Every day, and all day long, has the traveller to contend with the ignorance and obstinacy and superstitions of the heathen he finds himself among—oftentimes alone—on whom he is dependent not only for the success of his enterprise, but, alas! for his very life. They will work when and as easily as they choose, and should they rebel against his just remonstrance and desert, he is a doomed man. Even when the explorer has plenty of money and companions and influence, his journeyings are not invariably through paths of roses, as may be gathered from the following account of a day’s march in Eastern Africa, by Burton:
“About 5 a.m. the camp is fairly roused, and a little low chatting becomes audible. This is a critical moment. The porters have promised overnight to start early and make a long wholesome march. But, ‘uncertain, coy and hard to please,’ they change their minds, like the fair sex; the cold morning makes them unlike the men of the warm evening, and perhaps one of them has fever. Moreover, in every caravan there is some lazy, loud-lunged, contradictory, and unmanageable fellow, whose sole delight is to give trouble. If no march be in prospect they sit obstinately before the fire, warming their hands and feet, inhaling the smoke with averted heads, and casting quizzical looks at their fuming and fidgety employer. If all be unanimous, it is vain to tempt them, even soft sawder is but ‘throwing comfits to cows.’ We return to our tent. If, however, there be a division, a little active stimulating will cause a march. Then a louder conversation leads to cries of ‘Collect,’ ‘pack,’ ‘set out,’ ‘a journey, a journey to-day,’ and some peculiarly African boasts, ‘I am an ass,’ ‘a camel,’ accompanied by a roar of bawling voices, drumming, whistling, piping, and the braying of horns. The sons of Ramji come in a body to throw our tents and to receive small burthens, which, if possible, they shirk; sometimes Kidogo does me the honour to inquire the programme of the day. The porters, however, hug the fire till driven from it, when they unstack the loads piled before our tents, and pour out of the camp or village. My companion and I, when well enough to ride, mount our asses led by the gun-bearers, who carry all necessaries for offence and defence; when unfit for exercise we are borne in hammocks slung to long poles and carried by two men at a time. The Baloch tending their slaves, hasten off in a straggling body, thinking only of escaping an hour’s sun. The jemadar, however, is ordered to bring up the rear, with Said-bin-Salim, who is cold and surly, abusive, and ready with his rattan. Four or five packs have been left upon the ground by deserters or shirkers who have started empty handed, consequently our Arab either double loads more willing men or persuades the sons of Ramji to carry a small parcel each, or that failing, he hires from some near village a few porters by the day. This, however, is not easy; the beads have been carried off, and the most tempting promises without prepayment have no effect upon the African mind.
“When all is ready the guide rises and shoulders his load, which is never one of the lightest. He deliberately raises his furled flag—a plain blood red, the sign of a caravan from Zanzibar—much tattered by the thorns, and is followed by a privileged Pagazi tom-toming upon a kettle-drum much resembling a European hour-glass. This dignitary is robed in the splendour of scarlet broadcloth, a narrow piece about six feet long with a central aperture for the neck, and with streamers dangling before and behind; he also wears some wonderful head-dress, the spoils of a white and black monkey on the barred skin of a wild cat crowning the head, bound round the throat, hanging over the shoulders, and capped with a tall cup-shaped bunch of owl’s feathers or the glorious plumes of the crested crane. His insignia of office are the kipungo or fly-flapper, the tail of some beast, which he affixes to his person as if it were a natural growth, the kome, or hooked iron spit, decorated with a central sausage of parti-coloured beads, and a variety of oily little gourds containing snuff, simples, and medicine for the road, strapped round his waist. He leads the caravan, and the better to secure the obedience of his followers he has paid them in a sheep or a goat the value of what he will recover by fees and rations: the head of every animal slaughtered in camp and the presents at the end of the journey are exclusively his. A man guilty of preceding the Pagazi is liable to fine, and an arrow is extracted from his quiver to substantiate his identity at the end of the march. Pouring out of the kraal in a disorderly mob, the porters stack their goods at some tree distant but a few hundred yards, and allow the late and lazy and the invalids to join the main body. Generally at this conjuncture the huts are fired by neglect or mischievousness. The khambi, especially in winter, burns like tinder, and the next caravan will find a heap of hot ashes and a few charred sticks still standing. Yet by way of contrast, the Pagazi will often take the trouble to denote by the usual signposts to those following them that water is at hand; here and there a little facetiousness appears in these directions, a mouth is cut in the tree trunk to admit a bit of wood simulating a pipe, with other representations still more waggish.
