“Then know, Sheikh, that I am in possession of a letter authorizing a demand for means of convoy from the Khedive and likewise one from the Sheikh Soliman; here are both of them, what dost thou demand now?”
“But, sir, if thou holdest a safe-conduct from his high majesty, why dost thou not demand the head of thy slave? It is at thy service, on his orders. I take thy wishes on my eyes and on my head. Command and thy servant obeys. Thou knowest the government prices. Allah protect thee; in the morning I shall send thee men, beasts, and water-skins.”
If any one imagines that all the preparations for the desert journey were thus brought to a satisfactory conclusion, he is indeed totally ignorant of the manners and customs of the people. In the morning none of the promised drivers or beasts had put in their appearance; only by afternoon did they begin to come in; not even on the following morning, but at soonest about the time of afternoon prayer, could one think of starting. “Bukra inshallah—to-morrow, if God will”—is their motto, and it baffles all commands. Indeed, there is much to do, much to arrange, and much to be planned before the journey can be undertaken.
In course of time the tent is the centre of a gay and lively picture. The sunburnt children of the desert bustle about among the baggage. Their activity is unbusiness-like to a degree, but they seem to try to make up for this by incredible noisiness. The baggage, which had been arranged in a sort of barricade, is scattered about; individual pieces are lifted and tested as regards both weight and bulk; one package is compared with another, selected and then rejected, strapped together and then pulled apart again. Each driver tries to outwit his neighbour, each endeavouring to secure the lightest load for his own beast; each one rushes about in opposition to the rest, and all are shouting and roaring, screaming and scolding, swearing and cursing, entreating and execrating. In anticipation of what is coming the camels also add to the noise right lustily, and if, instead of roaring, and growling and grumbling, they should keep silence for a while, that only means: Our time has not yet come, but it is coming! Anyhow, with or without the camels’ accompaniment, the stranger’s ear is harassed, literally tortured, by all the medley of sounds which fall upon it at once. For hours together the bustle, the racket, the uproar continues; the men scold and quarrel over the loads until they have had enough or more than enough; and at last the prelude comes to an end.
After peace is concluded they begin to twist the bast fibres of the date-palm into cords and ropes. With these they sling the bales and boxes cleverly together; they make hooks and eyes so that the two bundles may be fastened quickly to the saddle and as quickly loosened; they mend the ready-made nets which they have brought to hold the smaller packages; and they test the large and small skin bags, patching them where need be, and finally smearing them with ill-smelling varnish of colocynth. Lastly, they examine the sun-dried flesh, fill several bast bags with Kaffir-millet or dhurra, others with wood-charcoal, and some perhaps with camels’ dung, rinse out the skin-bags and fill them with water fresh from the stream. As the tedious business is brought to a close one hears each utter a hearty “Thank God”—“El hamdu lillahi”.
To look after all these preparations is the duty of the Chabir or leader of the caravan. According to its importance is his rank, but in all cases he must be what his title signifies—one who knows the way and the existing conditions. Experience, honesty, cleverness, mettle, and bravery are the requirements of his difficult, and not rarely dangerous office. He knows the desert as a mariner the sea, he can read the stars, he is familiar with every oasis and every spring on the course of the journey, he is welcome to the tent of every Bedouin or nomad chief, he understands all sort of precautions against break-down or peril by the way, he can cure snake-bite and scorpion-sting, or at least alleviate the sufferings of the injured, he wields the weapons of the warrior and of the huntsman with equal skill, he has the word of the Prophet not only on his lips but in his heart, he utters the “Fatiha” at starting, and discharges the obligations of Mueddin and Iman at the appointed times; in a word, he is the head of the many-membered body which travels through the desert. In the solitudes where nothing seems to point the way which other caravans have taken, where the wind obliterates every track almost as soon as the last camel has passed, he finds signs unseen by others which guide him aright. When the dry, ill-boding dust of the desert hides the everlasting heavens, his genius is his guiding star; he tests the drifting sand, measures its waves, and estimates their direction; he reads the points of the compass on a stem of grass. On him every caravan, every traveller depends without mistrust. Ancient and in part most remarkable laws, inscribed in no charter, yet known to all, make him responsible for the welfare of the journey and for the life of each traveller, except in so far as any inevitable dispensation of the Ordainer of destiny may decree otherwise.
Fig. 49.—Caravan in the African Desert.
At the sacred hour, the time of afternoon prayer, the leader announces to travellers and drivers that all is ready for the start. The brown men rush around, catching, leading, saddling, and loading the camels. Resisting to the utmost the beasts are forced to obey; they seem to have a vivid foreboding of a stretch of toilsome days. Their time has now come. Roaring, screaming, snarling, and grumbling, in obedience to the inimitable guttural commands of their masters and sundry gentle hints from the whips, they sink down on their bended knees; bellowing they adjust themselves to receive the unwelcome burden on their humped backs, and still bellowing they rise with their load. Not a few kick and bite in their efforts to resist being loaded, and it indeed requires all the inexhaustible patience of the drivers to subdue the obstinate creatures. But patience and tact master even camels. As soon as the rebellious beast has consented to kneel, one of the drivers stands up on its bent fore-legs, and with a quick grip seizes the upper part of the muzzle so that by pressing the nose he can stop the camel’s breathing; meanwhile two others from opposite sides lift the equally poised burden on to the saddle; a fourth runs fastening pegs through the loops of the ropes; and the fractious camel is loaded before he has quite regained his senses. As soon as all are loaded, the march begins.
It is now the turn of the well-saddled trotting camels. Each traveller fastens his weapons and indispensable personal luggage to the high, trough-shaped saddle fixed over the hump. He then proceeds to mount his steed. For the novice this is usually a critical business. With a bold spring he must leap into the saddle, and, as soon as he touches this, the camel bolts up. He rises backwards, first on his fore-knees, immediately afterwards on his long hind-legs, and finally on his fore-legs. To the second jerk the novice in camel-riding usually falls a victim, he is hurled out of the saddle and either kisses mother earth or falls on the beast’s neck and holds on tightly. The camel is much too ill-humoured to treat this as a joke or an accident. An angry cry bursts from its ugly lips; it flies into a passion with the poor traveller, hanging in a most unenviable position on its neck, and proceeds to shake itself free both of him and his baggage. It takes some time before the traveller from the North learns to bend his body forwards and backwards at the right moment so as to keep his seat as the camel springs up.