Zonhwe was the turning-point of the Expedition’s difficulties. Another ass had died, reducing the number to twenty-three, and the Baloch, at first contented with two, doubled their requirements, and on the 14th August took a fifth, besides placing all their powder upon our hard-worked animals. I therefore proposed to the Jemadar that the cloth, the beads, and the other similar luggage of his men, should be packed, sealed up, and inserted into the porters’ loads, of which several had shrunk to half-weight. He probably thought the suggestion a ruse on my part to discover the means by which their property had almost trebled its quantity; his men, moreover, had become thoroughly weary of a journey where provisions were not always obtainable, and they had persuaded themselves that Lieut.-Col. Hamerton’s decease had left me without support from the government of Zanzibar. After a priming with opium, the monocular returned and reported that his men refused to open their baggage, declaring their property to be “on their own heads.” Whilst I was explaining the object of the measure, the escort appeared in mass, and, with noise sufficient for a general action, ostentatiously strewed their old clothes upon the ground, declaring that at Zanzibar they were honourable men, and boasting that the Baloch were entrusted with lacs of dollars by the Sayyid Said. Again I offered reasons, which, as is the wont of the world in such cases, served only to make them more hopelessly unreasonable. The Jemadar accused me of starving the party. I told him not to eat abominations, upon which, clapping hand to hilt, he theatrically forbade me to repeat the words. Being prostrated at the time by fever, I could only show him how little dangerous he was by using the same phrase half a dozen times. He then turned fiercely upon the timid Said bin Salim, and having safely vented the excess of his wrath, he departed to hold a colloquy with his men.
The debate was purposely conducted in so loud a tone that every word reached my ears. Khudabakhsh, from first to last my evil genius and the mainspring of all mischief, threatened to take “that man’s life,” at the risk of chains for the remainder of his days. Another opined, that “in all Nazarenes there is no good.” All complained that they had no “hishmat” (respect!), no food, and, above everything, no meat.
Presently Said bin Salim was deputed by them to state that for the future they would require one sheep per diem—men who, when at Zanzibar, saw flesh probably once a year on the Eed. This being inadmissible, they demanded three cloths daily instead of one. I would willingly have given them two, as long as provisions continued scarce and dear, but the shade of concession made them raise the number to four. They declared that in case of refusal they would sleep at the village, and on the next day would return to Zanzibar. Receiving a contemptuous answer, they marched away in a body, noisily declaring that they were going to make instant preparation for departure.
Such a proceeding on the part of several of these mercenaries was inexcusable. They had been treated with kindness, and even indulgence. They had hitherto never complained, simply because they had no cause for complaint. One man, Ismail, who suffered from dysentery, had been regularly supplied with food cooked by the Goanese; and even while we dragged along our fevered frames on foot, he was allowed to ride an ass. Yet the recreant never attempted a word of dissuasion, and deserted with the rest.
After the disappearance of the Baloch, the Sons of Ramji were summoned. I had privily ascertained from Said bin Salim the opinions of these men concerning their leader: they said but little evil, complaining principally of the Englishman’s “heat,” and that he was not wholly ruled by their rascalities, whereas the Baloch in their private confabs never failed to indulge in the choicest of Oriental Billingsgate. The slaves, when they heard the state of the case, cheerfully promised to stand by us, but on the same evening, assembled by Kidogo, they agreed to follow the example of the escort on the first justifiable occasion. I did not learn this till some days afterwards, and even if I had been told it on the spot, it would have mattered little. My companion and I had made up our minds, in case of the escort and the slaves deserting, to bury our baggage, and to trust ourselves in the hands of the Wanyamwezi porters. The storm, however,—a brutum fulmen—blew over with only noise.
A march was ordered for the next day—the 17th August. As the asses were being loaded, appeared the one-eyed Jemadar, with Greybeard Musa and Darwaysh, looking more crestfallen and foolish than they had ever looked before. They took my hand with a polite violence, begged suppliantly for a paper of dismissal to “cover their shame,” and declared that, so far from deserting me, I was deserting them. As this required no reply, I mounted and rode on.
