We spent the night in a small Babel of Baloch. It was a savage opera scene. One recited his Koran, another prayed, a third told funny stories, whilst a fourth trolled out in minor key lays of love and war, made familiar to my ear upon the rugged Sindian hills. This was varied by slapping away the lank mosquitoes that flocked to the gleaming camp-fires, by rising occasionally to rid ourselves of the ants, and by challenging the small parties of savages who, armed with bows and arrows, passed amongst us, carrying grain to Panga-ni. The Baloch kept a truly oriental watch. They sang and shouted, and they carefully fed the camp fire during early night, when there is no danger; but all slept like the dead through the ‘small hours,’ the time always chosen by the African freebooters, and indeed by almost all savages, to make their unheroic onslaughts. Similarly, throughout our expedition to the Lake Regions, the ‘soldiers’ never dreamed of any precaution whilst in dangerous regions. As we approached the coast, however, sentinels were carefully set, that all might be well which ends well.
At daybreak on February 9, accompanied by a much reduced detachment, we resumed our march: the poitrinaire Jemadar, who was crippled by the moonlight and by the cold dew, resolved, when thawed, to return with the rest of his company Chogwe-wards. An hour’s hard walking brought us to the foot of rugged Tongwe, the Great Hill. Ascending the flank of the N. Eastern spur, we found ourselves at 8 A.M., after five or six bad miles, upon the chine of a little ridge, with summer facing the sea, and a wintry wind blowing from the deep and forested valley to landward. Thence, pursuing the rugged incline, after another half-hour we entered the ‘fort,’ a crenellated, flat-roofed, and whitewashed room, 14 feet square, supported inside by smooth blackened rafters. It was tenanted by two Baloch, who figure on the muster-rolls as 20 men. They complain of loneliness and of the horrors: though several goats have been sacrificed, an obstinate demon still haunts the hill, and at times the weeping and wailing of distressed spirits makes their thin blood run chill from their hearts.
Tongwe is the first offset of the massive mountain-terrace which forms the Region of Usumbara: here, in fact, begins the Highland block of Zangian and equatorial Africa, which culminates in Kilima-njaro and Doenyo Ebor, or Mount Kenia. It rises abruptly from the plain, and projects long spurs into the river valley, where the Panga-ni flows noisily through a rocky trough, and whence we could distinctly hear the roar of the celebrated waterfall. Situated N. West of (324°), and nine miles as the crow flies from, Chogwe, the hill summit, about 2000 feet above sea-level, is clothed with jungle, through which we had to cut a way with our swords, when seeking compass bearings of the Nguru hills. The thickness of the vegetation, which contains stunted cocoas, oranges grown wild and bitter, the Castor shrub, the Solanum, and the bird-pepper plant, with small berry, but very hot i’ the mouth, renders the eminence inaccessible from any but the Eastern and Northern flanks. The deserted grounds showed signs of former culture, and our negro guide sighed as he told us that his kinsmen had been driven by the Wazegura from their ancient seats to the far inner wilds. Around the Fort were slender plantations of maize and manioc springing amongst the ‘black jacks,’ which here, as in the Brazil, are never removed. The surface is a reddish, argillaceous, and vegetable soil, overlying grey and ruddy granite and schists. These rocks bear the ‘gold and silver complexion’ which was fatal to Colin Clout, the chivalrous ‘Shepherd of the Ocean,’ and the glistening spangles of mica still feed the fancy of the pauper Baloch mercenary. Below Tongwe hill, a deep hole in the northern face supplies the sweetest ‘rock-water,’ and upon the plain a boulder of well-weathered granite, striped with snowy quartz, contains two crevices ever filled by the purest springs. The climate appeared delicious, temperate in the full blaze of an African and tropical summer, and worthy of verse—
‘Fair is that land as evening skies,
And cool though in the depths it lies
Of burning Africa.’
The temperature would correspond with a similar altitude upon the Fernando Po and the Camarones peaks. But whilst the hill was green the lower lands were baked like bread crust—the ‘fertile and flourishing regions about Tongwe’ belong to the category of things gone by.
We had much to do before leaving Tongwe. The Jemadar had, it is true, ordered for us an escort, but in these latitudes obedience to orders is an optional matter. Moreover, the Baloch, enervated by climate and by long habits of utter indolence, looked forward with scant pleasure to the discomforts of a mountain march. Shoeless, bedless, and almost ragless, they could hardly be induced, even by the offer of ‘stone dollars,’ to quit for a week their hovel homes, their black Venuses, and their whitey-brown piccaninnies. They felt truly happy with us at Tongwe, doing nothing beyond devouring, twice a day, vast quantities of our dates and rice, an unknown luxury; and they were at infinite pains to defer the evil hour of departure. One fellow declared it was absolutely impossible for him to travel without salt, and proposed sending back a slave to Chogwe: the move would have involved the loss of at least three days, so we thought it best at once to begin with firmly saying no.
By hard talking I managed at last to secure a small party, which demands a few words of introduction to the reader—it is the typical affair in this part of Africa, and the sketch may be useful to future travellers. We have four slave boys, idle, worthless dogs, who never work save under the rod, who think of nothing beyond their stomachs, and who are addicted to running away upon all occasions. Petty pilferers to the backbone, they steal, magpie-like, by instinct, and from their impudent fingers nothing is safe. On the march they lag behind to see what can be ‘prigged,’ and not being professional porters, they are as restive as camels when receiving their loads. ‘Am I not a slave?’ is their excuse for every detected delinquency, and we must admit its full validity. One of these youths happening to be brother-in-law—after a fashion—to the Jemadar, requires almost superhuman efforts to prevent him loading the others with his own share.
The guide, Muigni Wazira, is a huge broad-shouldered, thick-waisted, large-limbed Msawahili, with coal black skin and straight features, massive and regular, which look as if cut in jet; a kind of face that might be seen on the keystone of an arch. He frowns like the Jann spoken of in the Arabian Nights, and he often makes me wish for a photographer. He is purblind, a defect which does not, however, prevent his leading us by the shortest path into every village that aspires to mulct our slender store of sprig-muslin. Wazira is our rogue, rich in all the perfections of African cunning. A prayerless Sherif, he utterly despises all Makafiri or infidels; he has a hot temper, and when provoked he roars like a wild beast. He began by stubbornly refusing to carry any load; but he yielded when it was gently placed upon his heavy shoulder, with a significant gesture in case of recusance. He does not, however, neglect to pass it occasionally to his slave, who, poor wretch, is almost broken down by the double burden.