country well wooded, we reached, after a march of about seven miles, a
village, and entered it cheerfully with the intention of spending the
night there, but were greatly disappointed on discovering that it was
entirely deserted, and did not contain a living creature. Fortunately,
however, after consulting what was to be done, we found a traveller who
showed us a small path which was to lead us to the town of Álamáy. He
also informed us that the inhabitants of this village, the name of which
was Jáwel, had formed a new village further south. The little path
pointed out, however, was so overgrown and slightly marked that we soon
became doubtful and perplexed. I went, therefore, to inquire of a
shepherd whom we saw at some little distance on the right of our path;
but no sooner did he observe me approaching than he ran away, leaving
his flock at our discretion.
The state of this country is very miserable indeed, all the petty
governors around, as soon as they have any debts to pay, undertaking a
predatory expedition, and often selling even their own subjects.[46]
However, we were lucky in finding at last a more trodden path, which
soon brought us to an open, straggling village named Kárgímawa, which
displayed a most animated and cheerful picture of a wealthy and
industrious little community—the men sitting in the shade of some fine
caoutchouc tree, some of them busy making mats, others weaving, while
the women were carrying water, or setting the pot upon the fire for the
evening repast. Cattle, goats, and fowl roved about in considerable
quantities.
Quite delighted at arriving (in consequence of having strayed from the
direct road) at this sequestered place, we pitched our tent with a
grateful sense of security, and squatted comfortably down, while the
camels found a rich repast in the fields. In one thing, however, I was
disappointed. The sight of so many cattle had led me to anticipate a
good draught of milk; but the cattle did not belong to the inhabitants,
and before sunset they were driven away. In other respects we were
hospitably treated, and four little dishes were brought us in the
evening from different huts, three of which contained paste of Guinea
corn, and one beans. The latter always seemed to me an agreeable
variety; but a European must be very cautious how he indulges in them in
these regions, as they are apt to derange the stomach, and to bring on
serious illness.
[Sidenote: Friday, March 21st.]
Very early in the morning a numerous troop of small tradesmen, with
pack-oxen, passed through the village while we awaited day-light; and
then having gratefully taken leave of the hospitable villagers, we set
out, accompanied by one of them, to show us the road. Having passed the
former site of a little town, we soon gained the direct road, where we
fell in with a motley gipsy-looking troop of those Tébu-Jétko, who,
after the almost total annihilation of the commonwealth of Kánem, have
immigrated into Bórnu. Those we met here were coming from Zínder. They
had a few horses, oxen, and asses with them, but scarcely any luggage;
and the whole attire of men, women, and children was very poor. We then
passed the little town of Álamáy, surrounded not only with an earthen
wall and ditch, but also with a dense thorny fence some ten feet thick
on the outside. Here was exhibited the pleasant picture of a numerous
herd of fine cattle lying tranquilly on the spacious area inside the
wall, ruminating their last day’s repast, while a large extent of
cultivated ground around the town gave ample proof of the industry of
the people. But the wellbeing of the inhabitants of these regions has
very little guarantee; and when, toward the end of the year 1854, I
again travelled this same road, not a single cow was to be seen here,
and the whole place looked mournful and deserted, tall reed-grass
covering the fields which had been formerly cultivated.
Having then passed a thick forest of underwood, and some cultivated
ground, half an hour before noon we reached Búndi[47], the residence of
the ghaladíma ʿOmár, fortified in the same way as Álamáy, and went up
directly to the house of the governor, which consists entirely of reed-
work. However, the mats (“lágará”) which surround the whole
establishment are of very great height, at least fifteen feet, and of
considerable thickness, made of a peculiar reed called “súgu,” and being
sustained by long poles, and kept in a good state of repair, do not look
ill. Besides, they are in general strengthened still further on the
outside by a fence of thorny bushes.
