Another cause of delay became imminent; my companion was comparatively strong, but the others were prostrated by sickness. Valentine first gave in; he was nearly insensible for three days and nights, the usual period of the Mukunguru or “Seasoning” of Unyamwezi—a malignant bilious remittent—which left him weaker and thinner than he had ever been before. When he recovered, Gaetano fell ill, and was soon in the happy state of unconsciousness which distinguished all his fevers. The bull-headed slave Mabruki also retired into private life, and Bombay was laid up by a shaking ague, whilst the Baloch and the sons of Ramji, who had led a life so irregular that the Arabs had frequently threatened them with punishment, also began to pay the penalty of excess.
Snay bin Amir was our principal doctor. An adept in the treatment, called by his countrymen “camel-physic,” namely, cautery and similar counter-irritants, he tried his art upon me when I followed the example of the party. At length, when the Hummah, or hot fit, refused to yield to its supposed specific, a coating of powdered ginger, he insisted upon my seeing a Mganga, or witch, celebrated for her cures throughout the country-side. She came, a wrinkled old beldame, with a greasy skin, black as soot, set off by a mass of tin-coloured pigtails: her arms were adorned with copper bangles like manacles, and the implement of her craft was, as usual, a girdle of small gourds dyed red-black with oil and use.
After demanding and receiving her fee in cloth, she proceeded to search my mouth, and to inquire anxiously concerning poison. The question showed the prevalence of the practice in the country, and indeed the people, to judge from their general use of “Mithridates,” seem ever to expect it. She then drew from a gourd a greenish powder, which was apparently bhang, and having mixed it with water, she administered it like snuff, causing a convulsion of sneezing, which she hailed with shouts and various tokens of joy. Presently she rubbed my head with powder of another kind, and promising to return the next day, she left me to rest, declaring that sleep would cause a cure. The prediction, however, was not fulfilled, nor was the promise. Having become wealthy, she absconded to indulge in unlimited pombe for a week. The usual consequences of this “seasoning,” distressing weakness, hepatic derangements, burning palms, and tingling soles, aching eyes, and alternate thrills of heat and cold, lasted, in my case, a whole month.
Our departure from Kazeh had now been repeatedly deferred. The fortnight originally fixed for the halt had soon passed in the vain search for porters. Sickness then delayed the journey till the 1st December, and Snay bin Amir still opined that want of carriage would detain me till the 19th of that month; he would not name the 18th, which was an unlucky day. When they recovered from their ailments, the Jemadar and the Baloch again began to be troublesome. All declared that a whole year, the term for which they had been sent by their Prince, had elapsed, and therefore that they had now a right to return. The period was wholly one of their own, based perhaps upon an answer which they had received from Lieut.-Col. Hamerton touching the probable duration of the Expedition, “a year or so.” Even of that time it still wanted five months, but nothing from myself or from Said bin Salim could convince men who would not be convinced, of that simple fact. Ismail, the Baloch, who was dying of dysentery, reported himself unable to proceed: arrangements were made to leave him and his “brother” Shahdad—the fearful tinkling of whose sleepless guitar argued that the sweet youth was in love—under the charge of Snay bin Amir, at Kazeh. Greybeard Mohammed was sulking with his fellows. He sat apart from them; and complaining that he had not received his portion of food, came to me for dismissal, which was granted, but not accepted. The Jemadar required for himself and the escort a porter per man. When this was refused, he changed his tactics, and began to lament bitterly the unavoidable delay. He annoyed me with ceaseless visits, which were spent in harping upon the one string, “When do we march?” At last I forbade all allusion to the subject. In wrath he demanded leave, declaring that he had not come to settle in Africa, and much “excessiveness” to the same effect. He was at last brought to his senses by being summarily turned out of the house for grossly insulting my companion. A reaction then ensued; the Baloch professed penitence, and all declared themselves ready to march or to halt as I pleased. Yet, simulating impatience to depart, they clung to the pleasures of Kazeh; they secretly caused the desertion of the porters, and they never ceased to spread idle reports, vainly hoping that I might be induced to return to the coast.
