[Footnote 62: The following is a loose translation of the

document:—“Praise be to the only God, and peace to

our Prophet Mohamed, and his followers!—Made free by Rais

Khaleel-ben-Inglise, a young black, called Abdelahy, of Mandara,

from the hands of Abdi Nibbe-ben-Attaia Towerga, for the sum

of thirty-six Spanish dollars, which the said Abdi Nibbe has

received—Rais Khaleel giving freedom to the said slave,

over whom he has no power, nor any other person whatever; and

the said Abdelahy is in full enjoyment of all the privileges of

Musselmans. In the presence of us, the parties being in possession

of their senses and faculties. Given this 16 Rabbia-attani, 1240, di

Hegira—Mohamed-ben-Zein-Abeedeen-ben-Hamet-Ben-Mohamed-Ben-Omeran,

Mahmoud-ben-Hagi, Solyman.”]

SUPPLEMENTAL CHAPTER ON BORNOU.

* * * * *

Bornou, a kingdom of Central Africa, is comprehended, in its present

state, between the 15th and 10th parallel northern latitude, and

the 12th and 18th of east longitude. It is bounded on the north

by part of Kanem and the desert; on the east, by the Lake Tchad,

which covers several thousand miles of country, and contains many

inhabited islands; on the south-east by the kingdom of Loggun and

the river Shary, which divides Bornou from the kingdom of Begharmi,

and loses itself in the waters of the Tchad; on the south by Mandara,

an independent kingdom, situated at the foot of an extensive range

of primitive mountains; and on the west by Soudan. The heat is

excessive, but not uniform; from March to the end of June being the

period when the sun has most power. At this season, about two hours

after noon, the thermometer will rise sometimes to 105 and 107;

and suffocating and scorching winds from the south and south-east

prevail. The nights are dreadfully oppressive; the thermometer

not falling much below 100°, until a few hours before day-light;

when 86 or 88 denote comparative freshness. Towards the middle of

May, Bornou is visited by violent tempests of thunder, lightning,

and rain. Yet in such a dry state is the earth at this time, and so

quickly is the water absorbed, that the inhabitants scarcely feel

the inconvenience of the season. Considerable damage is done to the

cattle and the people by the lightning. They now prepare the ground

for their corn; and it is all in the earth before the end of June,

when the lakes and rivers begin to overflow; and from the extreme

flatness of the country, tracks of many miles are quickly converted

into large lakes of water. Nearly constant rains now deluge the land

with cloudy, damp, sultry weather. The winds are hot and violent,

and generally from the east and south.

In October the winter season commences; the rains are less frequent,

and the harvest near the towns is got in; the air is milder and more

fresh, the weather serene: breezes blow from the north-west, and

with a clearer atmosphere. Towards December, and in the beginning

of January, Bornou is colder than from its situation might be

expected. The thermometer will, at no part of the day, mount higher

than 74 or 75; and in the morning descends to 58 and 60.

It is these cold fresh winds from the north and north-west that

restore health and strength to the inhabitants, who suffer during

the damp weather from dreadful attacks of fever and ague, which

carry off great numbers every year. The inhabitants are numerous;

the principal towns or cities are thirteen. Ten different languages,

or dialects of the same language, are spoken in the empire. The

Shouaas have brought with them the Arabic, which they speak nearly

pure. They are divided into tribes, and bear still the names of

some of the most formidable of the Bedouin hordes of Egypt. They

are a deceitful, arrogant, and cunning race; great charm writers;

and by pretending to a natural gift of prophecy, they find an easy

entrance into the houses of the black inhabitants of the towns,

where their pilfering propensities often show themselves. The strong

resemblance they bear, both in features and habits, to some of our

gipsy tribes, is particularly striking. It is said that Bornou can

muster 15,000 Shouaas in the field mounted. They are the greatest

breeders of cattle in the country, and annually supply Soudan with

from two to three thousand horses. The Bornou people, or Kanowry,

as they are called, have large unmeaning faces, with fat Negro

noses, and mouths of great dimensions, with good teeth, and high

foreheads. They are peaceable, quiet, and civil: they salute each

other with courteousness and warmth; and there is a remarkable

good-natured heaviness about them which is interesting. They are no

warriors, but revengeful; and the best of them given to commit petty

larcenies, on every opportunity that offers. They are extremely timid;

so much so, that on an Arab once speaking harshly to one of them,

he came the next day to ask if he wished to kill him.

As their country produces little beside grain, mostly from a want

of industry in the people, so are they nearly without foreign trade.

In their manner of living, they are simple in the extreme. Flour

made into a paste, sweetened with honey, and fat poured over it,

is a dish for a sultan. The use of bread is not known; therefore but

little wheat is grown. Indeed it is found only in the houses of the

great. Barley is also scarce; a little is sown between the wheat, and

is used, when bruised, to take off the brackish taste of the water.

The grain most in use amongst the people of all classes, and

upon which also animals are fed, is a species of millet called

_gussub_. This grain is produced in great quantities, and with

scarcely any trouble. The poorer people will eat it raw or parched in

the sun, and be satisfied without any other nourishment for several

days together. Bruised and steeped in water, it forms the travelling

stock of all pilgrims and soldiers. When cleared of the husk,

pounded, and made into a light paste, in which a little _meloheia_

(the _eboo ochra_ of Guinea) and melted fat is mixed, it forms a

favourite dish, and is called _kaddell_. _Kasheia_ is the seed of

a grass, which grows wild and in abundance near the water. It is

parched in the sun, broken, and cleared of the husk. When boiled,

it is eaten as rice, or made into flour; but this is a luxury.

Four kinds of beans are raised in great quantities, called _mussaqua_,

_marya_, _kleemy_, and _kimmay_, all known by the name of _gafooly_,

and are eaten by the slaves, and poorer people. A paste made from

these and fish was the only eatable we could find in the towns near

the river. Salt they scarcely knew the use of. Rice might have been

cultivated in Bornou, before it became the scene of such constant

warfare as has for the last fifteen years defaced the country. It is

now brought from Soudan, in the neighbourhood of Maffatai: in Bornou,

it is scarce, and of an inferior quality. Indian corn, cotton,

and indigo, are the most valuable productions of the soil. The two

latter grow wild, close to the Tchad and overflowed grounds. The

senna plant is also found wild, and in abundance. The indigo is of

a superior quality, and forms a dye which is used in colouring the

tobe (the only dress the people wear) dark blue, which probably is

not excelled in quality in any part of the world. The only implement

of husbandry they possess is an ill-shaped hoe, made from the iron

found in the Mandara mountains; and the labours of their wretched

agriculture devolve, almost entirely, on women. Most of their grain is

reaped within two or three months of its being scattered on the earth

(for it can scarcely be called sowing); and probably there is no spot

of land between the tropics, not absolutely desert, so destitute

of either fruit or vegetable as the kingdom of Bornou. Mangoes are

only found growing in the neighbourhood of Mandara and to the west;

and with the exception of two or three lemon, or rather lime trees,

and as many fig trees, in the garden of the sheikh at Kouka, raised

on a spot of ground watched by himself, the care and culture of

which give employment to about fifty negroes, not a fruit of any

description can be found in the whole kingdom. Date trees there are

none south of Woodie, four days north of Kouka, where they are sickly,

and produce but an indifferent fruit. Onions are to be procured near

the great towns only, but no other vegetable. The people indeed have

nothing beyond the bare necessaries of life; and are rich only in

slaves, bullocks, and horses. Their dress consists of one, two, or

three tobes, or large shirts, according to the means of the wearer:

a cap of dark blue is worn on the head by persons of rank. Others,

indeed generally all, go bare-headed; the head being kept constantly

free from hair, as well as every other part of the body. They carry

an immense club, three or four feet in length, with a round head

to it, which they put to the ground at every step, and walk with

great solemnity, followed by two or three slaves: they have what

we should call a rolling gait. Red caps are brought by the Tripoli

and Mesurata merchants; but are only purchased by sultans and their

immediate attendants. They are Musselmans, and very particular in

performing their prayers and ablutions five times a day. They are

less tolerant than the Arabs; and I have known a Bornouese refuse to

eat with an Arab, because he had not _sully’d_ (washed and prayed)

at the preceding appointed hour.

They seldom take more than from two to three wives at a time,

even the rich, and divorce them as often as they please, by paying

their dower. The poorer class are contented with one. The women are

particularly cleanly, but not good-looking: they have large mouths,

very thick lips, and high foreheads. Their manner of dressing the

hair is also less becoming than that of any other Negro nation I

have seen: it is brought over the top of the head in three thick

rolls; one large, one in the centre, and two smaller on each side,

just over the ears, joining in front on the forehead in a point,

and plastered thickly with indigo and bees’ wax. Behind the point

it is wiry, very finely plaited, and turned up like a drake’s

tail. The _Scarin_, or tattoos, which are common to all Negro nations

in these latitudes, and by which their country is instantly known,

are here particularly unbecoming. The Bornouese have twenty cuts or

lines on each side of the face, which are drawn from the corners of

the mouth, towards the angles of the lower jaw and the cheek-bone;

and it is quite distressing to witness the torture the poor little

children undergo who are thus marked, enduring, not only the heat,

but the attacks of millions of flies. They have also one cut on the

forehead in the centre, six on each arm, six on each leg and thigh,

four on each breast, and nine on each side, just above the hips. They

are, however, the most humble of females, never approaching their

husbands except on their knees, or speaking to any of the male sex,

otherwise than with the head and face covered, and kneeling. Previous

to marriage, there appears to be more jealousy than after.

Adultery is not common: the punishment is very severe, if caught in

the fact, and secured on the spot; and this is the only evidence on

which conviction is granted. The guilty couple are bound hand and

foot, cast on the ground, and their brains dashed out by the club

of the injured husband and his male relations.

Girls rarely marry until they are fourteen or fifteen; often not so

young. The age of puberty does not arrive here at so early a period

as in Barbary; females there not unfrequently becoming mothers at

the age of twelve, and even eleven. In Bornou, such a circumstance

is unknown: for a woman to have twins is extremely rare; and to make

them believe that more were ever brought into the world at one time,

in any country, would be difficult.

The domestic animals are dogs, sheep, goats, cows, and herds of oxen,

beyond all calculation. The Shouaas on the banks of the Tchad have

probably 20,000, near their different villages; while the shores of

the great river Shary could furnish double that number. They also

breed multitudes of horses, with which they furnish the Soudan market,

where this animal is very inferior.

The domestic fowl is common, and is the cheapest animal food that

can be purchased: a dollar will purchase forty. They are small,

but well flavoured.

The bees are so numerous, as in some places to obstruct the passage

of travellers. The honey is but partially collected. That buzzing

noisy insect, the locust, is also a frequent visitor. Clouds of

them appear in the air; and the natives, by screams and various

noises, endeavour to prevent their descending to the earth. In the

district where they pitch, every particle of vegetation is quickly

devoured. The natives eat them with avidity, both roasted and boiled,

and formed into balls as a paste.

The game is abundant, and consists of antelopes, gazelles, hares,

an animal about the size of a red deer, with annulated horns,

called _koorigum_, partridges very large, small grouse, wild

ducks, geese, snipes, and the ostrich, the flesh of which is much

esteemed. Pelicans, spoonbills, the Balearic crane, in great numbers,

with a variety of other large birds of the crane species, are also

found in the marshes. The woods abound with the Guinea fowl.

The wild animals are, the lion, which in the wet season approaches to

the walls of the towns, panthers, and a species of tiger-cat, are in

great numbers in the neighbourhood of Mandara, the leopard, the hyena,

the jackal, the civet cat, the fox, hosts of monkeys, black, grey,

and brown, and the elephant, the latter so numerous as to be seen

near the Tchad in herds of from fifty to four hundred. This noble

animal they hunt, and kill for the sake of his flesh, as well as the

ivory of his tusk. The buffalo, the flesh of which is a delicacy,

has a high game flavour. The crocodile and the hippopotamus are

also numerous; and the flesh of both is eaten. That of the crocodile

is extremely fine: it has a green firm fat, resembling the turtle,

and the callipee has the colour, firmness, and flavour of the finest

veal. The giraffe is seen and killed by the buffalo hunters in the

woods and marshy grounds near the Tchad. Reptiles are numerous;

they consist of scorpions, centipedes, and disgusting large toads,

serpents of several kinds, and a snake said to be harmless, of the

congo kind, sometimes measuring fourteen and sixteen feet in length.

The beasts of burden used by the inhabitants are the bullock and

the ass. A very fine breed of the latter is found in the Mandara

valleys. Strangers and chiefs, in the service of the sheikh or sultan,

alone possess camels. The bullock is the bearer of all the grain and

other articles to and from the markets. A small saddle of plaited

rushes is laid on him, when sacks made of goats-skins, and filled

with corn, are lashed on his broad and able back. A leather thong

is passed through the cartilage of his nose, and serves as a bridle,

while on the top of the load is mounted the owner, his wife, or his

slave. Sometimes the daughter or the wife of a rich Shouaa will be

mounted on her particular bullock, and precede the loaded animals;

extravagantly adorned with amber, silver rings, coral, and all sorts

of finery, her hair streaming with fat, a black rim of _kohol_, at

least an inch wide, round each of her eyes, and I may say, arrayed

for conquest at the crowded market. Carpets or tobes are then spread

on her clumsy palfrey: she sits _jambe deçà jambe delà_, and with

considerable grace guides her animal by his nose. Notwithstanding

the peaceableness of his nature, her vanity still enables her to

torture him into something like caperings and curvetings.

