Part 4 (2/2)

Next day we pushed on a double march through the forest, and reached a nullah. As it crosses the track in a southerly direction, this might either be the head of the Kululu mongo or river, which, pa.s.sing through the district of Kiwele, drains westward into the Malagarazi river, and thence into the Tanganyika, or else the most westerly tributary to the Ruaha river, draining eastward into the sea. The plateau, however, is apparently so flat here, that nothing b a minute survey, or rather following the watercourse, could determine the matter. Then emerging from the wilderness, we came into the open cultivated district of Tura, or ”put down”--called so by the natives because it was, only a few years ago, the first cleared s.p.a.ce in the wilderness, and served as a good halting-station, after the normal ten day's march in the jungles, where we had now been struggling more than a month.

The whole place, once so fertile, was now almost depopulated and in a sad state of ruin, showing plainly the savage ravages of war; for the Arabs and their slaves, when they take the field, think more of plunder and slavery than the object they started on--each man of the force looking out for himself. The incentives, too, are so great;--a young woman might be caught (the greatest treasure of earth), or a boy or a girl, a cow or a goat--all of the fortunes, of themselves too irresistible to be overlooked when the future is doubtful. Here Sheikh Said broke down in health of a complaint which he formerly had suffered from, and from which I at once saw he would never recover sufficiently well to be ever effective again. It was a sad misfortune, as the men had great confidence in him, being the representative of their Zanzibar government: still it could not be helped; for, as a sick man is, after all, the greatest possible impediment to a march, it was better to be rid of him than have the trouble of dragging him; so I made up my mind, as soon as we reached Kaze, I would drop him there with the Arabs. He could not be moved on the 16th, so I marched across the plain and put up in some villages on its western side. Whilst waiting for the sheikh's arrival, some villagers at night stole several loads of beads, and ran off with them; but my men, finding the theft out in time, hunted them down, and recovered all but one load--for the thieves had thrown their loads down as soon as they found they were hotly pursued.

Early this morning I called all the head men of the village together, and demanded the beads to be restored to me; for, as I was living with them, they were responsible, according to the laws of the country. They acknowledged the truth and force of my demand, and said they would each give me a cow as an earnest, until their chief, who was absent, arrived.

This, of course, was objected to, as the chief, in his absence, must have deputed some one to govern for him, and I expected him to settle at once, that I might proceed with the march. Then selecting five of my head men to conduct the case, with five of their elders, it was considered my losses were equivalent to thirty head of cattle. As I remitted the penalty to fifteen head, these were made over to me, and we went on with the march--all feeling delighted with the issue but the Hottentots, who, not liking the loss of the second fifteen cows, said that in Kafirland, where the laws of the country are the same as here, the whole would have been taken, and, as it was, they thought I was depriving them of their rights to beef.

By a double march, the sheikh riding in a hammock slung on a pole, we now made Kuale, or ”Partridge” nullah, which, crossing the road to the northward, drains these lands to the Malagarazi river, and thence into the Tanganyika lake. Thence, having spent the night in the jungle, we next morning pushed into the cultivated district of Rubuga, and put up in some half-deserted tembes, where the ravages of war were even more disgusting to witness than at Tura. The chief, as I have said, was a slave, placed there by the Arabs on the condition that he would allow all traders and travellers to help themselves without payment as long as they chose to reside there. In consequence of this wicked arrangement, I found it impossible to keep my men from picking and stealing. They looked upon plunder as their fortune and right, and my interference as unjustifiable.

By making another morning and evening march, we then reached the western extremity of this cultivated opening; where, after sleeping the night, we threaded through another forest to the little clearance of Kigue, and in one more march through forest arrived in the large and fertile district of Unyanyembe, the centre of Unyamuezi--the Land of the Moon--within five miles of Kaze which is the name of a well in the village of Tbora, now const.i.tuted the great central slave and ivory merchants' depot. My losses up to this date (23d) were as follows:--One Hottentot dead and five returned; one freeman sent back with the Hottentots, and one flogged and turned off; twenty-five of Sultan Majid's gardeners deserted; ninety-eight of the original Wanyamuezi porters deserted; twelve mules and three donkeys dead. Besides which, more than half of my property had been stolen; whilst the travelling expenses had been unprecedented, in consequence of the severity of the famine throughout the whole length of the march.

