The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile, And Explorations of the Nile Sources

by Sir Samuel White Baker

Landing at Eppigoya, we were at once met by the headman, and I proposed that he should sell us a few kids, as the idea of a mutton chop was most appetizing. Far from supplying us with this luxury, the natives immediately drove their flocks away, and after receiving a large present of beads, the headman brought us a present of a sick lamb almost at the point of natural death, and merely skin and bone. Fortunately there were fowls in thousands, as the natives did not use them for food; these we purchased for one blue bead (monjoor) each, which in current value was equal to 250 fowls for a shilling. Eggs were brought in baskets containing several hundreds, but they were all poultry.

At Eppigoya the best salt was produced, and we purchased a good supply—also some dried fish; thus provisioned, we procured boatmen, and again started on our voyage.

Hardly had we proceeded two hundred yards, when we were steered direct to the shore below the town, and our boatmen coolly laid down their paddles and told us that they had performed their share, and that as Eppigoya was divided into four parts under separate headmen, each portion would supply rowers!

Ridiculous as this appeared, there was no contesting their decision; and thus we were handed over from one to the other, and delayed for about three hours in changing boatmen four times within a distance of less than a mile! The perfect absurdity of such a regulation, combined with the delay when time was most precious, was trying to the temper. At every change, the headman accompanied the boatmen to our canoe, and presented us with three fowls at parting; thus our canoes formed a floating poultry show as we had already purchased large supplies. Our live stock bothered us dreadfully; being without baskets, the fowls were determined upon suicide, and many jumped deliberately overboard, while others that were tied by the legs were drowned in the bottom of the leaky canoe.

After the tenth day from our departure from Vacovia the scenery increased in beauty. The lake had contracted to about thirty miles in width, and was decreasing rapidly northward; the trees upon the mountains upon the western shore could be distinguished. Continuing our voyage north, the western shore projected suddenly, and diminished the width of the lake to about twenty miles. It was no longer the great inland sea that at Vacovia had so impressed me, with the clean pebbly beach that had hitherto formed the shore, but vast banks of reeds growing upon floating vegetation prevented the canoes from landing. These banks were most peculiar, as they appeared to have been formed of decayed vegetation, from which the papyrus rushes took root; the thickness of the floating mass was about three feet, and so tough and firm that a man could walk upon it, merely sinking above his ankles in the soft ooze. Beneath this raft of vegetation was extremely deep water, and the shore for a width of about half a mile was entirely protected by this extraordinary formation. One day a tremendous gale of wind and heavy sea broke off large portions, and the wind acting upon the rushes like sails, carried floating islands of some acres about the lake to be deposited wherever they might chance to hitch.

On the thirteenth day we found ourselves at the end of our lake voyage. The lake at this point was between fifteen and twenty miles across, and the appearance of the country to the north was that of a delta. The shores upon either side were choked with vast banks of reeds, and as the canoe skirted the edge of that upon the east coast, we could find no bottom with a bamboo of twenty-five feet in length, although the floating mass appeared like terra forma. We were in a perfect wilderness of vegetation: On the west were mountains of about 4,000 feet above the lake level, a continuation of the chain that formed the western shore from the south: these mountains decreased in height towards the north, in which direction the lake terminated in a broad valley of reeds.

We were told that we had arrived at Magungo, and that this was the spot where the boats invariably crossed from Malegga on the western shore to Kamrasi's country. The boatmen proposed that we should land upon the floating vegetation, as that would be a short cut to the village or town of Magungo; but as the swell of the water against the abrupt raft of reeds threatened to swamp the canoe, I preferred coasting until we should discover a good landing place. After skirting the floating reeds for about a mile, we turned sharp to the east, and entered a broad channel of water bounded on either side by the everlasting reeds. This we were informed was the embouchure of the Somerset river from the Victoria N'yanza. The same river that we had crossed at Karuma, boiling and tearing along its rocky course, now entered the Albert N'yanza as dead water! I could not understand this; there was not the slightest current; the channel was about half a mile wide, and I could hardly convince myself that this was not an arm of the lake branching to the east. After searching for some time for a landing place among the wonderful banks of reeds, we discovered a passage that had evidently been used as an approach by canoes, but so narrow that our large canoe could with difficulty be dragged through—all the men walking through the mud and reeds, and towing with their utmost strength. Several hundred paces of this tedious work brought us through the rushes into open water, about eight feet deep, opposite to a clean rocky shore. We had heard voices for some time while obscured on the other side of the rushes, and we now found a number of natives, who had arrived to meet us, with the chief of Magungo and our guide Rabonga, whom we had sent in advance with the riding oxen from Vacovia. The water was extremely shallow near the shore, and the natives rushed in and dragged the canoes by sheer force over the mud to the land. We had been so entirely hidden while on the lake on the other side of the reed bank that we had been unable to see the eastern, or Magungo shore; we now found ourselves in a delightful spot beneath the shade of several enormous trees on firm sandy and rocky ground, while the country rose in a rapid incline to the town of Magungo, about a mile distant, on an elevated ridge.

