CHAPTER VII.

THE BONGO: Area, boundaries, and population of Bongoland.

Subjection of the Bongo to the Khartoomers. Decrease of

population by slave-trading. Red tinge of the skin. Width of

the skull. Small growth of hair. No aridity in climate. Wild

tubers as food. Races of goats and dogs. Hunting-weapons.

Villages and huts. Smelting furnaces. Money of the Bongo.

Weapons for display. Wood-carving. Penates of the Bongo. Musical

instruments. Character of Bongo music. Corpulence of the women.

Hottentot Venus. Mutilation of the teeth. Disfigurement of

the lips. Arrow-poisoning. National games. Marriage premiums.

Natural morality. Disposing of the dead. Memorial erections.

Mistrust of spirits. Loma, good and ill-luck. Fear of ghosts.

Belief in witches. Peculiarities of language. Unity of the

people of Central Africa. Extermination of the race.

I purpose in this chapter to describe a people which, though visibly

on the decline, may still by its peculiarity and striking independence

in nationality, language, and customs, be selected from amid the

circle of its neighbours as a genuine type of African life. Belonging

to the past as much as to the present, without constitution, history,

or definite traditions, it is passing away, like deeds forgotten in

the lapse of time, and is becoming as a drop in the vast sea of the

Central African races. But just as a biographer, by depicting the

passions, failings, and virtues of a few individuals, may exhibit a

representation of an entire epoch in history, so we may turn with

interest to scenes which have been enacted in this limited district of

the great and mysterious continent, sure of finding much edifying

matter in the course of our investigations. Like the rain-drop which

feeds the flowing river and goes its way to replenish the mighty

ocean, every separate people, however small, has its share in the

changes which supervene in the progress of nations; there is not one

which is without an abstract bearing on the condition of primitive

Africa, and which may not aid us in an intelligent survey of any

perspective that may be opened into its still dark interior.

To the antiquary, within whose province the description may lie in a

degree, the material that is offered must be in a measure attractive.

A people, as long as they are on the lowest step of their development,

are far better characterised by their industrial products than they

are either by their habits, which may be purely local, or by their own

representations, which (rendered in their rude and unformed language)

are often incorrectly interpreted by ourselves. If we possessed more

of these tokens, we should be in a position to comprehend better than

we do the primitive condition of many a nation that has now reached a

high degree of culture.

[Sidenote: COUNTRY OF THE BONGO.]

Of all the natives with whom I had intercourse in my wanderings, the

majority of those who acted as my bearers, and amongst whom I most

frequently sojourned, were the Bongo. It was in their territory that I

spent the greater part of my time in the interior; and thus it

happened that I became intimate with many particulars of their life,

was initiated into all their habits, and even to a certain extent

mastered their dialect.[28]

The present country of the Bongo lies between lat. 6° and 8° N. on the

south-western boundary of the depression of the Bahr-el-Ghazal basin,

and on the lowest of the terraces where the southern slopes appear to

make a transition from the elevated ferruginous crust to the

unfathomed alluvial flats which are traversed by all the affluents of

the river. In the extent of its area the land covers about the same

surface as Belgium, but with regard to population, it might be more

aptly compared to the plains of Siberia or the northern parts of

Norway and Sweden; it is a deserted wilderness, averaging only 11 or

12 people to the square mile. The country extends from the Roah to the

Pango, and embraces the middle course of nearly all the affluents of

the Gazelle; it is 175 miles long by 50 miles broad, but towards the

north-west the breadth diminishes to about 40 miles. On the north it

is only divided by the small Dyoor country from that of the Dinka,

which, however, it directly joins upon the north-east. The south-east

boundary is the Mittoo territory on the Roah; and that on the west is

the country of the Golo and Sehre on the Pango. The eastern branch of

the extensive Niam-niam lands joins the Bongo on the south; whilst,

wedged between and straitly pressed, the Bellanda and the Babuckur

have their settlements.

When, eighteen years ago, the Khartoomers first set foot in Bongoland,

they found the entire country divided into a number of independent

districts, all in the usual anarchy of petty African communities;

there was nothing anywhere like an organised commonwealth such as may

be found amongst the Dinka, where entire districts unite and form an

imposing warlike tribe. Every village simply had its chief, who, in

virtue of superior wealth, exercised a certain authority over the rest

of the inhabitants, and who, in some cases, had an additional

_prestige_ from his skill in the art of magic. The Nubians,

consequently, never had to contend against the unanimous hostility of

a powerful or well-disciplined people, and only in a few isolated

places had to encounter much resolute opposition. Their soldiers, not

merely by the tenor of their religion, conceived themselves justified

in perpetrating every sort of outrage upon heathen unbelievers, but

they were taught to consider their acts of violence as meritorious in

the sight of God: it was, therefore, an easy matter for them to fall

upon the weak authorities of the country, and in the space of a few

years to apportion the entire territory amongst the few ivory

merchants in Khartoom, whose spirit of enterprise, suddenly kindled by

the exaggerated reports of the profits secured on the Upper Nile by

Europeans, the first explorers, had developed itself into a remarkable

activity.

[Sidenote: VASSALAGE.]

The natives were without difficulty reduced to a condition of

vassalage, and, in order that they might be under the close

supervision and at the service of their oppressors, they were

compelled to quit their homes, and to reside near the Seribas that

were established in various parts of the land. By the application of

this sort of feudal system, the trading companies brought about the

realisation of their project for a permanent occupation of the

country. Shut in by the Niam-niam on the south and by the Dinka on the

north, Bongoland offered a twofold advantage for the establishment of

headquarters for the expeditions: in the first place, it was in close

proximity to the Mesheras, or landing-places; and, secondly, by its

advanced position towards the interior, it afforded most ample

opportunities for setting in operation the contemplated excursions to

the prolific ivory districts of the south. The Dinka, hostile and

intractable from the first, had never given the intruders the smallest

chance of settling amongst them; while the Bongo, docile and yielding,

and addicted almost exclusively to agriculture, had, on the other

hand, contributed in no slight measure to maintain the Seribas. If

ever, now and again, they had been roused to offer anything like a

warlike opposition, they had only too soon succumbed to the motto of

the conquerors, “Divide, et impera.”

The Dyoor, the Golo, the Mittoo, and other smaller tribes, shared the

fate of the Bongo, and in the short space of ten years a series of

more than eighty Seribas had arisen between the Rohl and the Beery.

Scarcely half the population escaped slavery, and that only by

emigrating; a portion took refuge amongst the Dinka on the north, and

others withdrew southwards to the Niam-niam frontiers, where the

isolated mountains enabled them to hold out for a while. The

Khartoomers, however, were not long in pursuing them, and gradually

displaced them even from this position.

During the early years of their occupation, the Nubians beyond a

question treated the country most shamefully; there are traces still

existing which demonstrate that large villages and extensive plots of

cultivated land formerly occupied the scene where now all is

desolation. Boys and girls were carried off by thousands as slaves to

distant lands; and the Nubians, like the _parvenu_ who looks upon his

newly-acquired wealth as inexhaustible, regarded the territory as

being permanently productive; they revelled like monkeys in the

durra-fields of Taka and Gedaref. In course of time they came to know

that the enduring value of the possessions which they had gained

depended mainly on the physical force at their disposal; they began to

understand how they must look to the hands of the natives for the

cultivation of their corn, and to their legs for the transport of

their merchandise. Meanwhile, altogether, the population must have

diminished by at least two-thirds. According to a careful estimate

that I made of the numbers of huts in the villages around the Seribas

and the numbers of bearers levied in the several districts, I found

that the population could not at most be reckoned at more than

100,000, scattered over an area of nearly 9000 square miles.

On first landing from the rivers, the Khartoomers opened up an

intercourse with the Dinka, who did not refuse to furnish them with

bearers and interpreters for their further progress into the interior,

and it was from them that they learnt the names of the different

tribes. In Central Africa every nation has a different designation for

its neighbours than that by which they are known among themselves; and

it is the same with the rivers, which have as many names as the

nations through whose territory they flow. In this way the Nubians

have adopted the Dinka appellations of Dyoor for Lwoh, Niam-niam for

Zandey, and Dohr for Bongo. This last people always style themselves

Bongo, and the Khartoomers, since they have made their headquarters in

their territory, have discarded the Dinka name of Dohr, and now always

use the native term Bongo. According to the Arabic form of expression,

the plural of Dohr is Derahn, and of Niam-niam it is Niamahniam.

[Sidenote: COMPLEXION OF THE BONGO.]

The complexion of the Bongo in colour is not dissimilar to the

red-brown soil upon which they reside; the Dinka, on the other hand,

are black as their own native alluvium. The circumstance is suggestive

of Darwin’s theory of “protective resemblance” among animals; and

although in this instance it may be purely accidental, yet it appears

to be worthy of notice. Any traveller who has followed the course of

the main sources of the White Nile into the heathen negro countries,

and who has hitherto made acquaintance only with Shillooks, Nueir, and

Dinka, will, on coming amongst the Bongo, at once recognise the

commencement of a new series of races extending far onwards to the

south. As trees and plants are the children of the soil from which

they spring, so here does the human species appear to adapt itself in

external aspect to the red ferruginous rock which prevails around. The

jet-black Shillooks, Nueir, and Dinka, natives of the dark alluvial

flats, stand out in marked distinction to the dwellers upon the

iron-red rocks, who (notwithstanding their diversity in dialect, in

habit, or in mode of life) present the characteristics of a connected

whole. Of this series the tribes which must be accounted the most

important are the Bongo, the Mittoo, the Niam-niam, and the Kredy, all

of which are equally remarkable for their entire indifference to

cattle-breeding. The whole of these, especially the women, are

distinguished for the reddish hue of their skin, which in many cases

is almost copper-coloured. It cannot be denied that this red-brown

complexion is never entirely wanting, even amongst the darkest skins

that are found in the lowlands; but the difference between their

complexion and what is ordinarily observed among the Bongo is only to

be illustrated by the contrast in colour between a camellia leaf in

its natural condition and after its epidermis has been removed.

Although amongst every race the tint of the complexion is sure to

deviate into considerable varieties of shade, yet, from a broad

estimate, it may be asserted that the general tint remains unaltered,

and that what may be denominated the “ground tint” constitutes a

distinctive mark separating between race and race. Gustav Fritsch, in

his work upon the people of Southern Africa, has bestowed great

attention upon this subject, and by means of an ingenious table,

arranged according to the intensity of various shades of colour, has

very perspicuously explained the characteristics of the Kaffirs,

Hottentots, and Bochjesmen. As matter of fact, among the Bongo may be

seen individuals with their skin as black as ebony; but yet this does

not prevent the true ground tint of their complexions being something

essentially distinct from any example that could occur among the true

Ethiopians, whether these might be light or dark. The evidence of the

distinction of which I speak, I have no doubt is altogether very

conclusive; and I have had many opportunities of testing its reality

in my observations at the various Seribas, where half-castes are very

numerous, being the offspring of Nubians (including Bedouins in that

category) and Bongo.