Chapter V. Unyamuezi

The Country and People of U-n-ya-muezi--Kaze, the Capital--Old Musa--The Naked Wakidi--The N'yanza, and the Question of the River Running in or out--The Contest between Mohinna and ”Short-legs”--Famine--The Arabs and Local Wars--The Sultana of Unyambewa--Ungurue ”The Pig”--Pillage.

U-n-ya-muezi--Country of Moon--must have been one of the largest kingdoms in Africa. It is little inferior in size to England, and of much the same shape, though now, instead of being united, it is cut up into petty states. In its northern extremities it is known by the appellation U-suk.u.ma--country north; and in the southern, U-takama--country south. There are no historical traditions known to the people; neither was anything ever written concerning their country, as far as we know, until the Hindus, who traded with the east coast of Africa, opened commercial dealings with its people in salves and ivory, possibly some time prior to the birth of our Saviour, when, a.s.sociated with their name, Men of the Moon, sprang into existence the Mountains of the Moon. These Men of the Moon are hereditarily the greatest traders in Africa, and are the only people who, for love of barter and change, will leave their own country as porters and go to the coast, and they do so with as much zest as our country-folk go to a fair. As far back as we can trace they have done this, and they still do it as heretofore.

The whole of their country ranges from 3000 to 4000 feet above the sea-level--a high plateau, studded with little outcropping hills of granite, between which, in the valleys, there are numerous fertilising springs of fresh water, and rich iron ore is found in sandstone.

Generally industrious--much more so than most other negroes--they cultivate extensively, make cloths of cotton in their own looms, smelt iron and work it up very expertly, build tembes to live in over a large portion of their country, but otherwise live in gra.s.s huts, and keep flocks and herds of considerable extent.

The Wanyamuezi, however, are not a very well-favoured people in physical appearance, and are much darker than either the Wazaramo or the Wagogo, though many of their men are handsome and their women pretty; neither are they well dressed or well armed, being wanting in pluck and gallantry. Their women, generally, are better dressed than the men.

Cloths fastened round under the arms are their national costume, along with a necklace of beads, large bra.s.s or copper wire armlets, and a profusion of thin circles, called sambo, made of the giraffe's tail-hairs bound round by the thinnest iron or copper wire; whilst the men at home wear loin-cloths, but in the field, or whilst travelling, simply hang a goat-skin over their shoulders, exposing at least three-fourths of their body in a rather indecorous manner. In all other respects they ornament themselves like the women, only, instead of a long coil of wire wound up the arm, they content themselves with having ma.s.sive rings of copper or bra.s.s on the wrist; and they carry for arms a spear and bow and arrows. All extract more or less their lower incisors, and cut a [upside-down V shape] between their two upper incisors. The whole tribe are desperate smokers, and greatly given to drink.

On the 24th, we all, as many as were left of us, marched into the merchant's depot, S. lat. 5 0' 52”, and E. long. 33 1' 34”, [7]

escorted by Musa, who advanced to meet us, and guided us into his tembe, where he begged we would reside with him until we could find men to carry our property on to Karague. He added that he would accompany us; for he was on the point of going there when my first instalment of property arrived, but deferred his intention out of respect to myself.

He had been detained at Kaze ever since I last left it in consequence of the Arabs having provoked a war with Manua Sera, to which he was adverse. For a long time also he had been a chained prisoner; as the Arabs, jealous of the favour Manua Sera had shown to him in preference to themselves, basely accused him of supplying Manua Sera with gunpowder, and bound him hand and foot ”like a slave.” It was delightful to see old Musa's face again, and the supremely hospitable, kind, and courteous manner in which he looked after us, constantly bringing in all kind of small delicacies, and seeing that nothing was wanting to make us happy. All the property I had sent on in advance he had stored away; or rather, I should say, as much as had reached him, for the road expenses had eaten a great hole in it.