The path fell easily westwards down a long grassy and jungly incline, cut by several water-courses. About noon, I lay down half-fainting in the sandy bed of the Muhama Nullah—the “Palmetto,” or “Fan-palm;” and retaining Wazira and Mabruki, I urged the caravan forwards, that my companion might send me back a hammock from the halting-place. Suddenly appeared the whole body of deserters shouldering—as porters and asses had been taken from them—their luggage, which outwardly consisted of cloth, dirty rags, green skins, old earthen pots, and greasy gourds and calabashes. They led me to a part of the nullah where stagnant water was found, and showing abundant penitence, they ever and anon attempted excuses, which were reserved for consideration. At 3 P.M., no hammock appearing, I remounted, and pursued a path over rolling ground, with masses of dwarf-hill flanking a low bottom, which renewed the scenery of the “Slough of Despond”—Zungomero. Again the land, matted with putrid grass, displayed the calabash and the hyphæna, the papaw and the palmetto; the holcus and maize were of luxuriant dimensions, and deep rat-holes, enlarged by the boy-hunters, broke the grassy path. I found two little villages, inhabitated by Wangindo and Mandandu immigrants from the vicinity of Kilwa. Then appeared on a hill-side the Kraal in which the caravan had halted; the party had lost the road, and had been dispersed by a swarm of wild bees, an accident even more frequent in East Africa than in India.
Next morning the Baloch were harangued; they professed themselves profoundly penitent, and attributing their unsoldier-like conduct to opium, and to the Wiswas, the temptations of Sathanas, they promised to reform. The promise was kept till we reached Ugogi. They were, however, always an encumbrance; they did no good beyond creating an impression, and “making the careless Æthiopians afraid.” I saw them, it is true, in their worst colours. They held themselves to be servants of their prince, and as no Eastern man can or will serve two masters, they forfeited all claim to their sole good quality—manageability. As men, they had no stamina; after a few severe marches they murmured that
“Famine, despair, thirst, cold, and heat,
Had done their work on them by turns.”
Their constitutions, sapped by long residence at Zanzibar, were subject to many ailments, and in sickness they were softer than Indian Pariahs. Under the slightest attack of fever, they threw themselves moaning upon the ground; they were soon deterred by the sun from bringing up the rear, and by night they would not keep watch or ward even when in actual danger of robbery. Notwithstanding their affectation of military carriage their bravery was more than problematical; they were disciplined only by their fears. As men at arms, one and all deserved to wear the wooden spoon: I saw the whole garrison of Kaole firing for an hour, without effect, at a shell, stuck on a stick, distant about a dozen paces: our party expended thirty pounds of gunpowder without bagging a pair of antelope, and it was impossible to trust them with ammunition; when unable to sell it, they wasted it upon small birds. Ever claiming for themselves “hishmat,” or respect, they forgot their own proverb that “courtesy hath two heads;” they complained that they were not seated half the day in our tents, and the being “told to depart,” when their terribly long visits rendered the measure necessary, was a standing grievance. Like the lower races of Orientals, they were ever attempting to intrude, to thrust themselves forwards, to take an ell when an inch was offered; they considered all but themselves fools, ready to be imposed upon by the flimsiest lie, by the shallowest artifices. Gratitude they ignored; with them a favour granted was but an earnest of favours to come, and one refusal obliterated the trace of a hundred largesses. Their objects in life seemed to be eating, and buying slaves; their pleasures, drinking and intrigue. Insatiable beggars were they; noisy, boisterous, foul-mouthed knaves, swearers “with voices like cannons;” rude and forward in manner, low and abusive in language, so slanderous that for want of other subjects they would calumniate one another, and requiring a periodical check to their presumption. I might have spent the whole of my day in superintending the food of these thirteen “great eaters and little runners.” Repeatedly warned, both by myself and by my companion, that their insubordination would prevent our recommending them for recompense at the end of the journey, they could not check repeated ebullitions of temper. Before arrival at the coast they seemed to have made up their minds that they had not fulfilled the conditions of reward. After my departure from Zanzibar, however, they persuaded Lieut.-Col. Hamerton’s successor to report officially to the Government of Bombay “the claims of these men, the hardships they endured, and the fidelity and perseverance they showed!”