In the evening Mohammed established a shooting match. The natives had never been made familiar with the effect of our firearms, regarding them only as clumsy lances, or, as they called them, great “iron sticks,” and Mohammed felt it was desirable to inspire them with a proper respect for the weapons. Selecting one of the thickest of the wooden gates that, according to custom, swung in front of the huts, he set it up for a target, and the general astonishment was unbounded when it was discovered that out of fifty balls at a hundred paces, at least ten had gone clean through the wood. The Bongo bearers were then put through an exercise of feigning an attack. With wild outcry, and still wilder boundings and jumpings, they rushed upon their imaginary foe, representing, in their way, the light cavalry dashing in after the prelude of the roar of the artillery. Then, to complete the illusion of the spectacle, they seized huge clods of earth and great clumps of grass, and so returned, a picture of troops laden with spoil, to the position from which they had started. This was but a sham fight; but a few weeks later, and the scene had to be re-enacted in earnest.
The next movement of the caravan was towards the west. Twice there were some brooks to cross, and after half a league we halted by the Yuroo. We were now in a country with a large population, the whole district being called Nabanda Yuroo, or the “villages of the Yuroo,” as the names of the streams in this region always give their designation to the land. The stream was shadowed in the usual way by the thickly developed growth of the gallery foliage, and took a curve in the form of a horse-shoe. Within the bend were scattered the farmsteads surrounded by large groves of plantains of which the ripe fruit had been already housed. The preparations that were set on foot towards forming a camp without making use of the existing huts either for the shelter of our baggage or for the reception of the superiors, demonstrated at once that a residence here for some days was certainly intended. The pretext alleged for the stay was to allow the Mohammedans to solemnise the anniversary of their new year. The issue, however, did not answer to the expectation.
ENTERTAINING THE A-BANGA.
I had here to exhibit myself to a larger number of curious eyes than usual; but I was able to obtain the measurements of the skulls of some of the A-Banga, whilst others were immortalised in my sketch-book. I had also to provide for the entertainment of the people who came to visit me, and in this respect was greatly assisted by my matches, as the marvel of my being able to produce fire at my pleasure was an inexhaustible source of interest. If ever I handed over a lucifer and allowed them to light it themselves, their rapture surpassed all bounds; they never failed to consider that the power of producing flames resided in me, but their astonishment was very greatly increased when they discovered that the faculty could be extended to themselves. Giving the white man credit for being able to procure fire or rain at his own free-will, they looked upon the performances as miracles unparalleled since the dawn of creation. For myself, I sat composedly apart, as though invested with some mysterious charm; but to say the truth, I was rather bored by this conjuring, which was a stale excitement to me, as it had now entered upon its second year of performance. Still the wonder of the Africans seemed never to cease, and they did not flag in their delight at the instantaneous flame.
The method of obtaining fire, practised alike by the natives of the Nile lands and of the adjacent country in the Welle system, consists simply in rubbing together two hard sticks at right angles to one another till a spark is emitted. The hard twigs of the Anona senegalensis are usually selected for the purpose. Underneath them is placed either a stone or something upon which a little pile of embers has been laid; the friction of the upper piece of wood wears a hole in the lower, and soon a spark is caught by the ashes, and is fanned into a flame with some dry grass, which is swung to and fro to cause a draught, the whole proceeding being to marvel which might well-nigh eclipse the magic of my lucifer matches.
As we were now expecting a forced campaign of two days through the wilderness, on the confines my servants had to apply their attention to the provision of adequate supplies, as whatever we required would have to be carried with us. To accomplish our plan satisfactorily we were obliged to contract a treaty offensive and defensive with the natives, and nothing would suffice for this but a mutual interchange of blood. The circumstance led me for the first time to become a witness of this barbarous, but truly African custom. The words of the pledge are emphatic: “In peace we will hold together; in war we will be a mutual defence.” Osman, one of my people who had come from Berber, being a novice in the ranks of the Niam-niam campaigners, became one of the most enthusiastic adherents to this pledge. In vain I represented to him the unlawfulness of his conduct from a Mohammedan point of view; I threatened that for the future he should be called a heretic and an unbeliever, as bad as a Kaffir; but all to no purpose: he became a blood-drinker by profession, and so obtained from me whatever copper rings and beads were necessary for cementing the bonds of the treaty.
The following day was devoted entirely to exploring the sylvan flora around; to my heart’s desire could I now wander amidst the thickets on the Yuroo, which would have been deemed inaccessible to any one but a plant-hunter.
HOSTILE ATTITUDE OF THE NATIVES.
In the mould formed by the leaves which had decayed beside the stream that parted itself into many a vein, I came across a number of drums, stools, and other specimens of wood-work which the natives had buried in the mud, in order to give them a permanent blackness. This too is the way in which they prepare the reeds of which they weave their shields and matting. The process of rapid superficial humifaction which takes place here, is to be attributed doubtless to the temperature being so much higher than in the temperate zones, where a corresponding degree of decomposition would be the work of years.
Whilst botanising on the Assika we had more than once been taken by surprise at arrows from some unknown hand having fallen very near us. To bend down to pluck a remarkable plant, and to take up some whistling arrow instead, is not a common experience, even in Africa. The hostile and defiant attitude of the natives was too plainly revealed to us, when on the 11th of March the elder of my Niam-niam attendants, Gyabir, was shot in the muscle of his arm. Shrieking aloud in alarm and agony, he flung down my valuable rifle, and betook himself to flight. So dense was the thicket that I knew nothing of the disaster till my other attendants came running up, and terror-stricken began to shout, “They are coming! they are coming!” After this we hurried back to the camp. I was very deeply concerned at the supposed loss of my breech-loader, which I was accustomed to call my “cook,” so serviceable had it been day after day, in bringing down guinea-fowl and francolins for my table. By good fortune, however, one of the Bongo folk had caught sight of the weapon, and soon brought it back to me safe and sound.