The ghaladíma[48], or governor of the Gháladí, which (as we shall see in
the historical account of the Bórnu empire) comprised all the western
provinces of Bórnu from the komádugu Wáube (the so-called Yéou) to the
shores of the Kwára, having his residence in Bírni Ngurú, near Mármar,
in former times was an officer (or rather an almost independent feudal
vassal) of immense power; at present, however, he has sunk to great
insignificance, and in real power is much inferior to his neighbours the
governors of Múniyo, Zínder, and even that of Máshena. But the present
ghaladíma ʿOmár is an intriguing man; and it would have been imprudent
to pass on without paying him the compliment of a visit; and I was
justified in hoping that he would provide me with a guide in order that
I might reach as soon as possible the presence of his liege lord the
sheikh of Bórnu.
Not being able to see him directly, I was obliged to sacrifice half a
day, and to make up my mind to spend the night here. I therefore asked
for quarters, and was lodged in a spacious but dirty courtyard, where I
could procure but a very insufficient shade with my little English bell-
tent of thin canvass. Having passed two uncomfortable hours without any
refreshment, I was called in the afternoon into the presence of the
governor, and being obliged to leave my servant behind to take care of
my luggage while ʿAbd-Alla was pasturing the camels, I went alone, and
found the great man in a spacious room or hall formed entirely of
matwork, where he was lying upon an elevated platform or divan spread
with a carpet. He was a short, well-fed, dark-coloured man, of about
sixty years of age, his large, broad face looking forth from the hood of
a blue cloth bernús, with a neutral expression indicating neither
stupidity nor cleverness; his courtiers were grouped around him on the
ground. Having saluted him and made the usual polite inquiries, I
expressed my ardent desire to reach Kúkawa as soon as possible, as the
day which I had fixed with my elder brother (Mr. Richardson) for a
meeting in that place was drawing nigh; and I begged him, therefore, to
grant me a guide who might conduct me there by the most direct road, of
which I myself was ignorant, much time having been already lost in
groping my way from one place to another. I then delivered my little
present, consisting of an English razor and clasp-knife, a large mirror
of German silver, a parcel of English darning-needles, half a pound of
cloves, and a piece of scented soap. Having looked at these things with
satisfaction, he asked me if I had not anything marvellous with me; and
I consented to return to my quarters and fetch my musical box, with the
performance of which the ghaladíma was highly pleased, but greatly
desired to see some other curious things, such as pocket-pistols,
whereupon I told him that I had nothing else calculated to gratify his
curiosity. I was much fatigued, and on returning to my tent was not at
all pleased to be still troubled by the governor’s servant, who came to
ask, in the name of his master, for calico, sugar, rose oil, and sundry
other articles.
Búndi is a place of tolerable size, but with little industry; and the
province of which it is the capital is going to ruin more and more, on
account of the laziness and negligence of its governor,—a statement
which will be amply proved by the account of my journey through the same
district in 1854. The town probably contains eight or nine thousand
inhabitants, who belong to the Mánga nation, which seems to be the chief
element of the Kanúri, and preserves many very remarkable customs. The
special name of the clan of this tribe which dwells hereabouts is Kárda.
There is no market here of any importance; but the inhabitants seem to
be tolerably at their ease, and there was music and racing, or
“kadáske,” in the evening, accompanied by the joyous shrill voices, the
“wulúli,” of the women. We, however, seemed to be forgotten; and it was
nine o’clock at night, long after we had supped, when we received a dish
for ourselves, and corn for the horse. It is rather remarkable that
these western provinces of Bórnu were never conquered by the Fúlbe or
Felláta, though lying so much nearer to those countries of which they
have definitively taken possession than that part of Bórnu situated
between the old capital and the great lagoon. The consequence is, that a
certain degree of independence is allowed to them, and that they do not
pay any tithes to the sheikh.[49]
[Footnote 42: The names he gave me are as follow:—Dubberáno, Buténi,
Hákka, Hanʿaa, Syr-há, Néshyrá, Tárfa, Sábená, Harzána, Surfa, Iwák,
Shemák, Ikelíllu, Fáram makadám, Fáram makhéro. Of these fifteen names,
which I was unable to identify with the months of the Arab calendar, as
the man scarcely understood a word of Arabic, three may rather denote
the seasons.]
[Footnote 43: “Chínna-n-yalá” is an interesting specimen of the
corruption of a language in the border-districts; for while the words
are Kanúri, they are joined according to the grammar of the Háusa
language, for in Kanúri the expression ought to be “chínna yalabe.”]
