retreat.
The fair of Berbera, which had opened in early October, was breaking
up, and the wild clansmen were retiring from the seaboard to their
native hills. The harbour rapidly emptied; happily, however, for us, a
single boat remained there.
We slept comfortably on April 18th, agreeing to have a final shot at
the gazelles before marching. Between 2 a.m. and 3 a.m. we were roused
by a rush of men like a roar of a stormy wind. I learned afterwards
that our enemies numbered between three and four hundred. We armed
ourselves with all speed, whilst our party, after firing a single
volley, ran away as quickly as possible.
[Illustration: THE ATTACK ON THE CAMP AT BERBERA. [_See Page 96._]
The unfortunate Lieutenant Stroyan was run through with a spear; he
slept far from us, and we did not see him fall. Lieutenants Herne and
Speke and I defended ourselves in our tent till the savages proceeded
to beat it down. I then gave the word to sally, and cleared the way
with my sabre. Lieutenant Herne accompanied me and――wonderful to
relate――escaped without injury. Lieutenant Speke was seized and tied
up; he had eleven spear-thrusts before he could free himself, and he
escaped by a miracle. When outside the camp, I vainly tried once more
to bring up our men to the fray. Finding me badly hurt they carried me
on board the boat. Here I was joined by the survivors, who carried
with them the corpse of our ill-fated friend.
Sad and dispirited, we returned to Aden. We had lost our property as
well as our blood, and I knew too well that we should be rewarded with
nothing but blame. The authorities held a Court of Inquiry in my
absence, and facetiously found that we and not they were in fault.
Lord Dalhousie, the admirable statesman then governing in general
British India, declared that they were quite right. I have sometimes
thought they were.
_TO THE HEART OF AFRICA_
1856-1859
I
_THE JOURNEY_
I had long wished to “unveil Isis”――in other words, to discover the
sources of the Nile and the Lake regions of Central Africa――and to
this end I left London in September, 1856, for Bombay. Here I applied
for Captain Speke to accompany me as second in command, as he wished
much to go. My subsequent dispute with Speke is well known, and I will
not refer to it here. I took him with me out of pure good nature, for,
as he had suffered with me in purse and person at Berbera the year
before, I thought it only just to offer him the opportunity of
renewing an attempt to penetrate to the unknown regions of Central
Africa. I had no other reasons. He was not a linguist, nor a man of
science, nor an astronomical observer, and during the expedition he
acted in a subordinate capacity only. The Court of Directors refused
him leave, but I obtained it from the local authorities in Bombay. I
may here add that the Royal Geographical Society had given me a grant
of £1,000, and that the Court of Directors of the East India Company
had given me two years’ leave.
I landed at Zanzibar from Bombay on December 19th, 1856, and received
much kindness from Lieutenant-Colonel Hamerton, Her Majesty’s Consul.
First of all I made an experimental trip, and this and the study of
Zanzibar occupied my time until May 14th, 1857, when I left Zanzibar
for the second time, and on the 27th of the same month I landed at
Wale Point, on the east coast of Africa, about eighty-four miles from
the town of Bagamoyo.
I wanted to engage one hundred and seventy porters, but could only get
thirty-six, and thirty animals were found, which were all dead in six
months, so I had to leave a part of my things behind, including a
greater part of my ammunition and my iron boat. I paid various visits
to the hippopotamus haunts, and had my boat uplifted from the water
upon the points of two tusks, which made corresponding holes in the
bottom. My escort were under the impression that nothing less than one
hundred and fifty guns and several cannon would enable them to fight a
way through the perils of the interior. I was warned that I must pass
through savages who shot with poisoned arrows, that I must avoid
trees――which was not easy in a land of forest――that the Wazaramo had
forbidden white men to enter their country, that one rhinoceros had
killed two hundred men, that armies of elephants would attack my camp
by night, and that the hyena was more dangerous than the Bengal
tiger――altogether, not a cheerful outlook.