Finally, Said bin Salim fulfilled at Kazeh Lieut.-Col. Hamerton’s acute prophecy. The Bukini blood of his mother—a Malagash slave—got the better of his Omani descent. I had long reformed my opinion concerning his generosity and kindheartedness, hastily concluded during a short cruise along the coast. “Man’s heart,” say the Arabs, “is known only in the fray, and man’s head is known only on the way.” But though high-flown sentiment and studied courtesy had disappeared with the first days of hardship and fatigue, he preserved for a time the semblance of respectability and respect. Presently, like the viler orders of Orientals, he presumed upon his usefulness, and his ability to forward the Expedition; the farther we progressed from our “point d’appui” the coast, the more independent became his manner,—of course it afterwards subsided into its former civility,—and an overpowering egotism formed the motive of his every action. I had imprudently allowed him to be accompanied by the charming Halimah. True to his servile origin, he never seemed happy except in servile society, where he was “king of his company.” At Kazeh, jealous of my regard for Snay bin Amir, and wearied by long evening conversations, where a little “ilm” or knowledge in the shape of history and divinity used to appear,—his ignorance and apathy concerning all things but A. bin B., and B. bin C., who married his son D. to the daughter of E., prevented his taking part in them,—he became first sulky, and then “contrarious.” Formerly he was wont, on the usual occasions, to address a word of salutation to my companion: this ceased, and presently he would pass him as if he had been a bale of cloth. He affected in society the indecorous posture of a European woman stretched upon a sofa, after crouching for months upon his shins,—in fact he was, as the phrase is, “trailing his jacket” for a quarrel.
Through timidity he had been profuse in expending the goods entrusted to his charge, and he had been repeatedly reproved for serving out, without permission, cloth and beads to his children. Yet, before reaching Unyanyembe,I never had reason to suspect him of dishonesty or deceit. At Kazeh, however, he was ordered to sell a keg of gunpowder, before his slaves could purloin the whole. He reported that he had passed on the commission to Snay bin Amir. I also forbade him to issue hire to porters for a return-march from the Lake, having been informed that such was the best way to secure their desertion; and the information proved true enough, as twenty-five disappeared in a single night. He repeatedly affirmed that he had engaged and paid them for the up-march only. When he stood convicted of a double falsehood, he had not spoken about the gunpowder, and he had issued whole hire to several of the porters, I improved the occasion with a mild reproach. The little creature became vicious as a weasel, screamed like a hyæna, declared himself no tallab or “asker,” but an official under his government, and poured forth a torrent of justification. I cut the same short by leaving the room—a confirmed slight in these lands—and left him to rough language on the part of Snay bin Amir. Some hours subsequently he recovered his temper, and observed that “even husband and wife must occasionally have a gird at each other.” Not caring, however, for a repetition of such puerilities, I changed the tone of kindness in which he had invariably been addressed, for one of routine command, and this was preserved till the day of our final parting on the coast.
The good Snay bin Amir redoubled his attentions. His slaves strung in proper lengths, upon the usual palm-fibre, the beads sent up loose from Zanzibar; and he distributed the bales in due proportions for carriage. Our lights being almost exhausted, he made for us “dips,” by ladling over wicks of unravelled “domestics” the contents of a cauldron filled with equal parts of hot wax and tallow. My servant, Valentine, who, evincing uncommon aptitude for cooking, had as yet acquired only that wretched art of burlesquing coarse English dishes which renders the table in Western India a standing mortification to man’s palate, was apprenticed to Mama Khamisi, a buxom housekeeper in Snay’s establishment. There, in addition to his various Goanese accomplishments—making curds and whey, butter, cheese, and ghee; potting fish, pickling onions and limes, and preparing jams and jelly from the pleasant and cooling rosel,—he learned the art of yeasting bread with whey or sour bean-flour (his leathery scones of coarse meal were an abomination to us); of straining honey, of preparing the favourite “Kawurmeh,” jerked or smoked meat chipped up and soused in ghee; of making Firni, rice-jelly, and Halwa, confectionery, in the shape of “Kazi’s luggage,” and “hand-works:” he was taught to make ink from burnt grain; and last, not least, the trick of boiling rice as it should be boiled. We, in turn, taught him the various sciences of bird-stuffing, of boiling down isinglass and ghee, of doctoring tobacco with plantain, heeart, and tea leaves, and of making milk-punch, cigars, and guraku for the hookah. Snay bin Amir also sent into the country for plantains and tamarinds, then unprocurable at Kazeh, and he brewed a quantity of beer and mawa or plantain-wine. He admonished the Baloch and the sons of Ramji to be more careful, as regards conduct and expenditure. He lent me valuable assistance in sketching the outlines of the Kinyamwezi, or language of Unyamwezi, and by his distances and directions we were enabled to lay down the Southern limits, and the general shape of the Nyanza or Northern Lake, as correctly—and the maps forwarded from Kazeh to the Royal Geographical Society will establish this fact—as they were subsequently determined, after actual exploration, by my companion. He took charge of our letters and papers intended for home, and he undertook to forward the lagging gang still expected from the Coast: as the future will prove, his energy enabled me to receive the much wanted reserve in the “nick of time.”