The price of a good bullock is from three dollars to three dollars

and a half.

The Bornou laws are arbitrary, and the punishment summary. Murder

is punished by death: the culprit, on conviction, is handed over

to the relations of the deceased, who revenge his death with their

clubs. Repeated thefts by the loss of a hand, or by burying the

young Spartan, if he be a beginner, with only his head above ground,

well buttered or honeyed, and so exposing him for twelve or eighteen

hours, to the torture of a burning sun, and innumerable flies and

mosquitoes, who all feast on him undisturbed. These punishments are,

however, often commuted for others of a more lenient kind. Even

the judge himself has a strong fellow-feeling for a culprit of this

description. When a man refuses to pay his debts, and has the means,

on a creditor pushing his claims, the cadi takes possession of the

debtor’s property, pays the demand, and takes a handsome per centage

for his trouble. It is necessary, however, that the debtor should

give his consent; but this is not long withheld, as he is pinioned

and laid on his back until it is given; for all which trouble and

restiveness, he pays handsomely to the cadi; and they seldom find

that a man gets into a scrape of this kind twice. On the other hand,

should a man be in debt, and unable to pay, on clearly proving his

poverty, he is at liberty. The judge then says, “God send you the

means;”—the bystanders say, “Amen:” and the insolvent has

full liberty to trade where he pleases. But if, at any future time,

his creditors catch him with even two tobes on, or a red cap, on

taking him before the cadi, all superfluous habiliments are stripped

off, and given towards payment of his debts.

The towns generally are large, and well built; they have walls,

thirty-five and forty feet in height, and nearly twenty feet in

thickness. They have four entrances, with three gates to each, made

of solid planks eight or ten inches thick, and fastened together

with heavy clamps of iron. The houses consist of several court-yards,

between four walls, with apartments leading out of them for slaves;

then a passage, and an inner court, leading to the habitations of the

different wives, who have each a square space to themselves, enclosed

by walls, and a handsome thatched hut. From thence also you ascend a

wide stair-case of five or six steps, leading to the apartments of

the owner, which consist of two buildings like towers or turrets,

with a terrace of communication between them, looking into the

street, with a castellated window. The walls are made of reddish

clay, as smooth as stucco, and the roofs most tastefully arched

on the inside with branches, and thatched on the out with a grass

known in Barbary by the name of _lidthur_. The horns of the gazelle

and the antelope serve as a substitute for nails or pegs. These are

fixed in different parts of the walls, and on them hang the quivers,

bows, spears, and shields of the chief. A man of consequence will

sometimes have four of these terraces and eight turrets, forming

the faces of his mansion or domain, with all the apartments of

his women, within the space below. Not only those _en activité_

(as the French would say), but those on the superannuated list, are

allowed habitations. Horses and other animals are usually allowed an

enclosure near one of the court-yards forming the entrance. Dwellings,

however, of this description are not common. Those generally used

by the inhabitants are of four kinds:—

_Coosie_, which is a hut built entirely of straw.

_Bongo_, a hut with circular mud walls, thatched with straw.

_N’Geim kolunby_, and _fatto-sugdeeby_,—huts of coarse mats,

made from the grass which grows near the lake. Our dwellings were

called _bongos_, and were about eight feet in diameter inside, about

the shape of a hay-stack, and with a hole at the bottom, about two

feet and a half high, which we used to creep in and out at. Air,

or light holes, we were obliged to dispense with, as they admitted

both flies and mosquitoes, which were worse than darkness.

Their utensils are few, and consist of earthen pots, which they

make beautifully for cooking, and wooden bowls for dishes. Water,

which is their only beverage, is drunk from a large calabash, which

grows wild near the rivers, after being cooled in earthen jars. They

sleep on mats covered with the skins of animals. Married women are

extremely superstitious, in having their beds covered with the skins

of particular animals when their husbands visit them; and never fail

to predict the fate and fortune of a child, in consequence of these

arrangements. A panther or a leopard’s skin is sure to produce a

boy, or nothing. Should the father be a soldier, and a chief, the

boy will be a warrior, bold, but bloody. A lion’s skin is said

to prevent child-bearing altogether; yet exceptions to this rule

sometimes occur. It is then always a boy, and a wonderful one. He

puts his foot on the necks of all the world, and is alike brave,

generous, and fortunate. Leather cushions of various colours, and

fancifully ornamented, are brought from Soudan, and are used as

pillows by persons of superior rank; who also have a small Turkey

carpet, on which they sit or sleep, and the price of which is a

young female slave.

The amusements of the people consist in meeting together in the

evening, either in the court-yard of one of the houses of the great,

or under the shades formed with mats, which are in the open places

of the town, where prayers are said at the different appointed

hours by the Iman or priest. Here they talk, and sometimes play

a game resembling chess, with beans, and twelve holes made in the

sand. The Arabs have a game similar to this, which they play with

camels’ dung in the desert; but the Bornouese are far more skilful.

Like the birds, their day finishes when the sun goes down; but very

few, even of the great people, indulge in the luxury of a lamp,

which is made of iron, and filled with bullocks’ fat. They have no

oil. A few jars are brought by the Tripoli merchants from the valleys

of the Gharian, as presents only. Soap is also an article they are

greatly in want of. An oily juice, which exudes from the stem of

a thorny tree, called _Kadahnia_, or _mika dahniah_, resembling a

gum, enables the people of Soudan to make a coarse soap, by mixing

it with bullocks’ fat and trona. It is something like soft soap,

and has a pleasant smell. This is brought in small wooden boxes,

holding less than half a pound, which sell for seven rottala each,

two-thirds of a dollar. From this tree is also procured a nut, from

which a purer oil is extracted, which they burn in Soudan, and is

also used by the women, to anoint their heads and bodies. This tree

is not found in Bornou.

The skin of their sheep is covered with a long hair; wool therefore

they have none. Brass and copper are brought in small quantities from

Barbary. A large copper kettle will sell for a slave. The brass is

worked into leglets, and worn by the women.

A small brass basin tinned is a present for a sultan, and is used

to drink out of. Four or five dollars, or a Soudan tobe, will

scarcely purchase one. Gold is neither found in the country, nor

is it brought into it. The Tuaricks are almost the only merchants

visiting Soudan who trade in that metal, which they carry to Barbary

and Egypt. It is said the sheikh has a store, which is brought him

directly from Soudan.

Iron is procured in the Mandara mountains, but is not brought in

large quantities, and it is coarse. The best iron comes from Soudan,

worked up in that country into good pots and kettles. The money

of Bornou is the manufacture of the country. Strips of cotton,

about three inches wide, and a yard in length, are called gubbuk;

and three, four, and five of these, according to their texture,

go to a rottala. Ten rottala are now equal to a dollar.

The government of Bornou has ever been, until during the last

fifteen years, an elective absolute monarchy, the brother sometimes

succeeding, to the exclusion of the son. Achmet Ali, who, descended

from a royal line of ancestors, was sultan in 1808, contended for

several years with a powerful people from the westward, called the

Felatah. These people had gradually been increasing in power for more

than half a century, had established themselves firmly in Soudan;

where Bello their chief, assuming the government, dictated laws to

a numerous and powerful black population.

Soon after the conquest of Bornou by the Felatahs, El Kanemy formed

a plan for delivering that country from the bondage into which it

had fallen; and, stirring up the Kanemboo to assist him by a well

planned tale of having been called by a vision to this undertaking,

he made his first campaign with scarcely 400 followers, and defeated

an army of the Felatahs nearly 8,000 strong. He followed up this

victory with great promptitude and resolution, and in less than ten

months had been the conqueror in forty different battles.

He refused the offer of being made sultan; and placing Mohammed,

the brother of sultan Achmet, on the throne, he, first doing homage

himself, insisted on the whole army following his example. The

sheikh built for Sultan Mohammed his present residence, New Birnie,

establishing himself at Angornou, three miles distant, and retaining

the dictatorship of the kingdom, _pro tempore_. Such a commencement

was extremely politic, on the part of the sheikh; but his aspiring

mind was not calculated to rest satisfied with such an arrangement.

The whole population now flocked to his standard, and appeared willing

to invest him with superior power, and a force to support it. One

of the first offers they made was to furnish him with twenty horses

per day, until a more regular force was organized, which continued

for four years[63]. He now raised the green flag, the standard of the

Prophet, refused all titles but that of the “servant of God!” and

after clearing the country of the Felatahs, he proceeded to punish

all those nations who had given them assistance, and with the slaves,

the produce of these wars, rewarded his faithful Kanemboo and other

followers for their fidelity and attachment.

Even in the breasts of some of the Bornouese, successful war had

raised a passion for conquest: their victories, no less a matter of

surprise than delight, crest-fallen and dispirited as they were,

gave a stimulus to their exertions, and they became accustomed to

warfare and regardless of danger.

For the last eight years the sheikh has carried on a very desperate

and bloody war with the sultan of Begharmi, who governs a powerful

and warlike people, inhabiting a very large tract of country south of

Bornou, and on the eastern bank of the Shary. Although meeting with

some reverses, and on one occasion losing his eldest son in these

wars, who was greatly beloved by the people, he has, upon the whole,

been successful; and is said to have, from first to last, destroyed

and led into slavery more than thirty thousand of the sultan of

Begharmi’s subjects, besides burning his towns and driving off

his flocks.

The late sultan of Bornou, who always accompanied the sheikh to the

field, also lost his life in these wars: his death was attributable to

his immense size and weight; the horse he rode refused to move on with

him from fatigue, although at the time not more than 500 yards from

the gates of Angala, and he fell into the hands of the enemy. He died,

however, with great dignity, and six of his eunuchs and as many of his

slaves, who would not quit him, shared his fate. A sultan of Bornou

carries no arms, and it is beneath his dignity to defend himself:

sitting down, therefore, under a tree, with his people around him,

he received his enemies, and hiding his face in the shawl which

covered his head, was pierced with a hundred spears.

Ibrahim, his brother, succeeded him, who is now not more than

twenty-two years old. The sultanship of Bornou is but a name: the

court still keeps up considerable state, and adheres strictly to its

ancient customs, and this is the only privilege left them. When the

sultan gives audience to strangers, he sits in a kind of cage, made

of the bamboo, through the bars of which he looks on his visitors,

who are not allowed to approach within seventy or eighty yards of

his person.

Their dresses are extremely rich, and consist of striped silks and

linens of various colours, from Cairo and Soudan. When they take the

field, their appearance is truly grotesque: the sultan is preceded

by six men, bearing frum-frums (trumpets) of cane, ten feet long:

an instrument peculiar to royalty, but which produces a music neither

agreeable nor inspiring. Their own heads, and those of their horses,

are hung round with charms, sewed up in leather cases, red, green,

and white; and altogether, with their wadded doublets and large heads,

they would be more apropos in a pantomime than in a field of battle.

At the present moment there is but one power in central Africa to

be at all compared to the sheikh of Bornou in importance,—that

of Bello, the Felatah chieftain; and from the sensation created

throughout the neighbourhood of Kano and Kashna, on his late

defeat of the Begharmi force, I imagine he would find but little

difficulty in extending his empire in that direction: he has turned

all his victories to the advantage of those for whom he conquered,

by attending to their improvement in moral and religious duties. His

subjects are the most strict Mussulmans in all the black country,

and their respect for us gradually increased on ascertaining that

we really had a religion of our own, and obeyed its ordinances

by praying, if not by fasting,—which they at first doubted. Our

determination to travel fearlessly and boldly in our own characters,

as Englishmen and Christians, mistrusting no one, so far from proving

an impediment to our progress, as we were assured from all quarters

it would do, excited a degree of confidence to which we may, in a

great measure, attribute the success which has attended our steps.

Wherever El Kanemy has power, Europeans, and particularly Englishmen,

will be hospitably and kindly received.

Bornou was always infested by robbers, who way-laid and plundered

travellers within sight of the walls of the capital: such an event

now never occurs, and the roads through the sheikh’s government

are probably as safe as any even in happy England itself.

Although harassed by the constant wars in which he has been engaged,

yet has not the sheikh been unmindful of the benefits which an

extended commerce would confer upon his people, nor of the importance

of improving their moral condition, by exciting a desire to acquire,

by industry and trade, more permanent and certain advantages than are

to be obtained by a system of plunder and destructive warfare. Arab or

Moorish merchants, the only ones who have hitherto ventured amongst

them, are encouraged and treated with great liberality. Several

of them are known to have returned, after a residence of less than

nine years, with fortunes of fifteen and twenty thousand dollars;

and which might, perhaps, by a more intelligent trader, have been

doubled, as the commodities with which they barter are mostly European

produce, purchased at Tripoli, at prices full two hundred and fifty

per cent. above their prime cost.

The usual calculation of a Moorish merchant is, that a camel load

of merchandize, bought at Mourzuk for 150 dollars, will make a

return, in trading with Bornou, of 500 dollars, after paying all

expenses. Persons in Fezzan will send three camel loads in charge

of one man, and, after paying all the expenses out of the profits,

give him a third of the remainder for his labour.

