When, fourteen or fifteen years previously, the first intruders made their way into this district, the story goes that hundreds of the natives, with their wives and children and all their goods and chattels, betook themselves to this inaccessible retreat; and that having died of starvation, their evil spirits survive and render their place of refuge a place of danger. Just as we had contrived to push a little way into the thicket, an idea struck one of my servants that he could be as cunning as his master. Finding that I persevered in my intention, he bethought himself of the bees on the White Nile, and so there rose the shout of “Bees, bees!” from more than one of the party. But they got some stings they hardly looked for: one good box on the ear, followed up by another and another, made their cheeks tingle again, and they were fain to proceed. I can still laugh as I picture to myself those nigger rascals resigning themselves to enter the shrubs, and I see them heaving a sigh, and looking as if they were ready to send their lances through the first devil they should happen to meet. I followed them on through the hazardous pathway, the darkness growing ever deeper. Stumbling on, we made our way over blocks of stone, descending for more than a hundred feet till we reached the entrance of the cave, which, after a low kind of porchway through the rifled rocks, arches itself into a spacious grotto, capable of sheltering some thousand men.
INVOKING THE SPIRITS.
In place of any heart-rending shrieks of wicked ghosts, there was nothing more to alarm us than the whizzing of countless bats (Phyllorhina caffra), and thus at once the whole veil of romance was torn asunder. We reclined for a time in the cool shade, and then I invited the whole party to take part in a scene of conjuration, for which they were quite prepared. With the full strength of my voice I cried, “Samiel, Samiel, Afreed!” invoking the spirits of evil to put in an appearance; thus all pretext of fear from that quarter was put to rest; and now belief in ghosts took another shape, and the men pretended that they were terrified, because the cave was a lurking-place of lions; but as a fine brown dust covered the floor of the grotto, leaving it as smooth as though it had just been raked over, I asked them to show me some traces of the lions. They could detect nothing, however, but the vestiges of some porcupines, of which a few quills made it clear that other creatures besides ghosts and bats made the cave their home. That brown dust was a vast mass of guano that had gradually accumulated; I brought away a sack of it with me, and it worked wonders in making my garden productive, resulting in some cabbages of giant growth.
The rocky walls of the cave, dripping as they were with moisture, were covered with thick clusters of moss, which took the most variegated forms, and were quite a surprise in this region of Central Africa, where mosses are very scarce. A regular network of foliage, with long creepers and thorny brambles, filled up the entire glen upon which the grotto opened, so that no ray of sunlight could ever penetrate.
The Bongo give the name of “Gubbehee” (or the subterranean) to this cavern. I tried to creep into some of the crevices, but was soon obliged to desist, sometimes because the fissures were too narrow, and sometimes because the multitudes of bats came flying out in my face, and sometimes because the reeking ammonia choked me, and made further progress impossible. By some shots, however, which I discharged, I convinced myself of the magnitude of these rifts, which, within a few inches, were full of guano.
Full of spirits, we retraced our steps to the Seriba, and had some sport with the Governor about his pretence of the susceptibility of his donkey. When I asked him to accept a bet of 100 dollars that he would pass a night by himself in the cave, he was quite as bumptious as on the day before; but I moderated his enthusiasm by suggesting that his donkey, perhaps, was worth more than the 100 dollars, and that I was sure that the donkey could not stand the damp. The result was, that he declined the engagement, and cried off the wager.
These details will answer the purpose of showing what kind of heroes these cattle-stealers and men-hunters are. To them most literally applies Dante’s verse, when he speaks of the saucy herds who, “behind the fugitives swell with rage, but let these show their teeth, or even stretch out their purse, and at once they are gentle as a lamb.” Against the poor faint-hearted negroes they were valiant and full of pluck; but all their courage vanished into nothing when they came in contact with the Shillooks and Bari.
In Kulongo were wide plains covered with earth-nuts, which attract multitudes of the jackals of the country, which scratch up the nuts, and crack them with their teeth. The jackal (the “bashohm” of the Nubians, Canis variegatus) is one of the most common animals in Bongo-land. It is about the size of an ordinary fox, in colour being like a wolf, with black back and tail. They are pretty sure to be seen in the early morning, squatting comfortably down, and composedly enjoying the nuts. I knocked over several of them with heavy shot, and took care of their skins, which gave me some beautiful fur. The bashohm is very destructive among the poultry of the villages, doing even more mischief than the wild cat, which does not care to venture so near the huts.
ANOTHER DESERTED SERIBA.
From Kulongo I returned to Geer, from which it is distant about as far as from Addai. Half a league on the way we came to a spot where a deserted Seriba of Ghattas’s exhibited its desolate remains. The sight here was very striking; after penetrating the tall masses of grass, we found some self-sown sorghum, the stalks of which reached the astonishing length of 20 feet, being beyond question the tallest cereal in the world. The extraordinary growth was probably to be attributed to the manuring substances which, year after year, collect upon and fertilise the soil. The palisades of the old Seriba were still partially standing, and were hardly higher than the surrounding grass, and the ruins were overgrown with wild gourds, calabashes, and cucumbers. The bare frameworks of the conical roofs had fallen to the ground, and lay like huge crinolines: they served as supports to the growing pumpkins, and formed in this condition a thick shady bower.