At Kifukuru I was delayed a day whilst settling the blackmail of its Sultan Miyandozi. Said bin Salim, the Jemadar, and Kidogo called upon him in the morning and were received in the gateway of a neat “Tembe,” the great man disdaining to appear on so trivial an occasion. This Sultan is the least powerful of the four; he is plundered by the Warori tribes living to the south-west, and by his western neighbour, Magomba; his subjects are poorly clad, and are little ornamented compared with those occupying the central regions, where they have the power to detain travellers and to charge them exorbitantly for grain and water. Yet Miyandozi demanded four white and six blue shukkahs; besides which I was compelled to purchase for him from the sons of Ramji, who of course charged treble its value, a “Sohari” or handsome silk and cotton loin-cloth. In return he sent—it appeared to be in irony—one kayla, or four small measures of grain. The slaves of Salim bin Rashid obliged me with a few pounds of rice, for which I gave them a return in gunpowder, and they undertook to convey to Zanzibar a package of reports, indents, and letters, which was punctually delivered. An ugly accident had nearly happened that night; the Wanyamwezi porters managed to fire the grass round a calabash tree, against which they had stretched their loads, and a powder-magazine—fortunately fire-proof—was blackened and charred by the flames. A traveller cannot be too careful about his ammunition in these lands. I have seen a slave smoking a water pipe, tied for convenience of carriage to a leaky keg of powder; and another in the caravan of Salim bin Sayf of Dut’humi, resting the muzzle of his musket against a barrel of ammunition, fired it to try its strength, and blew himself up with several of his comrades.
On the 3rd October we quitted Kifukuru in the afternoon, and having marched nearly six hours we encamped in one of the strips of waterless brown jungles which throughout Ugogo divide the cultivated districts from one another, and occupy about half the superficies of the land. The low grounds, inundated during the rains, were deeply cracked, and my weak ass, led by the purblind Shahdad, fell with violence upon my knee, leaving a mixture of pain and numbness which lasted for some months. On the next day we resumed our journey betimes through a thick rugged jungle and over a rolling grassy plain, which extended to the frontier of Kanyenye, where Sultan Magomba rules. The 5th October saw us in the centre of Kanyenye, a clearing about ten miles in diameter. The surface is a red tamped clayey soil, dotted with small villages, huge calabashes, and stunted mimosas; water is found in wells or rather pits sunk from ten to twelve feet in the lower lands, or in the sandy beds of the several Fiumaras. Flocks and herds abound, and the country is as cultivated and populous as the saline nitrous earth, and the scarceness of the potable element, which often tarnishes silver like sulphur-fumes, permits.
At Kanyenye I was delayed four days to settle blackmail with Magomba, the most powerful of the Wagogo chiefs. He was on this, as on a subsequent occasion, engaged in settling a cause arising from Uchawi or Black Magic; yet all agree that in Ugogo, where, to quote the “Royal Martyr’s” words,
“Plunder and murder are the kingdom’s laws,”
there is perhaps less of wizardhood and witchcraft, and consequently less of its normal consequences, fiscs and massacres, than in any other region between the Atlantic and the Indian Ocean. “Arrow-heads” employed every art of wild diplomacy to relieve me of as much cloth as possible. I received, when encamped at the Ziwa, a polite message declaring his desire to see white men; but—“the favour of the winds produces dust”—I was obliged to acknowledge the compliment with two cottons. On arrival at his head-quarters I was waited upon by an oily cabinet of Wazirs and elders, who would not depart without their “respects”—four cottons. The next demand was made by his favourite wife, a peculiarly hideous old princess with more wrinkles than hairs, with no hair black and no tooth white, and attended by ladies in waiting as unprepossessing as herself: she was not to be dismissed without a fee of six cottons. At last, accompanied by a mob of courtiers, who crowded in like an African House of Commons, appeared in person the magnifico. He was the only Sultan that ever entered my tent in Ugogo—pride and a propensity for strong drink prevented other visits. He was much too great a man to call upon the Arab merchants, but in our case curiosity had mastered state considerations. Magomba was a black and wrinkled elder, drivelling and decrepid, with a half-bald head from whose back and sides depended a few straggling corkscrews of iron gray: he wore a coat of castor-oil and a “Barsati” loin-cloth, which grease and use had changed from blue to black. A few bead strings decorated his neck, large flexible anklets of brass wire adorned his legs, solid brass rings, single and in coils, which had distended his earlobes almost to splitting, were tied by a string over his cranium, and his horny soles were defended by single-soled sandals, old, dirty, and tattered. He chewed his quid and he expectorated without mercy; he asked many a silly question, yet he had ever an eye to the main chance. He demanded and received five “cloths with names,” which I was again compelled to purchase at an exorbitant price from the Baloch and slaves, one coil of brass wire, four blue cottons, and ten “domestics;” the total amounted to fifty shukkahs, here worth at least fifty dollars, and exhausting nearly two-thirds of a porter’s load. His return present was the leanest of calves; when it was driven into camp with much parade, his son, who had long been looking out for a fit opportunity, put in a claim for three cottons.