In taking a coloured likeness of a Bongo it is necessary to use the

deep red pigment known as Pompeian red very freely. I was once in the

studio of an artist at Rome who was painting in oil the likeness of a

Bongo whom I had brought to Europe. I could not help observing that he

made the ground-tint of the flesh quite of a liver colour (hepatic)

hue, whilst when he was portraying natives, either of Dongola or of

Berber, or even when he was depicting the true Arabs, although their

skins were equally dark, he did not make use of red at all, but

employed a kind of yellow for the basis of the shades to follow. His

proceeding appeared to me an involuntary attestation to the

distinction which really exists.

[Sidenote: STATURE OF THE BONGO.]

Like the Niam-niam, Mittoo, and Kredy, the Bongo rarely exceed a

medium height. They differ, however, in several respects from the

Dinka and other people of the lowland plains. Their prominent

characteristics appeared to me to consist in a more compact form of

limb, a sharper development of muscle, a wider formation of the skull,

and generally a preponderating mass in the upper part of the body. Of

83 men that I measured I did not find one who had attained a height of

6 ft. 1 in., whilst the average height did not appear to me to be more

than 5 ft. 7 in. Dinka and Bongo alike afforded very striking samples

of the two great series of races which they severally represented, and

each displayed the principal characteristics of their particular race

in their stature, their complexion, and their form of skull. I cannot

recall a single instance among the Bongo where the skull was of the

long but narrow shape that is all but universal among the Dinka. Of

many of these Bongo that I measured, I should pronounce that they

would require to be classified as hardly removed from the lowest grade

of the Brachycephaly. They appear themselves to be aware of this

characteristic. I remember a discussion that once arose about a little

boy, too young to speak, as to whether he was a Dinka or a Bongo. One

of the interpreters, after minute examination of the proportions of

the child’s head, came to an immediate, but decided, opinion that the

boy was a Bongo, and in answer to my inquiry as to the grounds on

which he so confidently based his decision, he explained that he

judged from the fact that the head was broad; he went on, moreover,

accompanying his words by corresponding gestures, to say that the

Bongo women, as soon as an infant is born, press its head downwards,

but the Dinka mothers, on the contrary, compress the heads of their

babies from the sides. Now, although it is hardly credible that this

manipulation on the part of the mothers would have any permanent

influence on the conformation of the skulls of an entire nation, yet

we may accept the statement as a significant proof of the high

estimation in which the natives hold this attribute and token of their

race. It has been proved by experience that in the most diverse

nations of the earth, mothers will always be ready to use external

means to promote as far as they can any signs of nationality in their

offspring, ignorant of the certainty that these signs would of

themselves, without assistance, be manifested eventually. In order to

effect an actual alteration in the shape of the skull, such as may be

observed amongst the Mongolian and American Indian tribes, it is

necessary to employ continuous and forcible pressure, and to bind the

head with straps and bandages from the earliest infancy.

The hair of the Bongo offers no peculiarity, either with regard to its

culture or its growth, that can be deemed of any special interest; it

is short and curly; moreover, it is of that woolly nature at which, in

default of anything better, the theorist who propounds the doctrine of

the independent and yet of the mutual connection of the heathen races

eagerly clutches. Corresponding to the numerous gradations in

complexion and formation of the skull are the varieties in growth of

the hair which are exhibited. Hair which is thick and frizzly is

common amongst every race that has hitherto been discovered on African

soil, and although there are a few unimportant exceptions among the

Arab tribes (the Sheigieh) who have settled in Nubia, and

notwithstanding that the hair of the Ethiopians, as well as that of

the North African people may be termed curly more appropriately than

woolly, yet straight hair is nowhere to be found. The real

distinctions, therefore, in the growth of the hair in the nations of

Central Africa consist in the colour and length, which vary

considerably in the different races; beards predominate with some,

whilst with others they fail entirely. In common with most other

people of the red soil, the Bongo have hair which is perfectly black,

but in its length it is very different from that of the Niam-niam. On

the Niam-niam frontiers the Bongo have often tried to imitate their

neighbours by twisting and plaiting their hair, but their attempts

have been always a failure. Whiskers, beards, and moustaches are

cultivated in very rare cases, but the hair never grows to a length

much exceeding half-an-inch.

[Sidenote: SUPPLY OF WATER.]

Bongoland is traversed from south to north by five important

tributaries of the Gazelle. With these are associated a number of

smaller rivulets which are not permanent streams; nevertheless, from

the pools which remain in their beds throughout the dry season, they

furnish a sufficient supply of moisture to maintain the vegetation of

the country. Water for drinking never fails, although from November to

the end of March a fall of rain is quite exceptional. In cases of

necessity water can always be procured without much time or trouble

from those pools which survive the periodical water-courses in the

marshes. Dearth as a consequence of prolonged drought appears to be a

condition quite unknown; certainly it has not occurred for the last

ten years. The crops are far more frequently injured by superabundant

moisture than by drought, and the continuance of wide inundations has

been followed by famine. Everything seems to suggest the thought how

easily rice might be cultivated in the country.

The Bongo are essentially an agricultural people. With the exception

of some occasional hunting and some intermittent periods devoted to

fishing, they depend entirely upon the produce of the soil for their

subsistence. Their cultivated plants have already been noticed in a

previous chapter. To agriculture men and women alike apply themselves,

devoting their greatest attention to the culture of their sorghum. The

amount of labour they bestow upon this cereal is very large. The seed

is lavishly broadcast into trenches which have been carefully prepared

for its reception, and when it has germinated and made its appearance

above the ground, two or three weeks are spent in thinning the shoots

and in transplanting them away from the spots where they are too

thick; a system which experience has shown can very advantageously be

applied to maize. Very few vegetables are cultivated, but for these

the people find a variety of substitutes in the wild plants and tubers

which abound. Everywhere throughout the tropics the Gynandropsis, the

Corchorus, and the Gieseckia grow close upon the confines of the

abodes of men, and the leaves of these, like the leaves of the gourd,

are frequently used as an ingredient in soup. The fleshy leaves of the

_Talinum roseum_ are served up in the same way as our spinach; and the

tough foliage of the Tirna-tree (_Pterocarpus_), as it becomes soft in

the process of boiling, is employed as a vegetable, and is really

sweet and tender. The fruit of the Hymenocardia, not unlike that of

the maple, has an acid flavour far from unpleasant, and serves a

similar purpose.

[Sidenote: FUNGUSES.]

During the rainy season the country is very prolific in many varieties

of funguses. The Bongo have a great fancy for them; they keep them

till they are on the verge of decay, and then dry and pound them. They

use them for the purpose of flavouring their sauces, which in

consequence are enriched by a _haut goût_, which without depreciation

may perhaps be compared to rotten fish. Throughout the country I never

saw any funguses but what were perfectly edible, and some of them I

must confess were very palatable. The natives call them all “Kahoo,”

while to the larger species they give the special name of

“hegba-mboddoh,” which is synonymous with the Low German “poggen

staul,” or with the English “toad-stool.” “Hegba” is the name which

the Bongo give to their little carved stools, and “mboddoh” is the

generic term for all frogs and toads, and the proper designation for

the _Bufo pandarinus_ in particular. This “hegba-mboddoh,” which has

thus suggested the same idea in very remote parts of the world, is

here a gigantic Polyporus; not unfrequently specimens may be found of

it which grow to a height of nine inches, are a foot in diameter and

weigh nearly fifty pounds. In form, size, and colour they are not

unlike the grey clay edifices of the _Termes mordax_, of which I shall

have occasion to speak hereafter. The funguses which are most common,

and which moreover are the most preferred, are the different species

of Coprinus, Marasmius, Rhodosporus, and the tough but aromatic

Lentinus.

I have already mentioned the great abundance of edible, if not always

palatable, fruit which is produced by the common trees of the country.

In clearing the woods for their tillage the Bongo are always careful

to leave as many of these trees as they can, and by thus sparing them

they preserve many a noble ornament to their fields, which would

otherwise be as monotonous as they are flat. The Butter-tree and the

Parkia are very carefully in this way saved from destruction, and form

a striking feature in many of their landscapes. It is a remarkable

peculiarity of the flora of this region that all the species which are

not essentially shrubby or arborescent strive for a perennial

existence; and, as evidence of this, it may be observed that the roots

and portions of the stem beneath the soil either develop into bulbs

and tubers, or exhibit a determination to become woody. Annuals occupy

a very insignificant place, and all vegetation seems to be provided

with a means of withstanding the annual steppe-burning, and of

preserving the germs of life until the next period of vitality recurs.

When their corn provision is exhausted, or when there is a failure in

the harvest, then do the Bongo find a welcome resource in these

tubers; they subsist upon them for days in succession, and find in

them the staple of their nourishment whenever they go upon their

marches in the wilderness.

Quite incredible is it what the Bongo are able to digest. Most of the

bulbs and tubers are so extremely bitter that it is not until they

have been thoroughly steeped in boiling water or have had their

pungent matter mollified by being roasted at a fire, that they can be

eaten at all; they are gall to the taste. Amongst these bitter bulbs

there are two which may claim a special notice; these are the Mandibo

and the Moddobehee. The Mandibo is a species of Coccinea, which is

nearly everywhere very abundant; the Moddobehee (dog’s gum) is one of

the Eureiandræ; they are both Cucurbitaceæ, and both contain poisonous

matter. Impregnated with the like bitterness are the rape-like roots

of the Asclepiadeæ, the huge tubers of the _Entada Wahlbergii_, and of

the Pachyrrhizus; so also are the various kinds of Vernoniæ and

Flemingiæ, which are dug up from a foot below the surface of the soil.

The natives can make but little use of the plants which grow from any

of these numerous tubers. The diminutive Drimia lifts its pretty red

blossoms about a couple of inches above the rocky ground, and is a

bulbous plant which becomes edible after a prolonged boiling.

Whenever a halt is made upon the marches across the wilderness, the

bearers, as soon as they are liberated from their burdens, set very

vigorously to work and grub up all sorts of roots from the nearest

thickets. I can myself vouch for a fact, which might fairly be deemed

incredible, that thirty Bongo who accompanied me on my return to

Sabby, at a time when I had scarcely enough to keep me from

starvation, subsisted for six consecutive days entirely on these

roots, and although we were hurrying on by forced marches, they lost

neither their strength nor their spirits. Their constitution was

radically sound, and they seemed formed to defy the treatment of their

inhospitable home.

Already it has been mentioned that there is an entire deficiency of

common salt throughout the district of the Gazelle. The alkali that is

everywhere its substitute is obtained by soaking the ashes of the

burnt wood of the _Grewia mollis_, a shrub common throughout

Bongoland, and which is notoriously useful in another way by the

quantity of bast which it produces.

[Sidenote: SMOKING AMONG THE BONGO.]

Tobacco is indispensable to the Bongo, and is universally cultivated.

The species known as Mashirr (_Nicotiana rustica_) is very pungent;

its small thick leaves are pounded in a mortar, and are subsequently

pressed and dried in moulds. From the cakes thus formed, the natives

break off fragments as they require them, grind them into powder by

means of stones, and smoke the preparation in long pipes that have

very pretty clay bowls. They are addicted to smoking quite as

inveterately as many of the nations that live in the polar regions,

and are not content until they are utterly stupefied by its effects. I

had a circumstance brought under my notice which exhibited to me the

extreme to which they can carry their abuse of the narcotic: upon one

of our marches a Bongo man had indulged to such excess, and had

inhaled the pungent fume so long, that he fell senseless into a

campfire, and was taken up so severely burnt that he had to be carried

by his comrades on a litter for the remainder of the journey.