My first question was concerning the riding oxen. They were reported in good order. We were invited to wait under a tree until the presents from the headmen should be delivered. Accordingly, while my wife sat under the shade, I went to the waterside to examine the fishing arrangements of the natives, that were on an extensive scale. For many hundred feet, the edges of the floating reeds were arranged to prevent the possibility of a large fish entering the open water adjoining the shore without being trapped. A regular system of baskets were fixed at intervals, with guiding fences to their mouths. Each basket was about six feet in diameter, and the mouth about eighteen inches; thus the arrangements were for the monsters of the lake, the large bones of which, strewed about the vicinity, were a witness of their size. My men had just secured the half of a splendid fish, known in the Nile as the "baggera." They had found it in the water, the other portion having been bitten off by a crocodile. The piece in their possession weighed about fifty pounds. This is one of the best fish in the lake. It is shaped like the perch, but is coloured externally like the salmon. I also obtained from the natives an exceedingly good fish, of a peculiar form, having four long feelers at the positions that would be occupied by the limbs of reptiles; these looked like rudiments of legs. It had somewhat the appearance of an eel; but, being oviparous, it can have no connexion with that genus. The natives had a most killing way of fishing with the hook and line for heavy fish. They arranged rows of tall bamboos, the ends stuck firmly in the bottom, in a depth of about six feet of water, and about five or ten yards apart. On the top of each was a lump of ambatch-wood about ten inches in diameter. Around this was wound a powerful line, and, a small hole being made in this float, it was lightly fixed upon the point of the bamboo, or fishing rod. The line was securely attached to the bamboo, then wound round the large float, while the hook, baited with a live fish, was thrown to some distance beyond. Long rows of these fixed rods were set every morning by natives in canoes, and watchers attended them during the day, while they took their chance by night. When a large fish took the bait, his first rush unhitched the ambatch-float from the point of the bamboo, which, revolving upon the water, paid out line as required. When entirely run out, the great size and buoyancy of the float served to check and to exhaust the fish. There are several varieties of fish that exceed 200 lbs. weight.

A number of people now arrived from the village, bringing a goat, fowls, eggs, and sour milk, and, beyond all luxuries, fresh butter. I delighted the chief, in return for his civility, by giving him a quantity of beads, and we were led up the hill towards Magungo.

The day was beautifully clear. The soil was sandy and poor, therefore the road was clean and hard; and, after the many days' boating, we enjoyed the walk, and the splendid view that lay before us when we arrived at Magungo, and looked back upon the lake. We were about 250 feet above the water level. There were no longer the abrupt cliffs, descending to the lake, that we had seen in the south, but the general level of the country appeared to be about 500 feet above the water, at a distance of five or six miles, from which point the ground descended in undulations, Magungo being situated on the summit of the nearest incline. The mountains on the Malegga side, with the lake in the foreground, were the most prominent objects, forming the western boundary. A few miles north there appeared to be a gap in the range, and the lake continued to the west, but much contracted, while the mountain range on the northern side of the gap continued to the northeast. Due north and northeast the country was a dead flat, and far as the eye could reach was an extent of bright green reeds, marking the course of the Nile as it made its exit from the lake. The sheet of water at Magungo being about seventeen miles in width, ended in a long strip or tail to the north, until it was lost in the flat valley of green rushes. This valley may have been from four to six miles wide, and was bounded upon its west bank by the continuation of the chain of mountains that had formed the western boundary of the lake. The natives told me that canoes could navigate the Nile in its course from the lake to the Madi country, as there were no cataracts for a great distance, but that both the Madi and the Koshi were hostile, and that the current of the river was so strong, that should the canoe descend from the lake, it could not return without many rowers. They pointed out the country of Koshi on the west bank of the Nile, at its exit from the lake, which included the mountains that bordered the river. The small country, M'Caroli, joined Malegga, and continued to the west, towards the Makkarika. The natives most positively refused to take me down the Nile from the lake into the Madi, as they said that they would be killed by the people, who were their enemies, as I should not be with them on their return up the river.