Magomba before our departure exacted from Kidogo an oath that his Wazungu would not smite the land with drought or with fatal disease, declaring that all we had was in his hands. He boasted, and with truth, of his generosity. It was indeed my firm conviction from first to last, that in case of attack or surprise I had not a soul except my companion to stand by me: all those who accompanied us could, and consequently would, have saved their lives;—we must have perished. We should have been as safe with six as with sixty guns; but I would by no means apply to these regions Mr. Galton’s opinion, “that the last fatal expedition of Mungo Park is full of warning to travellers who propose exploring with a large body of men.” For though sixty guns do not suffice to prevent attack in Ugogo, 600 stout fellows armed with the “hot-mouthed weapon” might march through the length and breadth of Central Africa.
During our four days’ detention at Kanyenye, I was compelled to waste string after string of beads in persuading the people to water the porters and asses. Yet their style of proceeding proved that it was greed of gain, not scarcity of the element, which was uppermost in their minds; they would agree to supply us with an unlimited quantity, and then would suddenly gather round the well and push away the Wanyamwezi, bidding them go and fetch more beads. All the caravan took the opportunity of loading itself with salt. Whilst the halt lasted, my companion brought in a fine-flavoured pallah and other antelopes, with floriken, guinea-fowl, and partridge. Neither he nor I, however, had strength enough, nor had we time, to attack the herds of elephants that roam over the valley whose deep purple line separates the table-land of Ugogo from the blue hills of the Wahumba to the north. And here, perhaps, a few words concerning the prospects of sportsmen in this part of Africa, may save future travellers from the mistake into which I fell. I expected great things, and returned without realising a single hope. This portion of the peninsula is a remarkable contrast to the line traversed by Dr. Livingstone, where the animals standing within bow-shot were so numerous and fearless, that the burden of provisions was often unnecessary. In the more populous parts game has melted away before the woodman’s axe and the hunters’ arrows: even where large tracks of jungle abound with water and forage, the note of a bird rarely strikes the ear, and during a long day’s march not a single large animal will be seen from the beaten track. It is true that in some places, there is
“—— enough
Of beastes that be chaseable.”
The park lands of Dut’humi, the jungles and forests of Ugogi and Mgunda Mk’hali, the barrens of Usukuma, and the tangled thickets of Ujiji, are full of noble game,—lions and leopards, elephants and rhinoceroses, wild cattle, giraffes, gnus, zebras, quaggas, and ostriches. But these are dangerous regions where the sportsman often cannot linger for a day. Setting aside the minor considerations of miasma and malaria,—the real or fancied perils of the place, and the want of food, or the difficulty of procuring water, would infallibly cause the porters to desert. Here are no Cape-waggons, at once house, store, and transport; no “Ships of the Desert,” never known to run away; in fact there is no vehicle but man, and he is so impatient and headstrong, so suspicious and timorous, that he must be humoured in every whim. As sportsmen know, it is difficult to combine surveying operations and collection of specimens with a pursuit which requires all a man’s time; in these countries, moreover, no merely hunting-expedition would pay, owing to the extraordinary expense of provisions and carriage. Thus Venator will be reduced to use his “shooting-iron” on halting days, and at the several periods of his journey, and his only consolation will be the prospect of wreaking vengeance upon the hippopotamus and the crocodile of the coast, if his return there be entered in the book of Time. Finally, East Africa wants the vast variety of animals, especially the beautiful antelopes, which enrich the lists of the Cape Fauna. The tale of those observed in short: the horns of the oryx were seen, the hartebeest and steinbok, the saltiana and the pallah,—the latter affording excellent venison,—were shot. The country generally produces the “Suiya,” a little antelope with reddish coat and diminutive horns, about the size of an English hare, the swangura, or sungula, an animal somewhat larger than the saltiana, and of which, according to the people, the hind only has horns; and at K’hutu my companion saw a double-horned antelope which he thought resembled the “Chouka-singa,” (Tetraceros Quadricornis) of Nepaul. The species of birds, also, are scarcely more numerous than the beasts; the feathered tribe is characterised by sombreness of plumage, and their song is noisy but not harmonious, unpleasant, perhaps because strange, to the European ear.
On the 8th October appeared at Kanyenye a large down-caravan headed by Abdullah bin Nasib, a Msawahili of Zanzibar, whose African name is Kisesa. This good man began with the usual token of hospitality, the gift of a goat, and some measures of the fine Unyanyembe rice, of which return-parties carry an ample store: he called upon me at once with several companions,—one of them surprised me not a little by an English “good morning,”—and he kindly volunteered to halt a day whilst we wrote reports and letters, life-certificates, and duplicate-indents upon Zanzibar for extra supplies of drugs and medical comforts, cloth and beads. The asses were now reduced to five, and as Magomba refused to part with any of his few animals, at any price,—on the coast I had been assured that asses were as numerous as dogs in Ugogo—Abdullah gave me one of his riding-animals, and would take nothing for it except a little medicine, and a paper acknowledging his civility. Several of the slaves and porters had been persuaded by the Wagogo to desert, and Abdullah busied himself to recover them. One man, who had suddenly deposited his pack upon the path and had disappeared in the jungle during the noonday halt, was pointed out by a woman to Kidogo, and was found lurking in a neighbouring village, where the people refused to give him up. Abdullah sent for Magomba’s four chief “ministers,” and persuaded them to render active aid: they seized the fellow, took from him his wire and his nine cloths, appropriated four, and left me five wherewith to engage another porter. The deserter was of course dismissed, but the severity of the treatment did not prevent three desertions on the next day.