Flotilla at Fajao.
We began our climb to the summit of the Falls in the blazing heat of the day, and for the first time I was forced to confess the Central African sun as formidable as that which beats on the plains of India. Yet even at the worst moments it is more endurable, for the breeze does not stifle you with the breath of a furnace. First the path led through the deadly groves; and here, of course, the most beautiful butterflies—some five inches across the wings—floated tantalizingly. Sometimes we descended to where the river lapped along the rocks and curled in eddies under floating islands of froth. Precautions were required against diverse dangers. The Nile below the Murchison Falls swarms with crocodiles, some of an enormous size, and herds of hippopotamus are found every half mile or so; so that, what with the rifles which it was necessary to take for great beasts, and the gloves and veils which were our protection against even more villainous small ones, we were painfully encumbered. Indeed, the veils were such a nuisance and the heat was so great that I resolved to hazard the tsetse and took mine off. But after half an hour of menacing buzzings, and after a fly—presumably of the worst character—had actually settled on my shoulder, brushed off by the promptness of my companion, I changed my mind again.
As we were thus scrambling along the brink of the river a crocodile was discovered basking in the sunshine on a large rock in mid-stream, about a hundred and fifty yards from the shore. I avow, with what regrets may be necessary, an active hatred of these brutes and a desire to kill them. It was a tempting shot, for the ruffian lay sleeping in the sun-blaze, his mouth wide open and his fat and scaly flanks exposed. Two or three attendant white birds hopped about him, looking for offal, which I have been assured (and does not Herodotus vouch for it?) they sometimes pick from his very teeth. I fired. What the result of the shot may have been I do not know, for the crocodile gave one leap of mortal agony or surprise and disappeared in the waters. But then it was my turn to be astonished. The river at this distance from the Falls was not broader than three hundred yards, and we could see the whole shore of the opposite bank quite plainly. It had hitherto appeared to be a long brown line of mud, on which the sun shone dully. At the sound of the shot the whole of this bank of the river, over the extent of at least a quarter of a mile, sprang into hideous life, and my companions and I saw hundreds and hundreds of crocodiles, of all sorts and sizes, rushing madly into the Nile, whose waters along the line of the shore were lashed into white foam, exactly as if a heavy wave had broken. It could be no exaggeration to say that at least a thousand of these saurians had been disturbed at a single shot. Our British friends explained that Fajao was the favourite haunt of the crocodiles, who lay in the water below the Falls waiting for dead fish and animals carried over by the river. Very often, they told us, hippos from the upper river and from Lake Chioga were caught and swept downwards, the force of the water "breaking every bone in their body." "Indeed," added the officer, somewhat obscurely, "they are very lucky if they are not smashed into pulp."
The Top of the Murchison Falls.
Uganda Scenery.