Sunday, 23d.—This morning I was much better, having shut my little straw hut up as close as possible, so that I was as if in a steam bath all night. I have ever found this and fasting a good cure for most disorders.
The king went through the camp, attended by a great rabble, a slave carrying the umbrella I had given him over his head. He paid me a visit, and began, as soon as he had seated himself, to show me his staff of authority, a black stick, about four feet long, with a silver head. He said I had got some of the same kind, and he wanted one. I said I could not indulge him with one, unless I gave him that intended for Bello. He then begged my travelling knife and fork. I said, “What, then, I am to go without, and eat with my fingers! he had better go to Tabra, and take all I had.” He observed he would certainly not do that; that he would send me to Kano, and that I should go in five or six days after this. He then went home, and sent me, as a present, a small country horse, which will do well enough for Pascoe to ride. I have now two horses and a mare.
The Sanson, or camp, is like a large square village, built of small bee-hive-like huts, thatched with straw, having four large broad streets, and with a square or clear place near the huts of the king. Only for the number of horses feeding, and some picketed near the huts, and the men all going armed, and numbers of drums beating, it would pass for a well-inhabited village. Here are to be seen weavers, taylors, women spinning cotton, others reeling off, some selling foo-foo and accassons, others crying yams and paste, little markets at every green tree, holy men counting their beads, and dissolute slaves drinking roa bum.
Monday, 24th.—Morning cool and cloudy. In the early part of the morning I went to take leave of the king, whom I found in his hut, surrounded by Fellatas, one of whom was reading the Koran aloud for the benefit of the whole; the meaning of which not one of them understood, not even the reader. This may seem odd to an Englishman; but it is very common for a man, both in Bornou and Houssa, to be able to read the Koran fluently, and not understand a word in it but “Allah,” or able to read any other book. They left off reading when I came in; and as soon as the compliments of the morning were over, the king begged me to give him my sword, which I flatly refused, but promised to give him the five dollars, the staff, and the pistol, whenever I was permitted to leave this for Kano, which he promised I should do, and pointed out a person whom he said he would send with me as a messenger; and that a merchant from Koolfu would come and agree about the price he was to have for carrying my baggage. I thanked him, and took my leave. He is one of the most beggarly rogues I have yet met with; every thing he saw or heard that I was possessed of he begged, not like a person that wished to have them because they were scarce or rare, but with a mean greediness that was disgusting. Though I had given him a better present than he had ever got in his life before, he told me that I said “No, no,” to every thing he asked for. He has been the ruin of his country by his unnatural ambition, and by calling in the Fellatas, who will remove him out of the way the moment he is of no more use to them; even now he dares not move without their permission. It is said that he has put to death his brother and two of his sons. Through him the greater part of the industrious population of Nyffé have either been killed, sold as slaves, or fled from their native country. To remove him now would be charity; and the sooner the better for his country.
At 8.30 in the morning I left the Sanson, and riding on ahead of old Malam Fama, the Morzukie, I halted under a tree at eleven to let the horses feed, and the Malam to come up with the sheep. At noon, Mahomed having joined, I started with a plundering party who were going the same road. They told me they were going to seize some villagers who had returned to build up their ruined huts and sow a little millet without first praying for leave to the Magia. On crossing one of the small rivers and ascending the steep and slippery bank, the chief of this band checked his horse, and both horse and rider fell souse into the water. He was close behind me, but I left his companions to pick him up. On the 25th we once more reached Tabra.
I have observed more people with bad teeth and the loss of the front teeth in Nyffé than any other country in Africa, or indeed any other country. The males mostly are those who lose their teeth. Whether it may arise from the universal custom of chewing snuff mixed with natron or not, I do not pretend to say. The white of the eye in the black population is in general bilious-looking and bloodshot. There is scarcely one exception, unless it be in those below eighteen or twenty years of age.
Tuesday, May 2.—This morning I left Tabra, and travelling along the banks of the May-yarrow, passed the walled village of Gonda. Having crossed a stream coming from the north, and running into the May-yarrow, I entered the walled town of Koolfu, the greatest market town in this portion of Nyffé, and resorted to by trading people from all parts of the interior. I was provided with a good house; and the head man of the town, a plausible fellow, was very officious, but at the same time giving broad hints for a present. Mohamed Kalu, the madagoo or head man of the goffle from Bornou, has to remain here until after the Rhamadan. I was visited by all the principal people in the place, as a matter of curiosity, though many of them had seen me at Tabra.