From the circumstance, however, of there being no direct trade from

this country with Tripoli, or, I believe, with any of the ports of

Barbary, English goods (the demand for which is daily increasing

amongst a population of not less than five millions), within six

hundred miles of the coast, are sold at enormous prices, although

frequently of the very worst description[64].

The principal return which Moorish merchants obtain for their goods

consists in slaves; but Bornou is scarcely any thing more than a

mart or rendezvous of kafilas from Soudan. These unhappy victims are

handed over to the Tripoli and Fezzan traders, who are waiting with

their northern produce to tempt the cupidity of the slave merchants

of Soudan. I think I may say, that neither the sheikh himself, nor

the Bornou people, carry on this traffic without feelings of disgust,

which even habit cannot conquer. Of the existence of a foreign slave

trade, or one which consigns these unfortunates to Christian masters,

they are not generally aware at Bornou; and so contrary to the tenets

of his religion—of which he is a strict observer—would be such a

system of barter, that one may easily conclude, the sheikh of Bornou

would be willing to assist, with all the power he possesses, in any

plan which might have for its object the putting a final stop to a

commerce of this nature.

Already the desire of exchanging whatever their country produces, for

the manufactures of the more enlightened nations of the North, exists

in no small degree amongst them: a taste for luxury, and a desire of

imitating such strangers as visit them, are very observable; and the

man of rank is ever distinguished by some part of his dress being of

foreign materials, though sometimes of the most trifling kind. It is

true that these propensities are not yet fully developed; but they

exist, and give unequivocal proof of a tendency to civilization,

and the desire of cultivating an intercourse with foreigners.

Every approach which the African has made towards civilization, even

to the knowledge of, and the belief in, the existence of a Supreme

Being, is attributable to the intrepid Arab spirit, which, despising

the dread of the apparently interminable deserts that separate the

Black from the White population, has alone penetrated to any extent

into the country of these before unenlightened savages,—carrying

with him his religion and his manners, and converting thousands to

the Mohammedan faith.

The eagerness with which all classes of people listened to our

proposals for establishing a frequent communication by means of

European merchants, and the protection promised by the sheikh to such

as should arrive within the sphere of his influence, particularly if

they were English, excites an anxious hope that some measures will

be adopted for directing the labours of a population of millions

to something more congenial to the humanity and the philanthropy

of the age we live in, than the practice of a system of predatory

warfare, which has chiefly for its object the procuring of slaves,

as the readiest and most valuable property to trade with, on every

appearance of the merchants from the north at their markets.

Every probability is against such a barter being preferred by the

African black. Let the words of the sheikh himself, addressed to

us in the hearing of his people, speak the sentiments that have

already found a place in his bosom:—“You say true, we are all

sons of one father! You say, also, that the sons of Adam should

not sell one another, and you know every thing! God has given you

all great talents, but what are we to do? The Arabs who come here

will have nothing else but slaves: why don’t you send us your

merchants? You know us now; and let them bring their women with

them, and live amongst us, and teach us what you talk to me about so

often, to build houses and boats, and make rockets.” The reader

will conceive with what exulting hearts we heard these words from

the lips of a ruler in the centre of Africa.

The return which European traders might, in the first instance,

obtain, would not, probably, be sufficient to employ large capitals,

but that would annually improve; and the great profits would, in

some measure, compensate for the deficiency. The propensity in the

natives to war upon and plunder their neighbours, from the profit

arising from such a system, would gradually subside, when other more

profitable occupations were encouraged amongst them. The Kanemboos

who inhabit the northern and eastern borders of the lake Tchad are

a bold and hardy people, extremely expert with the spear, swift of

foot, and practised hunters.

The tusk of the elephant, the horns of the buffalo, both which may

be obtained at a very low price, and in exchange for English goods,

are eagerly bought even at Tripoli, and at all the European ports in

the Mediterranean, at high prices: the cultivation of indigo, also,

of a very superior kind, might be carried to any extent, as it now

grows wild, as well as senna, in many parts of the country. The zibet,

or musk from the civet cat, is also to be procured, about two hundred

per cent. lower than it will sell for in Tripoli.

The following are the prices in Bornou, of some of those articles

which would be most esteemed in Europe, viz.—

Ostrich skins, from three to six dollars each.

Elephants’ teeth, two dollars the 100 lbs.

Raw hides may also be purchased, at about two dollars for 100 skins.

Probably the strong desire of the sheikh to improve the state of his

country, and the habits of his people, cannot be better exemplified

than in his having given me the designs for three coins, which he

entreated might be laid before the king of England, with his request

to have the stamp and apparatus for striking money, so that he might

introduce a more convenient medium of exchange than the one at present

in use amongst them; one of these pieces of money he intended should

be of gold, a second of silver, and the third of iron. This chief,

also, as well as all the principal people, entreated that some one

of our party should remain in their country, “to receive,” as

they said, “the English merchants that were coming.” And it was

under the idea of securing to ourselves the great advantages we had

gained, by so firm a footing in the very centre of Africa, as the

sheikh’s friendship enabled us to boast of, that I recommended

Mr. Tyrwhitt’s remaining at Kouka, with all the privileges granted

to Barbary consuls, until the pleasure of His Majesty’s Government

should be known.

I consider the establishment of a friendly intercourse with this

potentate beyond the Great Desert, by whose means the unknown parts

of Africa may at no distant period be visited, of the greatest

importance, in every point of view. By encouraging a commercial

intercourse, all the objects of African discovery must be advanced:

not alone will the cause of science and research be benefited,

but the real philanthropist must see, that an opening is now made,

by means of which, with judicious arrangements, thousands of his

fellow beings may be saved from slavery.

Until introduced by the Moors, the trading in slaves was little

known amongst them; the prisoners taken in battle served them,

and were given as portions to their children, on their marriage,

for the same duties; but they were seldom sold. Even now the greater

part of the household of a man of rank are free, with the exception

of the women, who often die in the service of the master of their

youth. They are treated always like the children of the house, and

corporal punishment is a rare occurrence amongst them. I have more

than once known a Bornouese, on his morning visit to my hut, say,

with tears, that he had sent a slave to be sold, who had been three

years a part of his family: then he would add, “but the devil has

got into her, and how could I keep her after that?”

In short, it is to the pernicious principles of the Moorish traders,

whose avaricious brutality is beyond all belief, that the traffic for

slaves in the interior of Africa not only owes its origin, but its

continuance. They refuse all other modes of payment for the articles

which they bring with them; they well know the eagerness with which

these articles are sought after; and by offering what appears to the

natives an amazing price, tempt them to sell their brethren, to the

most inhuman of all human beings, while they gain in Fezzan, Bengazi,

and Egypt, sometimes a profit of 500 per cent. I am not, however,

without hopes, that a more extended intercourse with Barbary might

detach even the proverbially unfeeling Moor from dealing in human

flesh; and it was with feelings of the highest satisfaction that I

listened to some of the most respectable of the merchants, when they

declared, that were any other system of trading adopted, they would

gladly embrace it, in preference to dealing in slaves: knowing, too,

how often we interfered to ameliorate the situation of any of these

unfortunates, when they were oppressed or ill-treated, they would

continually point out to us, as if to excite our approbation, how

well dressed, and well fed, their own slaves were, in comparison with

those of others, as we traversed the Desert, on our return to Tripoli.

D. D.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 63: Tirab, his favourite Shouaa chief, was intrusted with

this duty, and acquired the name of Bagah-furby, Gatherer of horses.

A horse of the best breed in this country, which was sent by

the Sheikh of Bornou as a present to His Majesty, is described by

Mr. Sewell as possessing great strength, to be supple, and extremely

active. He also adds, “His movements remind me strongly of the

brown Dongala horse, whose picture I have.”]

[Footnote 64: The articles most in request amongst the Negro nations

are:—

Writing paper, on which the profit is enormous.

Coral barrelled, and imitation coral.

Printed cottons of all kinds, with a great deal of red and yellow in

the pattern.

Coloured silks, in pieces for large shirts and shifts, of the most

gaudy patterns.

Imitations of damask, worked with gold thread, and flowers.

Common red cloth.

Green do.

White barracans, purchased in Tripoli.

Small looking-glasses.

White bornouses, purchased in Tripoli.

Small carpets, five or six feet long, purchased in Tripoli.

English carpets of the same size would sell better, and might be

bought at one-third of the price of Turkish ones.

Ornamented cheap pistols, with long barrels.

Common razors.

Red caps, purchased in Tripoli.

Turbans of all descriptions, large amber, for the Kanemboo women, and

the Shouaas.

Common China basins, much esteemed.

Coffee cups.

Brass basins, tinned in the inside.

Red breeches, made up.

Cotton caftans, striped, made up.

Pieces of striped cotton.

Handkerchiefs, and coarse white muslin.

Large shirts or tobes, ready made, of striped cottons, and white

calico.

Coarse white calico. }

} much esteemed.

Fine do. do. }

Frankincense, }

}

Ottaria, } purchased of the Jews in Tripoli,

} or Leghorn.

Spices, }

The beads most in demand, indeed the only ones that they

will purchase, are:—

H’raz-el mekka, white glass beads, with a flower.

Merjan tiddoo, mock coral.

Quamur, white sand beads.

Quamar m’zein, small black beads, with yellow stripes.

H’raz-el pimmel, ant’s head bead, with black stripes.

Contembali, red and white.

Hazam el bashaw, the bashaw’s sash.

Sbgha m’kerbub, red pebble, from Trieste.

Sbgha toweel, long bead.

H’shem battura, Arab’s nose, a large red bead.

Arms of all descriptions, of an inferior quality, will always meet

with a ready sale, as well as balls of lead, and what we call

swan-shot.

]

=JOURNAL=

OF

=AN EXCURSION,=

ETC. ETC.

PREFATORY NOTICE

TO THE

_Narrative of Captain Clapperton’s Journey from Kouka to Sackatoo._

* * * * *

The Manuscript of the following Journal was placed in my hands by

Captain Clapperton, on his departure from England, with a request that

I would see it through the press, whenever the account of the recent

mission to Central Africa should be published. In complying with

this request, I have carefully abstained from altering a sentiment,

or even an expression, and rarely had occasion to add, omit, or

change, a single word; so that my easy task has been confined to

the mere ordinary correction of the press.

Captain Clapperton, like Major Denham, as will appear from his

Journal, makes no pretensions to the systematic knowledge of

natural history. They were both excellent pioneers of discovery, and

capable of ascertaining the latitude by observations of the heavenly

bodies; and also to compute, to a certain degree of accuracy, the

longitudes of the various places which they visited: and even this

is no trifling advantage to geography, though it has but too commonly

been neglected by travellers. By a strict attention to these points,

by comparing them with the courses and distances travelled, and by

Captain Clapperton’s frequent endeavours to verify the estimated

results by lunar observations (though not much to be depended on by

_one_ observer, _on shore_), we may now be pretty well assured of the

actual and relative positions of many places, which have hitherto

been wholly dislocated and scattered at random on our best maps of

Africa,—all of them bad enough,—and the situation of cities and

towns have also been ascertained, whose names even had never before

reached us.

The only traveller of the party, who was supposed to possess a

competent knowledge of natural history, was Doctor Oudney; and he was

unfortunately disabled from the pursuit of it by a protracted illness,

which terminated in death. As so little appears in the present volume

from the pen of Doctor Oudney, and as Captain Clapperton has stated

(page 5) a wish expressed by that gentleman, a short time previous

to his death, that “his papers should be put into the hands of

Mr. Barrow, or Professor Jameson, provided the request meets with

Earl Bathurst’s approbation,” I feel it necessary to say a few

words on this subject. Nothing could have been more gratifying to me

than to have undertaken and executed, to the best of my power, such

a task: it is quite natural that I should have willingly done so,

were it for no other reason than my having been instrumental in his

appointment, from the strongest testimonials in his favour which I

had received from Professor Jameson, whose acquirements in natural

history stand so deservedly high in public estimation, as to entitle

any recommendation from him to immediate attention. Unfortunately,

however, for this branch of science, Doctor Oudney, at a very early

stage of their journey, caught a severe cold, which fell on his lungs,

and which rendered him, on their arrival in Bornou, nearly incapable

of any exertion. It will be seen from Major Denham’s Narrative,

how frequently and how seriously, not to say alarmingly, ill, he

became from the first moment of their arrival in Bornou. In a letter

addressed to Mr. Wilmot Horton, of the date of the 12th September,

1823, Doctor Oudney says, “I send you a simple itinerary from

Fezzan here; that to the river Shary, and the borders of Soudan,

and my remarks on Bornou, I must leave till another time. I cannot

write long; one day’s labour in that way makes me ill for a week.”

No account of these journeys to the river Shary, and the borders

of Soudan, appear among his papers; nor any materials respecting

them, beyond what are contained in a very general account of the

proceedings of the Mission, in an official letter addressed to the

Secretary of State. The papers, delivered to me by Captain Clapperton,

consisted of an account of an excursion, jointly performed by these

gentlemen, from Mourzuk to Ghraat, the first town in the Tuarick

country:—some remarks on the journey across the Great Desert,

which appear not to have been written out fair:—and the rest,

of mere scraps of vocabularies, rude sketches of the human face,

detached and incomplete registers of the state of the temperature,

and a number of letters to and from the Consul at Tripoli, respecting

the pecuniary and other affairs of the mission, wholly uninteresting,

and of which no use whatever could be made.

