Travels and discoveries in North and Central Africa

by Heinrich Barth

We have seen above, that the Bórnu people had given to their relations with Ádamáwa a hostile character; but from that quarter they had nothing to fear, the governor of their province being too much occupied by the affairs of his own country.

I will now say a word about Wadáÿ. That was the quarter to which the most anxious looks of the Bórnu people were directed. For, seven years previously, they had been very nearly conquered by them, and had employed every means to get information of what was going on there. But from thence also the news was favourable. For although the report of the death of the Sultan Mohammed Sheríf, in course of time, turned out to be false, still it was true that the country was plunged into a bloody civil war with the Abú-Senún, or Kodoyí, and that numbers of enterprising men had succumbed in the struggle. The business of the town went on as usual, with the exception of the ʿaid el fotr, the ngúmerí ashám, the festival following the great annual fast, which was celebrated in a grand style, not by the nation, which seemed to take very little interest in it, but by the court. In other places, like Kanó, the rejoicings seem to be more popular on this occasion; the children of the butchers or “masufauchi” in that great emporium of commerce mounting some oxen, fattened for the occasion, between the horns, and managing them by a rope fastened to the neck, and another to the hind leg. As for the common people of Bórnu, they scarcely took any other part in this festivity than by putting on their best dresses; and it is a general custom in larger establishments that servants and attendants on this day receive a new shirt.

I also put on my best dress, and mounting my horse, which had recovered a little from the fatigue of the last journey, though it was not yet fit for another, proceeded in the morning to the eastern town or “billa gedíbe,” the great thoroughfare being crowded with men on foot and horseback, passing to and fro, all dressed in their best. It had been reported that the sheikh was to say his prayers in the mosque, but we soon discovered that he was to pray outside the town, as large troops of horsemen were leaving it through the north gate or “chinna yalábe.” In order to become aware of the place where the ceremony was going on, I rode to the vizier’s house, and met him just as he came out, mounted on horseback, and accompanied by a troop of horsemen.

At the same time several cavalcades were seen coming from various quarters, consisting of the kashéllas, or officers, each with his squadron, of from a hundred to two hundred horsemen, all in the most gorgeous attire, particularly the heavy cavalry; the greater part being dressed in a thick stuffed coat called “degíbbir,” and wearing over it several tobes of all sorts of colours and designs, and having their heads covered with the “búge,” or casque, made very nearly like those of our knights in the middle age, but of lighter metal, and ornamented with most gaudy feathers. Their horses were covered all over with thick clothing called “líbbedí,” with various coloured stripes, consisting of three pieces, and leaving nothing but the feet exposed, the front of the head being protected and adorned by a metal plate. Others were dressed in a coat of mail, “síllege,” and the other kind called “komá-komí-súbe.” The lighter cavalry was only dressed in two or three showy tobes and small white or coloured caps; but the officers and more favoured attendants wore bernúses of finer or coarser quality, and generally of red or yellow colour, slung in a picturesque manner round the upper part of their body, so that the inner wadding of richly coloured silk was most exposed to view.

All these dazzling cavalcades, amongst whom some very excellent horses were seen prancing along, were moving towards the northern gate of the “bílla gedíbe,” while the troop of the sheikh himself, who had been staying in the western town, was coming from the south-west. The sight of this troop, at least from a little distance, as is the case in theatrical scenery, was really magnificent. The troop was led by a number of horsemen; then followed the livery slaves with their matchlocks; and behind them rode the sheikh, dressed as usual in a white bernús, as a token of his religious character, but wearing round his head a red shawl. He was followed by four magnificent chargers clothed in líbbedí of silk of various colours, that of the first horse being striped white and yellow, that of the second white and brown, that of the third white and light green, and that of the fourth white and cherry-red. This was certainly the most interesting and conspicuous part of the procession. Behind the horses followed the four large álam or ensigns of the sheikh, and the four smaller ones of the musketeers, and then a numerous body of horsemen.

This cavalcade of the sheikh’s now joined the other troops, and the whole body proceeded in the direction of Dawerghú to a distance of about a mile from the town. Here the sheikh’s tent was pitched, consisting of a very large cupola of considerable dimensions, with blue and white stripes, and curtains, the one half white and the other red; the curtains were only half closed. In this tent the sheikh himself, the vizier, and the first courtiers were praying, while the numerous body of horsemen and men on foot were grouped around in the most picturesque and imposing variety.

