From the Malagarazi Ferry many lines traverse the desert on the right or northern bank of the river, which is preferred to the southern, whence the Wavinza exclude travellers. Before entering this region caravans generally combine, so as to present a formidable front to possible foes. The trunk road, called Jambeho, the most southerly of the northern routes, has been described in detail.
The district of Ukaranga extends from the Ruguvu or the Unguwwe River to the waters of the lake: on the south it is bounded by the region of Ut’hongwe, and on the north by the Ruche River. This small and sluggish stream, when near the mouth, is about forty yards in breadth, and, being unfordable at all seasons, two or three ferry-boats always ply upon its waters. The rauque bellow of the hippopotamus is heard on its banks, and the adjacent lowlands are infested by mosquitoes in clouds. The villages of Ukaranga are scattered in clumps over the plain—wretched hamlets, where a few households live surrounded by rare cultivation in the drier parts of the swamps. The “port of Ukaranga” is an open roadstead, which seldom shows even a single canoe. Merchants who possess boats and can send for provisions to the islands across the lake sometimes prefer, for economy, Ukaranga to Kawele; it is also made a halting-place by those en route to Uguhha, who would lose time by visiting Ujiji. The land, however, affords no supplies; a bazar is unknown; and the apathetic tribe, who cultivate scarcely sufficient grain for themselves, will not even take the trouble to cast a net. Ukaranga sends bamboos, rafters for building, and fire-wood, cut in the background of highlands, to Kawele and other parts of Ujiji, at which places, however, workmen must be hired.
Ukaranga signifies, etymologically, the “Land of Groundnuts.” This little district may, in earlier ages, have given name to the Mocarangas, Mucarongas, or Mucarangas, a nation which, according to the Portuguese historians, from João dos Sanctos (1586-97) to Don Sebastian Xavier Botelho (1835), occupied the country within the Mozambique, from S. lat. 5° to S. lat. 25°, under subjection to the sovereign and the people of “Monomotapa.” In the absence of history, analogy is the only guide. Either, then, the confusion of the Tanganyika and the Nyassa Lakes by the old geographers, caused them to extend the “Mocarangas” up to the northern water—and the grammatical error in the word “Mucaranga” justifies some suspicion as to their accuracy—or in the space of three centuries the tribe has declined from its former power and consequence, or the Wakaranga of the Tanganyika are a remnant of the mighty southern nation, which, like the Watuta tribe, has of late years been pressed by adverse circumstances to the north. Though Senhor Botelho, in his ‘Memoria Estatisca,’ denominates the “Monomoezi country” “Western Mucaranga,” it is certain that no Mnyamwezi in the present day owns to connection with a race speaking a different dialect, and distant about 200 miles from his frontier.
The land of Ujiji is bounded on the north by the heights of Urundi, and on the south by the Ukaranga country: eastward it extends to Ubuha, and westward it is washed by the waves of the Tanganyika Lake. On its north-east lies the land of Uhha, now reduced by the predatory Watuta to a luxuriant desert.
The head-quarter village of Ujiji was in 1858 Kawele. To the westward of this settlement was the district of Gungu, facing the islet rock Bangwe. This place was deserted by travellers on account of the plundering propensities of its former chief. His son “Lurinda,” however, labours to recover lost ground by courtesy and attention to strangers. South-eastwards of Kawele is the district of Ugoyye, frequented by the Arabs, who find the Sultans Habeyya and Marabu somewhat less extortionate than their neighbours. It is a sandy spot, clear of white ants, but shut out by villages and cultivation from the lovely view of the lake. To one standing at Kawele all these districts and villages are within two or three miles, and a distant glance discloses the possessions of half-a-dozen independent tribes.
