Resuming our way at 9 P.M., we passed on the left "Scylla Rocks," then a wash, and beyond them four high and tree-clad heads off the right bank. Three are islets, the Zunga chya Gnombe—of the bull—formed by a narrow arm passing round them to the north: other natives called them Zunga chya Umbinda, but all seem to differ. These are the Gombac Islands of the chart, Hall Island being the easternmost, and the northern passage between the three horns and the main is called by us "Gombac Creek." Half an hour beyond was a mass of villages, in a large, grassy low-land of the left bank, girt by mountains higher than those down stream. Some outlying huts were called by the interpreters Suko Nkongo, and formed the "beach town" of large interior settlements, Suko do Wembo and Mbinda. Others said Lasugu or Sugo Nkongo, the Sooka Congo of the charts: others again for "Mbinda" proposed "Mpeso Birimba." This is probably the place where according to the mail of November, 73, diamonds were found, and having been submitted to "Dr. Basham (Dr. Bastian before mentioned), Director of the Museum of Berlin," were pronounced to be of very fine water. It is possible that the sandstone may afford precious stones like the itacolumite of the Brazil ("Highlands of the Brazil," i. 380), but the whole affair proved a hoax. In mid-stream rose No. 2, "One-Tree Island," Zunga chya Nlemba or Shika chya Nzondo; in Tuckey it is called Boola Beca or Blemba (the husband) Rock; the old ficus dying at the head, was based upon a pedestal which appeared groin-shaped from the east. Here the mirage was very distinct, and the canoes seemed to fly, not to swim—
"As when far out of sea a fleet descried,
Hangs in the clouds."
The northern bank shows a stony projection called by Maxwell
"Fiddler's Elbow;" it leads to the fourth reach, the second of
the north-eastern series; and the breadth of the stream, once
more a mountain lake, cannot be less than two miles.
I foresaw trouble in passing these settlements. Presently a snake-like war canoe with hawser-holes like eyes, crept out from the southern shore; a second fully manned lay in reserve, lurking along the land, and armed men crowned the rocks jutting into the stream. We were accosted by the first craft, in which upon the central place of honour sat Mpeso Birimbá, a petty chief of Suko Nkongo; a pert rascal of the French factory, habited in a red cap, a green velvet waistcoat, and a hammock-shaped tippet of pine-apple fibre; his sword was a short Sollingen blade. The visit had the sole object of mulcting me in rum and cloth, and my only wish was naturally to expend as little as possible in mere preliminaries. The name of Manbuku Prata was duly thrown at him with but little effect: these demands are never resisted by the slave-dealers. After much noise and cries of "Mwendi" (miser, skin-flint) on the part of the myrmidons, I was allowed to proceed, having given up a cloth twenty-four yards long, and I felt really grateful to the "trade" which had improved off all the other riverine settlements. Beyond this point we saw nothing but their distant smokes.
Before the second north-eastern reach, the interpreters exclaimed "Yellala falla"—"the cataract is speaking," and we could distinctly hear the cheering roar. The stream now assumed the aspect of Niagara below the Falls, and the circular eddies boiling up from below, and showing distinct convexity, suggested the dangerous "wells" of the northern seas. Passing the "Three Weird Sisters," unimportant rocks off, the right bank, we entered upon the remarkably long stretch, extending upwards of five miles, and, from its predominating growth, we proposed to call it "Palmyra Reach." The immediate river banks were clad with sedge, and the broad leaves of the nymphæa, a plant like the calamus of Asia, but here used only as a toothpick, began to oust the rushy and flaggy growth of the lower bed. The pink balls of the spinous mimosa, and bright flowers, especially the convolvulus and ipomaea, illuminated the dull green. The grassy land at the foot of the mountains was a mere edging, faced by outlying rocks, and we were shown the site of a village long ago destroyed.
The Nteba, or palmyra nobilis, mixed here and there with a glorious tamarind, bombax or calabash, forms a thin forest along the reach, and rarely appears upon the upper hills, where we should expect it. The people use both fruit and wine, preferring, however, the liquor of the Ebah (oil palm-tree), and the autumnal fires can hardly affect so sturdy a growth. The other trees are the mfuma, cotton-tree or bombax (Pentandria truncospinoso, Smith), much valued as a canoe: Merolla uses Mafuma, a plural form, and speaks of its "wonderful fine wool." The wild figs show glorious stature, a truly noble growth, whose parents were sun and water.