The Bongo fashion of smoking is even more disgusting than that which

has been already described as prevalent amongst the Dinka. In the same

manner as with them, the pipe is passed from hand to hand, but the

lump of bast that intercepts the pungent oil is not placed in the

receptacle of the stem, but is put in the mouth of the smoker, and

together with the pipe is passed from one person to another. The habit

of chewing tobacco is adopted as much by the Bongo as by the

Mohammedan inhabitants of Nubia; but the custom is so universal that

there would seem to be ample justification for the belief that it is

indigenous rather than what has been acquired from foreigners. The

practice in which the Bongo indulges of placing his tobacco quid

behind his ear is very repulsive.

[Illustration: Bongo Goat.]

[Sidenote: BONGO GOATS.]

It is to their indifference to cattle-breeding, like what is practised

so extensively by the Dinka, that the Bongo owe their comparatively

peaceful relations with the so-called “Turks.” It is to the same cause

that the latter are indebted for the sluggish measure of opposition

shown them by their vassals. The domestic animals of the Bongo are

poultry, dogs, and goats; sheep being almost as rare as cattle. The

goats are unlike those of the Dinka, but are of a breed quite common

throughout these regions of Central Africa. Not only did I see them

amongst the Mittoo and Madi, but likewise among the Babuckur, and even

in the country of the Monbuttoo, whither they had been brought by the

equatorial nations whom the Monbuttoo simply style the “Momvoo.” These

goats, like the Dinka sheep, are distinguished by a hairy appendage

from the breast and shoulders, and by a short stiff mane, which runs

right along the ridge of the back to the small erect tail. The frontal

is round, and projects considerably beyond the base of the nasal bone,

and the horns are very strong and but slightly curved. The ordinary

colour of these pretty animals is a light fawn or chamois-brown, the

mane being very dark. I occasionally found the Bongo in possession of

another breed which I met with nowhere else, and which is probably

merely a cross with the Dinka goat. It has a remarkably short and

plump body, and is generally of a pepper-and-salt colour. The coat is

somewhat longer and more shaggy than that of the other breed, and

besides the mane-like appendage in front the hind quarters are also

covered with long rough hair.

[Illustration: Short-bodied Goat of the Bongo.]

The Bongo dogs, with regard to size, are between the small Niam-niam

race and the Dinka breed, which corresponds more nearly to the common

pariah of Egypt. On account of the indiscriminate crossing of the

races, a dog of pure Bongo breed is somewhat rare; its chief

characteristics are a reddish tan colour, short erect ears, and a

bushy tail like a fox’s brush. Their greatest peculiarity appeared to

me to be the bristling of their hair, which at every provocation

stands up along the back and neck like that of an angry cat. The

bushiness of the tail distinguishes the breed from the smooth-tailed

Dinka dog, and from that of the Niam-niam, of which the tails are as

curly as pigtails.

Although the Bongo are not over choice in their food, they

persistently abstain from eating dog’s flesh, a practice to which

their southern and south-eastern neighbours are notoriously addicted;

in fact, they show as much abhorrence at the idea as they would at

devouring human flesh itself. They have a curious superstition about

dead dogs. I was about to bury one of my dogs that had recently died,

and some of the men came and implored me to desist from my intention,

since the result would assuredly be that no rain would fall upon their

seeds. For this reason all the Bongo simply throw their dead dogs out

into the open fields.

At some seasons, especially at the end of the rainy months, fishing

and hunting offer productive sources for obtaining the means of

subsistence. Hunting is sometimes practised by independent individuals

going out separately; but at other times it takes the form of an

extensive _battue_, in which the men belonging to a whole district

will combine to take a share. Occasionally, too, a rich booty is

obtained from the trenches and snares. Nets are used in all the

_battues_ for game, and the Bongo devote as much attention to the

construction of these nets as they do to the weaving of their

fish-snares and basket-pots. Their fishery is principally limited to

the winter months.

[Sidenote: HUNTING-SNARES.]

Elephant-hunting has for the last twelve years been among the things

of the past. It is only the oldest of the men—and here the number of

the men that are really old is very small—who appear to have any

distinct recollection of it at all. The huge lance-heads, which are

now only weapons of luxury in the possession of the wealthy, or upon

some rare occasions used for buffalo-hunting, are the sole memorials

of the abundance of ivory of which Petherick, as an eye-witness, has

given so striking a description. The snares by which the Bongo succeed

in catching the smaller kinds of game generally consist of the stem of

a tree balanced horizontally by means of ropes.[29] A spot which the

game is known to haunt is selected for the erection of these snares; a

hedge, or some sort of enclosure, is set up on each side of the tree

so that the game may be obliged to run underneath: it is arranged so

that the animals as they pass tread upon a kind of noose or slip-knot

which slackens the ropes by which the tree is suspended, and the

falling weight crushes and kills the game below. The numbers of snares

of this description which are found in the bush-thickets is a

sufficient proof of their efficacy. The smaller species of antelopes,

ichneumons, civets, genets, wild cats, servals, and caracals, are all

in turn caught by this stratagem.

Hunting on a minor scale is a very favourite recreation, and the

children find a daily amusement in catching rats and field-mice. They

weave baskets in the form of long tubes, which they lay flat upon the

ground in the immediate neighbourhood of the mouse-holes; they then

commence a regular _battue_, when the scared mice, scampering back to

regain their homes, run through the stubble, and often rush into the

open traps, where, like fish in a weir-basket, they are easily

secured. In this way the Bongo boys catch considerable quantities of

meriones, _Mus gentilis_, and _M. barbarus_, which they tie together

by their tails in clusters of about a dozen, and barter them to each

other as dainty morsels. “These are our cows,” they would shout to me

with great glee whenever I met them returning after their sport had

been successful. Another use which is made of the mice which are

captured by this simple artifice is to employ them for a bait for

securing what they esteem the especial delicacy of roast cat. On the

narrow paths which traverse the steppes like rifts in the long grass,

they construct diminutive huts out of some twisted reeds; by placing

the mice inside these they are very often able to entice the cats into

a snare.

With the exception of human flesh and the flesh of dogs, the Bongo

seem to consider all animal substance fit for eating, in whatever

condition it may be found. The putrefying remnant of a lion’s feast,

which lies in the obscurity of a forest and is only revealed by the

kites and vultures circling in the air above, is to them a welcome

discovery. That meat is “high” is a guarantee for its being tender,

and they deem it in that condition not only more strengthening than

when it is fresh, but likewise more easy of digestion. There is,

however, no accounting for taste, certainly not with the Bongo, who do

not recoil from the most revolting of food. Whenever my cattle were

slaughtered, I always saw my bearers eagerly contending for the

half-digested contents of the stomach, like the Esquimaux, whose only

ideas of vegetables appears to be what they obtain from the contents

of the paunches of their reindeers; and I have seen the Bongo calmly

strip off the disgusting amphistoma-worms which literally line the

stomachs of all the cattle of this region, and put them into their

mouths by handfuls. After that, it was not a matter of surprise to me

to find that the Bongo reckons as game everything that creeps or

crawls, from rats and mice to snakes, and that he is not particular

what he eats, from the carrion vulture to the mangy hyæna, or from the

fat earth-scorpions (_Heterometrus palmatus_) to the caterpillars of

the winged termites with their oily beetle-bodies.

Having thus dilated with more minuteness than elsewhere upon the

external features of Bongo life, such as their agriculture, hunting,

and fishing, I may proceed to call attention to those arts by which,

even in this low grade of development, man seeks to ameliorate and

embellish his existence.

[Sidenote: BONGO DWELLINGS.]

First of all, the dwelling-place may demand our notice, that which

binds every man more or less to the soil which affords him his

subsistence—that family nucleus, from which the wide-branching tree

of human society has derived its origin.

In the period when the Khartoomers first made their way into the

country, the Bongo, quite unlike the other tribes, inhabited extensive

villages, which, similar to the present Seribas, were encompassed by a

palisade. Neither towns nor villages are now to be seen, and the

districts which are occupied at all are only marked by scattered

enclosures and little gatherings of huts, as in the country of the

Dinka and the Niam-niam. Very rarely are more than five or six

families resident in the same locality, so that it is almost an

exaggeration to speak of their being villages in any sense. The

communities in past times seem to have had a preference for gathering

round some great tamarind, ficus, or butter-tree, which often still

survives and constitutes the only relic of habitations which have long

fallen to decay; and even to the present time the Bongo appear to

retain this partiality, and more often than not they may be found

beneath the natural shade of a spreading roof of foliage, enjoying the

light and space which are prohibited to their cramped and narrow

dwellings. The ground for a considerable circuit about the huts is all

well cleared and levelled, its surface being the general scene of

labour on which all the women perform their ordinary domestic duties.

The corn is there thrashed and winnowed; there it is brayed in the

wooden mortars or pounded by the mill; there are the leaves of the

tobacco plant laid out to dry; there stand the baskets with the loads

of mushrooms or supply of fruit; and there may be seen the accumulated

store of nutritious roots. Dogs and poultry alike seem to revel in

security under the majestic covering, while the little children at

their play complete the idyllic picture of life in Central Africa.[30]

Upon the erection of their dwellings there is no people in the Gazelle

district who bestow so much pains as the Bongo. Although they

invariably adopt the conical shape, they allow themselves considerable

diversity in the forms they use. The general plan of their

architecture has already been sketched. The materials they employ are

upright tree-stems, plaited faggots, canes of the bamboo, clay from

the mushroom-shaped white-ant hills, and tough grass and the bast of

the Grewia.

The diameter of the dwellings rarely exceeds twenty-feet, the height

generally being about the same. The entrance consists of a hole so

small that it is necessary to creep through in order to get inside;

and the door consists of a hurdle swung upon two posts so as to be

pushed backwards and forwards at pleasure. The clay floor in the

interior is always perfectly level; it is made secure against damp as

well as against the entrance of white ants by having been flattened

down by the women trampling upon broad strips of bark laid upon it.

The common sleeping-place of the parents and smaller children is on

the floor. The bedding generally consists only of skins, the Bongo

having little care for mats. For the pillow of the family they

ordinarily use a branch of a tree smoothed by being stripped of its

bark.

In every dwelling-place is found a conical receptacle for corn, named

the “gallotoh,” which is elevated on piles, varying in height, so as

to protect the provision from the damp of the soil or from the ravages

of rats or white ants. Magazines of this kind for the reserve of corn

are in general use throughout Africa, from the Rumboo of Damerghoo in

the Central Soudan, right into the country of the Kaffirs and

Bechuanas.

All the dwellings of the Bongo, whether large or small, are marked by

one characteristic, which might almost be represented as a national

feature. The peak of their huts is always furnished with a circular

pad of straw, very carefully made, which serves as a seat, and from

which it is possible to take a survey of the country, covered with its

tall growth of corn. The name of “gony” is given to this elevation,

which is surrounded by six or eight curved bits of wood projecting as

though the roof were furnished with horns. It is peculiar to the huts

of the Bongo.

[Sidenote: ABUNDANCE OF IRON.]