Monday, 8th.—Clear and cool. The house in which I live is one of the best in Koolfu. I have three separate coozies parted off from the rest of the house, and a place for my stud, which now amounts to two horses and a mare. My landlady is a widow, large, fat, and deaf, with an only child, a daughter, about five years old; a spoiled child. The widow Laddie, as she is called, is considered to be very rich. She is a merchant; sells salt, natron, and various other articles: but what she is most famed for is her booza and roa bum, as the palm wine is called; and every night the large outer hut is filled with the topers of Koolfu, who are provided with music as well as drink, and keep it up generally until the dawn of morning separates them. Their music consists of the drum, erbab, or guitar of the Arabs, the Nyffé harp, and the voice. Their songs are mostly extempore, and allude to the company present. The booza is made from a mixture of doura, or Guinea corn, honey, Chili pepper, the root of a coarse grass on which the cattle feed, and a proportion of water: these are thrown in equal proportions into large earthen jars, open at top, and are allowed to ferment near a slow fire for four or five days, when the booza is fit to drink, and is put into earthen jars. It is a very fiery and intoxicating beverage; but, whether Mohamedan or pagan, they all drink, and agree very well together when in their cups. At first neither I nor my servants could sleep for their noise, but now I have got used to it. This night the new moon was seen, and Mohamedan and pagan joined in the cry of joy. My landlady had thirteen pieces of wood, on each of which was written by the Bornou malem the word “Bismillah,” the only word he could write. These boards she then washed and drank the water, and gave to her family to drink. She offered some of it to me; but I said I never drank dirty water: and I thought that if she and her servants had taken a comfortable cup of booza or bum it would have done them more good than drinking the washings of a board written over with ink; for the man was a rogue who had made her pay for such stuff. “What!” says she, “do you call the name of God dirty water? it was good to take it.” These rogues, who call themselves malems, impose on the poor ignorant people very much; and the pagans are as fond of having these charms as the Mohamedans. These dirty draughts are a cure for all evils, present and to come, and are called by the people dua. Some of their fighting men will confine themselves to their houses for thirty or forty days, fasting during the day, and only drinking and washing with this dirty stuff. If a man is fortunate, or does any feat above the common, it is attributed to the dua, or medicine: neither his wit nor the grace of God gains a man any thing.
Tuesday, 9th.—Clear and warm. The new moon having been seen last night put an end to the fast of the Rhamadan; and this day is kept throughout the northern interior by Mohamedan and Kafir. Every one was dressed in his best, paying and receiving visits, giving and receiving presents, parading the streets with horns, guitars, and flutes; groups of men and women seated under the shade at their doors, or under shady trees, drinking roa bum or booza. I also had my share of visitors: the head man of the town came to drink hot water, as they call my tea. The chief of Ingaskie, the second town in Youri, only a day’s journey distant, sent me a present of a sheep, some rice, and a thousand gora nuts, for which he expects double the amount in return. The women were dressed and painted to the height of Nyffé perfection; and the young and modest on this day would come up and salute the men as if old acquaintances, and bid them joy on the day; with the wool on their heads dressed, plaited, and dyed with indigo; their eyebrows painted with indigo, the eyelashes with khol, the lips stained yellow, the teeth red, and their feet and hands stained with henna; their finest and gayest clothes on; all their finest beads on their necks; their arms and legs adorned with bracelets of glass, brass, and silver, their fingers with rings of brass, pewter, silver, and copper; some had Spanish dollars soldered on the back of the rings. They, too, drank of the booza and roa bum as freely as the men, joining in their songs, whether good or bad. In the afternoon, parties of men were seen dancing: free men and slaves all were alike; not a clouded brow was to be seen in Koolfu; but at nine in the evening the scene was changed from joy and gladness to terror and dismay; a tornado had just began, and the hum of voices and the din of people putting their things under cover from the approaching storm had ceased at once. All was silent as death, except the thunder and the wind. The clouded sky appeared as if on fire; each cloud rolling towards us as a sea of flame, and only surpassed in grandeur and brightness by the forked lightning, which constantly seemed to ascend and descend from what was now evidently the town of Bali on fire, only a short distance outside the walls of Koolfu. When this was extinguished a new scene began, if possible worse than the first. The wind had increased to a hurricane; houses were blown down; roofs of houses going along with the wind like chaff, the shady trees in the town bending and breaking; and, in the intervals between the roaring of the thunder, nothing heard but the war-cry of the men and the screams of women and children, as no one knew but that an enemy was at hand, and that we should every instant share in the fate of Bali. I had the fire-arms loaded when I learned this, and stationed Richard and Pascoe at the door of each hut, and took the command of my landlady’s house, securing the outer door, and putting all the fires out. One old woman roasting ground nuts, quite unconcerned, made as much noise as if she had been going to be put to death when the water was thrown over her fire. At last the rain fell: the fire in Bali had ceased by its being wholly burnt down. In our house we escaped with the roof blown off one coozie, and a shed blown down. All was now quiet; and I went to rest with that satisfaction every man feels when his neighbour’s house is burnt down and his own, thank God! has escaped.
Sunday, 14th.—Mohamed, the Fezzanie, whom I had hired at Tabra, and whom I had sent to the chief of Youri for the books and papers of the late Mungo Park, returned, bringing me a letter from that person, which contained the following account of the death of that unfortunate traveller: that not the least injury was done to him at Youri, or by the people of that country; that the people of Boussa had killed them, and taken all their riches; that the books in his possession were given him by the Imam of Boussa; that they were lying on the top of the goods in the boat when she was taken; that not a soul was left alive belonging to the boat; that the bodies of two black men were found in the boat chained together; that the white men jumped overboard; that the boat was made of two canoes joined fast together, with an awning or roof behind; that he, the sultan, had a gun, double-barrelled, and a sword, and two books that had belonged to those in the boat; that he would give me the books whenever I went to Youri myself for them, not until then.