Never before had any European traveller in Central Africa such advantageous conditions for pursuing his investigations; never hitherto in the heart of an unknown land had there been anything like the same number of bearers at his disposal, and that, too, in a region where the sole means of transport is on the heads of the natives. All the museums—particularly those which are appropriated to botany—which have been enriched in any way by my journeyings are indebted to Aboo Sammat for not a few of their novelties. Solely because I was supported by him did I succeed in pushing my way to the Upper Shary, more than 800 miles from Khartoom, thus opening fresh districts to geographical knowledge and establishing the existence of some enigmatical people.
Everything, moreover, that Mohammed did was suggested by his own free-will. No compulsion of government was put upon him, no inducements on my part were held out, and, what is more, no thought of compensation for his outlay on myself or my party ever entered his mind. The purest benevolence manifestly prompted him—the high virtue of hospitality in its noblest sense. Whoever is actuated by the spirit of adventure to penetrate into the heart of Africa, so as to make good his footing amongst four different peoples, is undoubtedly a man of energy; although he may not be spurred on by any scientific purpose, and may simply be gratifying a desire to visit lands that are strange and to enjoy sights that are rare, yet he must have succeeded in vanquishing the thoughts which suggest that there is no place like home, and which represent it as the merest folly to sacrifice domestic ease for the fatigues, troubles, and privations which are inseparable from the life of a wanderer.
Our caravan was joined on its way by a company of Ghattas’s from Dangadduloo, conducted by a stout Dinka, whose acquaintance I had already made at the Seriba where he resided. His party consisted of 500 bearers and 120 soldiers, and they contemplated, in conjunction with a part of Aboo Sammat’s people, undertaking an expedition into the ivory district of Keefa. That district was shut out from Ghattas’s by the fact of the road towards it being the property of Aboo Sammat: according to a convention entered into by the Nubians, a caravan of one company was not to traverse a region appropriated by another, unless an alliance for that purpose was made between the two. As the result of this compact, it had come to pass that no less than fifteen different roads, corresponding to the same number of different merchant houses in Khartoom, branched out towards the south and west from the localities of the Seribas into the remotest lands of the Niam-niam.
Wherever two of these roadways intersect, a serious collision between the parties concerned is almost certain to ensue. Any conductor of an expedition is sure to endeavour to get the monopoly of all the ivory into his own hands. The various native chieftains are prohibited from disposing of their produce to any other agent than himself—a demand which is enforced by violence—and rival companies are intimidated by threats of action for trespass; in fact, no pains are spared to assert a right as vigorously as possible.
MITTOO BEARERS.
An agreement had now been made according to which the leader of Ghattas’s caravan was to accompany Aboo Sammat’s expedition as far as his establishments in the Niam-niam lands, and afterwards was to be allowed the protection of a military detachment to proceed towards the west, Aboo Sammat himself having resolved to carry on his own main body in the direction of the south. The bearers of the Ghattas party from the east were all Mittoo, a tribe that is of much weaker frame and less capable of sustaining fatigue than the Bongo, so that by the time that they had reached Sabby, although it was only about four days’ march, they had already a considerable number of invalids. Aboo Sammat’s intention this year was to make his first experiment with the Mittoo from the territories he had recently gained, and to try to employ them as bearers in this enterprise among the Niam-niam. To be a bearer is a service which demands a kind of apprenticeship, and no one without practice is fitted for the continual strain and endurance which it requires. The representations, moreover, which had been made to these inexperienced Mittoo, both about the nature of the country they would have to traverse and the cannibal propensities of the people with whom they would be brought in contact, acted so powerfully upon them that it was only under compulsion that they could be made to enter upon the service at all. While, therefore, the Bongo bearers were to be relied upon, and looked forward blithely to any fatigues that might be before them, the Mittoo had to be scrupulously watched, and by night to be carefully secured within the bounds of the palisade to prevent their effecting an escape. On the very evening before we started from Sabby a number of them ventured upon a combination to revolt, and, in fact, got free into the open country. By the assistance of the Bongo they were captured after an hour’s hard chase, brought back into the Seriba, placed under closer guardianship, and for a punishment were made to wear all night the yoke of the “shaba,” which is ordinarily placed on the necks of slaves.
Swelling the numbers of our caravans there was a whole troop of women and female slaves, and a crowd of negro lads who followed the soldiers to carry their equipments. There was in addition a large herd of cattle which the Ghattas party had plundered from the Dinka, and which they drove with them to maintain themselves when they came to enter upon the desolation of the desert. Aboo Sammat, never rich in cattle, because he did not, in the same way as his neighbours, indulge in plundering the Dinka, had certainly made no superfluous provision for the needs of his people; but for myself there was an abundant supply of calves, sheep, and goats still remaining from the liberal presents that had been made me in Mvolo during my excursion to the Rohl. Whenever an animal was killed, I invariably shared the meat with the Nubians, and they were always ready to return the favour as often as they slaughtered any of their own. My people’s necessities were thus supplied, whilst personally I was continually provided by Aboo Sammat with the choicest morsels as long as there was any choice to be made. But where property fails, even Cæsar must forego his rights; and days of scarcity did arrive, when for my servants there was nothing, and for myself there was next to nothing, to be had.
It will readily be imagined that for a colony of nearly 800 people a start in single file was not effected in a moment: it was quite midday before I commenced any movement at all. Several days had to elapse, and no little patience had to be tried, before things fell into anything like regularity. Of all men in the world, perhaps the Nubians are the most disorderly. Method is altogether alien to their nature; they loathe it after the unshackled freedom they are accustomed to indulge; they have no idea of any advantages arising from mutual co-operation, and accordingly they look upon any approach to order only as a token of individual bondage.
MANAGING THE NUBIANS.
Amongst a body of men actuated by such sentiments, any thought of discipline, according to our ideas, is entirely out of the question. Only that master can at all hope to succeed in exercising any authority who understands how to get upon the weak side of their character. By this means he may perchance attain what he wants in a way which a Turk, even by the extremest severity, could never accomplish. He may prevail, for instance, by slipping in at the right time an allusion to brotherhood, or by an appeal to honour and to the value of one’s word; or he may invoke the religious sentiment by reminding the Nubian of his being a Mohammedan, “Thou art a Moslem;” or again, by holding out a bribe, such as a fresh slave or a good payment, he may reduce a cantankerous spirit to subjection; but whatever is done has to be effected craftily and with a good deal of insinuation and gentle coaxing. No one understood all these artifices better than Aboo Sammat, who was utterly regardless of all consequences and could behave like a perfect tyrant as soon as ever he had established a control. On account of my own position amongst the Nubians I had to renounce most of these little artifices, but, nevertheless, I had my own special resources. A piece of wit, brought to bear at the right place and at the right time, very seldom failed to be of essential service. Although a capacity for appreciating wit must in a way be considered local and limited in its compass, yet it hardly admits of dispute that there is no nation of the world entirely without its sense of humour. The botanist Fortune, who made his laborious investigations in China, has left it upon record that he only succeeded by mother-wit in gaining access to a people which had previously resisted every effort towards the least familiar intercourse with them. A faculty of bantering a little may be of considerable service to assist the progress of a traveller; and I may, perhaps, be allowed to relate what follows as an instance of the mode in which I attempted to proceed, and the example, perchance, may give a trifling hint to those who may be disposed to follow in my wake.