Although the intelligence conveyed by Ori and Poncet failed utterly in giving either clearness or consistency to the confused depositions of those ignorant and uninformed men who had been their authorities, it still had the intrinsic merit of enlarging the domain of geographical knowledge by some matters of fact which it was reserved for me individually to confirm by my own observation. It laid down as facts, first, that to the south of the Niam-niam territory there is a river flowing towards the west;[19] secondly, that this river is not tributary to the Nile; and, thirdly, that its banks are populated by a race quite distinct from the ordinary negro race, its inhabitants being of a brownish complexion, and exhibiting a grade of civilization which is considerably in advance of what is elsewhere found in Central Africa.
These people were designated by the name of the Monbuttoo, and by the ivory traders they were known as Gurru-gurroo, a definition that is derived from an Arabic word which refers to their universal habit of piercing their ears.
No sooner had I really reached the district of the Gazelle than I discovered from my conversation and intercourse with the leaders of the ivory traffic that the Monbuttoo were regarded as holding a very peculiar and prominent place. Their country never failed to furnish a theme of general praise. It was declared to be prolific in ivory; it was profuse in its natural products; the pomp of its sovereign was unrivalled; but, above all, the skill of its people, in the fabrication alike of their weapons for war and their utensils for peace, was assumed to be so striking that they were comparable to the denizens of the civilized west, and that in some respects the Franks themselves did not surpass them in the exercise of an æsthetic faculty.
That I might succeed in making my way onwards to the territory of this problematical people, naturally became more and more my impatient and ardent desire; and it will readily be understood how eagerly I recognised Aboo Sammat as offered by a propitious fate to be the conductor upon whom I might rely for being introduced to a closer view of this undefined race, which might be likened in a way to a nebula in the geographical firmament. Very much I now rejoice at being in a position to submit, upon the evidence of my own observation, a somewhat detailed account of this race, who may be described as constituting a sort of remote island of humanity. Surrounded as it is by the waves of fluctuating nationalities, it is, as it were, an “ultima Thule” of geographical research; or perhaps still more appropriately it might be likened to a boulder thrown up from a lower formation, and exhibiting a development of indigenous culture, entirely different to what can be witnessed all around.
The territory of the Monbuttoo, as it lies in the heart of Africa, does not cover an area of more than 4000 square miles, but the ratio of the census of its population is hardly exceeded by any region of the entire continent. Estimating the density of the people by the districts through which we travelled, and observing that cultivated farms followed upon cultivated farms, without a barren spot between, I suppose that there are at least 250 inhabitants to the square mile, which would give an aggregate population of about a million. The position of the country is embraced very nearly between the parallels of 3° and 4° north latitude, and 28° and 29° east longitude from Greenwich. To the north of the country there is a large river, usually copious in its stream, called the Keebaly. This is joined by the Gadda, which flows from the south-east. After the junction it is known as the Welle, and has a breadth of about 800 feet, whilst never, even in the driest season, does its depth diminish to less than fifteen feet. It proceeds to the west along the southern portion of the adjoining Niam-niam district, and being swollen by the accession of numerous tributaries from the southern districts of the Monbuttoo, it very rapidly assumes its large dimensions. Beyond a doubt it is the upper course of the most easterly of the two arms which, after they have united in Baghirmy, flow onwards under the name of the Shary, that river to which Lake Tsad owes its existence.
MONBUTTOO GOVERNMENT.
There are two chieftains who, with regard to the extent of their dominions and the numerical strength of their armed forces (for their sway extends far beyond the populous districts of the Monbuttoo), may well be designated as kings. They have partitioned the sovereignty between them: the eastern division being subject to Degberra, the western division is governed by Munza, who exercises a much more powerful control; he is a son of King Tikkiboh, who had once enjoyed the undivided rule over the entire Monbuttoo land, but thirteen years previously had been murdered by his brother Degberra.
Sub-chieftains or viceroys are distributed over various sections of the country, and these are accustomed to surround themselves with a retinue and state little inferior to those of the kings themselves. In Munza’s realms there are three of these dignitaries; viz. his brothers Izingerria, Mummery, and Nooma; subordinate to Degberra there are his four sons, Kubby, Benda, Koopa, and Yangara.
The country of the Niam-niam constitutes the northern and north-western boundaries of the Monbuttoo. This comprises the territories of Kanna and Indimma, sons of the once powerful Keefa, and, farther on, the district of Malingde or Marindo, which approaches in an easterly direction more towards the territory of Wando; each of these countries are, however, separated by wildernesses which it requires two days to cross. The southern limits of the Monbuttoo are enclosed, as it were, by a semicircle of typical negroes, whom they embrace in the comprehensive definition of “Momvoo,” a disdainful epithet implying the extremity of their degradation. From this category we are possibly called upon to exclude in this quarter (as perchance in every other region of Africa) those isolated races of dwarfs, familiarly known as “Pygmies,” of which the Akka, who reside in the S.S.W., and have their abodes close to the confines of the kingdom of Munza, may be quoted as examples. The bulk of this apparently thickly-peopled race is subject to independent chieftains, but there is one section which is tributary to Munza in so far as this, that it makes its contributary payments to Mummery, as being Munza’s vicegerent. According to the depositions of some Nubians who have been stationed for some years past in the Monbuttoo country, the language of the Babuckur is found to be spoken among the Momvoo. To support their opinion the Nubians affirm that women-slaves brought from Babuckur have always been found able to converse with the natives of the land just to the south of the Monbuttoo; a circumstance which is not without its signification as explaining the most recent migration of nations into this part of Africa. Since the two enclaves of Babuckur on the eastern boundaries of the Niam-niam appear only to be removed from each other by an interval of sixty miles and to be hemmed in by hostile neighbours, the fact, taken in connection with the above, may serve to demonstrate that Monbuttoo and Niam-niam alike must have been advancing in an easterly direction.
Munza’s neighbours towards the south-west and south of the kingdom of Kanna are the Mabohde. This is a people whom Keefa, Kanna’s father (known also as Ntikkima), was accustomed to harass in war till he met with his own death. Farther on towards the S.S.W., and separated from Munza by the Mabohde and the Akka, there lies the district of the Massanza, a tribe which is held in subjection by the formidable hand of Kizzo. To the south and south-east are found the Nemeigeh, the Bissangah, and the Domondoo, tenanting a mountainous region, which not improbably is the western declivity of that important mountainous formation to which Baker, in describing the north-west of Lake Mwootan, has referred under the name of the Blue Mountains. The settlements of the Domondoo are the usual limits to which the Monbuttoo are accustomed to carry their plundering expeditions. Some Nubian soldiers who had been quartered in the country of Munza, and who had accompanied him in some of his marauding exploits have given a description of the general mountainous character of the land, and, moreover, have asserted that goats, which are known neither to the Niam-niam nor to the Monbuttoo, have been captured there in great numbers. The Babuckur also, notwithstanding the frequent incursions which their neighbours, ever greedy of animal diet, have made upon their over-populated and oppressed communities, are always found in possession of herds of goats so numerous that they might be described as inexhaustible. Many days’ journey to the south and south-east of Munza’s realms are the abodes of the Maoggoo, over whom a powerful sovereign exercises his authority, and who seems to have various transactions with Munza, if I may judge from the splendid cattle which had been sent him as a present. Maoggoo is not improbably the same as Malegga, the appellation of a people, which appears in Baker’s map to the west of the Blue Mountains in an extensive country (Ulegga), of which it is affirmed that the king is named Kadjoro, and that the population is especially devoted to the breeding of cattle.