Iron is found in such quantities throughout the region that naturally

the inhabitants devote much of their attention to its manipulation;

its very abundance apparently secures them an advantage over the

Dinka. Although, according to our conceptions they would be described

as utterly deficient in tools and apparatus, still they produce some

very wonderful results, even surpassing the Dyoor in skill. With their

rude bellows and a hammer which, more commonly than not, is merely a

round ball of pebble-stone (though occasionally it may be a little

pyramid of iron without a handle) upon an anvil of gneiss or granite,

with an ordinary little chisel and a pair of tongs consisting of a

mere split piece of green wood, they contrive to fabricate articles

which would bear comparison with the productions of an English

smith.[31]

The season when opportunity is found for putting the iron-works in

motion is after the harvest has been housed and the rains are over.

Already, in a previous chapter,[32] iron-work, as produced by the

Dyoor, has been noticed, but the Bongo have a system considerably more

advanced, which appears worthy of a brief description. Their smelting

apparatus is an erection of clay, generally about five feet in height,

containing in its interior three distinct compartments.[33] These are

all of the same size, that in the middle being filled with alternate

layers of fuel and ore. This centre chamber is separated from the

lower by means of a kind of frame resting on a circular projection;

and it is divided from the chamber above by a narrow neck of

communication. The highest and lowest of the divisions are used for

fuel only. Round the base of the inferior chamber there are four

holes, into which the “tewels” or pokers are introduced, and to which

bellows are applied to increase the intensity of the combustion; there

is a fifth hole, which can be stopped with clay as often as may be

desired, and which serves to allow the metal to be raked out after it

has trickled down into the cavity below the frame.

[Illustration]

The most important of the iron productions are designed for the trade

that the Bongo carry on with the tribes that dwell in the north, and

which some time since was very active. The raw iron is exhibited in

three separate shapes: one is named “mahee,” being spear-heads of one

or two feet long, corresponding exactly with what has been mentioned

as common with the Dyoor; the second is known as “loggoh kullutty,”

and is simply a lot of black, ill-formed spades; the third is called

distinctively “loggoh,” consisting of regular spades, which, under the

market appellation of “melot,” have a wide sale everywhere along the

course of the Upper Nile.

[Illustration: Iron money. Loggoh Kullutty. Loggoh melot.]

[Sidenote: BONGO MONEY.]

The “loggoh kullutty” is the circulating medium of the Bongo, the only

equivalent which Central Africa possesses for money of any

description; but, rough-shaped as it is, it seems really to answer in

its way the purpose of regular coin. According to Major Denham, who

visited the Central Soudan in 1824, there were at that time some iron

pieces which were circulated as currency in Loggon on the Lower Shary,

answering to what is now in use among the Bongo; but at the period of

Barth’s visit all traces of their use had long disappeared. The

“loggoh kullutty” is formed in flat circles, varying in diameter from

10 to 12 inches. On one edge there is a short handle; on the opposite

there is attached a projecting limb, something in the form of an

anchor. In this shape the metal is stored up in the treasures of the

rich, and up to the present time it serves as well as the lance-heads

and spades for cash and for exchanges, being available not only for

purchases, but for the marriage portions which every suitor is pledged

to assign. The axe of the Bongo consists of a flat, cumbrous wedge of

iron, into the thick end of which is inserted a knobbed handle; it is

an instrument differing in no particular from what may be seen

throughout Central Africa.

[Illustration: Bongo lances.]

Besides these rough exhibitions of their craft, the Bongo produce

arms, tools, and ornaments of admirable quality, and, at the instance

of the controllers of the Seribas, have manufactured chains and

manacles for the slave-traffic. Very elegant, it might almost be said

artistic, is the work displayed on the points of their arrows and

lances. The keen and (to use a botanical expression) the “awny” barbs

and edges of these instruments, to any one who is aware of the simple

means of production in their reach, must be quite an enigma. The

lances are readily recognised by their shapes, and may be classified

in a threefold way. First, there is the common lancet-formed

spear-head, which is known as “mahee;” then, secondly, there is the

“golo,” a hastate sort of spear, with long iron barbs below the point

extending along the stem to which the wooden stock is attached; whilst

the third description is called “makrigga,” and consists of a spike,

the stem of which is covered with a number of teeth symmetrically

arranged along it, sometimes upwards and sometimes downwards. This

makrigga is often merely an article of show, and the technical skill

of the smith is concentrated upon its design. The name of makrigga is

appropriated to it from the _Randia dumetorum_,[34] a prickly shrub,

which is quite common in the district: seeming to indicate that the

pattern is derived from an object in nature, it affords a fresh

illustration of the view, that all human arts are only imitations of

what may be observed in the free fields of a wide creation.

[Illustration: Pincers used by the Bongo women for plucking out their

eyelashes.]

[Illustration: Knife of the Bongo women.]

[Sidenote: BONGO ORNAMENTS.]

Equal care is bestowed upon the production of the iron and copper

ornaments which are worn and the cutlery which is used by the women.

For the purpose of plucking out their eyebrows and eyelashes, they

employ a pair of little pincers called “peenoh,” of which an

illustration is here introduced. Quite peculiar to the Bongo women are

their “tibbah,” or elongated oval knives, with handles at either end,

which are sharpened on both edges, and which are often very elaborate

in their workmanship. These knives are in constant use for all

domestic purposes, being of especial service in peeling their tubers

and in slicing their gourds and cucumbers. The rings, the bells, the

clasps, the buttons, whatever they affix to their projecting lips or

attach to the rims of their ears, the lancet-shaped hair-pins, which

appear indispensable to the decoration of the crown of their head and

to the parting of their locks, all are fabricated to supply the

demands of the Bongo women’s toilet.

The decoration of which the men are proudest is the “dangabor,” which

simply means “rings one above another.” The Dinka and the Dyoor both

have an ornament very similar to this, composed of accumulated rings,

which cover the arm below the elbow; but the Bongo finish off their

article with much more elaborate work. Each separate ring is furnished

with a boss of a height and strength to correspond with the ring next

to it, the rings themselves being forged so as to become gradually

larger in proportion as they are farther from the wrist. The arm is

thus covered with what may be described as a sleeve of mail, each ring

of which can be turned round or displaced at pleasure.

[Illustration: The Dangabor and a single ring.]

[Sidenote: WOODEN UTENSILS OF THE BONGO.]

Hardly inferior to the skill of the Bongo in the working of iron is

their dexterity in wood-carving. Perhaps the most striking specimens

of their art in this way may be noticed in the little low four-legged

seats or stools which are found in every household, and are called

“hegba.” These are invariably made from a single block, the wood

chosen for the purpose being that of the Göll-tree (_Prosopis

lanceolata_, Benth.), which is of a chestnut brown, and after use

acquires an excellent polish; they are used only by the women, who are

continually to be seen sitting on them in front of their huts, but

they are altogether avoided by the men, who regard every raised seat

as an effeminate luxury.

[Illustration: Bongo stool.]

Other articles of their fabric in wood are the pestles, the troughs

for oil-pressing, the flails for threshing corn, and, most remarkable

of all, the goblet-shaped mortars in which the corn is bruised before

it is ground into flour upon the grinding-stones. Very graceful in

shape are these mortars, not unlike a drinking-goblet with a cut stem;

they are not sunk below the ground, as is ordinarily the case with

those of the Dinka and Dyoor, but they can be removed whenever it is

requisite from place to place. Their height is about thirty inches.

Mortars of very similar design were noticed by Barth amongst the

Musgoo, and they are also used by the Ovambo, the Makololo, and other

negro nations. They are worked by two women at once, who alternately

pound away with heavy pestles in a regular African fashion, which has

been long immortalised by the pictorial representations of ancient

Egypt. Very cleverly, too, do the Bongo cut spoons of very choice

design out of horn, of the same shape as may be found in nearly every

market in Europe.

Consequent upon the oppression to which the Bongo have now for years

been subject, and the remorseless appropriation of all their energies

by the intruders, very many of the primitive habits of the people were

disappearing; and at the time of my visit my attention was rather

arrested by what were memorials of a bygone and happier condition of

things, than by anything that was really done under my eyes. Just as

in the Central Soudan, in Borneo, and in the Tsad countries, so here

also the destructive power of Islamism has manifested itself by

obliterating, in comparatively a brief space of time, all signs of

activity and all traces of progress of any kind. Wherever it prevails,

it annihilates the chief distinctions of race, it effaces the best

vestiges of the past, and extends, as it were, a new desert upon the

face of the land which it overruns. Those who have been eye-witnesses

of the state of things when the intruders first broke in upon the

country, gave me still further details of what had been the special

industries of the people.

In the villages there are found very frequently whole rows of figures

carved out of wood and arranged either at the entrances of the

palisaded enclosures, forming, as it were, a decoration for the

gateway, or set up besides the huts of the “Nyare” (chiefs), as

memorials, to immortalise the renown of some departed character. In

Moody, a district towards the west, I came across the remains (still

in a perfect state of preservation) of an erection of this sort, which

had been reared above the grave of the Bongo chieftain Yanga. Large as

life, the rough-hewn figures represented the chief followed in

procession by his wives and children, apparently issuing from the

tomb. The curious conception of the separate individuals, and the

singular mode in which they were rendered by the artist, awakened my

keenest interest. The illustration which is subjoined may be accepted

as a faithful representation of the first rude efforts of savages in

the arts of sculpture.

[Illustration: Yanga’s grave.]

[Sidenote: BONGO GRAVES.]

Plastic representations of men are known generally by the name of

“Moiogohgyee:” when I first saw them, I was under the impression that

they must be idols, similar to what the Fetish-worship has introduced

into the western coasts, but I soon satisfied myself of my

misconception in this respect. The true design of these wooden figures

is simply to be a memorial of some one who has departed this life:

this is proved by the term “Moiagoh Komarah,” _i.e._, the figure of

the wife, which is applied to an image raised by a surviving husband

to the pious memory of his departed wife, and which is set up in the

hut as a species of Penates. However rude these attempts must be

pronounced, they nevertheless reveal a kind of artistic power

certainly far from contemptible; at any rate, the very labour bestowed

upon them indicates the appreciation which the artist entertained for

his work. The Bongo, for their own part, regard their wooden images as

incomparably superb, and persuade themselves that the likenesses of

those who are represented are perfect. To complete the illusion, they

very often deck the figure with bead-necklaces and rings and affix

some hair over the appropriate parts of the body. Travellers in

Central Africa have narrated that they have seen figures of wood

corresponding to what I have described, but although they have almost

universally taken them for carved deities, I would venture to suggest

that in all probability they are elsewhere monuments of the dead, in

the same way as among the Bongo.

In addition it may be mentioned that a custom exists of raising a

monument of this kind to preserve the memory of any _male_ person who

has been murdered. I was made acquainted with this circumstance by the

mouth of one of the national authorities, who depicted to me the

peculiar custom of his fathers in a narrative to the following effect.

He said that murder and manslaughter used to be the order of the day

at all their festivals and drinking-bouts; when the harvest had been

abundant and the granaries were well-stored with corn, there used to

be no bounds to their licentiousness; there was no respect for the

Nyare, and his words were disregarded amidst the blows of the Nogarra.

