APPENDIX I
On fitting out Somáli Expeditions
General Observations
Example I.—Calculation of six weeks’ trip to Guban and Ogo—Composition of caravan, and expenses.
Example II.—Eight weeks’ trip to the Haud and the more accessible parts of Ogádén.
Example III.—Sixteen weeks’ trip to distant Ogádén and the Webbe—General notes on trips to the Webbe and Gállaland—Notes on caravan defence—Notes on preliminary steps, and how to engage and pay off a caravan.
For an English sportsman, Somáliland is probably the best hunting-ground in Africa. The climate is healthy, and not too hot in the higher districts; the English are universally popular, and the natives appreciate sport. The caravan, when once properly provisioned at the coast, renders one entirely independent in a country practically without villages or supplies. The game is shy and not too easy to get, which is an advantage from a sporting point of view. There is room for many simultaneous expeditions if they are only pushed into unexplored ground, and a great variety of game is found within a limited area. Above all, there is easy access to the Somáli coast from civilised parts.
I have been asked so often to give information to intending travellers to Somáliland that, for the guidance of those who contemplate visiting that country, I venture to publish the following suggestions.
It is, of course, not to be expected that every traveller can share the same views on subjects connected with the fitting out of an expedition; but by way of illustration I shall calculate a few examples of the caravans which I would myself organise for certain definite objects. Whether the intending traveller agree with me or not, he will at least gain an insight into some of the more necessary details connected with the needs and precautions attendant upon the fitting out and conducting of caravans into the interior of Somáliland.
To begin with, if there are two or more Europeans in an expedition, in my opinion each should have his own caravan complete. There are several reasons for this. Where there are two or three Europeans with a combined caravan of mixed servants, it is difficult to ensure that equal loyalty shall be extended by the Somális to each member of the party. Interests clash, and the result has, according to all I have heard, too often been a spoilt trip. In my journeys with my brother the value of distinctly organised caravans was recognised at once, and we held to this system throughout, the result being that even our servants and camelmen pulled well together, and we had no caravan difficulties.
It is convenient in safe country, when an increase of sport can be obtained thereby, for the different Europeans to separate. Thus A hears of a lion two days’ march away; B goes three days’ march in the opposite direction to search a valley believed to contain elephants; C forms a camp in the hills twenty miles away for a week’s koodoo shooting. In unsafe country, or where there is sport for all at one spot, the camps may be reunited, the dinners clubbed together, the tents pitched side by side, and the camels joined into one herd. But the distinct organisation of each caravan should be preserved, under the command of its own white leader, assisted by his Somáli headman. In this way only, with the maximum of supervision, aided by a feeling of esprit de corps between the different caravans, can the maximum of work be got out of Somális.
I am against taking servants from India. They require a great deal of water, and are at enmity with their surroundings in a country where there are practically no villages nor bazaars, and where they are almost “put to Coventry” by the natives. Somális think them effeminate, saying they may be men in the town, but that they become women in the bush, especially in the waterless Haud! In our Dolbahanta journey the women ran after my Madras cook, who was dressed in flowing white with a large turban, and asked him whose wife he was! Sometimes when my brother was out of camp, the Somáli members of the expedition used to throw stones at his Punjabi “bearer,” and although a fine fellow in his own country, among the strange surroundings he used to break down, and with many tears ask to be sent to the coast. One day, when aggravated beyond all endurance by the Somális, he shouldered his bundle of brass cooking-pots and started, without food or water, to walk across a hundred miles of pathless Haud. Luckily he was tracked up and brought back into camp. It is not necessary to take Indians; for Somális, though often rather rough as servants in a civilised household, pick up their duties quickly, and are good enough for the jungle.