The Journey to Ghraat above mentioned, I have caused to be printed

at the end of the Introductory Chapter, with which it appears to be

partly connected, omitting some trifling details, of no interest

whatever; and I requested Major Denham to add a few foot-notes,

chiefly geological, to his own Journal across the Great Desert. It

seems to have been well known to the party that Doctor Oudney could

not possibly survive the journey into Soudan; and, indeed, he was

well aware of it himself; but his zeal to accomplish all that could

be done, would not suffer him to remain behind. It was that zeal

which led him to undertake the journey to Ghraat, which not a little

increased his disorder; for, to say the truth, he evidently was

labouring, while in England, under a pectoral complaint; but when

I told him so, and strongly advised him not to think of proceeding

(as I had before done to his unfortunate predecessor Ritchie), he,

like the latter, persisted that, being a medical man, he best knew

his own constitution, and that a warm climate would best agree with

it. Neither of them, however, seem to have calculated on the degree

of fatigue, and the sudden changes of temperature, to which they

were necessarily to be exposed.

With every disadvantage of collecting, preserving, and bringing home

from so great a distance, and over so dreary a desert of twelve

hundred miles, specimens of natural history, it will be seen, by

reference to the Appendix, that this department of science has not

been neglected.

_JOHN BARROW._

=JOURNAL=

OF

=AN EXCURSION,=

ETC. ETC.

* * * * *

SECTION I.

FROM KOUKA TO MURMUR, WHERE DR. OUDNEY DIED.

From our first arrival in Bornou, we intended to avail ourselves

of the earliest opportunity of exploring Soudan. Our preparations

being at length completed, and the sheikh having consented to our

departure, although with some degree of reluctance, Dr. Oudney,

notwithstanding the infirm state of his health, and myself, were

ready to set out on the 14th December, 1823. Accordingly we sent

off our camels and servants in the morning, and went in person to

take leave of the sheikh. On this occasion we found him in an inner

apartment, attended by two or three servants only. He asked us,

as he had often done before, if, in the course of our travels, we

proposed going to Nyffee. We answered, yes, if the road was open. He

replied, it was a great distance; and he feared we were not likely

to return to Kouka. We told him we hoped to return, if possible,

before the rains set in; but however that might be, we assured

him we should ever retain a grateful sense of his exceeding great

kindness towards us. He bade us farewell in the most affectionate

manner. About noon we left the town, accompanied by our comrade,

Major Denham, and most of the principal inhabitants. Even Hadje Ali

Boo Khaloom, with whom we had frequent occasion to be dissatisfied,

joined the train: they attended us to the distance of four or five

miles, and then took leave; our friend, the cadi Hadje Mohamed Zy

Abedeen, having first repeated the Fatha, or first chapter of the

Koran. We halted at the village of Fuguboo Thorio, where our servants

had pitched our tents, being distant from Kouka about ten miles.

Our party consisted of Dr. Oudney and myself, two servants, Jacob

the Jew, a sort of major domo, and three men of Fezzan. We had three

saddle horses, and four sumpter camels; the servants, except Jacob,

were on foot. There were also in the kafila (commonly pronounced

_goffle_) twenty-seven Arab merchants, two of whom were shreefs,

or descendants of the Prophet, one from Tunis, the other from

Houn, near Sockna, and about fifty natives of Bornou. The Arabs

were mostly mounted on horses, which they intended for sale; some

having besides a led horse. The Bornouese were on foot; one of them,

a hadje or Mahometan pilgrim, who had visited Mecca, would on no

account stay behind at Kouka, but persisted in accompanying us,

for the express purpose of having his hand regularly dressed by

Dr. Oudney: he had been wounded by the accidental bursting of a gun;

he invariably pitched his tent close to that of the Doctor, whom he

always regarded with the utmost respect.

Dec. 15.—We started at seven o’clock. The road was the same we

had travelled on a former visit to Old Birnee. We were no longer

annoyed with the noise and confusion in pitching the tents, or with

the clamours of obstreperous camel drivers; which we had formerly

experienced when under the guidance of Boo Khaloom. The weather too

was clear, cool, and pleasant. A little after mid-day we halted at

the wells of Budjoo; distance, north-west by north, seventeen miles.

Dec. 16.—We met several kafilas from Gubsharee and the surrounding

country, going to Kouka. Their heavy goods were carried on bullocks;

the smaller packages, weighing from twenty to thirty pounds, were

borne on men’s heads. The bearers poise their burdens with much

dexterity and ease to themselves, by cords hanging from the sides

of the packages, which are carried lengthwise on the head; by this

simple contrivance they avoid the fatiguing posture of keeping the

arm raised. We halted about three o’clock in the afternoon.

We still pursued the Old Birnee road: we saw several of the large red

and white antelopes, called by the Arabs mohur. We encamped on the

margin of one of the lakes, formed by the overflowing of the Yow;

the river was only about a quarter of a mile distant from us, to

the north. It had now fallen fully six feet, and its current might

be about three miles an hour.

Dec. 18.—We travelled along the banks of a chain of small lakes

formed by the Yow, once, perhaps, its original channel. I observed,

by the roadside, the tracks of various wild animals,—among others

of the hippopotamus and lion. We passed one of the country fairs,

held on a small hill, near the ruins of a large town which had been

destroyed by the Felatahs. We halted at Damasak, near an encampment of

the sheikh’s cowherds; who, on hearing that we were in the kafila,

brought us an abundant supply of milk.

Dec. 19.—As the low grounds from Damasak to Mugabee, about ten

miles distant, were inundated, we were obliged to make a long

circuit by an upper road, frequently wading across hollows filled

with water. At noon we had to halt on the banks of one of those

temporary rivers which are formed during the wet season: it still

contained a considerable body of water, which was running at the

rate of about two miles an hour. We met here several kafilas of

loaded bullocks, on their way from Gubsharee and Soudan. The people

were busily floating their goods over the river on rafts, made of

bundles of reeds; but there being too few in number to transport

our baggage, it was necessary to make new rafts for ourselves. We

therefore pitched our tents; and one man was sent by each of the

Arab merchants to cut long reeds, which are readily made into rafts,

by lashing bundles of them across two long poles.

I proceeded two or three miles up the banks of the river, which last

summer did not contain a drop of water. The lower road certainly

exhibited the appearance of being overflowed during the rains;

but nobody, from merely seeing it in that state, could suppose

that for nearly one half of the year it is a broad sheet of water,

or that the upper road itself is traversed, for the same period,

by several large streams falling into the Yow. The ferry-dues, paid

to the people who swim over with the rafts, are a rotal for every

camel load of goods: the rotal is now merely nominal, and represents

a pound of copper, eight or ten of which are equivalent to a Spanish

dollar. The bullocks, horses, and camels, are made to swim over,

together with the negro slaves.

Dec. 20.—Hitherto the atmosphere had been clear and serene,

but to-day it became hazy, and was particularly cold about

day-break. Hadje Ali, the invalid alluded to, having a very large

raft, we ferried over our baggage upon it without the smallest

accident, by means of a rope fastened to each end. It was far

otherwise with the Arabs a little lower down the river; there was

nothing but hubbub and bustle among them: many, through ignorance or

obstinacy, had their goods much damaged. The greatest difficulty was

with the camels and female slaves; the women screamed and squalled

with great vehemence; several of the men seemed almost in as great a

panic as the ladies, especially those of Fezzan, none of whom could

swim; and some of them jumped off the raft into the water three or

four times, before they could muster courage to cross. The camels

occasioned a great deal of trouble, one man having to swim before

with the halter in his teeth, while another kept beating the animal

behind with a stick, which every now and then attempted to turn back,

or bobbed its head under water. Before all had crossed, it was too

late to continue our journey that day; we therefore encamped on the

west bank for the night.

Dec. 21.—We still travelled along the upper grounds, on account

of the extent of the inundation. Yet the earth itself was so dry,

that we were put in some slight danger by a kafila, near Old Birnee,

carelessly setting the grass on fire in the course of the night: the

fire advanced rapidly, like a sea of flame, and must have put us all

to flight had we not had the good fortune to obtain shelter within

the ruined walls of the city, which checked a little the progress

of the conflagration. We did not halt, however, but continued our

route to a town called Bera, on the banks of a beautiful lake,

likewise formed by the overflowing of the Yow. Immediately there

was quite a fair in our camp, the townswomen coming with gussule or

Guinea corn, bean straw, cashew nuts, and milk; which they offered

in exchange for glass beads and gubga, or native cloth. The beads

in greatest request are pretty large, of a chocolate colour, with

a small spiral white ring round the middle, and are called by the

natives conteembalee, or Muckni; the latter appellation is derived

from a sultan of Fezzan of that name, who was originally a merchant,

and first brought these beads into fashion. A single bead exchanged

for a quart of Guinea corn. The gubga is narrow cotton cloth, of

native manufacture, about a palm in width; forty fathoms of which

are usually valued at a dollar. The value of commodities in barter

seems to be maintained with a certain stability, somewhat like the

money rate of exchange in Europe, by fixing a local standard price

for those articles in greatest demand, in lieu of the fictitious par

of exchange, which, with us, powerfully influences and indirectly

regulates all money transactions.

Dec. 22.—We crossed over a neck of land formed by a bend of the

river to a town called Dugamoo, where we halted. The banks of the

river are every where studded with towns and villages.

Dec. 23.—The morning was cold. Dr. Oudney had been very unwell

during the night, and felt himself extremely weak. At eight o’clock

we left Dugamoo, and, following a winding path, nearly due west, we

reached Deltago, having passed a number of towns and villages, one

of which, called Kukabonee, was of considerable size, and contained

perhaps 5000 or 6000 inhabitants. The country to the west of Old

Birnee rises in gentle undulations of hill and dale. There are very

few trees, except on the banks of the Yow. The soil is chiefly a

red clay. The inhabitants raise great quantities of Guinea corn, and

beans something like calavances. We had a very plentiful market. The

people here preferred coral, and the beads called conteembalee,

in exchange for grain, &c. to native cloth. Gunpowder was much

sought after as a medicine. To-day we gave a sheep as a boozafer

or gift, by way of footing, which all pay who travel this way for

the first time; a practice akin to our usage on doubling capes, or

crossing the tropics and line. Cotton seed bruised is very much used

for feeding sheep, bullocks, asses, and camels. These animals soon

become extremely fond of it: it is an excellent food for fattening

them. In the evening gussule was sent for our horses and camels,

as had been done in the other towns: we passed as soon as the people

learned we were the friends of the sheikh.

Dec. 24.—Dr. Oudney felt himself much better. We halted to-day, on

account of one of the merchants’ camels falling lame; the owner was

obliged to send to Dugamor to buy another. The kafila kept a grand

boozafer day, and all merchant new-comers paid a dollar apiece, or

gave its value in goods.—Time is to these people of no importance:

whatever accidental occurrence takes place to detain them, they bear

the delay with perfect indifference.

Dec. 25.—The weather clear and cool. We left Deltago, and, winding

along the banks of the river, or occasionally cutting off a bend by

a cross path, we reached Bedeekarfee. There is more wood here than

we had yet seen, and the soil is still a strong red clay. Villages

and towns are numerous; the inhabitants principally belong to the

Alluanee tribe of Shouah Arabs. The town of Bedeekarfee is large and

populous. The governor, commonly called in this and other African

towns Sultan, although holding a subordinate command, had seen us when

we were on the expedition to Munga with the sheikh of Bornou. On

our arrival he came out to meet us, and gave us a very cordial

reception. He was an elderly man, much afflicted with a urinary

disorder, for which he consulted Dr. Oudney. His dwelling, large,

extremely clean, and constructed after the manner of the country,

consisted of a spacious quadrangular enclosure, surrounded with mats

fixed to high poles, within which were several small round huts,

also of matting, with thatched conical roofs, each surmounted by an

ostrich egg. In outward appearance, these huts somewhat resemble our

bee-hives. Their walls are frequently made of clay. The ostrich egg

is a distinctive mark of the occupant being a man of rank. The floor

inside is covered with sand; and the only furniture is a bench to

supply the place of a bedstead, and a few mats for squatting upon,

besides some carved or coloured gourds and wide-mouthed earthen

jars, piled above one another, and intended to combine ornament with

utility. There is but one opening or door-way, which is round at the

top, and closed by a wicket. The door always faces to the west, on

account of the prevailing rains coming from the opposite quarter. The

grand entrance of the enclosure is often a hut erected at the western

side of the square, with an open thoroughfare, where a black slave

officiates as porter. Each separate hut is called a coozee.

The Arab women of this place are really beautiful; they wear their

hair differently from their countrywomen elsewhere: the fashion of it

is such, that at a distance it might be mistaken for a helmet,—a

large braid on the crown having some semblance to a crest, and the

side tresses being neatly plaited and frizzled out at the ends. There

are also many women of Bornou among them, who imitate the same style.

Guinea fowls abound in this part of the country: I went out

after we halted, and shot five of them, besides a wild duck and a

quail. Mohamoud El Wordee, one of two Fezzanee merchants, to whom we

were particularly recommended by the sheikh of Bornou, and who had

always appeared to me to be a man of strong natural sense, was thrown

into a sad fright by losing a charm or amulet off his horse’s neck,

with a number of which almost all are equipped. This charm is nothing

more than a short sentence from the Koran. Had he lost an only child

he could scarcely have been more afflicted. I gave him a scrap of

paper to make another, which Hadje promised to write out for him.