Now the “Turks” would punish a murderer by carrying off his wife and

children, and compel him to pay a heavy fine in iron and make some

compensation to the relatives: but formerly the friends would take the

law into their own hands, and proceed to exact personal punishment,

though they had to set to work very warily if they would keep

themselves out of difficulty. When anyone discovered that either his

friend, or it might be his brother, or perhaps his wife, had been

killed, and the criminal could not be detected, it was no unknown

device to prepare beforehand an image carefully representing the

murdered person, and very often the likeness would be singularly

perfect. He would then invite all the men to a feast, at which the

spirituous “legyee” would be freely circulated; and then, when the

excitement was at its height, in the very midst of the singing and

dancing, he would unexpectedly introduce the figure that had been

prepared. The apparition would be sure to work its effect; the culprit

would not fail to be betrayed, as he cowed and exhibited his wish to

slink away. Having thus detected the offender, the injured party could

deal with him as he pleased.

[Sidenote: BONGO MUSIC.]

The Bongo, in their way, are enthusiastic lovers of music; and

although their instruments are of a very primitive description, and

they are unacquainted even with the pretty little guitar of the

Niam-niam, which is constructed on perfectly correct acoustic

principles, yet they may be seen at any hour of the day strumming away

and chanting to their own performances. The youngsters, down to the

small boys, are all musicians. Without much trouble, and with the most

meagre materials, they contrive to make little flutes; they are

accustomed also to construct a monochord, which in its design reminds

one of the instrument which (known as the “gubo” of the Zulus) is

common throughout the tribes of Southern Africa. This consists of a

bow of bamboo, with the string tightly strained across it, and this is

struck by a slender slip of split bamboo. The sounding board is not,

however, made of a calabash attached to the ground, but the mouth of

the player himself performs that office, one end of the instrument

being held to the lips with one hand, while the string is managed with

the other. Performers may often be seen sitting for an hour together

with an instrument of this sort: they stick one end of the bow into

the ground, and fasten the string over a cavity covered with bark,

which opens into an aperture for the escape of the sound. They pass

one hand from one part of the bow to the other, and with the other

they play upon the string with the bamboo twig, and produce a

considerable variety of buzzing and humming airs which are really

rather pretty. This is quite a common pastime with the lads who are

put in charge of the goats. I have seen them apply themselves very

earnestly and with obvious interest to their musical practice, and the

ingenious use to which they apply the simplest means for obtaining

harmonious tones testifies to their penetration into the secrets of

the theory of sound.

As appeals, however, to the sense of sound, the great festivals of the

Bongo abound with measures much more thrilling than any of these minor

performances. On those occasions the orchestral results might perhaps

be fairly characterised as cat’s music run wild. Unwearied thumping of

drums, the bellowings of gigantic trumpets, for the manufacture of

which great stems of trees come into requisition, interchanged by fits

and starts with the shriller blasts of some smaller horns, make up the

burden of the unearthly hubbub which re-echoes miles away along the

desert. Meanwhile, women and children by the hundred fill gourd-flasks

with little stones, and rattle them as if they were churning butter:

or again, at other times, they will get some sticks or dry faggots and

strike them together with the greatest energy. The huge wooden tubes

which may be styled the trumpets of the Bongo are by the natives

themselves called “manyinyee;” they vary from four to five feet in

length, being closed at the extremity, and ornamented with carved work

representing a man’s head, which not unfrequently is adorned with a

couple of horns. The other end of the stem is open, and in an upper

compartment towards the figure of the head is the orifice into which

the performer blows with all his might. There is another form of

manyinyee which is made like a huge wine-bottle; in order to play upon

it, the musician takes it between his knees like a violoncello, and

when the build of the instrument is too cumbrous, he has to bend over

it as it lies upon the ground.

Little difference can be noticed between the kettle-drums of the Bongo

and those of most other North African negroes. A section is cut from

the thick stem of a tree, the preference being given to a tamarind

when it can be procured; this is hollowed out into a cylinder, one end

being larger than the other. The ends are then covered with two pieces

of goat-skin stripped of the hair, which are tightly strained and

laced together with thongs. At the nightly orgies a fire is invariably

kept burning to dry the skin and to tighten it when it has happened to

become relaxed by the heavy dews.

A great number of signal-horns may be seen made from the horns of

different antelopes; these are called “mangoal,” and have three holes

like small flutes, and in tone are not unlike fifes. There is one long

and narrow pipe cut by the Bongo out of wood which they call a

“mburrah,” and which has a widened air-chamber close to the

mouth-piece, very similar to the ivory signal-horns which are so

frequently to be seen in all the negro countries.

[Sidenote: BONGO SINGING.]

Difficult were the task to give any adequate description of the

singing of the Bongo. It must suffice to say that it consists of a

babbling recitative, which at one time suggests the yelping of a dog

and at another the lowing of a cow, whilst it is broken ever and again

by the gabbling of a string of words which are huddled up one into

another. The commencement of a measure will always be with a lively

air, and every one, without distinction of age or sex, will begin

yelling, screeching, and bellowing with all their strength; gradually

the surging of the voices will tone down, the rapid time will

moderate, and the song be hushed into a wailing, melancholy strain.

Thus it sinks into a very dirge, such as might be chanted at the

grave, and be interpreted as representative of a leaden and a frowning

sky, when all at once, without note of warning, there bursts forth the

whole fury of the negro throats; shrill and thrilling is the outcry,

and the contrast is as vivid as sunshine in the midst of rain.

Often as I was present at these festivities I never could prevent my

ideas from associating Bongo music with the instinct of imitation,

which belongs to men universally. The orgies always gave me the

impression of having no other object than to surpass in violence the

fury of the elements. Adequately to represent the rage of a hurricane

in the tropics any single instrument of course must be weak, poor, and

powerless, consequently they hammer at numbers of their gigantic drums

with powerful blows of their heavy clubs. If they would rival the

bursting of a storm, the roaring of the wind, or the splashing of the

rain, they summon a chorus of their stoutest lungs; whilst to depict

the bellowings of terrified wild beasts, they resort to their longest

horns; and to imitate the songs of birds, they bring together all

their flutes and fifes. Most characteristic of all, perchance, is the

deep and rolling bass of the huge “manyinyee,” as descriptive of the

rumbling thunder. The penetrating shower may drive rattling and

crackling among the twigs, and amid the parched foliage of the woods,

and this is imitated by the united energies of women and children, as

they rattle the stones in their gourd-flasks, and clash together their

bits of wood.

It remains still to notice some examples of the various handicrafts

which are practised by this people. Compared with other nations, the

Bongo are remarkable for the attention they give to basket-work. They

make (very much after the fashion of a coffee-bag) a strainer to

filter and clarify their “legyee,” which is a drink something like ale

fermented from sorghum. Baskets are roughly yet substantially made by

twining together the stems of the bamboo. As their first efforts in

this line, the natives are accustomed to make the circular envelopes

in which they pack their corn for exportation. They take the

coriaceous leaves of the Combreta and Terminaliæ, and by inserting the

petiole of one leaf into the laminæ of two others, they form strips of

leaves which in a few minutes are made into a kind of basket, equally

strong and flexible, which answers its purpose admirably.

Woven matting is very rarely found in use. The walls of every hut are

made of basket-work, as are the beehives, which are more often than

not under the shadow of some adjacent butter-tree. Generally these

hives are long cylinders, which midway have an opening about six

inches square. The yield of honey, wild or half-wild, is very large,

and of fine quality: the bees belong to the European species. The

aroma of the Gardenia flowers is retained to a very palpable degree,

but wherever the Candelabra-euphorbia happens to be abundant, the

honey partakes of the drastic properties of its poisonous milk, and

has been the cause of the natives being reproached with the intention

of poisoning the Nubians.

[Sidenote: BONGO FISHING.]

In consequence of the people being so much engrossed at certain

periods of the year by their hunting and fishing, the manufacture of

fish-nets, creels, and snares, makes an important item in their

industrial pursuits. For the most part all the twist, the bird-snares,

and the fishing-lines are made from the fibres of bast, which are so

plentiful in the cultivated Crotalaria and the Hibiscus. For inferior

purposes the common lime-like bast of the _Grewia mollis_ is made to

suffice. The _Sanseviera guineensis_ is not less abundant, but the

bast which it yields, although very fine, is not very enduring. It is

generally very black through having been left to lie upon the dark

soil of the marshes, and is only used for making a kind of kilt like a

horse’s tail, which the women wear behind from a girdle about their

waist. Cotton-shrubs are planted only by the Dinka, who make their

fishing-lines of the material which is thus provided.

The manufacture of the pottery all falls to the care of the women, who

do not shrink from the most difficult tasks, and, without the help of

any turning-wheel, succeed in producing the most artistic specimens.

The larger water-bottles are sometimes not less than a yard in

diameter. The clay water-pots are ordinarily of a broad oval shape,

adapted for being carried on the head with the narrow end resting on a

kind of porter’s knot, which is made either of leaves or plaited

straw. Handles are uniformly wanting: for, whatever may be the purpose

to which the vessels are applied, whether for holding water or oil,

for boiling or for baking, the material of which they are made

contains so large a quantity of mica (which the natives do not

understand how to get rid of), that it is very brittle, and the

imperfect baking in the open air contributes to this brittleness. To

compensate for the lack of handles by which the vessels might be

lifted, their whole outer surface is made rather rough by being

ornamented by a number of triangles and zigzag lines, which form all

manner of concentric and spiral patterns. The gourd-platters and

bottles are generally decorated with different dark rows of triangles.

A large amount of labour is expended upon the manufacture of clay

bowls for pipes, which are often really elaborate, and have generally

quite a European character; very often their design consists of a

human head, and these are so treasured as works of art, that their

possessors cannot be induced to part with them at any price.

The preparation of skins for leather aprons and similar purposes has

hitherto been limited amongst the Bongo, as probably amongst all the

heathen negroes, to the simplest mechanical process of kneading and

fulling by means of ashes and dung, which is followed up by a liberal

application of fat and oil till a sufficient degree of softness and

pliancy is attained. Recently from the Nubians the use of tan has

become generally known, and it may not unreasonably be conjectured

that the method of using it will gradually extend from the north of

Africa towards the south, in the same way as it has spread upwards

from the Cape. Previous to their contact with Europeans, none of the

southern people of Africa had discovered the use of tan, although the

skins of their animals were a very important item in their economy. In

Bongoland at present the bark of the Gere (_Hymenocardia Heudelotii_)

is what is most frequently employed, and the red tan it yields is

found to be very effectual.

[Illustration: Bongo.]

[Sidenote: BONGO PHYSIOGNOMY.]

We have now to notice the apparel and general external aspect of the

people, which is as important in its way as the outline of any natural

object, such as the growth and foliage of trees. In default of proper

clothing, various disfigurements of person play an important part, and

the savage is voluntarily even more of a slave to fashion than any of

the most refined children of civilization. Here, as in every other

quarter of the globe, the male sex desires to be externally

distinguished from the female, and they differ widely in their habits

in this respect. There is, however, one ugly custom which is common to

both sexes throughout the basin of the Gazelle, which consists in

snapping off the incisors of the lower jaw, an operation which is

performed as soon as the milk teeth have been thoroughly replaced by

the permanent. Upon the south borders of the country, near the

Niam-niam, this custom ceases to be exactly followed, and there it is

the habit, as with the Niam-niam themselves, instead of breaking them

off, to file some of the teeth, and indeed sometimes all of them, into

sharp points. Occasionally the natives file off the sides of the upper

teeth as well as clip off the lower; nor is it an uncommon thing for

gaps to be opened at the points of contact of the central upper teeth,

whilst every now and then individual cases occur where interstices

have been made in the sides of all the four front teeth large enough

to admit a good-sized toothpick. Circumcision is unknown throughout

the entire river-district.