“After the preliminary halt, the caravan forming into the order of march, winds like a monstrous land serpent over hill, dale, and plain. The kirangozi is followed by an Indian file; those nearest to him are heavily laden with ivory. When the weight of the tusk is inordinate it is tied to a pole and is carried palanquin fashion by two men. The ivory carriers are succeeded by the bearers of cloth and beads, each man poising on either shoulder, and sometimes raising upon the head for rest, packs that resemble huge bolsters, six feet long by two in diameter, cradled in sticks which generally have a forked projection for facility in stacking and reshouldering the load. The sturdiest fellows are usually the lightest loaded in Eastern Africa; as elsewhere, the weakest go to the wall. The maximum of burden may be two farasilah, or seventy pounds avoirdupois. Behind the cloth bearers straggles a long line of porters and slaves laden with the lighter stuff—rhinoceros teeth, hides, salt, tobacco, brass wire, iron hoes, boxes and bags, beds and tents, pots and water gourds, mats, and private stores. With the Pagazi, but in separate parties, march the armed slaves, who are never seen to quit their muskets; the women and the little toddling children, who rarely fail to carry something, be it only of a pound weight; and the asses neatly laden with saddle-bags of giraffe and buffalo hide. A Mganga also universally accompanies the caravan, not disdaining to act as a common porter. The rear is brought up by the master, or the masters, of the caravan, who often remain far behind for the convenience of walking and to prevent desertion.
“All the caravan is habited in its worst attire; the East African derides those who wear upon a journey the cloth which should be reserved for display at home. If rain fall they will doff the single goat-skin hung round their sooty limbs and, folding it up, place it between the shoulders and the load. When grain is served out for a long march, each porter bears his posho or rations fastened like a large ‘bustle’ to the small of his back. Upon this again he sometimes binds, with its legs projecting outwards, the three-legged stool, which he deems necessary to preserve him from the danger of sitting upon the damp ground. As may be imagined, the barbarians have more ornament than dress. Some wear a strip of zebra’s mane bound round the head with the bristly parti-coloured hair standing out like a saint’s gloria, others prefer a long bit of stiffened ox-tail rising like a unicorn’s horn at least a foot above the forehead. Other ornaments are the skins of monkeys and ocelots, roleaus and fillets of white, blue, or scarlet cloth, and huge bunches of ostrich, crane, and jay’s feathers crowning the heads like the tufts of certain fowls. Their arms are decorated with massive ivory bracelets, heavy bangles of brass and copper, and thin circlets of the same metal, beads in strings and bands adorn their necks, and small iron bells strapped below the knee or round the ancle by the more aristocratic. All carry some weapon; the heaviest armed have a bow and a bark quiver full of arrows, two or three long spears and assegais, and a little battle-axe, borne on the shoulder.
“The normal recreations of a march are whistling, singing, shouting, hooting, horning, drumming, imitating the cries of birds and beasts, repeating words which are never used except on journeys. There is gabble enough and abundant squabbling; in fact, perpetual noise, which the ear, however, soon learns to distinguish for the hubbub of a halt. The uproar redoubles near a village where the flag is unfurled and where the line lags to display itself. All give vent to loud shouts: ‘Hopa, hopa! go on, go on—Mgogolo! a stoppage—food, food—don’t be tired—the kraal is here—home is near—hasten, Kirangozi—oh! we see our mothers—we go to eat.’ On the road it is considered prudent, as well as pleasurable, to be as loud as possible, in order to impress upon plunderers an exaggerated idea of the caravan’s strength; for equally good reasons silence is recommended in the kraal. When threatened with attack, and no ready escape suggests itself, the porters ground their loads and prepare for action. It is only self-interest that makes them brave. I have seen a small cow trotting up with tail erect break a line of 150 men carrying goods not their own. If a hapless hare or antelope cross the path, every man casts his pack, brandishes his spear, and starts in pursuit; the animal, never running straight, is soon killed and torn limb from limb, each hunter devouring his morsel raw. When two parties meet, that commanded by an Arab claims the road. If both are Wanyamwezi, violent quarrels ensue; fatal weapons, which are too ready at hand, are turned to more harmless purposes, the bow and spear being used as whip and cudgel. These affrays are not rancorous till blood is shed. Few tribes are less friendly for so trifling an affair as a broken head; even a slight cut, or a shallow stab, is little thought of; but if returned with interest great loss of life may arise from the slenderest cause. When friendly caravans meet, the two Kirangozis sidle up with a stage pace, a stride and a stand, and with sidelong looks prance till arrived within distance, then suddenly and simultaneously ducking, like boys ‘give a back,’ they come to loggerheads and exchange a butt violently as fighting rams. Their example is followed by all with a crush which might be mistaken for the beginning of a faction; but it ends, if there be no bad blood, in shouts of laughter. The weaker body, however, must yield precedence and offer a small present as blackmail.”