Dec. 26.—This morning after sunrise, Fahrenheit’s thermometer

stood at 49°. The merchants were busily employed firing off their

guns and putting them in order for the Bedites, an ancient race of

native Bornouese, who have not embraced Islamism, and who occupy an

adjoining territory, chiefly protected by its natural fastnesses. They

are held both in dread and abhorrence by all the faithful. Every

thing being ready at eleven o’clock, we broke up our encampment. Our

kafila was now of an immense size. We had been joined at Bedeekarfee

by 500 people at least, who were waiting there for an Arab kafila to

pass through the Bedee country; for all Arabs are esteemed by the

natives here extremely formidable, as well from the possession of

fire arms, as from their national intrepidity. Their muskets, however,

in comparison of those of Europe, are of the meanest quality; and so

uncertain in their fire, that they are hardly worth more than their

weight as old iron. The courage, too, of most of these Arabs is very

questionable. When successful they are overbearing and cruel in the

extreme, and in bad fortune are in like degree servile and abject.

The natives of Haussa carry their merchandise on the head, and go

armed with bows and arrows. Those of Bornou convey their goods chiefly

on asses and bullocks, and are armed with spears. The Haussa merchants

deal in tobacco, Goora nuts, Koghelor or crude antimony, cotton cloth

in the web, or made into dresses called tobes and turkadees, and

tanned goat skins. Goora nuts are the produce of Ashantee and other

parts near the west, and are chewed by all people of consequence, on

account of their agreeable bitter taste, not unlike that of strong

coffee, and the supposed virtue of curing impotency. They are even

in great esteem as far as Fezzan and Tripoli, where they bring the

exorbitant price of two dollars a score. Crude antimony in powder

is applied by both sexes to the eye-lashes, to render them dark and

glossy. Native cloth, or gubga, as before mentioned, is extremely

narrow, seldom more than four inches in width. The tobe is a large

shirt with loose hanging sleeves like a waggoner’s frock, generally

of a dark blue colour, and is an indispensable part of male attire

throughout central Africa. The turkadees are articles of female dress,

commonly of blue cotton cloth, about three yards and a half long and

one broad. Sometimes they are made of alternate stripes of blue and

white (of the breadth of African cloth), or are all white, according

to fancy. Women of better circumstances commonly wear two turkadees,

one round the waist, and another thrown over the shoulders. These

articles are bartered in Bornou for trona or natron, common salt

and beads; which, together with coarse tobes, are also carried by

Bornouese adventurers to Haussa. Our road lay over an elevated clayey

plain, with low trees, most of them mimosas. We passed the ruins of

several towns, and such of our travelling companions as were best

acquainted with the country informed us it was well peopled before

the Felatah invasion. At sunset we halted, being already in the

Bedee country.

Dec. 27.—The temperature this morning was remarkably low, and the

water in our shallow vessels was crusted with thin flakes of ice. The

water skins themselves were frozen as hard as a board[65]. These

water skins, by the way, are goat skins, well tanned and seasoned,

stripped from the carcass over the animal’s head. They are extremely

convenient on a tedious journey over arid wastes and deserts. The

horses and camels stood shivering with cold, and appeared to suffer

much more than ourselves. The wind during the night was, as usual,

from the north, and north-north-west. Dr. Oudney was extremely ill,

having become much worse from catching a severe cold. We now travelled

south-south-west, over a country of much the same kind of soil as

that above described. As we approached the low grounds it was better

wooded, and the trees were of greater size and variety. Of these,

the most remarkable were the kuka and the goorjee.

The kuka is of immense size, erect and majestic; sometimes measuring

from twenty to twenty-five feet in circumference. The trunk and

branches taper off to a point, and are incrusted with a soft, glossy,

copper-coloured rind, not unlike a gummy exudation. The porous spongy

trunk is straight, but the branches are twisted and tortuous. The

leaves are small, somewhat like the young ash, but more pulpy, and

growing in clusters from the extremities of the lesser twigs. The

tree is in full leaf and blossom during the rainy months of June,

July, and August. The flowers are white, large, and pendulous,

somewhat resembling the white garden lily. The fruit hangs by a

long stalk, and is of an oval shape, generally larger than a cocoa

nut, with a hard shell full of a powdery matter, intermixed with

reddish strings and tamarind-like seeds. In its unripe state it is

of a beautiful velvety dark green colour, and becomes brown as it

approaches maturity. The tree, whether bare of its leaves, in flower,

or in full bearing, has a singularly grotesque naked appearance; and,

with its fruit dangling from the boughs like silken purses, might,

in the imagination of some Eastern story-teller, well embellish an

enchanted garden of the Genius of the Lamp. The leaves are carefully

gathered by the natives, dried in the sun, and used for many culinary

purposes. Boiled in water they form a kind of clammy jelly, giving

a gelatinous consistence to the sauces and gravies in most common

use. I have also eaten them boiled with dried meat, according to the

custom of the country, but did not much relish such fare. Both leaves

and fruit are considered, to a certain degree, medicinal. The leaves,

mixed with trona and gussub, are given to horses and camels, both for

the purpose of fattening these animals, and as a cooling aperient:

they are administered to the former in balls, and to the latter

as a drench. The white mealy part of the fruit is very pleasant to

the taste, and forms, with water, an agreeable acidulous beverage;

which the natives, whose libidinous propensities incline them to

such remarks, allege to possess the virtue of relieving impotency.

The goorjee tree much resembles a stunted oak, with a beautiful

dark red flower, when in full blow rather like a tulip. The natives

make use of the flower to assist in giving a red tinge to the mouth

and teeth, as well as in seasoning their food. These two trees are

generally found on a strong clayey soil, and are peculiar to Haussa

and the western parts of Bornou.

At noon, we came in sight of a lake called Tumbum, apparently formed

by some river in the rainy season. All the country to the southward

and westward, as far as the eye could reach, was a dismal swamp. Just

as we arrived within a short distance of the lake,—at the very

spot in which of all others the Arabs said we were most likely to

encounter the Bedites,—two men made their appearance. They were

dressed in the Bornouese costume; a loose tobe and drawers, with a

tight cap, all of blue cotton cloth. Each carried on his shoulder

a bundle of light spears, headed with iron. I was a little way in

front of our party, and first met them; they saluted me very civilly,

and I passed on without further notice, when the other horsemen

meeting them, and putting some questions, which the strangers did

not answer to their satisfaction, immediately seized, stripped, and

bound them. Considering it a matter in which I had no authority to

interfere, I merely requested that their drawers might be returned

to them, remarking, it was better not to treat them ill, as they

might prove to be honest men. “Oh! d——n their fathers,” (the

strongest imprecation in Africa), replied the captors, “they are

thieves; what would they be doing here if they were honest men?”

I still urged the propriety of taking them to Bedeguna, at least,

to afford them a chance of being recognised by the townspeople,

before treating them as robbers. I now rode off to water my horse;

when I returned, I found the magnanimous El Wordee guarding the two

unfortunate wretches, one of whom was a Shouah Arab, and the other a

Negro. The latter, while I was absent, had received a dreadful cut

under the left ear from a Bornouese, who pretended that the Negro

had attempted to escape; an attempt little likely in his desperate

situation. Notwithstanding the wound, they were leading the poor

fellow by a rope fastened round his neck. He was covered with blood,

and Dr. Oudney assured me, if the wound had been a little lower

down it must have caused instant death. I could not refrain from

beating the merciless Bornouese; and I obliged him to use his own

tobe in binding up the wound, at the same time threatening to lodge

the contents of my gun in his head, if he repeated his cruelty. The

occasion prompted me to impress on the minds of the Arabs generally

how unworthy it was of brave men to behave with cruelty to their

prisoners, and to suggest, that it would be far better to sell

them, or even to put them to death, than wantonly to inflict such

barbarities. The Arabs threw the blame on the Bornouese, and although

evidently exulting in secret over their captives, they were fairly

shamed into good behaviour, and promised to liberate the men if

innocent, or, if guilty, to surrender them to justice at Bedeguna.

Our road skirted the border of the great swamp, and we arrived at

Bedeguna at sunset. The galadema, literally “gate-keeper,” or

governor, was a Felatah, and a particular friend of Mohamoud El

Wordee, by whom we were introduced to him. He was tall and slender,

with a high arched nose, broad forehead, and large eyes; and, indeed,

altogether as fine a looking black man as I had ever seen. His

behaviour, too, was at once kind and dignified. Besides his native

language, he spoke with fluency Arabic, and the tongues of Bornou

and Haussa. He asked us a great many questions about England, of

which he had heard; and said his master, the Sultan of the Felatahs,

would be glad to see us. He applied to Dr. Oudney for medicines,

on account of a urinary obstruction, a disease very prevalent in

this country. We made him a present of a small paper snuff-box full

of cloves; he sent us, in return, a plentiful supply of milk.

The territory of Bedeguna, or little Bede, formerly belonged

to Bornou. The inhabitants are Bornouese, and speak their native

language. The territory includes many towns and villages, and produces

much gussub, Indian corn, wheat, and cotton. Herds of cattle are

also numerous. The principal implement of agriculture is a hoe made

of native iron, of their own manufacture. They reap with a crooked

knife, and merely cut off the ears of corn, which they store in round

thatched huts of clay, or matting, raised on wooden blocks from the

ground. The grain is cleaned from the husk by hand rubbing, and ground

into flour between two stones. We saw no plough to the southward of

Sockna, a town between Tripoli and Fezzan. I inquired of the governor

about the source of the swollen river we crossed on a raft between

Gateramaran and old Birnee, which again presented itself close to

our present encampment. He told me it rose in the country of Yacoba,

among rocky hills, and, running to the eastward of old Birnee, soon

afterwards entered the Yow. On questioning him further about Yacoba,

the name of the country, he said it was the sultan’s name; for

the people were infidels, and had no name for their own country. The

river, he added, was distinguished by the appellation of the Little

River, and in these parts did not dry up throughout the whole year.

The country to the south-east and south-west appears to be an entire

swamp, overflowed of course in the rainy season. Felatahs are in

features, and in the manner of wearing the turban, very like the

inhabitants of Tetuan in Morocco. They are here much esteemed by the

people whom they rule for the impartial administration of justice,

and were uniformly kind and civil to us. Our two prisoners happened

to be well known, having only left the town that morning. They were

accordingly liberated, but their clothes were not restored.

We were not a little indebted to the Arab merchants for the good name

they gave us. They almost looked upon us as of their own nation; and

although Kafirs, we, as Englishmen, were allowed to rank at least

next to themselves. I really believe they would have risked their

lives in our defence. Travelling in a kafila was much more pleasant

than any mode we had hitherto tried; all being ready to oblige one

another, and all vying in attention to us. The lake Zumbrum is about

twelve miles south-south-west from Bedeguna.

Dec. 28.—At sunrise to-day the thermometer was at 45°. Our new

friend, the governor, accompanied us two or three miles out of

town. At parting he prayed God to bless us; and, laying his hand on

his forehead, said he hoped we should ever continue friends. The

road at first followed the borders of the marsh, by the side of

the Little River, which suddenly breaks off to the southward, at a

town called Goobeer. There we filled our goat skins with water. We

continued our course, and shortly came to a strong red clay soil,

densely covered with grass so long that it actually overtopped our

heads, although on horseback. At sunset we halted in the woods for

the night. The horses and beasts of burden were last watered, when

we filled our water skins. Dr. Oudney was attacked with ague, but

luckily the evening proved very mild. For two or three nights past he

has had a fire in his tent, which seemed to abate the violence of his

cough. This evening, addressing me with resigned composure, he said,

“I feel it is all over with me. I once hoped to conduct the mission

to a successful termination, but that hope has vanished. Whenever

my death takes place, I wish my papers to be put into the hands of

Mr. Barrow, or Professor Jameson, provided the request meets with Earl

Bathurst’s approbation.” As this was a painful subject, I did

not encourage its renewal, and, according to this solemn injunction

of my lamented friend, I have delivered all his papers to Mr. Barrow.

Dec. 29.—After toiling two hours through a thickly wooded country,

we came in view of a large plain, with numerous towns and villages. We

found the towns by no means so neat as in Bornou, the coozees,

or huts, being much smaller, and often in bad repair. The people

raise great quantities of grain, principally gussub. We saw five

ostriches, which made off from us with great speed. Dr. Oudney was

a great deal better. In the afternoon we arrived at Sansan. Our

horsemen skirmished a little in front of the caravan before entering

the town, and then galloped up in pairs to the governor’s door,

firing off their muskets. This is the common compliment paid by

kafilas in such cases. The governor was absent on an expedition,

headed by the governor of Katagum, against the Bedites, who are in

the immediate neighbourhood. As before observed, the Bedites have

never received the doctrines of Mahomet; and, although speaking the

language of Bornou, and acknowledging a kind of nominal sovereignty

of the Bornouese sultan, they are every where regarded as a race of

outlaws, whom it is incumbent on every good Mussulman, Bornouese, or

Felatah, to enslave or murder. This race is said to have no religion;

but their common practice of first holding up to heaven the carcass

of any animal, killed for food, belies their being atheists—a

reproach attributed to them solely by their enemies. On the contrary,

it harmonizes with those universal feelings of reverence and awe

for a Supreme Being, which have ever existed among all nations,

and in all ages. The favourite food of this persecuted tribe is

said to be dogs, which they fatten for the purpose. Their country

is of small extent, defended by impenetrable morasses and forests,

by which alone they preserve a precarious and dangerous independence.

