In Geer I made numerous additions to my album. Here, too, I sketched the accompanying illustration of the village life of the Bongo. The huts and granaries are built round an immense butter-tree. On the left is one of the memorial graves which I have already described,[96] and on the right, a woman pounding corn in one of the native portable mortars; in the foreground are three Bongo women in attitudes in which they may frequently be observed, the sitting figure having a child suspended from her back in a leather bag; all round the village are sireh-fields, with their crops standing some twelve feet high, whilst the harp-shaped frames for drying the sesame rise up conspicuously above them.
The appearance of the first new moon after my return from my pleasant little trip was saluted with the usual nonsensical firing of guns, which threatened to cause a disaster similar to that over which I have already poured out my Jeremiad. It was the same old story; bullets were whizzing and whirring in all directions, when one of the straw roofs took fire; the flames were extinguished with much difficulty, and before any very serious damage had been done, but my powers of endurance were exhausted; I would not abide the chance of further repetition of the peril, and insisted upon preparations being at once taken in hand for sending off the boats to Khartoom.
An accidental circumstance favoured my design. Intelligence had casually reached me that Abdel Mesih, a son of Ghattas, was making a tour amongst the eastern Seribas of the Rohl, and intended very shortly to come on to us. To me the information was very opportune, as it gave me a handle, which I did not fail to use, to induce Idrees, our controller, to hurry on his movements in my behalf. I made him understand how much worse it would be for him if Abdel Mesih should arrive before I had taken my departure; for most certainly if I had the chance I should report upon the negligence that had caused the burning-down of the Seriba, and should demand compensation for all my losses. The consequences, I warned him, would be that his master would at once remove him from his post, and that he would have to go back to his place in Khartoom a poor beggarly slave. My threats answered their purpose admirably; they put Idrees into a frightful state of alarm; he lost no time in pushing matters forward, and on the 4th of June everything was ready for the march to the Meshera.
THE DINKA COUNTRY.
Our party consisted of fifty soldiers and rather more than 300 bearers. We started along our former road to the north-east, through the low-lying country of the Dinka, which I had previously traversed during the month of March; but so advanced was the season now that the whole region presented quite a new aspect. Bulbous plants of every variety shed their enlivening hues over the splendid plains, which were adorned by noble trees, park-like in their groupings. There was a descent in the land, but it was scarcely perceptible. We were only aware that we were approaching the limits of the rocky soil, when, on emerging from the bush, we saw stretching far before us the first great steppe that marked the commencement of the Dinka country. Scattered at intervals over the plain were some very remarkable groves. These were not only singularly compact, but their outline was as sharply defined as if it had been drawn by compasses, each cluster seeming to form itself around some unusually tall tree that was a common centre for the rest. The fantastic forms of the wild Phœnix and the candelabra-Euphorbia were the most conspicuous amidst these striking groups.
Our first night-camp was pitched at a deserted murah belonging to the Ayarr tribe. The deep holes that remained where wells had formerly been sunk, allowed us to make a very interesting inspection of the character of the soil; we had advanced exactly 7000 paces from the extremity of the rock, and on looking into the holes I could see that the ferruginous swamp-ore was here covered by a homogeneous layer of grey sandy soil, ten feet in thickness. These steppes are scarcely at all above the level of the Gazelle,[97] and, consequently, from July to the end of the rainy season they are constantly under water; traces of the inundation were apparent in the empty shells of the water-snail (Ampullaria) that were scattered about, and in the pools I found some of the little tortoises (Pelomedusa gehafie, Rüpp.) that have their home in the Gazelle itself.
On the following day we crossed the territory of the Dwuihr; the country retained the same character of level steppe broken by clumps of trees, but in consequence of the recent showers the roads in parts had become quite marshy. There were many detached huts scattered about.
As we advanced, our attention was attracted by a herd of hartebeests sporting together scarcely 500 paces from our path, and apparently quite unconscious of the proximity of a caravan nearly half a league in length. So regular were their evolutions as almost to suggest the idea that they were being guided by some invisible hand; they ran in couples like the horses in a circus, and kept going round and round a clump of trees, whilst the others stood in groups of three or four intently watching them; after a time these in turn took their place, and, two at a time, ran their own circuit in the same fashion. How long these movements might have continued, I cannot say; but my dogs soon afterwards made a dash in amongst the antelopes and sent them flying in all directions. The circumstance that I have now related may appear somewhat incredible; but I can only say that I had ample time to witness it, and that I was as much surprised at it as my readers can possibly be. I can only imagine, in explanation, that it was pairing-time, and that the animals were blind to all external danger.
I remembered that I had witnessed something similar, three months previously, upon the Dyoor. A party of three of us were rambling over a plain covered with short grass, when we saw two little Hegoleh-bocks (A. Madoqua) chasing each other upon one side of us; they kept up that peculiar grunting that belongs to their kind; a moment after, and they were on the other side of us; in another moment they were back again; and by watching them we found that they kept making a circle round the spot on which we were standing, and, although we shouted and tried to scare them, they persisted in twice more performing their circuit about us.
Our next task was to cross a swampy brook overgrown with the Habbas-mimosa, and the Bongo bearers made a diversion in the day’s proceedings by instituting a battue in the long steppe-grass in which they succeeded in killing four ichneumons.