Mademba gathered a court about him, showing a very clear sense of the right policy to pursue. When with us his manners and tastes were quite civilized, but he knew that to get an influence over his new subjects he must adopt the customs of their chiefs. He began by building himself a palace, which consists of a vast rectangular enceinte, with a door embellished with rough ornaments in clay. In the first vestibule, or bolo, are the guards, or dalasiguis, armed with muskets. This porch gives access to a series of courts and other bolos, where of an evening bellow the cattle and bleat the sheep belonging to the chief. A last door, guarded or rather watched over by some fifteen children, gives access to the favourite apartment of the Fama. Why should children be employed? Because they are the only people who can be depended on to tell the truth, and if they notice anything unusual they are very sure, sooner or later, to tell what they have seen. For the same reason, perhaps, and also on æsthetic grounds, the Fama is waited on by women only, most of whom are the daughters of blacksmiths or griots, specially attached to the chief, their name, Korosiguis, meaning, “those who sit beside.” Moreover, Mademba showed great acumen in his choice of servants, and I never saw so many pretty girls anywhere else in the Sudan.
Behind the royal apartments, and completely surrounding the vast enclosure, are the huts of Mademba’s wives; but there begins the private life of the chief, and I can’t introduce you to that, for the simple reason that I have never seen anything of it myself.
Surrounded by his male and female griots, wearing a grand green burnous, on which gleamed the Cross of the Legion of Honour, the reward of his courage in the service of France, Mademba came to the banks of the river to welcome us. Shouts and acclamations of delight and sympathy with us greeted us as we landed, and if we had not known what all the fuss meant, we might have mistaken it for a declaration of war.
We went home with the Fama, and there, taking off his burnous, the black chief disappeared, to be replaced by our old friend Mademba, cultivated, refined, a charming talker, quite up-to-date in all that was going on in Europe, the man whom all Frenchmen who have been in the Sudan know and appreciate. He did the honours of an excellent, almost European meal, and we drank a glass of champagne together, in spite of his being a good Mussulman, for he has none of the stupid fanaticism of his fellow believers.
Just before we started I had made the following little speech to my coolies: “My friends, I know I am asking what will cost you a good deal of self-denial, but you must oblige me by not being too attentive to the women you meet until we have reached Timbuktu. You know that that sort of thing leads to disputes, sometimes even to regular quarrels, with the natives, and we shall have quite enough hostility to contend with without creating any ill-feeling ourselves. I warn you, moreover, that I shall give you no more pay after we leave Sansanding till we reach our goal. I will, however, give you two months’ pay in advance at Sansanding, and you will have three days to spend it in. For a year therefore, and perhaps more, after you leave Sansanding, remember, you have done with women.”
Truth to tell, I had learnt from experience that the ardent temperaments of negroes forming the escorts of expeditions really often jeopardized success, if their amours did not actually bring about failure. Of course I can’t be sure that my orders, which I repeated later, were always strictly obeyed, but at all events I did a good deal to lessen the evil.
YAKARÉ.
I gave my jolly fellows three days to enjoy themselves in, and they took me at my word. Until half-past one on the 22nd I saw next to nothing of them on board, and when the time for starting arrived I had to send to hunt up our little Abdulaye Dem, who had quite forgotten how the time went in the society of a coal black Circe.
Meanwhile, we Europeans amused ourselves far more usefully in arranging for our further journey, and in trying the effect on the natives of our most attractive possessions, viz. the little organ, the bicycle, and the phonograph.