Meanwhile I made the round of this interesting scene, and endeavoured to count the various groups. In their numbers I was certainly disappointed, as I had been led to expect myriads. At the very least, however, there were three thousand horsemen, and from six thousand to seven thousand armed men on foot, the latter partly with bow and arrow. There were besides a great multitude of spectators. The ceremony did not last long; and as early as nine o’clock the ganga summoned all the chiefs to mount, and the dense mass of human beings began to disperse and range themselves in various groups. They took their direction round the north-western corner of the east town, and entered the latter by the western gate; but the crowd was so great that I chose to forego taking leave of the sheikh, and went slowly back over the intermediate ground between the two towns in the company of some very chevalieresque and well-mounted young Arabs from Ben-Gházi, and posted myself at some distance from the east gate of the western town, in order to see the kashéllas, who have their residence in this quarter, pass by. There were twelve or thirteen, few of whom had more than one hundred horsemen, the most conspicuous being Fúgo ʿAlí, ʿAlí Marghí, ʿAlí Déndal, ʿAlí Ladán, Belál, Sálah, Kandíl, and Jerma. It was thought remarkable that no Shúwa had come to this festivity; but I think they rarely do, although they may sometimes come for the ʿAíd-el-kebír, or the “ngumerí layábe.” It is rather remarkable that even this smaller festivity is celebrated here with such éclat, while in general, in Mohammedan Negroland, only the “láya” is celebrated in this way; perhaps this is due to Egyptian influence, and the custom is as old at least as the time of the King Edris Alawóma.

I had the inexpressible delight of receiving by the courier, who arrived on the 6th of August, a considerable parcel of letters from Europe, which assured me as well of the great interest which was generally felt in our undertaking, although as yet only very little of our first proceedings had become known, as that we should be enabled to carry out our enterprise without too many privations. I therefore collected all the little energy which my sickly state had left me, and concluded the report of my journey to Ádamáwa, which caused me a great deal of pain, but which, forwarded on the 8th of August, together with the news of Mr. Overweg’s successful navigation, produced a great deal of satisfaction in Europe. Together with the letters and sundry Maltese portfolios, I had also the pleasure of receiving several numbers of the Athenæum, probably the first which were introduced into Central Africa, and which gave me great delight.

Altogether our situation in the country was not so bad. We were on the best and most friendly terms with the rulers; we were not only tolerated, but even respected by the natives, and we saw an immense field of interesting and useful labour open to us. There was only one disagreeable circumstance besides the peculiar nature of the climate; this was the fact, that our means were too small to render us quite independent of the sheikh and his vizier, for the scanty supplies which had reached us were not sufficient to provide for our wants, and were soon gone. We were scarcely able to keep ourselves afloat on our credit, and to supply our most necessary wants. Mr. Overweg, besides receiving a very handsome horse from them, had also been obliged to accept at their hands a number of tobes, which he had made presents of to the chiefs of the Búdduma, and they looked upon him as almost in their employment. He lost a great deal of his time in repairing, or rather trying to repair, their watches and other things. Such services I had declined from the beginning, and was therefore regarded as less useful; and I had occasionally to hear it said, “ʿAbd el Kerím faidanse bágo,”—“ʿAbd el Kerím is of no use whatever;” nevertheless, I myself was not quite independent of their kindness, although I sacrificed all I could in order to give from time to time a new impulse to their favour by an occasional present.

The horse which they had first given me had proved incapable of such fatigue as it had to undergo, and the animal which I had bought before going to Ádamáwa had been too much knocked up to stand another journey so soon: and after having bought two other camels and prepared myself for another expedition, I was unable, with my present means, to buy a good horse. Remembering, therefore, what the vizier had told me with regard to my first horse, I sent him word that he would greatly oblige me by making me a present of one, and he was kind enough to send me four animals from which to choose; but as none of these satisfied me, I rejected them all, intimating very simply that it was impossible, among four nags, “kádara,” to choose one horse, “fir.” This hint, after a little further explanation, my friend did not fail to understand, and in the evening of the 7th of September he sent me a horse from his own stable, which became my faithful and noble companion for the next four campaigns, and from which I did not part till, after my return from Timbúktu, in December 1854, he succumbed to sickness in Kanó.