Wednesday, June 25.—Our luggage had been so wetted on the preceding afternoon, while crossing the Máyo Bínti, that we were obliged to stay in Ribágo the whole morning, in order to dry it. The horseman who had escorted me out of the town had returned; and in his stead Íbrahíma, with a companion on foot, had made his appearance, with orders from the governor to escort me to the very frontiers of the country. In order to render him a more sociable companion, I thought it well to make him a present of a túrkedí. My mʿallem had not come along with us; and I could not be angry with him for not desiring to return to Kúkawa, where he had been detained against his will. The horse on which I had mounted him he had well deserved for his trouble, Íbrahíma told me that Katúri had come after me as far as Yébborewó, thinking that I would pass the night there, but that the governor would not let him go further.
Before starting in the afternoon, I made our landlady, the wife of the Ardo of Ribágo, very happy by a few presents, as an acknowledgment of her hospitality in having twice entertained us in her house. After a short march of a few miles, we took up our quarters for the night in Duló, where the landlord, who a few days ago had been deprived of his office of mayor, received us at first rather unkindly, but afterwards assigned me a splendid hut, where the ganga or large drum, the ensign of his former authority, was still hanging from the wall. I was greatly in want of rest, and was obliged to keep my head always wet, and to abstain entirely from food.
Thursday, June 26.—I thought we should certainly cross the Bénuwé to-day; but, as if in defiance of the governor of the country, Bíllama desired to move on as slowly as possible, and took us to our well-known quarters in Chabajáure. But this slow progress was certainly better for me, as I had this day arrived at a crisis, and was dreadfully weak. Taking small doses of quinine the whole of the afternoon, I strengthened myself for the next day’s work, when after five miles’ march we reached the Tépe.
Friday, June 27.—The Fáro had only risen a little more than twenty inches since the 18th—that is to say, two inches and a half per day; nevertheless we had great difficulty in fording it. The Bénuwé had risen more rapidly; and of course in July both rivers rise at a very different rate. When the rainy season is at its height, the sandy beach of the headland at the junction is almost completely under water; and this was the case with our old place of embarkation on the northern bank of the Bénuwé, so that I was obliged to creep up the steep bank.
In order to withstand the fatigue, I continued taking quinine the whole day long, and was glad when in the evening we reached Sulléri, where, to my astonishment, we were this time exceedingly well received. The mayor of the place would not allow me to start the following day, although my camels were already laden, and a beautiful fine morning invited us to travel. After a good deal of resistance, I at length gave way to his entreaties, under the condition that he would construct for me a cool shed wherein to spend the heat of the day; and in twenty minutes a lofty hall had risen from the earth. Thus I spent the day very comfortably; and although I was unable to alleviate the pains suffered by my host from an arrow-wound in one of his eyes, or to give him a charm to prevent the death of his cattle, I was so fortunate as to effect a splendid cure on one of his sons, which procured me great fame.
Saturday, June 28.—On leaving Sulléri in the morning, we took a different route from that previously traversed, and which proved infinitely more interesting, although in the morning, after we had passed a small farm-village where all the field-labourers were at work, we had to cross a very extensive forest, and I became greatly exhausted. Having passed about noon several villages, which proved to be all slave-villages with the exception of one, which contained a lord’s mansion of neat appearance, suddenly the character of the country changed entirely, and we came to a wide depression or hollow, from one hundred to one hundred and twenty feet deep, which, winding round on our left, formed a fine green vale, bordered on the other side by a picturesque cone[79] rising abruptly, and forming on the east side a wooded terrace, while on the west it displayed a steep bare rocky bank of horizontal strata, and on this side, after a small interruption, a low ridge attached to it encircling the hollow on all sides.
Having reached the south-eastern foot of the cone by a gradual ascent, we obtained a view over the varied and rich scenery before us, a luxuriant mass of vegetation broken at intervals by comfortable-looking little hamlets, and bounded in the distance by a cone stretching out to a great length. Having crossed a small watercourse, and wound along between erractic blocks of granite, scattered about in wild disorder, and interrupted, wherever the ground offered a small level, by rich crops of grain, we reached the first hamlet of this most picturesque locality. It is one of the chief seats of the Démsa, or rather comprises two distinct villages, namely, Démsa-Póha and Démsa-Mésu.
It was indeed a most charming sight when we made our way along a broad well-trodden path, surrounded on both sides by neatly fenced clusters of large huts, encompassed by waving corn and picturesque clusters of trees. Thus we reached the “lamórde,” the residence of the governor, which is situated at a short distance from the southern foot of the large granitic cone; but he was absent, having gone on an expedition against the Fúri, an independent pagan tribe in the neighbourhood, and we had to wait some time before his servants undertook to assign us quarters, when we had to retrace our steps to the southern part of the village. It was half-past four in the afternoon when, feverish and extremely weak as I was, I at length found rest, but while reclining at full length in a cool shade, I listened with delight to Íbrahíma’s chat, who, in order to cheer my spirits, gave me an account of that famous expedition to the far south which the Fúlbe of Ádamáwa undertook a few years ago, and to which I have already alluded.
This memorable campaign having proceeded from Búbanjídda, none of the people of Ádamáwa, whose acquaintance I was able to make during my short stay in the country, had participated in it, so that all the accounts which I received of it were extremely vague. The expedition, after a march of almost two months, is said to have reached an unbounded expanse of unbroken plain, and, having kept along it for a day or two, to have arrived at an immense tree, in the shade of which the whole host found sufficient room. Here they found two natives of the southern regions, who informed them that they were the subjects of a powerful queen that resided in a vast town of two days’ march in circumference. These people, they say, were of short stature, and wore long beards. Frightened by these reports, and by the waterless tract before them, the expedition retraced their steps. Similar reports with regard to a very powerful female sovereign towards the south are also current in Bagirmi and all the adjacent country; but I am not able to determine whether they originate in faint rumours, spread so far north, of the powerful kingdom of Muata-ya-Nvo, or—of Queen Victoria.