Once settled down into position, Sheikh Snay and the whole conclave of Arab merchants came to call on me. They said they had an army of four hundred slaves armed with muskets ready to take the field at once to hunt down Manua Sera, who was cutting their caravan road to pieces, and had just seized, by their latest reports, a whole convoy of their ammunition. I begged them strongly to listen to reason, and accept my advice as an old soldier, not to carry on their guerilla warfare in such a headlong hurry, else they would be led a dance by Manua Sera, as we had been by Tantia Topee in India. I advised them to allow me to mediate between them, after telling them what a favourable interview I had had with Manua Sera and Maula, whose son was at that moment concealed in Musa's tembe. My advice, however, was not wanted. Snay knew better than any one how to deal with savages, and determined on setting out as soon as his army had ”eaten their beef-feast of war.”

On my questioning him about the Nile, Snay still thought the N'yanza was the source of the Jub river [8] as he did in our former journey, but gave way when I told him that vessels frequented the Nile, as this also coincided with his knowledge of navigators in vessels appearing on some waters to the northward of Unyoro. In a great hurry he then bade me good-bye; when, as he thought it would be final, I gave him, in consideration of his former good services to the last expedition, one of the gold watches given me by the Indian Government. I saw him no more, though he and all the other Arabs sent me presents of cows, goats, and rice, with a notice that they should have gone on their war-oath before, only, hearing of my arrival, out of due respect to my greatness they waited to welcome me in. Further, after doing for Manua Sera, they were determined to go on to Ugogo to a.s.sist Salem bin Saif and the other merchants on, during which, at the same time, they would fight all the Wagogo who persisted in taking taxes and in hara.s.sing caravans. At the advice of Musa, I sent Maula's son off at night to tell the old chief how sorry I was to find the Arabs so hot-headed I could not even effect an arrangement with them. It was a great pity; for Manua Sera was so much liked by the Wanyamuezi, they would, had they been able, have done anything to restore him.

Next day the non-belligerent Arabs left in charge of the station, headed by my old friends Abdulla and Mohinna, came to pay their respects again, recognising in me, as they said, a ”personification of their sultan,”

and therefore considering what they were doing only due to my rank. They regretted with myself that Snay was so hot-headed; for they themselves thought a treaty of peace would have been the best thing for them, for they were more than half-ruined already, and saw no hope for the future. Then, turning to geography, I told Abdulla all I had written and lectured in England concerning his stories about navigators on the N'yanza, which I explained must be the Nile, and wished to know if I should alter it in any way: but he said, ”Do not; you may depend it will all turn out right;” to which Musa added, all the people in the north told him that when the N'yanza rose, the stream rushed with such violence it tore up islands and floated them away.

I was puzzled at this announcement, not then knowing that both the lake and the Nile, as well as all ponds, were called N'yanza: but we shall see afterwards that he was right; and it was in consequence of this confusion in the treatment of distinctly different geographical features under one common name by these people, that in my former journey I could not determine where the lake had ended and the Nile began. Abdulla again--he had done so on the former journey--spoke to me of a wonderful mountain to the northward of Karague, so high and steep no one could ascend it. It was, he said, seldom visible, being up in the clouds, where white matter, snow or hail, often fell. Musa said this hill was in Ruanda, a much larger country than Urundi; and further, both men said, as they had said before, that the lands of Usoga and Unyoro were islands, being surrounded by water; and a salt lake, which was called N'yanza, though not the great Victoria N'yanza lay on the other said of the Unyoro, from which direction Rumanika, king of Karague, sometimes got beads forwarded to him by Kamrasi, king of Unyoro, of a different sort from any brought from Zanzibar. Moreover, these beads were said to have been plundered from white men by the Wakidi,--a stark-naked people who live up in trees--have small stools fixed on behind, always ready for sitting--wear their hair hanging down as far as the rump, all covered with cowrie-sh.e.l.ls--suspend beads from wire attached to their ears and their lower lips--and wear strong iron collars and bracelets.

