The East Africans ignore the use of red-hot arrows; and the poisoned shaft, an unmanly weapon, unused by the English and French archers even in their deadliest wars, is confined to the Wanyika of Mombasah, the Wazaramo, the Wak’hutu, the Western Wasagara, and the people of Uruwwa. The Wazaramo and Wak’hutu call the plant from which the poison is extracted Mkandekande. They sold at somewhat an exorbitant price a leaf full of the preparation, but avoided pointing out to the expedition the plant, which from their description appears to be a variety of euphorbia. M. Werne (“Sources of the White Nile,” chap. viii.) says that the river tribe prepare their arrow-poison from a kind of asclepias, whose milky sap is pressed out between two stones and allowed to thicken. Dr. Livingstone (chap. viii.) mentions the use of the n’gwa caterpillar amongst the Bushmen, who also poison waters with the Euphorbia arborescens; and Mr. Andersson (chap. vii.) specifies the Euphorbia candelabrum amongst the Ovaherero and the Hill Damaras. In East Africa the poison-leaves are allowed to distil their juices into a pot, which for inspissation is placed over a slow fire; becoming thick and slab, the contents are applied with a stick to the arrow, and are smoothed between the hands. When finished, the part behind the barb is covered with a shiny brown-black coat, not unlike pitch, to the extent of four or five inches. After drying it is renewed by the application of a fresh layer, the old being removed by exposure to the fire. The people fear this poison greatly; they wash their hands after touching it, and declare that a wounded man or beast loses sense, “moons about,” and comes to the ground before running a quarter of a mile. Much exaggeration, however, must be expected upon the subject of toxicology amongst barbarians: it acts like the Somali arrow-poison, as a strong narcotic, and is, probably, rarely fatal, even when freshly applied.
Fearing the action of the wind upon such light shafts if unfledged, the archer inserts into the cloven end three or four feathers, the cockfeather being as in Europe perpendicular when the arrow is nocked. The pile or iron head is curiously and cruelly barbed with long waving tails; the neck is toothed and edged by dinting the iron when hot with an axe, and it is sometimes half-sawed that it may break before extraction. The East Africans also have forkers or two-headed shafts, and bird-bolts or blunt arrows tipped with some hard wood, used when the weapon is likely to be lost. Before loosing an arrow the archer throws into the air a pinch of dust, not to find out the wind, but for good luck, like the Tartars of Tibet before discharging their guns. In battle the heavy-armed man holds his spear and a sheaf of spare arrows in the bow-hand, whilst a quiver slung to the left side contains reserve missiles, and a little axe stuck in the right side of the girdle is ready when the rest fail. The ronga or quiver is a bark-case, neatly cut and stained. It is of two forms, full-length, and provided with a cover for poisoned, and half-length for unpoisoned, arrows.
The rungu or knobkerry is the African club or mace; it extends from the Cape to the negroid and the Somal tribes north of the equator. The shape varies in almost every district: the head is long or round, oval or irregular, and sometimes provided on one side with an edge; it is cut out of the hardest wood, and generally from one piece. In some cases the knob is added to the handle, and in others it is supplied with a spear-head. The handle is generally two feet long, and it is cut thin enough to make the weapon top-heavy. The Mnyamwezi is rarely seen abroad without this weapon; he uses it in the chase, and in battle against the archer: he seems to trust it in close quarters rather than the feather-weight arrow or the spear that bends like gutta-percha, and most murders are committed with it. The East people do not, like the Kafirs, use the handle of the knobkerry as a dibble.
The sime or dudgeon is the makeshift for the Arab jambiyah and the Persian khanjar. The form of this weapon differs in almost every tribe. The Wahumba or Wamasai use blades about four feet long by two fingers in breadth; the long, round, and guardless hilt is ribbed for security of grasp, and covered with leather; their iron is of excellent quality, and the shape of the weapon has given rise to the report that “they make swords on the model of those of the Knights Templars.” The Wazegura and the Wagogo use knives not unlike the poniard of the Somal. In some tribes it is 3·5 feet long, with a leathern sheath extending half-way up the blade. Generally it is about half that size, straight, pointed, and double-edged, or jagged with teeth. The regions about the Lake manufacture and export great numbers of these weapons varying from a finger’s length to full dimensions.
The shoka or battle-axe is much used by the tribes around the Tanganyika. It has a blade of triangular shape, somewhat longer and thinner than that used as a working tool, which is passed through the bulging head of a short handle cut out of the bauhinia or some other hard tree. Amongst the Wasagara the peculiar mundu or bill often serves for the same purpose.
The targes of the Wasagara and the Wanyamwezi have already been described; the Wavinza make a shield of basket-work six feet by two, and much resembling that of the southern Kafirs, and the Wa’ungu carry large pavoises of bull’s hide. It is probable that the exceeding humidity of the climate, so ruinous to leather, prevents the general adoption of the shield; on the march it is merely an encumbrance, and the warrior must carry it on his head beyond the reach of the dewy grass.
The maritime races, the Wazegura, and others opposite the island of Zanzibar, have imprudently been allowed to purchase fire-arms, which they employ in obstructing caravans and in kidnapping-commandos against their weaker neighbours. A single German house has, it is said, sold off 13,000 Tower muskets in one year. The arms now preferred are those exported by Hamburg and America; they fetch 4 dollars each; the French single-barrel is somewhat cheaper, averaging 3 dollars 50 cents. In the interior fire-arms are still fortunately rare—the Arabs are too wise to arm the barbarians against themselves. In Unyamwezi an old gun is a present for a chief, and the most powerful rulers seldom can boast of more than three. Gunpowder is imported from Zanzibar in kegs of 10 and 25 lbs., bearing the American mark; it is of the description used in blasting, and fouls the piece after a few discharges. The price varies at Zanzibar from 3 dollars 50 cents to 7 dollars, and upon the coast from 5 to 10 dollars per small keg; in Unyamwezi ammunition is exchanged for ivory and slaves, and some Arab merchants keep as many as thirty kegs in the house, which they retail to factors and traders at the rate of 1 to 2 shukkahs per lb.
Swords in East Africa are used only by strangers. The Wasawahili and the slave-factors prefer the kittareh, a curved sabre made in Oman and Hazramaut, or, in its stead, an old German cavalry-blade. The Arabs carry as a distinction the “faranji,” a straight, thin, double-edged, guardless, and two-handed sword, about four feet long, and sharp as a carving-knife; the price varies from 10 to 100 dollars.
The negroid is an unmechanical race; his industry has scarcely passed the limits of savage invention. Though cotton abounds in the interior, the Wanyamwezi only have attempted a rude loom; and the working of iron and copper is confined to the Wafyoma and the Lakist races. The gourd is still the principal succedaneum for pottery. The other branches of industry which are necessary to all barbarians are mats and baskets, ropes and cords.
Carpentering amongst the East Africans is still in its rudest stage; no Dædalus has yet taught them to jag their knives into saws. It is limited to making the cots and cartels upon which the people invariably sleep, and to carving canoes, mortars, bowls, rude platters, spoons, stools, and similar articles of furniture. The tree, after being rung and barked to dry the juices, is felled by fire or the axe; it is then cut up into lengths of the required dimensions, and hacked into shape with slow and painful toil. The tools are a shoka, or hatchet of puerile dimensions, perhaps one-fifth the size of our broad axes, yet the people can use it to better advantage than the admirable implement of the backwoodsman. The mbizo or adze is also known in the interior, but none except the Fundi and the slaves trained upon the coast have ever seen a hand-saw, a centre-bit, or a chisel.