At Sansan we were waited upon by the principal native inhabitants,

and the resident Arabs. Among the Arabs there was a cousin of

the sheikh of Bornou, Hadje El Min El Hanem. The reports of our

travelling companions, the merchants, contributed very much to exalt

our character wherever we went.

Dec. 30.—At noon I found the latitude of our encampment to be 12°

20′ 48″ north by meridian alt. of lower limb of sun. Sansan in

Arabic signifies “the gathering,” where the scattered parties of

an army assemble previous to an expedition. The town had its name

from a late sultan of Bornou, making it the rendezvous of his army

when he went to conquer Haussa. The place where he pitched his tent is

still held in great veneration, and the buildings around it were first

erected by his army. The neighbouring district also abounds in towns

and villages, which, together with Bedeguna and Sansan, are under

the governor of Katagum, who is himself subordinate to the governor

of Kano. Sansan is formed of three distinct towns, called Sansan

Birnee, Sidi Boori, and Sansan Bana. The principal one, in which

the governor resides, is Sansan Birnee, or Sansan Gora, signifying

“the walled,” from a low clay wall in ruins, surrounded by a dry

ditch almost filled up. The mosque is without a roof, and the huts

and houses of the inhabitants are old and dilapidated. Sidi Boori,

another of the three towns, having a signification so indecent that

I must forbear to translate it, is about half a mile west of Sansan

Birnee, and inhabited by Shauah Arabs. The third town, called Sansan

Bana, or, “of the banners,” where the sultan’s tent stood,

is about a mile distant from Sansan Birnee, and is inhabited by

Bornouese, who are here in great numbers, and were first brought by

force from Old Birnee, and other towns of Bornou. At present they

are quite reconciled to the change, and now remain from choice.

The sister of the sultan of Bornou, having been made captive by

the Felatahs, was living here with her husband in great obscurity,

although her brother, the sultan, is surrounded by all the barbaric

magnificence of central Africa. She came out to meet the kafila,

along with several of her countrywomen, from whom she was nowise

distinguished in attire. The dress of Bornouese women consists of one

or two turkadees, blue, white, or striped, as before described. The

turkadee is wrapped rather tightly round the body, and hangs down from

the bosom, below the knees. If a second is worn, as by women of some

consideration, it is commonly flung over the head and shoulders. Their

sandals are the same as those of men, of tanned leather, or of the

undressed hide, according to their circumstances. The hair is plaited

in five close tresses,—one like a crest along the crown, and two at

each side, and thickly bedaubed with indigo. They dye their eyebrows,

hands, arms, feet, and legs of the same colour, except the nails of

the fingers and toes and the palms of the hands, which are stained

red with henna. They blacken the eyelashes with crude antimony

in powder. The ornaments for the ear are not pendent like ours,

but little green studs, or buttons, fixed in the lobe. The very

poorest wear strings of glass beads round the neck, and the wealthy

are adorned with armlets and anklets of horn or brass. Ornaments of

silver are very rare, and of gold hardly ever seen.

Dec. 31.—At sunrise the thermometer was 42°. Being market day,

I took a stroll to see what was going on. The market-place was on a

rising ground, a little to the south of Sansan Birnee. The place of

itself is a little village. The goods were exposed for sale in booths,

or houses, open at the side next the street. The different wares were

arranged each in its particular quarter,—knives, scissors, needles,

and beads; silken cords and pieces of silk; sword slings and koghel

cases; gubga tobes and turkadoes; beef, mutton, and fowls; gussub,

beans, Indian corn, &c. They have four different kinds of Indian

corn,—the yellow, the red, the white, and the Egyptian. The last is

reckoned the best. There were stalls, besides, for making and mending

every thing in common use. Bands of music, composed of drums, flutes,

and a kind of guitar, with strings of horsehair, called the Erbale,

each after its own rude fashion, were parading from booth to booth,

to attract the attention of customers.

Jan. 1, 1824.—Dr. Oudney was now very unwell. This morning we had

a visit from an ex-governor, of the name of Jesus, who had left the

army last night. He told us the commanders would to-day commence

their return to their different governments, as they were unable

to penetrate into the Bede territory. This person gave us several

broad hints to make him a present; but we found ourselves too poor

to understand him. At eight o’clock in the morning we resumed our

journey, over a level country. The winding road was little broader

than a footpath. We passed numerous small towns and villages, with

plantations of cotton, gussub, and Indian corn. There was more wood

as we re-approached the Yow, and the villages and cotton plantations

were also more numerous. We halted at a village called Obenda, not

above a quarter of a mile distant from the Yow. We could procure no

milk for Dr. Oudney, and his appetite was much worse. We had nothing

but kouskasoo and dweeda. The former is a well known preparation of

wheaten flour steamed over meat, and in very general use among the

Moors and Arabs. The dweeda is also of wheaten flour, and a kind of

coarse macaroni.

Jan. 2.—Dr. Oudney was this morning in a very weak state. I bought

a pound of coffee for three dollars from one of the merchants of

our kafila, as a cup of coffee was all that he could take. To-day we

followed a very troublesome zigzag track, for regular road there was

none. We passed many villages, adjoining to which were long double

rows of granaries. At first we were much puzzled with the novelty

of their appearance; but on a closer examination we found they

were constructed of matting in the usual way, and raised on poles

to prevent white ants and grubs from getting at the grain. Near

the Yow there were large fields of wheat, and plantations of

cotton. The people were then raising the second crop of wheat,

by means of irrigation.

A little before mid-day we crossed the Yow. Its channel is here

about 150 yards in breadth; but the stream of water was almost

dry. In order to take fish, the river was barricadoed by a row of

fish-pots, made of split bamboos. They are of a conical shape, about

five feet in diameter at the mouth, and secured by poles and spars

at the distance of three feet from one another, the interval being

filled up with reeds to prevent the escape of fish. At this period

not more than a third of the aperture was covered with water. The

city of Katagum stands about half a mile from the river, which we

had no sooner crossed than we were met by a servant of the governor

on horseback. He presented us with a small basket of Goora nuts,

called, by the Arabs, the coffee of Soudan. After delivering the

present, the servant returned at full speed to a party of horsemen

at a little distance, who appeared to be the attendants of some

great personage. The party then came to us at a gallop, brandishing

their spears. Their leader remained behind, as well as their band of

music. The horsemen, after saluting us, wheeled round, and rode on

before us, the drummers beating their drums, and two bards singing

the praises of their master in the following ditty, which I took

down in writing; one responding in a clear shrill voice the words

of the chorus, while the other sang, or rather bawled aloud:—

Bi, kora, nama, da birkin safay:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Bokri mi tugiamasso:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Manoganinka wykigani:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

My daikee ya fruss undunga:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Fuda da goma baka soranko.

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Kazibda goma bindiga da bia:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Gewa nagege avana do dona:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Camaraka hamen sirkino:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Girtho magaje wali:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Allahu Akber you do dona:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Allahu Akber you Zaramina:

Ah! mi tuga yumma.

Which may be thus translated:—

Give flesh to the hyenas at day-break:

Oh! the broad spears.

The spear of the sultan is the broadest:

Oh! the broad spears.

I behold thee now—I desire to see none other.

Oh! the broad spears.

My horse is as tall as a high wall:

Oh! the broad spears.

He will fight against ten, he fears nothing:

Oh! the broad spears.

He has slain ten—the guns are yet behind:

Oh! the broad spears.

The elephant of the forest brings me what I want:

Oh! the broad spears.

Like unto thee—so is the sultan:

Oh! the broad spears.

Be brave! be brave! my friends and kinsmen:

Oh! the broad spears.

God is great!—I wax fierce as a beast of prey:

Oh! the broad spears.

God is great!—To-day those I wished for are come:

Oh! the broad spears.

Meanwhile, the leader with his horsemen proceeded before us to

the city. We halted at a place allotted to us and the Arabs, the

Bornouese having left us to pursue their journey, as the dangers

of the road were past. About three in the afternoon, we saw the

governor, with all his attendants, coming to visit us. Mohamoud

El Wordee had mats spread under a tree for his reception, and

requested us to remain a few minutes in our tents. When sent for,

we found the governor sitting on the mats, surrounded by the Arab

merchants and his armed attendants. He received us in the kindest

manner, and said it was quite an ayd, or feast, for him to see us,

and would also prove highly gratifying to his master, the Sultan of

the Felatahs, who had never seen an Englishman before. He assured

us, we should find every thing here the same as at Kouka, with the

sheikh of Bornou. Dr. Oudney now presented the sheikh’s letter,

which he handed to one of his attendants. The Arab merchants were

loud in our praises, and particularly expatiated on the circumstance

of our nation being ever in strict alliance with the Sublime Porte,

and of having frequently assisted the Grand Signor. The governor, who

was named Duncowa, was a stout, tall fellow, blunt and good natured,

and lavish in his promises. We shook hands at parting, which is the

custom of the Felatahs, or Felanees, as they call themselves. On his

return home he sent us some wheat, of which we were in great want,

with honey, and Goora nuts. By the advice of Mohamoud El Wordee, we

sent a present of a few cloves, and a little cinnamon, in return;

which, however small, is every where the proper acknowledgment on

such occasions. On account of the scantiness of our own stock of

every thing, we now heartily wished for no more presents.

After the governor left us, we were waited upon by a Tripoline

merchant, of the name of Hameda, a good-looking, civil sort of

man, and extremely rich. He possessed no less than five hundred

slaves, and had a great number of horses. He was second only to the

governor in all Katagum, and had served with the Felatahs in most

of their wars. Referring to the result of the recent expedition,

I remarked it would have been better if the Felatahs had not gone

at all against the Bedites, who would now be emboldened in their

depredations. He replied, the Felatahs had become rich, and were now

afraid of blows: it was otherwise with them when poor; their head

men then led them to battle, dauntlessly braving danger and death,

whereas now-a-days their chiefs lagged behind, and sent their people

forward to the combat, who, in turn, dreaded a broken head as much as

their superiors, and would no longer fight, if it might anywise be

avoided.—Hameda had occasion to consult Dr. Oudney, who strongly

recommended his immediate return to Tripoli, to undergo a surgical

operation. He seemed very grateful, and offered us his house, and

whatever the country afforded. He sent milk for Dr. Oudney, and

bazeen, or flour-pudding, for me. Bazeen is made of wheat, barley,

or Guinea corn, and eaten with butter or sauce.

Dr. Oudney underwent here, as usual, much fatigue,—more, indeed,

than his strength was equal to; for the news of our arrival spread

before us, and at the different towns and villages through which we

passed, they brought to us all the sick to be cured. Nor was it the

sick alone who sought advice, but men and women, of all descriptions;

the former for some remedy against impotency, and the latter to remove

sterility. Many came for preventives against apprehended or barely

possible calamities; and, in anticipation of all the imaginable

ills of life, resorted to us in full hope and confidence of our

being able to ward them off. The women were particularly fanciful in

these matters, and were frequently importunate to receive medicines

that would preserve the affections of their gallants, ensure them

husbands, or, what was highly criminal, effect the death of some

favoured rival. The governor made us a present of three sheep,

and sent the Arab merchants eight bullocks.

Jan. 3.—Dr. Oudney was a little better, but still very weak. Having

early prepared our presents, which consisted of one of our tea-trays,

ten yards of red silk, an Indian palempore, or bed coverlet, a piece

of white linen cloth, with gold stripes, of Egyptian manufacture, a

pound of cinnamon, and a pound of cloves, we waited on the governor at

eight o’clock in the morning, accompanied by Mohamoud El Wordee. We

stopped about a quarter of an hour in the house of Hameda, till the

governor was ready to receive us. When introduced, we found no parade

of armed men, as at Kouka, and the other towns in Bornou. Duncowa

was sitting under a rude canopy, on a low bank of earth about six

feet square. There were only three old men with him. We shook hands,

and sat down on the floor before him. He importunately laid hold

of me, and wished me to sit by his side. I, however, declined so

high an honour. We were presented with Goora nuts, and he repeated

the promises he had made yesterday. When we displayed our presents,

and explained the use of the tray, and what it was made of, he was

highly delighted; and asked us if we wanted slaves, or what else,

for every thing he had or could procure was at our disposal. With

regard to slaves, we told him a slave was unknown in England, and

the moment one set foot on our shores, he was instantly free. We also

explained our great endeavours to put a stop to the slave trade on the

seacoast, and that our king and master (to use the African idiom) had

given immense sums to have it abolished; besides sending, every year,

several large ships to capture vessels engaged in that traffic, and to

set the slaves at liberty. “What, then, do you want?” he asked,

with some surprise. We answered, we only desired his friendship,

and condescending permission to collect the flowers and plants of

the country, and to visit its rivers. “Wonderful!” he exclaimed,

“you do not want slaves, you do not want horses, you do not want

money, but wish only to see the world? You must go to the sultan

Bello, who is a learned and pious man, and will be glad to see men

who have seen so much. You shall have all, and see all, that is in my

province; and I am sure my master will grant every thing you wish.”