The men do not go about in a condition so naked as either the Dyoor,

the Shillooks, or the Dinka, but they wear an apron of some sort of

skin, and recently have adopted a strip of stuff, which they fasten to

the girdle that is never missing, allowing the ends to hang over

before and behind. All the sons of the red soil, as the Bongo, the

Mittoo, the Niam-niam, and the Kredy, are called “women” by the Dinka,

because amongst them the females only are protected by any covering of

this description. The Bongo women on the other hand, and especially

those who reside on the highlands, obstinately refuse to wear any

covering whatever either of skin or stuff, but merely replenish their

wardrobe every morning by a visit to the woods; they are, therefore,

in respect of modesty, less particular than the women of the Dinka; a

supple bough with plenty of leaves, more often than not a bough of the

Combretum, and perhaps a bunch of fine grass, fastened to the girdle,

is all they consider necessary. Now and then a tail, like a black

horsetail, composed of the bast of the Sanseviera, is appended to the

back of the girdle in a way that has already been mentioned. The rest

of the body is allowed by both sexes to be entirely unclad, and no

addition to the costume is ever seen, except we should reckon the

feathered head-gear, which is exhibited on the occasion of a feast or

a ball.

As a rule the hair of both men and women is kept quite short, and not

unfrequently is very closely shorn, the principal exception being

found in the south, where the habits of the Niam-niam have extended

their influence into the Bongo territory, and both men and women wear

tufts and braids of a length approximating to that of their

neighbours.

[Illustration: Bongo Woman.]

[Sidenote: BONGO WOMEN.]

It may possibly be imagined that the extremely primitive covering of

the Bongo women irradiates them with something of the charm of

Paradise; but a very limited experience will soon dispel the rapture

of any illusion of the kind. All full-grown women attain such an

astounding girth of body, and acquire such a cumbrous superabundance

of flesh, that it is quite impossible to look at them without

observing their disproportion to the men. Their thighs are very often

as large as a man’s chest, and their measurement across the hips can

hardly fail to recall the picture in Cuvier’s Atlas of the now famous

“Hottentot Venus.” Shapes developed to this magnitude are no longer

the exclusive privilege of the Hottentots; day after day I saw them

among the Bongo, and they may well demand to be technically described

as “Steatopyga.” In certain attitudes, as for instance when they are

carrying their heavy water-jars upon their heads, they seem to assume

the shape of an inverted S. To their singular appearance the long

switch tail of bast very much contributes, and altogether the profile

of a fat Bongo woman is not unlike that of a dancing baboon. I can

vouch for it that women who weigh twenty stone are far from scarce.

Very few are the people of Central Africa amongst whom the partiality

for finery and ornaments is so strongly shown as with the Bongo. The

women wear on their necks an accumulation of cords and beads, and not

being fastidious like their neighbours, will put on without regard to

shape or colour, whatever the market of Khartoom can provide. The men

do not care much for this particular decoration, but prefer necklaces,

on which they string some of those remarkable little fragments of wood

which are so constantly found in every region of Africa. With the bits

of wood hang fragments of roots, which are in form something like the

mandrake, which, in Southern Europe, has been the subject of so

strange a superstition. Alternating with the roots and wood are the

talons of owls and eagles, the teeth of dogs, crocodiles, and jackals,

little tortoise-shells, the claws of the earth-pig (_Orycteropus_),

and in short any of those objects which we are accustomed to store in

the cabinets which adorn our _salons_. They appear to supply the place

of the extracts from the Koran which, wrapped in leather sheathes, the

Nubians wear by dozens about their person; anything in the shape of an

amulet being eagerly craved by every African.

[Sidenote: BONGO DECORATION.]

Not unfrequently the men deck themselves out in females’ ornaments.

Many cover the rims of their ears with copper rings and crescents;

others pierce the upper lip like the women, and insert either a

round-headed copper nail or a copper plate, or, what is still more

general, some rings or a bit of straw. The skin of the stomach above

the waist is often pierced by the men, and the incision filled up with

a bit of wood, or occasionally by a good-sized peg. On the wrist and

upper part of the arm they wear iron rings of every pattern; some

rings are cut out of elephant and buffalo hide, and look almost as

though they were made of horn. The “dangabor,” an ornament composed of

a series of iron rings, and worn on the lower portion of the arm, has

been already described.

The Bongo women delight in distinguishing themselves by an adornment

which to our notions is nothing less than a hideous mutilation. As

soon as a woman is married the operation commences of extending her

lower lip. This, at first only slightly bored, is widened by inserting

into the orifice plugs of wood gradually increasing in size, until at

length the entire feature is enlarged to five or six times its

original proportions. The plugs are cylindrical in form, not less than

an inch thick, and are exactly like the pegs of bone or wood worn by

the women of Musgoo. By this means the lower lip is extended

horizontally till it projects far beyond the upper, which is also

bored and fitted with a copper plate or nail, and now and then by a

little ring, and sometimes by a bit of straw about as thick as a

lucifer-match. Nor do they leave the nose intact: similar bits of

straw are inserted into the edges of the nostrils, and I have seen as

many as three of these on either side. A very favourite ornament for

the cartilage between the nostrils is a copper ring, just like those

that are placed in the noses of buffaloes and other beasts of burden

for the purpose of rendering them more tractable. The greatest

coquettes among the ladies wear a clasp or cramp at the corners of the

mouth, as though they wanted to contract the orifice, and literally to

put a curb upon its capabilities. These subsidiary ornaments are not

however found at all universally among the women, and it is rare to

see them all at once upon a single individual: the plug in the lower

lip of the married women is alone a _sine quâ non_, serving as it does

for an artificial distinction of race. According to the custom of the

people, there need only be a trifling projection of the skin so as to

form a flap or a fold, to be at once the excuse for boring a hole. The

ears are perforated more than any part, both the outer and the inner

auricle being profusely pierced; the tip of the ear alone is

frequently made to carry half-a-dozen little iron rings. There are

women in the country whose bodies are pierced in some way or other in

little short of a hundred different places.

The Bongo women limit their tattooing to the upper part of the arm.

Zigzag or parallel lines, or rows of dots, often brought into relief

by the production of proud flesh after the operation has been

accomplished, are the three forms which in different combinations

serve as marks of individual distinction. The men tattoo themselves

differently, and some of them abstain from the operation altogether.

At one time the lines run across the breast and stomach to one side of

the body; at another they are limited to the top of the arm, whilst it

is not at all unusual for the neck and shoulder-blades to be tattooed.

Besides the ornaments that I have mentioned, the toilet of a Bongo

lady is incomplete without the masses of iron and copper rings which

she is accustomed to wear on her wrists and arms, and more especially

on her ankles. These rings clank like fetters as she walks, and even

from a distance the two sexes can be distinguished by the character of

the sound that accompanies their movements. That human patience should

ever for the sake of fashion submit to a still greater martyrdom seems

almost incredible, though hereafter we shall have sufficient proof

when we delineate the habits of the Mittoo, the neighbours of the

Bongo, that such is really the case.

In Bongoland, as in all the northern parts of the territory that I

visited, copper of late years has attained a monetary value, and has

become an accustomed medium of exchange. Glass beads are annually

deteriorating in estimation, and have long ceased to be treasured up

and buried in the earth like jewels or precious stones, being now used

only to gratify female vanity. In former times, when the only

intercourse that the Bongo held with the Mohammedan world was by

occasional dealings with the Baggara Arabs, through the intervention

of the Dembo, a Shillook tribe connected with the Dyoor, cowrie-shells

were in great request, but these also have long since fallen out of

the category of objects of value. Gold and silver are very rarely used

as ornaments, even in the Mohammedan parts of the Eastern Soudan; it

is therefore hardly a matter of surprise that to the Bongo, whose soil

is singularly uniform in its geological productions, they should be

all but unknown. The Bongo, moreover, have but little value for brass,

differing greatly in this respect from their neighbours, the Dyoor.

[Sidenote: BONGO WEAPONS.]

Their weapons consist mainly of lances, bows and arrows, shields being

very rarely used, and even then being appropriated from other

neighbouring nations. Although the greater part of the population is

at present quite unaccustomed to any warlike occupation, except when

any of them chance to be employed in the raids upon the Dinka or in

the Niam-niam campaigns, yet they still maintain a wonderful dexterity

in the use of the bow and arrow, and we shall have occasion in another

place to notice their performances in this respect. The large size of

their weapons is remarkable; I saw many of their bows which were four

feet in length, their arrows are rarely under three feet long, and on

this account they are never made from the light reed-grass, but are

cut out of solid wood. The forms of the arrow-heads also have a

decided nationality stamped upon them. In the course of time I was

easily able to determine at a glance the tribe to which any weapon

belonged by certain characteristics, the details of which would now

engross more time and space than are at our command. It may be

mentioned that the Bongo, like the negroes above Fesoglu, on the Upper

Blue Nile, imbue their arrows with the milky juice of one of the

Euphorbiæ. This species, of which I now for the first time collected

some specimens, has been erroneously represented by Tremaux in the

atlas of his travels[35] as _Euphorbia mamillaris_, but it is in fact

one of the many Cactus-euphorbiæ for which the flora of Tropical

Africa, and especially that of the drier regions, is distinguished,

and is entirely distinct from the South African species. It is a

branching, straggling shrub, varying in height from five to eight

feet, at one time growing in large masses in the light woods, and then

failing altogether for the space of several days’ journey. Not only

the larger branches, nearly two inches thick, but also the smaller

boughs, are encrusted with a snowy white rind, covered with thick

spiny protuberances, which stand singly under the eyes of the leaves.

At the extremity of each bough is a bunch of fleshy succulent leaves,

shaped like lances, and six inches in length. This species of

Cactus-euphorbia (_E. venefica_) is termed by the Bongo “bolloh,” in

contradistinction to “kakoh,” their name for the larger sort (_E.

candelabrum_), which is common in the country, but of which the milky

juice is far less dangerous than that of the “bolloh,” for if this be

applied in a fresh condition to the skin, it results in a violent

inflammation. It is, however, my opinion that this juice, as it is

used by the Bongo, being spread in a hard mass over the barbs and

heads of the arrows, can do very little harm to the wounded, as when

it is once hard it is difficult to melt, and there cannot possibly be

time for it to commingle with the blood after a wound has been made by

an arrow.

[Sidenote: BONGO GAMES.]