Caravans entering Ujiji from the land side usually encamp in the outlying villages on the right or left bank of the Ruche, at considerable inconvenience, for some days. The origin of this custom appears to date from olden time. In East Africa, as a rule, every stranger is held to be hostile before he has proved friendly intentions, and many tribes do not admit him into their villages without a special invitation. Thus, even in the present day, the visitor in the countries of the Somal and Galla, the Wamasai and the Wakwafi, must sit under some tree outside the settlement till a deputation of elders, after formally ascertaining his purpose, escort him to their homes. The modern reason for the custom, which prevails upon the coast, as well as on the banks of the Tanganyika, is rather commercial than political. The caravan halts upon neutral ground, and the sultans or chiefs of the different villages send select messengers carrying various presents: in the interior ivory and slaves, and in the maritime regions cloth and provisions, technically called “Magubiko,” and intended as an earnest of their desire to open trade. Sweet words and fair promises win the day; the Mtongi, or head of the caravan, after a week of earnest deliberation with all his followers, chooses his host, temporary lodgings are provided for the guests, and the value of the retaining fees is afterwards recovered in Hongá and Kirembá—blackmail and customs. This custom was known in Southern Africa by the name of “marts;” that is, a “connection with a person belonging to another nation, so that they reside at each other’s houses when visiting the place, and make mutual presents.” The compulsory guest amongst the Arabs of Zanzibar and the Somal is called “Nezil.”
At Ujiji terminates, after twelve stages, which native caravans generally finish in a fortnight, all halts included, the transit of the fifth region. The traveller has now accomplished a total number of 85 long, or 100 short stages, which, with necessary rests, but excluding detentions and long halts, occupy 150 days. The direct longitudinal distance from the coast is 540 geo. miles, which the sinuosities of the road prolong to 955, or in round numbers 950 statute miles. The number of days expended by the Expedition in actual marching was 100, of hours 420, which gives a rate of 2·27 miles per hour. The total time was seven and a-half months, from the 27th June, 1857, to the 18th February, 1858; thus the number of the halts exceeded by one-third the number of the marches. In practice Arab caravans seldom arrive at the Tanganyika, for reasons before alluded to, under a total period of six months. Those lightly laden may make Unyanyembe in between two and a-half and three months, and from Unyanyembe Ujiji in twenty-five stages, which would reduce their journey to four months.
Dapper (‘Beschryving van Afrika,’ Amst. 1671) asserts that the “blacks of Pombo, i. e. the Pombeiros, or native travellers of W. Africa, when asked respecting the distance of the lake, say that it is at least a sixty days’ journey, going constantly eastwards.” But the total breadth of the continent between Mbuamaji and Loanda being, in round numbers, 1560 geographical miles, this estimate would give a marching rate of twenty-six geographical and rectilinear miles (or, allowing for deviation, thirty-six statute miles) per diem. When Da Couto (1565), quoting the information procured by Francisco Barreto, during his expedition in 1570, from some Moors (Arabs or Wasawahili) at Patta and elsewhere, says that “from Kilwa or Atondo (that is to say, the country of the Watondwe) the other sea of Angola might be reached with a journey of fifteen or twenty (150 or 200?) leagues,” he probably alludes to the Nyassa Lake, lying south-westwards of Kilwa, not to the Tanganyika. Mr. Cooley gives one itinerary, by Mohammed bin Nasur, an old Arab merchant, enumerating seventy-one marches from Buromaji (Mbuamaji) to Oha (Uhha), and a total of eighty-three from the coast to the lake; and a second by a native of Monomoezi, Lief bin Said (a misprint for Khalaf bin Saíd?) sixty-two to Ogara (Ugala), which is placed four or five days from Oha. In another page he remarks that “from Buromaji, near Point Puna, to Oha in Monomoezi is a journey of seventy-nine, or, in round numbers, eighty days, the shores of the lake being still six or eight days distant.” This is the closest estimate yet made. Mr. Macqueen, from the itinerary of Lief bin Said, estimates the lake, from the mouth of the river Pangani, at 604 miles, and seventy-one days of total march. It is evident, from the preceding pages, that African authorities have hitherto confounded the Nyanza, the Tanganyika, and the Nyassa Lakes. Still, in the estimate of the distance between the coast and Ujiji there is a remarkable and a most deceptive coherence.
