Exploration of Aïr

by Angus Buchanan

I am indebted, also, to the administrative officials in charge of the Kano district who kindly rendered me many services ere I set out to cross the boundary.

Collecting in the field is one side of Natural History research, but there is, as you are aware, another side—the painstaking study of the specimens after they are unpacked on the museum benches at home. And I am much indebted to Lord Rothschild, Dr. Hartert, and the British Museum for having most kindly furnished me with the full results of the skilled studies of research to which the collections have been subjected since my return, for in so doing they have placed most valuable records at my disposal, so that I may draw from that large fund of knowledge when desired and enhance the value of this work.

Angus Buchanan.

CONTENTS

		PAGE
	Introduction (by Lord Rothschild)	[xxi]
CHAPTER
I	Engaging Boys—Lagos	[1]
II	Kano, Northern Nigeria	[13]
III	Hausa—Currency—Camels—Travelling	[33]
IV	A Day’s Work Collecting	[60]
V	Zinder	[73]
VI	The Shores of Bushland and Desert	[82]
VII	Ostrich Hunting	[95]
VIII	Leaving the Bushland Behind—Aïr Entered	[121]
IX	Agades	[134]
X	Aïr: North to Baguezan Mountains and HuntingBarbary Sheep	[148]
XI	In Baguezan Mountains	[164]
XII	The Northern Regions of Aïr: Part I	[177]
XIII	The Northern Regions of Aïr: Part II	[197]
XIV	East of Baguezan: Aouderas and Tarrouaji	[215]
XV	The Tuaregs of Aïr	[232]
XVI	Heading for Home	[241]
Appendix: New Species discovered		[247]
Index		[255]

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

Out of the World	[Frontispiece]
FACING PAGE
The Author	[12]
View of Kano City	[12]
A Street-lane in Kano	[28]
An Entrance in the Mud Walls of Kano	[28]
A Hausa Native riding an Ox, Kano	[42]
Cattle of Hausaland	[42]
Natives drawing Water at Baban Tubki Wells,Zinder	[76]
Among the Rocks of Zinder	[76]
Beri-Beri Bushmen, Damergou	[92]
Tanout Village	[92]
Young Ostriches	[104]
Dorcas Gazelle	[104]
A Lonely Tuareg Camp in the Bush	[124]
Sundown in the Desert	[124]
View of Agades	[142]
Throne-Room of the Sultan of Agades	[142]
My Caravan on the Arrajubjub River	[150]
Typical Aïr Landscape	[150]
Typical Boulder Composition of many AïrMountains and Hills	[168]
Minerou, Chief of Baguezan, and Saidi, myGoumier	[168]
Wild Men, Northern Aïr	[190]
Approaching Iferouan	[190]
In Aguellal Mountains at 3,100 Feet	[202]
We find a Precious Pool of Water S.E. ofAguellal, Aïr	[202]
Teouar, a Typical Deserted Village of Aïr	[218]
Tuareg Boys of Baguezan Mountains	[234]
“Atagoom,” A Tuareg Native of Aïr in TypicalDress	[234]
Agades Fort, Built with Clay-mud	[242]
Caught in Flood Rains below Tegguidi	[242]
Map of Author’s Route	[AtEnd]

INTRODUCTION

Ever since Dr. Hartert[1] came to Tring, twenty-nine years ago, I have been keenly interested in the isolated mountains of Asben or Aïr in the middle of the Sahara, and the country surrounding them. This was chiefly owing to Dr. Hartert’s account of his interview with some Tuareg traders who had come down into Nigeria to sell salt. This interest was intensified by our own explorations in Algeria and “Les Territoires du Sud,” and Geyr von Schweppenburg and Spatz’s journeys in the Ahaggar Mountains, all of which yielded many zoological treasures. Therefore, Dr. Hartert and I felt much satisfaction when, after his strenuous labours in the war in East Africa, Captain Angus Buchanan fell in with our views and undertook to explore Asben and the country between it and Kano, in North Nigeria, the terminus of the new railway. The eleven months occupied in the undertaking have proved most fruitful, for, besides the interesting ethnological and other facts recorded in the subsequent pages of this book, the zoological results have been most valuable. These latter results have been published in Novitates Zoologicæ, the journal of the Tring Museum, in a series of articles by Messrs. O. Thomas and M. A. C. Hinton,[2] Dr. Hartert and myself.

The number of new species and sub-species is very large, especially among the Mammals; Mr. Thomas indeed says that he has never known a collection of Mammals, from a limited area such as this, with so large a proportion of novelties. Among the new Mammals, the most interesting are undoubtedly the “Gundi” (Massoutiera), the Rock-Dassy (Procavia), and the “Mouflon” (Ammotragus), because of the immense stretches of desert which separate them from allied species and sub-species.