[Footnote 44: Further on I shall give the itinerary from Kanó to this
important place, joining it with my own route.]
[Footnote 45: The drawing given by Denham of a Mánga warrior makes him
look much taller than the Kanémma, while the Mánga in general, though
more robust, is shorter than the former, though there are exceptions.
The battle-axe also and other characteristic details are wanting.]
[Footnote 46: The Anti-Slavery Society seems to be unaware of these
facts, as they suppose that a person in these regions is sufficiently
protected by his creed. They appear not to have read the late Mr.
Richardson’s Journal, the latter part of which is full of remarks and
exclamations on this melancholy state of the inhabitants. See especially
vol. ii. p. 223.]
[Footnote 47: “Búndi,” in Kanúri, means “wild beasts.” The inhabitants
still bear the particular name of Ngúru-bú, plural of Ngúru-ma, from the
name of the place or district Ngurú, generally called Ángarú.]
[Footnote 48: The termination -ma in Kanúri signifies the possession of
a thing, and is equivalent to the mai- in Háusa, placed before a word.
Thus bílla-ma is exactly identical with maí-gari, fír-ma with mai-dóki
(the horseman), and so on. With this termination almost all the names of
offices are formed in Kanúri, as yerí-ma, chiró-ma, kasél-ma, and so on.
Thus also the governor of the province Múniyo or Mínyo bears the title
Muniyó-ma or Minyó-ma, a name entirely misunderstood by Mr. Richardson.
I will only add here that the title of the governor of the Gháladí in
the Bórnu empire, on account of the immense extent of the latter, has
been introduced into the list of offices of all the courts of Central
Negroland, and that we find a ghaladíma in Sókoto as well as in every
little town of ʿAdamáwa. The same is to be said of some offices
originally belonging only to the court of the empire of Mélle, such as
that of feréng or fárma, mánso, and others.]
[Footnote 49: Here I will give the route from Kanó to Álamä́y, near
Búndi, by way of Khadéja, as it determines approximately the position of
this town, which has been also mentioned by Clapperton as a place of
importance. But its peculiar political situation, forced upon it by the
events of this period, when it became the residence of a rebel chief
waging war on all around, prevented my visiting it at a future period.
1st day. On leaving Kanó, sleep in Gógia, where the governor of Kanó has
a house, and where you arrive about two o’clock in the afternoon.
2nd. Gáya, another town of the province of Kanó, where you arrive about
the same hour, having crossed in the forenoon the bed of a torrent with
water only in the rainy season.
3rd. Dúchi or Dútsi; arrive about the ʿaser, having crossed in the
morning a torrent called Dedúrra, and passed about noon a half-deserted
place called Katákatá.
4th. Zogó, a large open place; about ʿaser. Many small villages on the
road.
5th. Khadéja, a large town surrounded with a beautiful and very strong
double clay wall, and well inhabited, the courtyards being inclosed with
clay walls, but containing only reed huts. The inhabitants employ
themselves exclusively in warlike expeditions, and have no industry; but
nevertheless there are still to be seen here a few dyeing-pots, marking
the eastern limit of this branch of industry. On the south side of the
town is a kogí, or komádugu, with a stream of running water in the rainy
season, but with only stagnant pools in summer, along which a little
wheat is cultivated. It is generally called Wáni.
6th. Garú-n-ghábbes, a middle-sized walled town, the first place of
Bórnu, on this side, with a good deal of cultivation around. Though
without importance in other respects, it is so in an historical point of
view; for this place being identical with the town Birám tá ghábbes,
mentioned above, is regarded as the oldest place of the seven original
settlements of the Háusa nation.
7th. Álamä́y, the place which I passed by this morning; arrive about
ʿaser. Country in a wild state; no cultivation.]
CHAP. XXVII.
BÓRNU PROPER.
[Sidenote: Saturday, March 22nd.]
The ghaladíma had promised to send me a horseman last evening, as I
wanted to start early in the morning; but as we neither saw nor heard
anything of him the whole night, I thought it better not to lose any
more time, but to rely upon my own resources, and accordingly left the
town quietly by the northern gate, while the people, after last night’s
merriment, were still buried in sleep.