After all, however, there is some reason in the African’s objection to be hurried on a march, or to exert himself overmuch in the interests of a traveller, whose private affairs are nothing to him and whom, when discharged, he will in all probability never see again. He does not particularly wish to see him, as he is perfectly comfortable at home. According to the last quoted authority he rises with the dawn from his couch of cow’s-hide. The hut is cool and comfortable during the day; but the barred door, impeding ventilation at night, causes it to be close and disagreeable. The hour before sunrise being the coldest time, he usually kindles a fire and addresses himself to his constant companion the pipe. When the sun becomes sufficiently powerful, he removes the reed-screen from the entrance and issues forth to bask in the morning beams. The villages are populous, and the houses touching one another enable the occupants, when squatting outside and fronting the central square, to chat and chatter without moving. About 7 a.m., when the dew has partially disappeared from the grass, the elder boys drive the flocks and herds to pasture, with loud shouts and sounding applications of the quarter staff. They return only when the sun is sinking behind the western horizon. At 8 p.m. those who have provisions at home enter the hut to refection with ugali or holcus-porridge, those who have not join a friend. Pombe, when procurable, is drunk from the earliest dawn.
After breaking his fast, the African repairs, pipe in hand, to the Iwanza, the village public previously described. Here in the society of his own sex he will spend the greater part of the day talking and laughing, smoking, or torpid with sleep. Occasionally he sits down to play. As with barbarians generally, gambling in him is a passion. The normal game is our “heads and tails,” the implement, a flat stone, a rough circle of tin, or the bottom of a broken pot. The more civilised have learned the “bas” of the coast, a kind of “tables” with counters and cups hollowed in a solid plank. Many of the Wanyamwezi have been compelled by this indulgence to sell themselves into slavery after playing through their property; they even stake their aged mothers against the equivalent of an old lady in these lands,—a cow or a pair of goats. As may be imagined, squabbles are perpetual, they are almost always, however, settled amongst fellow-villagers with bloodless weapons. Others, instead of gambling, seek some employment which, working the hands and leaving the rest of the body and the mind at ease, is ever a favourite with the Asiatic and the African; they whittle wood, pierce and wire their pipe sticks—an art in which all are adepts,—shave one another’s heads, pluck out their beards, eyebrows, and eyelashes, and prepare and polish their weapons.
“At about one p.m., the African, unless otherwise employed, returns to his hut to eat the most substantial and the last meal of the day, which has been cooked by his women. Eminently gregarious, however, he often prefers the Iwanza as a dining room, where his male children, relatives, and friends meet during the most important hour of the twenty-four. With the savage and the barbarian food is the all and all of life, food is his thought by day, food is his dream by night. The civilized European who never knows hunger nor thirst without the instant means of gratifying every whim of appetite, can hardly conceive the extent to which his wild brother’s soul is swayed by stomach; he can scarcely comprehend the state of mental absorption in which the ravenous human animal broods over the carcase of an old goat, the delight which he takes in superintending every part of the cooking process, and the jealous eye with which he regards all who live better than himself. After eating, the East African invariably indulges in a long fit of torpidity from which he awakes to pass the afternoon as he did the forenoon, chatting, playing, smoking, and chewing sweet earth. Towards sunset all issue forth to enjoy the coolness; the men sit outside the Iwanza, whilst the women and the girls, after fetching water for household wants from the well, collecting in a group upon their little stools, indulge in the pleasures of gossiping and the pipe. This hour, in the more favoured parts of the country, is replete with enjoyment. As the hours of darkness draw nigh, the village doors are carefully closed, and after milking his cows, each peasant retires to his hut, or passes his time squatting round the fire with his friends in the Iwanza. He has not yet learned the art of making a wick, and of filling a bit of pottery with oil. When a light is wanted he ignites a stick of the oleaginous msásá-tree—a yellow, hard, close-grained, and elastic wood with few knots, much used in making spears, bows, and walking staves—which burns for a quarter of an hour with a brilliant flame. He repairs to his hard couch before midnight and snores with a single sleep till dawn. For thorough enjoyment, night must be spent in insensibility, as the day is in inebriety, and though an early riser he avoids the ‘early to bed’ in order that he may be able to slumber through half the day.
“Such is the African’s idle day, and thus every summer is spent. As the wintry rains draw nigh, the necessity of daily bread suggests itself. The peasants then leave their huts about six or seven a.m., often without provision which now becomes scarce, and labour till noon or two p.m., when they return home, and find food prepared by the wife or the slave girl. During the afternoon they return to work, and sometimes, when the rains are near, they are aided by the women. Towards sunset all wend homeward in a body, laden with their implements of cultivation, and singing a kind of ‘dulce domum’ in a simple and pleasing recitative.”