He then descended from the seat of honour, sat down on the floor by

our side, and shook hands with us. This is the greatest compliment

one man of rank can pay to another in this country.

One of their lucky omens took place at the moment. My servant,

who had assisted in bringing the presents, got up to receive the

Goora nuts presented to me by the governor’s orders, and in rising

he overturned a pot of honey which had also been given to us, but

without breaking it, the honey running out on the floor. Had the

pot been broken, the omen would have been unfortunate. As it was,

the governor was highly elated, and graciously ordered the poor

to be called in to lick up the honey. They immediately made their

appearance, equally rejoiced at the lucky omen, and upon their

knees quickly despatched the honey, not without much strife and

squabbling. One man came off with a double allowance, happening to

have a long beard, which he carefully cleaned into his hand for a

_bonne bouche_, after the repast on the ground was finished.

We took leave of the governor and returned to our tents, where a great

concourse of men and women flocked to Dr. Oudney for medicines. In the

evening we had boiled dried meat, with bazeen, and excellent bread,

sent us by our friend Hameda; also milk from the governor, and a

live sheep from a black shreef, who had applied to Dr. Oudney for

advice. To-day the Doctor felt himself very weak, in consequence of a

diarrhœa, and the want of proper comforts in his infirm condition. At

noon I took an observation of the sun. At first the natives eagerly

crowded round me, but sat down very quietly at a little distance,

on telling them they were in my way. I was asked the old question

every where repeatedly, if I was looking at my country. I explained

to them, as well as I was able, that I merely ascertained in this

manner how far south I had come from home.

Jan. 4th.—The weather cold and hazy,—thermometer 48°. Mohamoud

El Wordee having gone to a city called Hadeeja, one day’s journey

to the northward, where he was to remain a day or two, it was agreed

beforehand we should go into the town and live in Hameda’s house

until El Wordee’s return, as the kafila was to proceed to Kano the

following day. At sunrise the governor sent to us to come into town,

but on account of Dr. Oudney’s illness, we waited till the heat of

the day. About noon we had the camels loaded, and Dr. Oudney and I

rode forward, accompanied by the governor’s people and Hadje ben

Hamed, the sheikh of the kafila, or chief who regulates its march,

stage, and route. On entering the town, we were conducted to a house

that adjoined Hameda’s, which we supposed to be his. The people

around us, after consulting together, told us we had better go and see

the governor. Dr. Oudney assented, but wished first to wait for our

baggage. The people, however, urged us to go without further delay;

and we complied with their entreaties. The governor met us at the

gate of his residence, took us by the hand, and led us first to one

coozee, then to another, saying, “This is for you,—that is for

the Doctor,—there is a place for your horses.” Seating himself

on a mat, he bade us sit down. Our baggage was brought to us in a

few minutes. “Abdullah,” said he, addressing me by my travelling

name, “show me the glass with which you look at the sun.” It

seemed the people had told him what they saw me doing yesterday. I

had now to explain to him the use of my compass, sextant, spy-glass,

and other instruments. He begged of me a little of the quicksilver

used for an artificial horizon in taking observations. This was like

asking me to part with my heart’s blood; but as he was a governor,

and evidently a man of considerable influence, I could not refuse

him. I took much pains to make him understand the use of the watch

and sextant. I easily made him comprehend the latter, by telling him

it was to enable me to find out the distance north or south, from any

other place: illustrating the matter, by telling him the north star

was higher in the heavens at Mourzuk than here, and still higher at

Tripoli; a circumstance the natives of these countries all confirmed,

to whom I shifted the trouble of making further explanations. The

telescope next was an object of surprise. He said all the places

he saw were brought near to him, and ascended the walls and house

tops to have a better view. Each of his attendants also had a peep;

but an old shreef would on no account look through it, but ran away

as if from a serpent ready to sting him. As to these shreefs, or

alleged descendants of the Prophet, some of whom are as black as

jet, I wonder what Mahomet, were he to rise from the dead, would

say to his sable progeny, not merely black in colour, but with the

true Negro features! The phenomenon, however, is less wonderful,

when we consider how soon an intermixture, whether black or white,

is lost in the course of a few generations, although the lineal

descent continue uninterrupted.

We received a plentiful supply of provisions from Hameda. The governor

also sent us fish and ficcory. The latter consists of pounded Guinea

corn dried in the sun, mixed with water or milk, and seasoned with

pepper, but has a sour, disagreeable taste.

Katagum, the capital of a province of the same name, is in lat. 12°

17′ 11″ north, and in long. about 11° east. This province formed

the frontier of Bornou before the Felatah conquest. At present it

includes the subject provinces of Sansan and Bedeguna. It extends

nearly one day’s journey to the northward, and five days’ journey

to the southward, where it is bounded by an independent territory,

called after the inhabitants Kurry-kurry. On the east it is bounded by

the kingdom of Bornou, and on the west by the neighbouring province

of Kano. From the best information I could obtain, the whole province

can send into the field about 4,000 horse and 20,000 foot, armed with

bows, swords, and spears. The principal productions are grain and

bullocks, which, with slaves brought from the adjoining territories of

the Kafirs, are the staple articles of trade. Here we found, for the

first time, kowrie shells in circulation as money; for hitherto native

cloth, or some other commodity of standard price, had been the common

medium of exchange. This city was the strongest we had seen since

we left Tripoli. It is in the form of a square, the sides facing the

cardinal points of the compass, with four corresponding gates, which

are regularly opened and shut at sunrise and sunset. It is defended by

two parallel walls of red clay, and three dry ditches, one without,

one within, and the third between the two walls, which are about

twenty feet high and ten feet broad at the base, gradually decreasing

upwards to a breadth just sufficient for a narrow footpath. This is

protected by a low parapet, and is ascended by flights of steps at

convenient distances. Both walls are of the same height, without

loopholes or towers, and, instead of being crenelated, terminate

in a waving line. The gates are defended by a platform inside over

the entrance, where a body of townsmen take their station to repel

assailants. The three ditches are of equal dimensions, each about

fifteen feet deep and twenty feet wide. There is only one mosque,

and this almost in ruins. The governor’s residence is in the centre

of the city, and occupies a space of about 500 yards square. The

governor and principal inhabitants have houses made entirely of

clay, besides the coozees already described. They are flat-roofed,

in the Turkish style, and sometimes of two stories, with square

or semicircular openings for windows. The city may contain from

7,000 to 8,000 inhabitants; including all merchants and tradesmen,

together with the servants or slaves of the governor.

Not far to the southward of Katagum is the country of Yacoba, of

which I shall mention a few particulars, collected from natives who

were here in slavery, as well as from Hameda. It is called by the

Mahometan nations Boushy, or country of infidels. It is extremely

hilly: the hills, consisting of limestone, are said to yield antimony

and silver. The inhabitants have received the name of Yemyems,

or cannibals; but with what justice I know not. Most probably the

imputation is an idle Arab tale, and undoubtedly the more suspicious,

from the well known Moslem abhorrence of Kafirs. On interrogating

the Arabs more strictly, they allowed they had never witnessed the

fact; but affirmed they had seen human heads and limbs hung up in

the dwellings of the inhabitants. At Mourzuk, when we first arrived,

a similar report was circulated to our defamation; whether in jest

or earnest, I could not ascertain; but the prejudice soon wore off

when we were better known.

The river Yow, which is within a quarter of a mile of Katagum, is said

to take its rise to the southward among the hills of Boushy, between

Adamowa and Jacoba, and after passing Katagum, to turn abruptly to the

eastward; it finally empties itself into the Tshad. Its waters were

dull and sluggish, as far as we observed; and during the middle of the

dry season the naked channel and a few pools of water, sometimes far

apart, are all that remain of the river. The breadth of the channel,

at the place where we last crossed, was, as above mentioned, about

150 yards; and this may be taken as a fair average breadth from

that spot downwards as far as the lake, where, however, the depth

seemed considerably increased. There is a prevalent opinion among

the inhabitants and Arab merchants that, during the rainy season,

the waters of this river rise and fall alternately every seven days;

which notion, perhaps, originates in a kind of vicissitude in the fall

of rain that I have remarked myself during my residence in Bornou.

Jan. 5.—Dr. Oudney thought himself a little better, but the

diarrhœa still continued. The kafila left us this morning for

Kano. We had a visit from the governor; I happened to be from home,

and was sent for. On my return the governor was gone, and had left a

message for me to follow him with the compass, spy-glass, &c. as he

wished me to show them to some men of rank: I followed, and found

him seated in the company of two or three Felatahs, to whom I had

to explain the use of the instruments over again; but a good deal

of trouble was taken off my hands by the governor himself, and his

Fezzanee servants. I was then taken to visit his favourite wife,

who pretended, of course, to be much frightened at the sight of a

Christian; she was a jolly, good looking, black wench. The governor

had a great number of other women besides, whose dwellings were all

very clean and neat. I was next conducted through other quarters of

the residence; and, on reaching the stables, we all sat down in an

open court, where the cadi and another learned Felatah joined us. The

same explanations had again to be repeated. The cadi, who had made the

pilgrimage of Mecca, and was acquainted with Arabic learning, appeared

to be a man of sense and discernment, and explained the use of the

watch to his countrymen with much perspicuity; he was a Felatah, about

fifty years of age,—his complexion coal black,—with a hook nose,

large eyes, and a full bushy beard. The office of cadi or judge,

I may remark, is frequently hereditary, and there is one in every

town to administer justice: his sole qualification is a competent

knowledge of the Koran, although his decisions can be reversed only

by the governor of the province, or the sultan of the country.

The governor resides in a large square, surrounded by a wall of red

clay, at least thirty feet high, and divided by lower walls into

four principal quarters: besides several flat-roofed houses of clay,

it contained a number of coozees, for the most part ranged in a single

row, just within the great walls. These are principally for the slaves

and guards attached to the governor’s establishment; it was here

we were lodged, the entrance being guarded night and day. Near the

eastern gate there was a sort of council or audience hall, from which

a passage led to the women’s apartments, on the north side of the

square. The stables occupied one quarter, each horse having a hut to

itself. The pillars that supported a room over the western gate were

superior to any I had seen in central Africa; they were formed of the

trunks of the palm tree, fashioned into columns, with rude pedestals

and capitals of no inelegant appearance, all incrusted with clay.

Jan. 6.—Dr. Oudney was much better to-day. In the afternoon we

had a visit from the governor: I had again to show him the sextant

and other instruments. He was particularly inquisitive about the

rockets we had given to the sheikh of Bornou; he persisted we had

still some of them remaining, and when convinced of the contrary,

seemed exceedingly desirous I should make him a few. I assured him,

with regret, of my inability; while I professed it to be an express

duty imposed on me by the king my master, to instruct him and his

countrymen in every thing useful and curious. Among many other

questions, he asked me if I ever prayed; I said, I should not be

a good man if I did not pray, but that we usually prayed alone:

at which answer he was highly amused.

Hadje Ali Boo Khaloom (the brother of the late commander of our

escort from Mourzuk) arrived here to-day, with a kafila from Kouka:

they left that place seven days after us. I heartily wished never

to see the face of this arrant rogue.

Jan. 7.—The governor paid us an early visit this morning; he came

at once into my tent, while I was writing, and I was again obliged

to show him my instruments. On opening my chest, there was a small

box of powder I had brought from England, still untouched; I was

very loth to tell him what it was, but it attracted his attention,

and I was compelled to yield to his solicitations for a small

supply. To humour him further, I attended him to fire at a mark;

I fired twice with my rifle, and happened to hit the mark both

times, at a distance of sixty or seventy yards, when he called out

“Ouda billa min Sheateen a rajeem,”—“The Lord preserve me

from devils!” yet, in token of his approbation, he threw over my

shoulders, with his own hands, a very handsome tobe.

Jan. 8.—I was indisposed all day, having caught cold.

Jan. 9.—This morning Hadje Ali Boo Khaloom left us for Kano. He

tried all in his power to induce us to accompany him, but we knew

him too well of old: he even asked the governor to send one of his

people with him, but was only laughed at for his assurance.

Our servants caught a female rat, or bandicoot, as it is called in

the East Indies, which measured two feet seven inches from the nose

to the tip of the tail. The colour of the body was light grey, the

tail black, and covered with long hairs, and the head much rounder

than that of the common rat.

The diarrhœa of Dr. Oudney had ceased, but the cough was no better,

and he was otherwise extremely ill: he had himself cupped on the

left side of the chest by one of the natives. This operation is

dexterously performed by them; they make the scarifications with a

razor, and afterwards apply a perforated horn, from which they first

extract the air by suction, and then stop the aperture with the thumb.

We had a visit from the wife of the cadi, a sister of Duncowa,

I gave her a brass ring, a pair of scissors, and some beads.

In the afternoon, I was not a little astonished at a message from

the governor, brought us by El Wordee, acquainting us that Hadje Ali

had told him we were spies and bad people, and wishing to know from

us if it was true. I did not think proper to disturb Dr. Oudney by

relating to him this calumny, and merely desired El Wordee to say to

the governor, that as we were in his power he could do with us as he

pleased; at the same time referring him particularly to the letter

of the sheikh of Bornou. El Wordee came back almost immediately,

and assured me the governor was satisfied.