Following the great road, we kept on through a light forest, at times
interrupted by a little cultivation. We met several parties—first of a
warlike character, armed, horse and foot, then a motley band of natron-
traders with camels, bulls, horses and asses, all laden with this
valuable article. Emerging at length from the forest, we came upon a
wide extent of cultivated land with a sandy soil, with hardly a single
tree at present, and, the labours of the field not having yet commenced,
still covered with the káwo or _Asclepias_, the characteristic weed of
Negroland, which every year, at the beginning of the agricultural
season, is cleared away, and which during the dry season grows again,
often to the height of ten or twelve feet. We then had a most
interesting and cheerful scene of African life in the open, straggling
village of Kálimarí or Kálemrí, divided into two distinct groups by a
wide open space, where numerous herds of cattle were just being watered
at the wells; but how melancholy, how mournful, became the recollection
of the busy animated scene which I then witnessed, when three years and
a half later, as I travelled again through this district, the whole
village, which now presented such a spectacle of happiness and well-
being, had disappeared, and an insecure wilderness, greatly infested by
robbers, had succeeded to the cheerful abode of man.
But inviting as the village was for a halt during the heat of the day,
we had, as conscientious and experienced travellers, the stomachs of our
poor animals more at heart than our own; and having watered the horse
and filled our skins, we continued on for a while, and then halted in
very rich herbage, where, however, there was scarcely a spot free from
the disagreeable “ngíbbu,” the _Pennisetum distichum_. On starting again
in the afternoon, the country began to exhibit a greater variety of bush
and tree; and after a march of two hours, we reached the village
Dármagwá, surrounded with a thorny fence, and encamped near it, not far
from another little trading-party. We were soon joined by a troop of
five Tébu merchants with two camels, a horse, and two pack-oxen, who
were also going to Kúkawa, but who, unfortunately, did not suit me as
constant companions, their practice being to start early in the morning
long before day-light, which was against my principle, as well in a
scientific as in a material point of view; for neither should I have
been able to lay down the road with correctness, nor would even the best
arms have guaranteed my safety while marching in the dark. We therefore
allowed them next morning to have the start of us for full two hours,
and then followed.
[Sidenote: Sunday, March 23rd.]
We now entered a district which may be most appropriately called the
exclusive region of the dúm-palm or _Cucifera Thebaïca_ in Negroland;
for though this tree is found, in large clusters or in detached
specimens, in many localities of Central Africa, yet it is always
limited to some favoured spot, especially to the bank of a watercourse,
as the komádugu near the town of Yó, and there is no other district of
such extent as this tract between Kálemrí and Zurríkulo where the
_Cucifera Thebaïca_ is the characteristic and almost the only tree. My
Gatróni thought that the trees would perhaps not bear fruit here; but on
my second journey, in the month of December, they were loaded with
fruit.
The country has a very peculiar open character, a sandy level very
slightly undulating, covered thinly with tall reed-grass shooting forth
from separate bunches, the line of view broken only now and then by a
cluster of slender fan-palms, without a single trace of cultivation. I
was anxious afterwards to know whether this tract has always had this
monotonous, deserted character, or whether it had contained formerly any
towns and villages; and from all that I could learn, the former seems to
be the case. However, our road was frequented, and we met several little
troops of native travellers, with one of whom I saw the first specimen
of the “kúri,” a peculiar kind of bull of immense size and strength,
with proportionately large horns of great thickness and curving inwards.
They are almost all of white colour. Their original home is Kárgá, the
cluster of islands and swampy ground at the eastern corner of the Tsád.