This people, I was told, are so fierce in war that no other tribe can stand against them, though they only fight with short spears. When this discourse was ended, ever perplexed about the Tanganyika being a still lake, I enquired of Mohinna and other old friends what they thought about the Marungu river: did it run into or out of the lake? and they all still adhered to its running into the lake--which, after all, in my mind, is the most conclusive argument that it does run out of the lake, making it one of a chain of lakes leading to the N'yanza, and through it by the Zambezi into the sea; for all the Arabs on the former journey said the Rusizi river ran out of the Tanganyika, as also the Kitangule ran out of the N'yanza, and the Nile ran into it, even though Snay said he thought the Jub river drained the N'yanza. All these statements were, when literally translated into English, the reverse of what the speakers, using a peculiar Arab idiom, meant to say; for all the statements made as to the flow of rivers by the negroes--who apparently give the same meaning to ”out” and ”in” as we do--contradicted the Arabs in their descriptions of the direction of the flow of these rivers.

Mohinna now gave us a very graphic description of his fight with Short-legs, the late chief of Khoko. About a year ago, as he was making his way down to the coast with his ivory merchandise, on arrival at Khoko, and before his camp was fortified with a ring-fence of thorns, some of his men went to drink at a well, where they no sooner arrived than the natives began to bean them with sticks, claiming the well as their property. This commenced a row, which brought out a large body of men, who demanded a bullock at the point of their spears. Mohinna hearing this, also came to the well, and said he would not listen to their demand, but would drink as he wished, for the water was the gift of G.o.d. Words then changed to blows. All Mohinna's pagazis bolted, and his merchandise fell into the hands of the Wagogo. Had his camp been fortified, he think he would have been too much for his enemies; but, as it was, he retaliated by shooting Short-legs in the head, and at once bolted back to Kaze with a few slaves as followers, and his three wives.

The change that had taken place in Unyanyembe since I last left it was quite surprising. Instead of the Arabs appearing merchants, as they did formerly, they looked more like great farmers, with huge stalls of cattle attached to their houses; whilst the native villages were all in ruins--so much so that, to obtain corn for my men, I had to send out into the district several days' journey off, and even then had to pay the most severe famine prices for what I got. The Wanyamuezi, I was a.s.sured, were dying of starvation in all directions; for, in addition to the war, the last rainy season had been so light, all their crops had failed.

27th and 28th.--I now gave all my men presents for the severe trials they had experienced in the wilderness, forgetting, as I told them, the merciless manner in which they had plundered me; but as I have a trifle more in proportion, to the three sole remaining pagazis, because they had not finished their work, my men were all discontented, and wished to throw back their presents, saying I did not love them, although they were ”perminents,” as much as the ”temperaries.” They, however, gave in, after some hours of futile arguments, on my making them understand, through Baraka, that what they saw me give to the pagazis would, if they reflected, only tend to prove to them that I was not a bad master who forgot his obligations when he could get no more out of his servants.

I then went into a long inquiry with Musa about our journey northward to Karague; and as he said there were no men to be found in or near Unyanyembe, for they were either all killed or engaged in the war, it was settled he should send some of his head men on to Rungua, where he had formerly resided, trading for some years, and was a great favourite with the chief of the place, by name Kiringuana. He also settled that I might take out of his establishment of slaves as many men as I could induce to go with me, for he thought them more trouble than profit, hired porters being more safe; moreover, he said the plan would be of great advantage to him, as I offered to pay, both man and master, each the same monthly stipend as I gave my present men. This was paying double, and all the heavier a burden, as the number I should require to complete my establishment to one hundred armed men would be sixty. He, however, very generously advised me not to take them, as they would give so much trouble; but finally gave way when I told him I felt I could not advance beyond Karague unless I was quite independent of the natives there--a view in which he concurred.

29th and 30th.--Jafu, another Indian merchant here, and co-partner of Musa, came in from a ten days' search after grain, and described the whole country to be in the most dreadful state of famine. Wanyamuezi were lying about dead from starvation in all directions, and he did not think we should ever get through Usui, as Suwarora, the chief, was so extortionate he would ”tear us to pieces”; but advised our waiting until the war was settled, when all the Arabs would combine and go with us.

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