The birds were lank black clivers (Plotus), exceedingly wild; the African roller (Coracias); halcyons of several species, especially a white and black kingfisher, nimble and comely; many swallows, horn-bills, and wild pigeons which made the bush resound; ardeine birds, especially a heron, like the large Indian "kullum;" kites, crows, "whip-poor-wills," and a fine haliaetus, which flies high and settles upon the loftiest branches. One of these eagles was shot, after a gorge of the electric fish here common; its coat was black and white, and the eyes yellow, with dark pupils. Various lizards ran over the rocks; and we failed to secure a water-snake, the only specimen seen on the whole trip.
About noon we struggled past Point Masalla, our "Diamond Rock," a reef ending in a triangular block, towering abruptly, and showing by drift-wood a flood-line now twelve feet high. There are several of these "bench-marks;" and the people declare that after every few years an unusual freshet takes place. Here the current impinges directly upon the rocks, making a strong eddy. "They die each time," said the interpreters, as the canoemen, with loud shouts of "Vai ou nao Vai? Vai sempre! Vai direito, ya mondele!" and "Arister," a mariner's word, after failing to force the way, tumbled overboard, with a hawser of lliana to act as tow-line. "Vai direito," according to Father Ciprani, also applies to a "wonderful bird, whose song consists in these plain words;" and "Mondele" is synonymous with the Utangáni of the Gaboon and the East African Muzungu, a white man.
This bend was in former days the terminus of canoe travel up stream. Grisly tales of mishap are told; and even now a musketry salute is fired when boats pass without accident. Beyond Diamond Rock is a well-wooded, stony cove, "Salan Kunkati:" Captain Tuckey makes this the name of the Diamond Rock, and translates it "the strong feather." Quartz, before in lines and bands, now appears in masses: the "Coal Rock," which the chart places near Insála (Bechope Point) on the northern bank, was probably submerged. High cliffs towered above us, and fragments which must have weighed twenty tons had slipped into the water; one of them bore an adansonia, growing head downwards.
The next feature was Npunga Bay, low and leek-green, between the blue-brown water, here some 700 yards broad, and the yellow sun- burnt trough-sides. A little further on, at 2 P.M., the canoe-men halted beyond a sandy point with two large "Bondeiro" trees, and declared their part of the bargain to have been fulfilled. "Bonderro" is a corruption of the Lusitanianized imbundeiro, the calabash, or adansonia (digitata?): the other baobab is called nkondo, probably the Aliconda and Elicandy of Battel and old travellers, who describe the water-tanks hollowed in its huge trunk, and the cloth made from the bark fibre. Thus the "Condo Sonio" of the Chart should be "Nkondo Sonho," the latter a proper name. It is seldom that we find trees turned to all the uses of which they are capable: the Congo people despise the nutritious and slightly laxative flour of the "monkey bread," and the young leaves are not used as pickles; the bast is not valued for cloth and ropes, nor are the boles cut into cisterns.
As will be seen, we ought to have insisted upon being paddled to Kala cliff and bight, the Mayumba Bay of the Chart, where the bed trends west-east, and shows the lowest rapids: the First Congo Expedition went up even higher. At Nkongo ka Lunga, the point marked by two calabashes, we inquired for the Nokki Congo, of which we had heard at Chisalla, and which still exists upon the chart,—districts and villages being often confounded. All laughed, and declared that the "port-town" had long been sold off, the same had been the case, even in Tuckey's day, with the next settlement, "Condo Sonio" (the Baobab of Sonho), formerly the great up-stream mart, where the slave-traders transacted their business. All the population was now transferred inland and, like our predecessors, we were promised a two hours' climb over the rough, steep highland which lay in front. Then we understood that "Nokki" was the name of a canton, not of a settlement. Its south-eastern limits may have contained the "City of Norchie, the best situated of any place hitherto seen in Ethiopia," where Father Merolla (p. 280) baptized 126 souls,—and this is rendered probable by the crucifixes and coleworts which were found by the First Congo Expedition.