We may now turn our attention to the Bongo games, which are as

original and primitive as their music. One of these games, as forming

excellent training for the chase, deserves some especial notice. A

number of men are provided with pointed sticks made of hard wood,

which they use as lances. They form a large ring, and another man who

has a piece of soft wood attached to a long string, runs round and

round within the circle. The others then endeavour with their pointed

sticks to hit the mark whilst it is being carried rapidly round. As

soon as it is struck it falls to the ground, and the successful

marksman is greeted with a loud cheer. Another game requires no less

calmness and dexterity. A piece of wood bent into a crescent has a

short string attached to the middle; this wood is then hurled by the

one end of it with such violence to the earth that it goes spinning

like a boomerang through the air. The players stand face to face at a

distance of about twenty feet apart, and the game consists in catching

the wood by the string, a performance that requires no little skill,

as there is considerable danger of receiving a sharp knock. Both games

might, under some modifications, admit of being adopted into our rural

sports.

Turning now to the national manners, customs, and ideas, I profess

that they are subjects of which I must treat with considerable

reserve, since my residence as a stranger for two years amongst these

savages only gave me after all a very superficial insight into the

mysteries of their inner life. Since, however, the accounts of

eye-witnesses, who knew the land in its primitive condition, seem to

accord with and to corroborate my own observations, as well as the

information I obtained from the Bongo themselves, I am in a position

to depose to some facts, of which I must leave the scientific analysis

to those who are seeking to cultivate the untried soil of the

psychology of nations.

Elsewhere, and among other nations with whom I became acquainted, the

number of a man’s wives was dependent on the extent of his

possessions, but amongst the Bongo it seemed to be limited to a

maximum of three. Here, as in other parts of Africa, a wife cannot be

obtained for nothing, even the very poorest must pay a purchase price

to the father of the bride in the form of a number of plates of iron;

unless a man could provide the premium, he could only get an old woman

for a wife. The usual price paid for a young girl would be about ten

plates of iron weighing two pounds each, and twenty lance tips.

Divorces, when necessary, are regulated in the usual way, and the

father is always compelled to make a restitution of at least a portion

of the wedding-payment. If a man should send his wife back to her

father, she is at liberty to marry again, and with her husband’s

consent she may take her children with her; if, however, her husband

retains the children, her father is bound to refund the entire

wedding-gift that he received. This would be the case although ten

years might have elapsed since the marriage. The barrenness of a woman

is always an excuse for a divorce. In cases of adultery, the husband

endeavours to kill the seducer, and the wife gets a sound flogging.

Whoever has been circumcised according to the Mohammedan law, cannot

hope to make a good match in Bongoland.

A Bongo woman, as a rule, will seldom be found to have less than five

children: the usual number is six, and the maximum twelve. In

childbirth she is supported with her arms on a horizontal beam, and is

in that position delivered of the child; the navel-cord is cut very

long with a knife, and always without a ligature. No festivities are

observed on the occasion of a birth. The infants are carried on the

mothers’ backs, sewn up in a bag of goat’s-hide, like a water-bottle.

The children are kept at the breast until they have completed their

second year, weaning being never thought of until they can be trusted

to run about. In order to wean a child, the mother’s breast is smeared

with some acrid matter, and the bruised leaves of some of the

_Capparidæ_ are mixed with water to a pulp, and have the effect of

drying up the milk.

Among the Bongo and the neighbouring nations there is a custom,

manifestly originating in a national morality, that forbids all

children that are not at the breast to sleep in the same hut with

their parents; the Bongo in this respect putting to shame many of

those who would boast of their civilization. The elder children have a

hut appropriated to themselves, but take their meals with the rest of

the family. In addition to this custom there is the universal rule, as

with ourselves, that no matrimonial alliance takes place until the

youths are about eighteen and the girls about fifteen years of age.

[Sidenote: BONGO EXEQUIES.]

In the disposal of their dead, the customs of the Bongo are very

remarkable. Immediately after life is extinct, the corpses are placed,

like the Peruvian mummies, in what may be described as a crouching

posture, with the knees forced up to the chin, and are then firmly

bound round the head and legs. When the body has been thus compressed

into the smallest possible compass, it is sewn into a sack made of

skins, and placed in a deep grave. A shaft is sunk perpendicularly

down for about four feet, and then a niche is hollowed to the side, so

that the sack containing the corpse should not have to sustain any

vertical pressure from the earth which is thrown in to fill up the

grave. This form of interment is also prescribed in the law of Islam,

which, in this and many other cases, has probably followed an African

custom. The Bongo have a striking practice, for which, perhaps, some

reason may be assigned, of burying men with the face turned to the

north and women to the south. After the grave is filled in, a heap of

stones is piled over the spot in a short cylindrical form, and this is

supported by strong stakes, which are driven into the soil all round.

On the middle of the pile is placed a pitcher, frequently the same

from which the deceased was accustomed to drink his water. The graves

are always close to the huts, their site being marked by a number of

long forked branches, carved, by way of ornament, with numerous

notches and incisions, and having their points sharpened like horns.

Of these votive stakes I saw a number varying from one to five on each

grave. The typical meaning belonging to these sticks has long since

fallen into oblivion, and notwithstanding all my endeavours to become

acquainted with the Bongo, and to initiate myself into their manners

and customs, I could never discover a satisfactory explanation. The

sticks reminded me of the old English finance-budgets in the time of

William the Conqueror. In answer to my inquiries, the Khartoomers

merely returned the same answer as they did to my predecessor,

Heuglin; they persisted in saying that every notch denoted an enemy

killed in battle by the deceased. The Bongo themselves, however,

repeatedly declared that such was by no means the case, and quite

repudiated the idea that they should ever think of thus perpetuating

the bloodthirstiness of the dead. The neighbouring Mittoo and Madi

adopt very much the same method of sepulture. The memorial-urns

erected over the graves of the Musgoo remind the traveller of those of

the Bongo. Whenever a burial takes place, all the neighbours are

invited to attend, and are abundantly entertained with merissa. The

entire company takes part in the formation of the grave, in the

rearing of the memorial-urn, and in the erection of the votive stakes.

When the ceremony is finished, they shoot at the stakes with arrows,

which they leave sticking in the wood. I often noticed arrows that had

been thus shot still adhering to the sticks.

The Bongo have not the remotest conception of immortality. They have

no more idea of the transmigration of souls, or any doctrine of the

kind, than they have of the existence of an ocean. I have tried

various ways and means of solving the problem of their inner life, but

always without success. Although the belief in immortality may be

indigenous to Africa, I should question whether the ancient Egyptians

did not in their religious development obey the promptings of the

Asiatic East. At any rate, those statements are incorrect which would

endeavour to explain the dull resignation displayed by the victims of

human sacrifice in Dahomey by a theory of their belief in immortality.

All religion, in our sense of the word religion, is quite unknown to

the Bongo, and, beyond the term “loma,” which denotes equally luck and

ill-luck, they have nothing in their language to signify any deity or

spiritual being. “Loma” is likewise the term that they use for the

Supreme Being, whom they hear invoked as “Allah” by their oppressors,

and some of them make use of the expression, “loma-gobo,” _i. e._, the

superior, to denote the God of the “Turks.” The almost incomprehensible

prayers of the Mohammedans are called by the Bongo “malah,” which has

evidently some connection with the word “Allah” that is generally

repeated over and over again in all the devotions of the Nubians.

If any one is ill, his illness is attributed to “Loma,” but in the

event of anybody losing a wager or a game, or returning from a hunting

adventure without game, or coming back from war without booty, he is

said to have had “no loma” (loma nya), in the sense of having no luck.

[Sidenote: BONGO SUPERSTITION.]

Quite amazing is the fear which exists among the Bongo about ghosts,

whose abode is said to be in the shadowy darkness of the woods.

Spirits, devils, and witches have the general appellation of

“bitaboh;” wood-goblins being specially called “ronga.” Comprehended

under the same term are all the bats (especially the _Megaderma

frons_, which flutters about from tree to tree in broad daylight), as

likewise are owls of every kind (_Strix leucotis_ and _Strix capensis_

being here the chief); and besides these the Ndorr (_Galago

senegalensis_), a kind of pseudo-simia, with great red eyes and erect

ears, which drags out a gloomy existence in the cavities of hollow

trees. There are, too, prowling beasts of night, for which they

entertain the utmost dread, regarding them with superstitious awe. To

ward off the evil influences of these spirits, the Bongo are

acquainted with no other means except the magical roots in which the

professional sorcerers trade, in a similar way as the Mohammedan

priests of the Soudan in their amulets and sentences from the Koran.

Very seldom are any attempts made to expel the spirits by the means of

exorcism, which is turned to great account by the Dinka magicians. The

institution of the “Cogyoor” is here called “belomah,” but whenever it

is necessary to have an invocation over a sick patient, they more

often than not send for a professional wizard from the neighbouring

Dinka.

Good spirits are quite unrecognised, and, according to the general

negro idea, no benefit can ever come from a spirit at all. They affirm

that the only thing they know about spirits is that they do mischief,

and certain it is that they have no conception either of there being a

Creator, or any kind and ruling power above. They assert that there is

no other resource for obtaining communication with spirits, except by

means of certain roots, which may be of service likewise in employing

the powers of evil to inflict injury on others. To their knowledge of

this magic may be attributed much of the influence which the native

chiefs, independently of their authorised rule, exercise over the mass

of the people in their districts. This may be witnessed among the Bary

on the Bahr-el-Gebel, and a hundred other tribes, who yield the

greatest deference to the controllers or captains of their

communities. The practice of fetching down rain is never pretended to

by the Bongo chiefs, and may be said to be absolutely unknown; but

probably this may rise from the climate so rarely making it necessary

to put their skill in this respect to the test.

[Sidenote: BELIEF IN WITCHES.]

All the very old people of either sex, but especially the old women,

are exposed to the suspicion of allying themselves to wicked spirits,

for the purpose of effecting the injury and detriment of others. Old

folks, so the Bongo maintain, wander through the forest-glades at

night, and have only to secure the proper roots, and then they may

apparently be lying calmly in their huts, whilst in reality they are

taking counsel with the spirits of mischief how they can best bring

their neighbours to death and destruction. They dig for roots, it is

continually said, that they may have the means of poisoning those

around them. Whenever any case of sudden death occurs, the aged people

are held responsible, and nothing, it is taken for granted, could be

more certain than that a robust man, except he were starved, would not

die. Woe to the old crones, then, in whose house the suspected herbs

and roots are found! though they be father or mother, they have no

chance of escape.

A genuine and downright belief in witches has long been and still

continues as deeply seated here as in any spot upon the face of the

earth, and nowhere are prosecutions more continually being instituted

against them. As matter of fact, I can affirm that really aged folks

among the Bongo are comparatively scarce, and that the number of

grey-headed people is, by contrast, surprisingly large amongst the

neighbouring race of the Dyoor, who put no faith at all in any

witchcraft. The Nubians are not only open to superstitions of their

own, but confirm the Bongo in all of theirs. In the Eastern Soudan,

which is a Mohammedan country, the conversation will constantly turn

upon the “sáhara” (_i. e._, the witches), and no comparison is more

frequent than that which likens the old women to hyænas: in fact, many

of the people hold hard and fast to the conviction that the witches

are capable of going out at night, and taking up their quarters inside

the bodies of these detestable brutes, without any one being aware of

what is happening. It chanced, during my stay in Gallabat, that I

killed one out of a herd of hyænas that was infesting the district; my

fate, in consequence, was to be loaded with reproaches on the part of

the Sheikh, who informed me that his mother was a “hyæna-woman,” and

that I might, for all I could tell, have shot her. After this I was

not so surprised as might be expected when Idrees, the governor of

Ghattas’s Seriba, boasted in my presence of his conflicts with

witches, bragging that in one day he had had half a dozen of them

executed. An occasion shortly afterwards arose, when Idrees was

contemplating putting two old women to death at the desire of some

Bongo, and the only scheme I could devise to make him desist from his

purpose, was by threatening him that, in the event of the women being

executed, I would poison his water-springs.

