TROPICAL FOREST.
During the entire day I occupied myself among the magnificent thickets on the stream near Kulenjo, the vegetation, so different from what I had seen in other parts of the Nile district, and of which I had had only a foretaste on the Atazilly, being here revealed in its full splendour. The flora embraces the majority of the plants of the western coasts of tropical Africa that are known on the Gaboon, the Niger, and the Gambia, and overstepping the watershed dividing the Nile districts from the basin of the Tsad, opens to the traveller from the north the unexpected glory of the wildernesses of Central Africa. Though all was but a faint reflection of the rich luxuriance of the primeval forests of Brazil, yet, in contrast to what had gone before, it could not fail to be very charming. Throughout the twenty-six degrees of latitude over which I travelled, the progress of vegetation, according to the geographical zone and the meteorological condition of the successive lands, was organised with wonderful simplicity. For the first 800 miles stretched the dreary desert, giving place to wide steppes, void of trees, but ever covered with grass; next came the delightful region of the bush forests, where the vegetation, divested of the obnoxious thorns of the desert, recalled the soft foliage of his native land to the mind of the traveller, who lastly entered upon what he might correctly call the true primeval forest, which carried him back to the memories of his youth when he yielded his fancy to the fascinations of ‘Robinson Crusoe’ or of ‘Paul and Virginia.’ An identical change gradually supervening in the character of vegetation is perceptible in a contrary direction in the southern half of the continent; and travellers proceeding from the Cape northwards to the Equator have rarely failed to draw attention to the fact.
Nature everywhere proceeds upon the principle of levelling what is opposite and balancing what is extreme: she would seem to abhor the sharply-defined boundaries in which man delights so much, and in accordance with this law she here presents to the eye of the inquirer a transition that is very gradual, so that the limits of her districts overlap one another like the fingers of folded hands. Even in lat. 7° N. small isolated tracts of bank-forest, bearing, however, the characteristic types of the “gallery” flora, are scattered like enclaves among the bush-forests of the distant north. The forests at Okale, at Yagla, and the locality called “Genana,” are examples which I have already mentioned.
Nowhere did the guinea-fowl afford better sport than along the stream at Kulenjo; about noon their grey plumage could be seen in the shade of the foliage as they perched aloft in the trees at the edge of the wood, where they could be brought down one after another with the greatest ease. The keen vision of the Niam-niam did me good service in spying out the birds from a distance, for the waving green around me made me almost blind. The early morning likewise is not an unfavourable time for getting at guinea-fowl; they begin their flight very shortly after sunrise, but even then they are too much occupied in securing their food to heed the approach of any tolerably cautious sportsman.
FEEDING THE BEARERS.
The reader may perchance wonder at my frequent mention of these guinea-fowl, and I would therefore be allowed to explain that the traveller in Africa would be quite at a loss without them, as, with rare exceptions, they form the main commodity of his daily cuisine. In the course of five years I daresay I brought down as many as a thousand of these birds, generally two at a time. By using the lightest shot that can be obtained, and aiming high, failure is quite exceptional, as the smallest grain that hits the long neck is sure to bring down the game. With dogs, even when untrained, securing the birds is a still more easy matter. The guinea-fowl cannot fly far at a time, and therefore when they perceive the dogs in the long grass, they seem to realise their inability to escape, and take refuge on the nearest bough. Often while my dogs have surrounded a tree, I have brought down from a distance of thirty or forty feet one guinea-fowl after another, without a single bird having ventured to leave its hiding-place.
In marching for three days across an open wilderness, the caravan had to be provided by Kulenjo with their ordinary meals, and it was no easy matter in a region so scantily populated to find the necessary food for a thousand hungry mouths. The feeding took place in the evening, and before sunrise in the morning. The whole party of bearers were divided into groups, to which the food was distributed by the different “nyare,” or local Bongo overseers, who generally accompany the leaders of these longer expeditions. Handfuls of corn, measured out just as though they were portions for camels or asses, and lumps of bread composed of coarsely-ground impure Teleboon-corn (eleusine), boiled to a pulp, formed the wretched allotment and composed the substance of a meal such as we should hesitate at giving even to our cattle. Frequently in the wilderness they are reduced to the necessity of cooking and eating their corn unground. In comparison with this vile and wretched provision, linseed-cake and bran would be accepted by the Bongo and Mittoo bearers as choice delicacies. The natives bring them their pulpy bread in baskets, and by counting the great lumps of dough, which were packed in green leaves, it was possible, with some approximation to truth, to estimate the number of families appointed to take their share in providing the supplies.
Dainties more tempting and recherché were brought in gourd-shells. The natives who brought these alone formed a goodly company, consisting chiefly of boys and children; the women, being shy, and also jealously guarded by their husbands, remained behind at home.
I must not omit to mention the vegetables, which, when circumstances permitted, were also brought for the bearers. These vegetables, served with sauces, were arranged in hundreds of gourd-shells, pots, and bowls, round the immense pile of the so-called bread. The sauces, which were greatly relished by the Bongo, consisted of a compound of animal and vegetable grease, water, soda, and aromatic herbs. The chief ingredients in the finer sorts were grains of sesame and hyptis, pounded to a pulp, whilst the inferior kinds were mainly composed of the Zawa-oil of the Lophira alata and oil of termites. Those with the most piquant flavour are made of dried fish, which is pounded and rolled into balls like cheese; in consequence of the heat of the climate these very soon acquire a haut goût. Neither Bongo nor Niam-niam will touch pimento, as they consider its very pungency to be an evidence of its poisonous properties; consequently they seek a substitute in stinking fermented matter.
Common salt is absolutely unknown in this part of Africa; the only salt to be procured being extracted from the ashes of the wood of the Grewia; consequently the greasy soups when boiled coagulate almost into a kind of soap, and their flavour may be more easily imagined than described. To make specially attractive sauces there is added the flesh of elephants and buffaloes, which has been previously dried and pounded. Any fat from meat is all but unknown: Nature appears to have quite denied any supply to animals that are wild, and the Niam-niam have no domestic animals like their neighbours; whilst the fat of dogs and men, even if it were not loathsome to the Bongo, would be far too rare and costly to be used for such a purpose. Such is the usual food supplied to the native bearers, and according to their notion it is probable that no more grateful diet could be prescribed.