At length, it became apparent that no other porters were procurable at Kazeh, and that the restiff Baloch and the sons of Ramji disdaining Cæsar’s “ite,” required his “venite.” I therefore resolved to lead them, instead of expending time and trouble in driving them, trusting that old habit, and that the difficulties attending their remaining behind would induce them to follow me. After much murmuring, my companion preceded me on the 5th December, and “made a Khambi,” at Zimbili, a lumpy hill, with a north and south lay, and conspicuous as a landmark from the Arab settlements, which are separated from it by a march of two hours. On the third day I followed him, in truth, more dead than alive,—the wing of Azrael seemed waving over my head,—even the movement of the Manchila was almost unendurable. I found cold and comfortless quarters in a large village at the base of Zimbili, no cartel was procurable, the roof leaked, and every night brought with it a furious storm of lightning, wind, and rain. By slow degrees, the Baloch began to drop in, a few of the sons of Ramji, and the donkey-men followed, half-a-dozen additional porters were engaged, and I was recovering strength to advance once more, when the report that our long-expected caravan was halted at Rubuga, in consequence of desertion, rendered a further delay necessary. My companion returned to Kazeh, to await the arrival of the reserve-supplies, and I proceeded onwards to collect a gang for the journey westwards.
At 10 A.M., on the 15th December, I mounted the Manchila, carried by six slaves, hired by Snay bin Amir, from Khamis bin Salim at the rate of three pounds of white beads each, for the journey to Msene. After my long imprisonment, I was charmed with the prospect, a fine open country, with well-wooded hills rolling into blue distance on either hand. A two hours’ ride placed me at Yombo, a new and picturesque village of circular tents, surrounded by plantains and wild fruit-trees. The Mkuba bears an edible red plum, which, though scanty of flesh, as usual, where man’s care is wanting, was found by no means unpalatable. The Metrongoma produces a chocolate-coloured fruit, about the size of a cherry: it is eaten, but it lacks the grateful acid of the Mkuba. The gigantic Palmyra or Borassus, which failed in the barren platform of Ugogo, here re-appears, and hence extends to the Tanganyika Lake.
I halted two days at Yombo: the situation was low and unhealthy, and provisions were procurable in homœopathic quantities. My only amusement there was to watch the softer part of the population. At eventide, when the labours of the day were past and done, the villagers came home in a body, laden with their implements of cultivation, and singing a kind of “dulce domum,” in a simple and pleasing recitative. The sunset hour, in the “Land of the Moon,” is replete with enjoyments. The sweet and balmy breeze floats in waves, like the draught of a fan; the sky is softly and serenely blue; the fleecy clouds, stationary in the upper firmament, are robed in purple and gold, and the beautiful blush, crimsoning the west, is reflected by all the features of earth. At this time, all is life. The vulture soars with silent flight, high in the blue expanse; the small birds preen themselves for the night, and sing their evening hymns; the antelopes prepare to couch in the bush; the cattle and flocks frisk and gamble, whilst driven from their pastures; and the people busy themselves with the simple pleasures that end the day. Every evening there is a smoking party, which particularly attracts my attention. All the feminine part of the population, from wrinkled grandmother to the maiden scarcely in her teens, assemble together, and sitting in a circle upon dwarf stools and logs of wood, apply themselves to their long black-bowl’d pipes.