"I cannot, I must watch still beside her. To-morrow she will be buried, and I shall never see her more. Now I can see her and be with her. To-morrow, after—you know what I mean—to-morrow take me away, far away, I can never come back here. I could not bear it."
"I am yours," said the Count, "and I will go wherever you wish."
CHAPTER XXV.
The journal of the expedition, under the command of Madame de Guéran, is very concise as regards the Niam-Niam, whose territory the Europeans were about to enter when we left them.
An irresistible impulse hurried the caravan forward. They scarcely rested, but marched, marched, marched. All trace of whatever apathy may have, existed had disappeared; they were drawing near the Equator, and yet, owing to the fact that the country is, on an average, over two thousand yards above the sea level, and owing still more to the numerous water courses to be met with at every step, the heat was less and the air lighter, and the travellers felt stronger and more active.
The escort, also, was in a better state of discipline. In the midst of the famous tribes whom they knew by hearsay only, they were afraid of accidents and misadventures, and they dared not leave the beaten track. Every one kept his place in the ranks, and the idlers and incorrigibles now hesitated either to lag behind or to make any expeditions on their own account into the brakes and thickets. Moreover, the caravan was not as numerous as it was when it started. We have already seen that it had diminished gradually, losing many of its members in the various seribas and amongst the Bongos. But, at the last stage before entering the Niam-Niam territory, there was a panic, a regular stampede, and more than sixty men bolted in all directions. Those who remained were at all events better worth having, because, having resisted every temptation, they might be looked upon as likely to be reliable in the future. They appeared to have unlimited confidence in their leaders, and they fully understood that, to make head against all dangers, they needed the support and assistance of the Europeans, and the influence which white men ever possess over their black brethren. Every step forward made desertion and flight more difficult. How, indeed, could they find their way back without a guide or counsellor in the midst of this tangled mass of woods, forests, and trees? They were very like our own sailors. Noisy and occasionally unmanageable when in harbour or ashore, they blindly obey their officers when at sea. They are conscious of their want of experience, and they know that, in spite of their numbers, they would be powerless to navigate the ship or fight against the elements. Brute force gives way before moral influence.
We may assume that the Europeans, according to all probability, though they are not explicit on this point, profited by the lower temperature and the improved discipline of the caravan to make longer stages and cross the territory of the Niam-Niam as quickly as possible. In the evening, tired out, they had not the heart to jot down in their journal their notes by the way. They confined themselves to a remark here and there, and a few curt paragraphs to which we may add the information we ourselves have gathered from the most reliable works on the subject. Thus, we are enabled to devote a few lines, very few, to a most curious and almost unknown race, whose savage nature in some respects passes all limits, but who also can boast of a species of civilization which one cannot help admiring.
Their cannibalism is admitted by every traveller except the Italian, Praggia, but even he confesses to have been a witness to one instance of it, though he puts it down to hatred and a spirit of revenge. We may, consequently, look upon it as a fact, and consider the Niam-Niam from other points of view, which certainly redound more to their credit.
Their vast territory is drained, to a certain extent, by countless streams, living sources of marvellous richness. In their land the glory of the tropics shines forth in all its splendour. "Trees with immense stems," says Schweinfurth, "and of a height surpassing all that we had elsewhere seen (not even excepting the palms of Egypt), here stood in masses which seemed unbounded except where at intervals some less towering forms rose gradually higher and higher beneath their shade. In the innermost recesses of these woods one would come upon an avenue like the colonnade of an Egyptian temple, veiled in the leafy shade of a triple roof above. Seen from without, they had all the appearance of impenetrable forests, but traversed within, they opened into aisles and corridors which were musical with many a murmuring fount. Hardly anywhere was the height of these woods less than seventy feet, and on an average it was much nearer a hundred. Far as the eye could reach it rested solely upon green, which did not admit a gap. The narrow paths that wound themselves partly through and partly around the growing thickets were formed by steps consisting of bare and protruding roots, which retained the light loose soil together. Mouldering stems, thickly clad with moss, obstructed the passage at well-nigh every turn. The air was no longer that of the sunny steppe, nor that of the shady grove; it was stifling as the atmosphere of a palm-house. Its temperature might vary from 70° to 80° Fahr., but it was so overloaded with an oppressive moisture exhaled by the rank foliage that the traveller could not feel otherwise than relieved to escape."
Praggia calls this part of the Niam-Niam territory "galleries," and he says that they reminded him of shady, perfume-laden paths in the enchanted gardens of the poets. But, instead of lovely nymphs, they are peopled with the ponderous rhinoceros, the savage buffalo, the massive elephant, and numerous varieties of monkeys.