Jan. 10.—To-day we left Katagum; the governor having furnished us

with a guide. We had a bassoor, or frame of wood, put on a camel,

and spread Dr. Oudney’s bed upon it, as he was now too weak to ride

on horseback; I also felt myself unwell. The governor accompanied us

four miles out of town. At half past three o’clock in the afternoon

we were obliged to halt, on account of Dr. Oudney’s weakness;

he was quite worn out, and could proceed no further; the road, too,

being crooked and entangled, and lying along a large swamp to the

south. We passed a number of villages.

Jan. 11.—At eight o’clock in the morning we proceeded on our

journey; but, at noon, were obliged to stop at the town of Murmur,

on account of the alarming situation of Dr. Oudney, who had now

become so feeble and exhausted, that I scarcely expected him to

survive another day. He had been wasting away in a slow consumption,

ever since we left the hills of Obarree, in Fezzan; where he was

seized with inflammation of the chest, in consequence of sitting

down in a current of cold air after being overheated.

Jan. 12.—Dr. Oudney drank a cup of coffee at day-break, and, by

his desire, I ordered the camels to be loaded. I then assisted him

to dress, and, with the support of his servant, he came out of the

tent; but, before he could be lifted on the camel, I observed the

ghastliness of death in his countenance, and had him immediately

replaced in the tent. I sat down by his side, and, with unspeakable

grief, witnessed his last breath, which was without a struggle

or a groan. I now sent to the governor of the town to request his

permission to bury the deceased, which he readily granted; and I had

a grave made about five yards to the north of an old mimosa tree,

a little beyond the southern gate of the town. The body being first

washed, after the custom of the country, was dressed by my directions,

in clothes made of turban shawls, which we were carrying with us

as presents. The corpse was borne to the grave by our servants,

and I read over it the funeral service of the church of England,

before it was consigned to the earth; I afterwards caused the grave

to be enclosed with a wall of clay, to keep off beasts of prey,

and had two sheep killed and distributed among the poor.

Thus died, at the age of 32 years, Walter Oudney, M. D., a man of

unassuming deportment, pleasing manners, stedfast perseverance,

and undaunted enterprise; while his mind was fraught at once with

knowledge, virtue, and religion. At any time, and in any place,

to be bereaved of such a friend, had proved a severe trial; but to

me, his friend and fellow traveller, labouring also under disease,

and now left alone amid a strange people, and proceeding through

a country which had hitherto never been trod by European foot,

the loss was severe and afflicting in the extreme.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 65: It is much to be regretted that the state of the

thermometer was not here noted; more particularly as a question has

arisen as to the correctness of this statement, which is however

repeated by Dr. Oudney almost in the same words.]

SECTION II.

FROM MURMUR TO KANO.

At day-break, on the following morning, I resumed my journey,

trusting to the salutary effects of change of air and abstinence,

as the best remedies both for mind and body. The road was swampy,

and we crossed a narrow stream called Shashum, that falls into the

Yow, near the town. There were numerous villages on all sides.

Jan. 14.—Thermometer 52°. Our road lay through a well cultivated

country; at nine o’clock, A.M., we came to the town of Digoo,

having an indifferent double wall, and a triple ditch nearly filled

up. The town contained very few houses, but date trees were in great

abundance; outside the walls, however, there were several villages,

or rather detached clusters of houses. The country afterwards began

to rise into ridges, running nearly east and west; our road lying

along one of them, gave me an excellent view of beautiful villages

all around, and herds of cattle grazing in the open country. In

the evening we halted under the walls of a town called Boogawa;

this is the last town in the province of Katagum: I did not enter it.

Jan. 15.—The road to-day was through a thickly wooded

country. Before mid-day, we again crossed the Shashum, which here

runs nearly due north. The camel-drivers brought me a quantity of

wild figs, which they found on the trees by the road side, near

the river. We next entered an open, well cultivated country, and in

the evening halted at a town called Katungwa, which is surrounded

by a wall, and has a number of fine date trees. This was the first

town I entered in the kingdom of Haussa Proper. I was visited by

a Felatah, who had been at Bagdad, Constantinople, Jerusalem, and

Mecca, and belonged to the order of Dervishes. He was a chattering

little fellow, and told me he had seen the Wahabees at Mecca, who,

he said, were the same people and spoke the same language as the

Felatahs. I made him a present of a pair of scissors and a snuff-box,

of which he seemed very proud, and sent me a bowl of bazeen in the

evening. I here saw a range of low rocky hills, stretching nearly

south-west. They are called, in the language of Haussa, Dooshee,

or The Rocks, from which a large town on one of the roads leading

from Katagum to Kano takes its name. Since we left the Wells of

Bellkashiffra, on the southern borders of the great desert, we had not

met with rocks, or even pebbles, till now, the very channels of the

rivers being destitute of stones, and the whole country consisting

of soft alluvial clay. The camels were missing, and I sent all the

servants after them; they were not brought back before midnight,

being found on their return to Bornou.

Jan. 16.—The country still open and well cultivated, and the

villages numerous. We met crowds of people coming from Kano with

goods. Some carried them on their heads, others had asses or bullocks,

according to their wealth. All were armed with bows and arrows,

and several with swords; the Bornouese are known by carrying spears.

El Wordee and I having advanced before the cavalcade were waiting

for it under a tree, near a town called Zangeia, when a man from

Katagum went, of his own accord, and told the governor of Zangeia

that a friend of the governor of Katagum was close at hand. The

governor of Zangeia sent the man to tell us he would come and

meet us on horseback, and show us a proper place to pitch our

tents. We mounted our horses, and, led by the Katagumite who was

so anxious for the honour of the friend of his master, we met the

governor, about a quarter of a mile from the tree under which we

had reposed ourselves. He was mounted on a very fine white horse,

gaily caparisoned, and had seven attendants behind him, also

on horseback, besides being accompanied by several men on foot,

armed with bows and arrows. He advanced to us at full gallop, and,

after many courteous welcomes, placed himself at our head, and rode

before us into the town. On reaching his own house, he desired us to

pitch our tents before his door, observing, “Here is a place of

great safety.” The camels arriving with the baggage, I presented

him with a razor, a knife, a pair of scissors, and some spices. He

sent me, in return, some milk and bazeen, with grass and gussub for

the horses. Although a governor, I found out he was only a eunuch,

belonging to the governor of Kano. He was in person fat, coarse,

and ugly, with a shrill squeaking voice, and kept me awake half the

night, laughing and talking among his people.

Zangeia is situate near the extremity of the Dooshee range of hills,

and must have been once a very large town, from the extensive walls

which still remain. The inhabitants were slaughtered or sold by the

Felatahs, and plantations of cotton, tobacco, and indigo now occupy

the place where houses formerly stood. Indeed the town may be said to

consist of a number of thinly scattered villages. Within the walls

there is a ridge of loose blocks of stone, connected with the range

of hills in the neighbourhood. These masses of rock may be about two

hundred feet high, and give a romantic appearance to the neat huts

clustering round the base, and to the fine plantations of cotton,

tobacco, and indigo, which are separated from one another by rows

of date trees, and are shaded by other large umbrageous trees, of

whose names I am ignorant. The prospect to the south was bounded

by high blue mountains. It was market day; plenty of beef, yams,

sweet potatoes, &c. for sale.

[Illustration: Drawn by Captn. Clapperton.

Engraved by E. Finden.

VIEW INSIDE THE TOWN OF SANGIA.

IN HOUSSA.

_Published Feb. 1826, by John Murray, London._]

Jan. 17.—The country still highly cultivated, and now diversified

by hill and dale. We passed a remarkable range of little hillocks of

grey granite; they were naked rocks, flattened or rounded at top,

and appeared like detached masses of stone rising singly out of

the earth. We also passed several walled towns quite deserted, the

inhabitants having been sold by their conquerors, the Felatahs. Women

sat spinning cotton by the road side, offering for sale, to the

passing caravans, gussub water, roast meat, sweet potatoes, cashew

nuts, &c. In the afternoon, we halted in a hollow, to the west of

a town, or rather a collection of villages, called Nansarina, where

it was also market day. The governor, when he heard of my arrival,

sent me milk and bazeen. I sent him, in return, a pair of scissors

and a snuff-box.

Jan. 18.—When I ascended the high ground this morning, I saw a

range of hills to the south-west, which, I was told, were called

Dul, from a large town at their base. They appeared to be 600 or 700

feet high, not peaked, but oval topped, and running in a direction

nearly north and south. I could not learn how far southward they

extended. We crossed a little stream, flowing to the north. The

country continued beautiful, with numerous plantations, as neatly

fenced as in England. The road was thronged with travellers, and

the shady trees by the road side served, as yesterday, to shelter

female hucksters. The women not engaged in the retail of their wares

were busy spinning cotton, and from time to time surveyed themselves,

with whimsical complacency, in a little pocket mirror. The soil is a

strong red clay, large blocks of granite frequently appearing above

the surface.

At eleven in the morning we halted at a walled town called Girkwa,

through which I rode with El Wordee. The houses were in groups,

with large intervening vacancies, the former inhabitants having also

been sold; the walls are in good repair, and are surrounded by a

dry ditch. It was market day, and we found a much finer market here

than at Tripoli. I had an attack of ague,—the disease that chiefly

prevails in these parts,—and was obliged to rest all day under the

shade of a tree. A pretty Felatah girl, going to market with milk

and butter, neat and spruce in her attire as a Cheshire dairy-maid,

here accosted me with infinite archness and grace. She said I was

of her own nation; and, after much amusing small talk, I pressed

her, in jest, to accompany me on my journey, while she parried my

solicitations with roguish glee, by referring me to her father and

mother. I don’t know how it happened, but her presence seemed

to dispel the effects of the ague. To this trifling and innocent

memorial of a face and form, seen that day for the first and last

time, but which I shall not readily forget, I may add the more

interesting information to the good housewives of my own country,

that the making of butter such as ours is confined to the nation of

the Felatahs, and that it is both clean and excellent. So much is this

domestic art cultivated, that from a useful prejudice or superstition,

it is deemed unlucky to sell new milk; it may, however, be bestowed

as a gift. Butter is also made in other parts of central Africa,

but sold in an oily fluid state something like honey.

A native of Mourzuk who resides here sent me some kouskousoo and

fowls. I received a visit from a black shreef, who informed me he

had seen the sea, and that a river I should cross on the morrow

communicated between the Kowara and the Yow. By the Kowara,

I understood him to mean the river that passes Timbuctoo, and

which, of late years, has been so much talked of in Europe, under

the name of Niger. This was a piece of gratuitous information,

for on cross-questioning him he could furnish no authority for his

opinion. But I soon discovered the whole trick, by El Wordee strongly

recommending me to give my informant a present. The country to the

south and south-west was very hilly.

Jan. 19.—We crossed a water-course called Girkwa, from the name

of the town in its immediate vicinity. It is the channel of the

same river the black shreef alluded to, but did not now contain

a drop of water. Indeed the channel itself is extremely shallow,

and only about sixty or seventy yards across. The guide furnished

me by the governor of Katagum told me, that the river took its rise

in the mountains of Dul, and falling into another river, which we

should soon come to, and which rose among the mountains of Nora,

their united waters flowed into the Yow, to the north of Katagum.

The country was much the same as yesterday; clear of wood, well

cultivated, and divided into plantations. At noon we crossed the river

Sockwa, alluded to above, and forming a junction with the Girkwa. The

water was not above ankle deep in the middle of the stream, which

did not now fill one twentieth part of the channel, and both rivers,

I have no doubt, are at all times fordable, even during the rainy

season. About a mile from the banks of the river, we passed the town

of Sockwa, which is defended by a high clay wall. Being very unwell,

I did not enter the town, but rode on through a clear, open country,

to the town of Duakee, where I halted under a tree until the camels

came up. This town is also walled, but contains few inhabitants,

although the walls, made of clay like all the others, are of great

extent, and in good repair. Before four o’clock the camels arrived,

and we pitched our tents under the tree where I had lain down. The

road was still crowded, from sunrise to sunset, with people going

to or coming from Kano.

Jan. 20.—By El Wordee’s advice, I prepared myself this morning

for entering Kano, which was now at hand. Arrayed in naval uniform,

I made myself as smart as circumstances would permit. For three miles

to the north of Duakee, the country was open and well cultivated. It

then became thickly covered with underwood, until we ascended a rising

ground, whence we had a view of two little mounts within the walls of

Kano. The soil here is a tough clay mixed with gravel, the stones of

which appear to be clay ironstone. The country was now clear of wood,

except here and there a few large shady trees, resorted to as usual

by the women of the country selling refreshments. The villages were

numerous, and the road was thronged with people of all descriptions.

At eleven o’clock we entered Kano, the great emporium of the

kingdom of Haussa; but I had no sooner passed the gates, than I felt

grievously disappointed; for from the flourishing description of it

given by the Arabs, I expected to see a city of surprising grandeur:

I found, on the contrary, the houses nearly a quarter of a mile

from the walls, and in many parts scattered into detached groups,

between large stagnant pools of water. I might have spared all the

pains I had taken with my toilet; for not an individual turned his

head round to gaze at me, but all, intent on their own business,

allowed me to pass by without notice or remark.