After five hours’ marching, when we had just traversed a small hollow
full of herbage, the dúm-palm was for a moment superseded by other
trees, chiefly by the gáwo or karáge; but it soon after again asserted
its eminence as the predominating tree. We encamped at length, ignorant
as we were of the country, a few minutes beyond a small village, the
first human abode we had met with since we had left Dármagwá, half an
hour before noon, in the shade of a tamarind-tree, surrounded by a thick
cluster of dúm-palms. Certainly the tamarind-tree indicated that water
was near; but I was not a little surprised, when ʿAbd-Alla, who was
tending the camels, brought me the news that a considerable river, now
stagnant, was close behind us. It was, as I afterwards learnt, the
“Wáni,” that branch of the komádugu Wáube (erroneously called “Yë́u”)
which runs past Khadéja and joins the other branch which comes from
Katágum. We therefore watered our camels here without being obliged to
pay a single shell, and gave them a good feed, after which we resumed
our march, and were not a little astonished when, having crossed the
komádugu where it formed a narrow meandering channel about fifty yards
broad, and bordered on both sides with trees, we discovered the town of
Zurríkulo at a short distance before us.
Going round the north side of the town, we entered the dilapidated wall
on the eastern side, where there was an open space, and pitched my tent
close to the Tébu, who had arrived already in the forenoon. Soon after,
there arrived also a káfila, with twelve camels and a number of oxen and
asses, from Kúkawa, and I was anxious to obtain some news of Mr.
Richardson; but these people were utterly ignorant of the actual or
expected arrival of any Christian in that place. They told me, however,
what was not very agreeable, that the sheikh of Bórnu was about to
undertake a pilgrimage to Mekka; but fortunately, though that was the
heart’s desire of that mild and pious man, he could not well carry it
into execution.
I had now entered Bórnu proper, the nucleus of that great Central
African empire in its second stage, after Kánem had been given up. It is
bordered towards the east by the great sea-like komádugu the Tsád or
Tsáde, and towards the west and north-west by the little komádugu which
by the members of the last expedition has been called Yéou, from the
town of that name, or rather Yó, near which they first made its
acquaintance on their way from Fezzán. I had now left behind me those
loosely-attached principalities which still preserve some sort of
independence, and henceforth had only to do with Bórnu officers.
Not feeling very well, I remained in my tent without paying my
compliments to the officer here stationed, whose name is Kashélla Sʿaid,
with whom I became acquainted on a later occasion, but the good man
being informed by the people that a stranger from a great distance, who
was going to visit his liege lord, had entered his town, sent his people
to welcome me, and regaled me with several bowls of very good paste,
with fresh fish, and a bowl of milk.
Zurríkulo was once a large town, and at the time of the inroad of Wadáÿ
revolted from the sheikh, but was obliged to surrender to his brother
ʿAbd e’ Rahmán. Since then it has gradually been decaying, and is now
half deserted. The neighbourhood of the town is full of wild animals;
and great fear was entertained by my companions for our beasts, as we
had no protection in our rear. The roaring of a lion was heard during
the night.
[Sidenote: Monday, March 24th.]
Next morning, when we resumed our march, the fan-palm for some time
continued to be the prevailing tree; but some kukas also, or _Adansonia
digitata_, and other more leafy trees began to appear, and after a while
a thick underwood sprang up. Then followed a few scattered, I might say
forlorn, date-trees, which looked like strangers in the country,
transplanted into this region by some accident. The sky was clear; and I
was leaning carelessly upon my little nag, musing on the original homes
of all the plants which now adorn different countries, when I saw
advancing towards us a strange-looking person of very fair complexion,
richly dressed and armed, and accompanied by three men on horseback,
likewise armed with musket and pistols. Seeing that he was a person of
consequence, I rode quickly up to him and saluted him, when he,
measuring me with his eyes, halted and asked me whether I was the
Christian who was expected to arrive from Kanó; and on my answering him
in the affirmative, he told me distinctly that my fellow-traveller Yakúb
(Mr. Richardson) had died before reaching Kúkawa, and that all his
property had been seized. Looking him full in the face, I told him that
this, if true, was serious news; and then he related some particulars,
which left but little doubt as to the truth of his statement. When his
name was asked, he called himself Ismʿaíl; I learned, however,
afterwards, from other people, that he was the sheríf el Habíb, a native
of Morocco, and really of noble blood, a very learned, but extremely
passionate man, who, in consequence of a dispute with Mʿallem Mohammed
had been just driven out of Kúkawa by the sheikh of Bórnu.