But, in this dread of witches, the whole superstition of the Bongo

culminates and exhausts itself; and we Europeans may well ask what

real right have we, with all our advancement in knowledge, to presume

to reproach them? We cannot resist the impression that these poor

Bongo are infinitely more free from hundreds of superstitious

fallacies than many of those who boast of their civilization; much

more so, for instance, than the Mohammedans of the Soudan, where the

idlest of superstitions prevail in every household. Let nature be

free, and the germs of energy in man’s spirit will develop themselves,

without overstepping their proper limits, in trustful dependence upon

the presiding spirit which controls all thought. That the spirit of

man, moreover, revolves in a circle, is demonstrated by the old man

becoming again a child. A philosopher might fairly speculate (in the

spirit of Bernardin de St. Pierre, when he advocated a worship of

Nature) whether this land would not have been happier if the Moslems

had never set foot upon its soil. They brought a religion that was

destitute of morality; they introduced contagion rather than

knowledge; they even suppressed the true doctrines of Mohammed their

prophet, which would have enfranchised the very people whom they

oppressed, and have raised them to a condition of brotherhood, and of

equality.

[Sidenote: BONGO SURGERY.]

The method of proceeding among the Bongo with the sick and wounded is

invariably of the very simplest character. When the disorder is

internal, and the origin cannot be detected, the treatment consists

merely in liberal applications of very hot water. The patient is

stretched upon the ground, and sprinkled by means of leafy boughs with

boiling water from vessels that are placed close by. Somewhat more

expert is their proceeding in the case of the wounded. It once chanced

that I saw a group of sufferers brought back from one of the raids

that had been made into the territory of the Dinka. The wounds had

nearly all been inflicted by the lances of the adversary. With

remarkable fortitude the patients all submitted to the practice of the

country, which consisted in the introduction of a number of setons,

made of the strong and fibrous bast of the grewia, into the injured

parts, in order to reduce the inflammation. Amongst others, I saw a

knee, which was immensely swollen, subject to the operation of being

pierced in every direction by setons of this sort, until it was larded

like a roast hare. With the exception of red ochre the Bongo, like

most of their neighbours, are not acquainted with any mineral which

they can apply to a wound, either as a reduceut or an antiseptic. As

medicines to accelerate the natural processes of cure, they make use

of the astringent bitter barks of certain trees like the Hymenocardia,

the Butyrospermum, and the Prosopis, which are here known as the

“gere,” the “kor,” and the “göll.” Syphilis, which now makes its

insidious progress, was quite unknown amongst these poor savages

previous to the settlement amongst them of the Nubians, and against

its mischief the only specific employed is the bitter bark of the

Heddo-tree (_Anogeissus_), one, however, which undoubtedly is utterly

useless for the purpose.

The misshapen and crippled are entirely unknown amongst these

unsophisticated children of Nature. But in a country where, even with

the best attention on the part of a mother, every child must be

exposed to the perils which necessarily are associated with existence

in a wilderness, how should it be possible for a cripple to stand out

the battle of life? As freaks of nature, every now and then there may

be seen some dwarfs, and I presume that some mutes may occasionally be

found, as there is a word (“mabang”) in their language to express the

defect in the faculty of speech.

The insane (“bindahko”) are shackled hand and foot; and avowedly with

the design of cooling and soothing their passions, they are thrown

into the river, where they are immersed by practised swimmers. If this

remedy should prove of no effect, the patient is put into confinement,

and dieted by the relatives; but generally the lot of a maniac is far

happier than that which befalls an aged man, however innocent. To

maintain the strength of invalids, certain kinds of flesh are

prescribed, and a particular value is attributed to the flesh of the

Gullukoo (_Tmetoceros abyssinicus_), a kind of rhinoceros hornbill,

which has a detestable flavour, as odious as hemlock.

The dialect of the people throughout the whole country exhibits very

little diversity; the best evidence for this is afforded by the

perfect uniformity of expression in every part of the land for all

natural objects whatever; whilst even in dealing with conceptions of

an abstract character, there is little fear of being misunderstood.

The language altogether has a harmonious ring, abounding in the vowel

sounds of _a_ and _o_, as the name of the people indicates; it is very

simple in its grammatical structure, and at the same time it presents

a great variety of terms for all concrete subjects. The vocabulary

that I compiled contained nearly one thousand distinct expressions.

[Sidenote: BONGO DIALECT.]

The etymology of connected words and the analysis of separate idioms

afford considerable interest, and transport the student right into the

ingenuous world of their natural life. The more common of our abstract

ideas such as _spirit_, _soul_, _hope_, and _fear_, appear to be

absolutely wanting, but experience shows that in this respect other

negro tongues are not more richly provided by nature. The labours of

missionaries in translating the Scriptures have notoriously introduced

into the written language a number of elevated idioms and of

metaphorical ideas which very probably in a few generations may be

more or less incorporated into the tongue, but to the student of

language who shall make the gleanings these introductions will be a

mere refuse, and the only subject of any scientific interest will be

the speech of the people as it was while it remained intact and

unaffected by innovation.

Instances of the indirect method which is employed on the part of the

Bongo to express any abstract idea may here be given. The monosyllable

“firr,” for example used in combination with other words, answers the

purpose of expressing any of the following ideas: will, love,

pleasure, taste, or speech. The true conception which would appear to

be the original force of the little word, is first the will, and then

the expression of that will by means of the tongue. The phrase for “I

wish it,” would be “firr nahamah,” which is literally, “The will is in

my stomach.”

Nor is it uninteresting to notice the various equivalents which are

found of one and the same word. “Mahee” means “lance” and “meat” in

general, and is a collective expression for antelopes of every kind;

“attamatta” is employed equally for what is “bitter” and what is

“annoying;” “dill” implies either a “shadow” or a “cloud;” “gimah” is

used indifferently for either “a son” or “a boy,” and “goah” for

either “a pit” or “deep.” “Helleleh” simply means “wind” or “air,” but

by reduplication “helleleh-helleleh,” implies whatever is “light.”

Either “rain” or “the sky” may be indicated by the word “hetorro,” and

“ndan” not merely signifies “night,” but is used for “to-day.” This

last mode of expression has been transferred from the African to the

Arabic of the Eastern Soudan, where “fee lehle” means either “by

night” or “this very day.”

The disposition which is ever manifested amongst the untutored

children of nature to represent certain animals by imitating the

sounds they utter, is extended amongst the Bongo to describe a variety

of inanimate object. As examples of this kind of nomenclature I may

mention “golongolo” as their name for a “bell,” “gohi” as their name

for a “cough,” “kulluluh” for a “ball,” and “marongonn” for “snoring.”

The name they give a “cat” is “mbriow” differing little in its

pronunciation from “mew.”

There is a kind of poetry which underlies many of their expressions,

and which invests some objects with a certain charm of indefiniteness;

thus for example they call a leaf “mbillee-kaggah,” “an ear of the

tree,” and a man’s chest they name “doah kiddi,” or “the capital of

the veins.”

The speech of a people is very often indicative of the predominating

character of their pursuits. By the name of “mony,” which originally

meant the common sorghum, which is the staple of their produce, the

Bongo, being an agricultural people, have come to denote not so much

the particular corn, as eatables of any description. They have,

moreover, adopted this word as the root of a verb which is conjugated.

In a way corresponding to this the Niam-niam, who are mainly addicted

to hunting, give a very comprehensive meaning to their word “push-yo,”

which signifies “meat.” Of almost infinite variety are the names of

the different individuals among the Bongo. I had opportunities of

making inquiries whilst I was measuring nearly a hundred of the

people, and I do not think that I found more than five names that

occurred more than once. As a regular rule parents name their children

after trees or animals, or some object in nature, and it is quite

exceptional for any personal peculiarity to be associated with the

appellation.

[Sidenote: INTERMINGLING OF RACES.]

In the labyrinth of African culture it is very difficult to

disentangle the hundred threads which lead up to the centre from which

they have been all unwound. Not a custom, not a superstition is found

in one part which is not more or less accurately repeated in another;

not one contrivance of design, not one weapon of war exists of which

it can be declared that it is exclusive property of any one race. From

north to south, and from sea to sea, in some form or other every

invention is sure to be repeated; it is “the thing that has been.” The

creative hand of Nature alone produces what is new. If we could at

once grasp and set before our minds facts that are known (whether as

regards language, race, culture, history, or development) of that vast

region of the world which is comprehended in the name of Africa, we

should have before us the witness of an intermingling of races which

is beyond all precedent. And yet, bewildering as the prospect would

appear, it remains a fact not to be gainsaid, that it is impossible

for any one to survey the country as a whole without perceiving that

high above the multitude of individual differences there is throned a

principle of unity which embraces well nigh all the population.

Such a conclusion has been amply borne out by the preceding

delineation of the Bongo, who form an element in that unity. We cannot

take a retrospect of the particulars which have been now detailed

about them, without the question arising as to which of the other

races of Central Africa most nearly resemble the Bongo. Any answer to

this question that could not be invalidated would afford hints

invaluable for the investigation of the latest movements among African

nations; but I must confess that I am only hazarding an opinion which

I cannot establish, when I name the countries about Lake Tsad as being

those in which the most marked similarity in habit to the Bongo might

be expected, and the tribes to which I would more particularly allude

are the Musgoo, the Massa, the Wandala, and the Loggon.

I conclude by repeating the comparison which I made at the beginning

between the existence of a people and a drop of water evaporating in

the sea. Ere long, the Bongo as a people will be quite forgotten,

superseded by a rising race. The time cannot be far off when this

race, so gifted and so impressionable, shall be known no more. The

domination over the people which is contemplated in Egypt cannot fail

to effect this result, and it is a destiny that probably awaits all

the rest of the African races. However much the Nubian may tyrannize,

he still leaves the poor natives a portion of their happiness. But

there is still a more distant future: after the Nubian comes the Turk,

and he takes all. Truly it is not without reason that the proverb

circulates in every district, “Where the Turk has been no grass will

grow.”

FOOTNOTES:

[28] Vide ‘Linguistische Ergebnisse einer Reise nach

Central Afrika,’ by Dr. G. Schweinfurth. Berlin: Wiegandt

and Hempsel, 1873.

[29] An illustration of this contrivance appears in

Petherick’s ‘Travels in Central Africa,’ vol. i. p. 255.

[30] For a pictorial representation of this scene, vide

vol. ii.

[31] Vide Petherick, ‘Egypt, the Soudan,’ &c., p. 395.

[32] Vide Chap. V. p. 206, _seq._

[33] The woodcut represents a vertical section of one of

these smelting-ovens.

[34] Petherick in his ‘Travels,’ vol. i. p. 164, refers to

this shrub, and designates one of its branches by the name

of “ebony.”

[35] Tremaux: ‘Voyage Pittoresque au Soudan.’ Tab. XIV.