ABOO SAMMAT’S INTERVIEW WITH WANDO.
Mohammed here expressed his intention of having a preliminary conference with Wando before we definitively pitched our camp, and borrowing my revolver, as he had done before, he set out with the utmost composure, attended solely by his black body-guard, the Farookh. At the head of these he hurried away at a pace so fast that the lads who carried his arms could scarcely keep up with him. It is characteristic of the Nubians that whenever they have important transactions on hand they always move with extreme rapidity.
Within an hour Mohammed returned, perfectly content with his interview, and proceeded at once to conduct the caravan to the station allotted to it, close to the banks of the Dyagbe, and just about the distance of an arrowshot from the wall of foliage which formed the confine of the primeval forest. Taking their hatchets, the bearers entered the thickets and hewed down long stakes, with which they set to work to construct some huts, my own people meanwhile busying themselves by providing some posts and props which I required equally for the protection of my baggage from the dampness of the ground and for placing it out of the reach of white ants. I had brought some deal boards with me from Khartoom, and by putting these upon the props a convenient arrangement was made for storing in the narrowest compass a good deal of baggage. Space in my tent was necessarily very limited.
Every hand was set to work, and in a very short time a number of pretty little huts were erected with no other material than the fresh grass; and when the baggage had all been properly secured there commenced a brisk and very amicable commerce with the natives. Fine elephant-tusks were brought for sale, and found no lack of ready purchasers. Presents of cloth and beads were freely distributed, for the double purpose of putting the people into a good mood and of inducing them to disclose new resources for procuring ivory. Wando himself appeared arrayed in a large shirt of figured calico, made with long sleeves, which he wore (in the same way as all the other native chieftains) solely out of compliment to the donor. As soon as the visitors withdrew he deemed it an attire below his dignity, and could not condescend to trick himself out in a dress which ordinarily was reserved as a kind of curiosity for his wardrobe.
The cannibal prince, of whom for some days we had been in such dread, looked a harmless mortal enough as he strolled through the camp arm-in-arm with Mohammed’s officers; no doubt they had enjoyed a mutual drink to each other’s health.
The kind of beads which the Niam-niam prefer wearing, when they can procure them, is that which is known in Khartoom commerce as “mandyoor,” consisting of a long polyhedral prism, about as large as a bean and blue as lapis lazuli. Hardly any other kind retains any value at all. Cowries are still used as a decoration on the national costume, but the demand for them is not great, and for ten years past they have not formed at all an important item in the Khartoom traffic. Fashion extends its sway even as far as these remote wildernesses, which have their own special demand for “novelties.”
As medium of exchange, nothing here was of any value except copper and iron, which never failed to be accepted in payment. English copper, which the Khartoomers take with them in long bars about three-quarters of an inch thick, is most in repute; but not unfrequently they make use of the lumps of copper which they obtain from the mines to the south of Darfoor. With any other resources for obtaining copper the inhabitants of the country through which I travelled appear to be hardly acquainted, though possibly the Congo region might, in former times, have found an outlet for its store in this direction. To provide suitable small change for their minor purchases, the expeditions to the Niam-niam always include among their bearers a certain number of smiths, who from the larger bars and ingots fabricate rings of all sizes, from the circlet to go round the arm down to the ring just large enough to fit the finger. These rings are made from quadrangular bars, the ends of which are subsequently reduced to taper points. It may be added, by way of example, that for a finger ring a Niam-niam would give a chicken, although the copper material itself was not worth three farthings.
COST OF IVORY.
Here, at its fountain-head, ivory, as might naturally be expected, may be obtained in barter at a very trifling cost. On the coast of Guinea it is necessary to part with a whole host of commodities, guns, cloth, knives, looking-glasses, and what not, for a single tusk of an elephant; but a Niam-niam is contented if he can get half a bar of copper, which would not be worth more than four or five dollars. Not only, however, would there be some additional presents of cloth or beads, but the weight and transport would have to be taken into account. The prime cost here would probably be scarcely five per cent. of the value of the ivory, which fluctuating, of course, according to quality, generally, on an average, in Europe realises two or three dollars a pound; whilst on the other hand, the same purchase could not be made at the harbours upon the western coasts for much less than 80 per cent. of the gross value. Through the immense outlay which is entailed upon the Khartoom merchants by the support of so many soldiers, and, in fact, from the precarious results of the expeditions, the ultimate profit is really so moderate and it is gained at so much risk, that the ivory trade on the whole is not flourishing. But how matters could practically be mended, or how the expenses of proceeding in the lands of the Upper Nile could be diminished, I confess I have no scheme to propose. The lands are not only so remote from the coast, but they are so far away even from the navigable rivers, that they can never play an important part in the traffic of the world; nor can the railway which it is in contemplation to construct between Khartoom and Egypt introduce any material change into the existing condition of things.
So full of bustle was our camp life that it was not till nightfall that I had an opportunity of inquiring from Mohammed what had transpired during his interview with Wando. I now learnt that the revolver he had borrowed had done him a good turn. He had hurried on in front of his escort, and had gone boldly to the chieftain to reprimand him for his equivocal behaviour; but he had no sooner entered the hut than he was encircled by a troop of Wando’s satellites, who levelled their lances at him in a most threatening attitude. He felt himself a prisoner, but, undismayed, he cried out that his life should cost them a thousand lives, and, snapping the revolver, he dared them to touch him at their peril. The intimidated Niam-niam at once assumed a milder tone, and, thanks, as Mohammed said, to his temerity, everything turned out well.