Ujiji—also called Manyofo, which appears, however, peculiar to a certain sultanat or district—is the name of a province, not, as has been represented, of a single town. It was first visited by the Arabs about 1840; ten years after that they had penetrated to Unyamwezi; they found it conveniently situated as a mart upon the Tanganyika Lake, and a central point where their depôts might be established, and whence their factors and slaves could navigate the waters, and collect slaves and ivory from the tribes upon its banks. But the climate proved unhealthy, the people dangerous, and the coasting-voyages frequently ended in disaster; Ujiji, therefore, never rose to the rank of Unyanyembe or Msene. At present it is visited during the fair season, from May to September, by flying caravans, who return to Unyanyembe as soon as they have loaded their porters.
Abundant humidity and a fertile soil, evidenced by the large forest trees and the abundance of ferns, render Ujiji the most productive province in this section of Africa: vegetables, which must elsewhere be cultivated, here seem to flourish almost spontaneously. Rice of excellent quality was formerly raised by the Arabs upon the shores of the Tanganyika; it grew luxuriantly, attaining, it is said, the height of eight or nine feet. The inhabitants, however, preferring sorghum, and wearied out by the depredations of the monkey, the elephant, and the hippopotamus, have allowed the more civilised cereal to degenerate. The principal grains are the holcus and the Indian nagli or nanchni (Eleusine coracano); there is no bajri (panicum or millet) in these regions; the pulses are phaseoli and the voandzeia, groundnuts, beans, and haricots of several different species. The manioc, egg-plant, and sweet-potato, the yam, the cucumber, an edible white fungus growing subterraneously, and the Indian variety of the Jerusalem artichoke, represent the vegetables: the people, however, unlike the Hindus, despise, and consequently will not be at the pains to cultivate them. Sugar-cane, tobacco, and cotton are always purchasable in the bazar. The fruits are the plantain and the Guinea-palm. The mdizi or plantain-tree is apparently an aborigen of these latitudes: in certain parts, as in Usumbara, Karagwah, and Uganda, it is the staff of life: in the hilly countries there are, it is said, about a dozen varieties, and a single bunch forms a load for a man. It is found in the island and on the coast of Zanzibar, at K’hutu in the head of the alluvial valley, and, though rarely, in the mountains of Usagara. The best fruit is that grown by the Arabs at Unyanyembe: it is still a poor specimen, coarse and insipid, stringy and full of seeds, and strangers rarely indulge in it, fearing flatulence. Upon the Tanganyika Lake there is a variety called mikono t’hembu, or elephant’s-hands, which is considerably larger than the Indian “horse-plantain.” The skin is of a brickdust red, in places inclining to rusty-brown; the pulp is a dull yellow, with black seeds, and the flavour is harsh, strong, and drug-like. The Elæis Guiniensis, locally called mchikichi, which is known by the Arabs to grow in the islands of Zanzibar and Pemba, and more rarely in the mountains of Usagara, springs apparently uncultivated in large dark groves on the shores of the Tanganyika, where it hugs the margin, rarely growing at any distance inland. The bright-yellow drupe, with shiny purple-black point, though nauseous to the taste, is eaten by the people. The mawezi or palm-oil, of the consistency of honey, rudely extracted, forms an article of considerable traffic in the regions about the Lake. This is the celebrated extract, whose various officinal uses in Europe have already begun to work a social reformation in W. Africa. The people of Ujiji separate, by pounding, the oily sarcocarpium from the one seed of the drupe, boil it for some hours, allow the floating substance to coagulate, and collect it in large earthen pots. The price is usually about one doti of white cotton for thirty-five pounds, and the people generally demand salt in exchange for it from caravans. This is the “oil of a red colour” which, according to Mr. Cooley, is bought by the Wanyamwezi “from the opposite or south-western side of the lake.” Despite its sickly flavour, it is universally used in cooking, and it forms the only unguent and lamp-oil in the country. This fine Guinea-palm is also tapped, as the date in Western India, for toddy; and the cheapness of this tembo—the sura of West Africa—accounts for the prevalence of intoxication, and the consequent demoralisation of the Lakist tribes.