The first of January, 1870, appeared, beginning a new link in the unbroken chain of time. It was the second New Year that I had commenced in Central Africa, and although for me the day passed quietly and with no rejoicing, yet I was filled with thoughts of gratitude that I had been spared so long. Although one cloud and another might appear to loom in the uncertain future, yet the confidence I felt in my acclimatisation enabled me with good courage to proceed upon my wanderings.
Goggo, a Mittoo-Madi Chief.
The next place that we reached was Kurragera, the most southern point of Aboo Sammat’s newly-acquired territory. The march had occupied about five hours, and on our way we had for the sixth time crossed the Wohko. Previously we had halted in the village of one of the Madi elders, who bore the melodious name of Kaffulukkoo; I had also the honour of an introduction to another chief, called Goggo, of whom I was able to secure a portrait. His imposing peruke was not of his own hair, nor indeed was it hair at all, but consisted of an artificial tissue of woven threads, which were soaked with yellow ochre and reeking with grease.
KURRAGERA.
Kurragera’s Seriba, like Aboo Sammat’s other settlements, had been entirely cleared of its soldiers, and only the local overseer of the Madi remained to look after the corn-stores. Inside the palisade were piled thousands of the bearers’ loads, each neatly packed into a circular bundle, and protected by the simple and effectual coverings made by the natives from leaves and straw. These packages contained a preliminary portion of the corn-stores. Almost every product of the soil that I have described in Chapter VI. was here to be seen, and in addition were the sweet potatoes cultivated by the Madi.
Aboo Sammat at this time, with his whole available fighting force, was encamped on the Wohko about three leagues to the south. With the help of 250 soldiers, and more than 300 Bongo and Mittoo bearers, he had put the entire country in the south and south-east, from beyond the Rohl nearly as far as the frontiers of the so-called Makkarakkah, under contribution. The tribes in the more immediate neighbourhood were the Madi-Kaya, the Abbakah, and Loobah, which manifestly occupied the same district to which, in 1863, Petherick’s agent Awat made an expedition. Many chiefs submitted voluntarily to the taxation; others remained hostile for a period, but afterwards surrendered all their stores to the enemy à discrétion. The region was so productive that the number of bearers did not nearly suffice to carry away the goods that had been seized. The enterprise was accomplished without any loss of blood.
I was compelled to stay for some days in Kurragera to await Aboo Sammat’s return, and began to get somewhat weary, as amongst the flora I could find little that was suitable for my collection; I had besides used up all the pencils I had brought with me, and was obliged to write with hen’s blood. Meanwhile, as in Awoory and Ngahma, I continued my study of the Mittoo language, and took a great deal of pains to unravel the intricacies of the Madi method of counting, to which I shall have another occasion to refer hereafter.
The butter-trees were now in full bloom. The milky juice that exudes from the stems of these trees reminds one of gutta-percha, which is a secretion of a species of the same order of plants (Sapotaceæ). I often saw the children making balls with the lumps of caoutchouc, which served as universal playthings. In 1861, Franz Binder, the Transylvanian, formerly a merchant in Khartoom, brought a hundredweight of this india-rubber to Vienna, but although the material turned out very well in a technical point of view, the cost of its transport was too great for it ever to become an important article in the commerce of these lands.