Here, then, lay before us the goal of our wanderings, and powerful emotion seized us all as we, though only at a great distance, for the first time looked upon our future home. The Kenia peak, however, remained wrapped in clouds during the two days of our stay on the eastern outskirts of the Kikuyu forest. We made our halt in a charming grove of gigantic bread-fruit trees, where the Wa-Kikuyu placed their huts gratuitously at our disposal. The place is called Semba, and had been selected as the meeting-place of the greatshauri. We found a great number of natives already assembled there; and on the next day everything was arranged and confirmed between us to our mutual satisfaction. Thus we were able to start on our return march on the 16th of June. We did not go over the Ngongo, but followed a tributary of the Amboni to its source--more than 7,000 feet above the sea--and then dropped abruptly down from the edge of the Kikuyu tableland and went direct to the Naivasha, which we reached on the evening of the 19th. We were somewhat exhausted, but otherwise in good condition and in excellent spirits. We had discovered that we should be able to reach the Kenia a good week earlier than would have been possible by the originally chosen route through Lykipia.
The Naivasha is a beautiful lake in the midst of picturesque ranges of hills, the highest points of which reach 6,500 feet. The lake has a superficies of about thirty square miles, and its characteristic feature is a fabulous wealth in feathered game of all kinds. Here Johnston had made all the necessary preparations for the great feast of peace and joy which we purposed to give the Masai. The news that they had henceforth to reckon the Wa-Kikuyu also among our friends was received by theel-moranwith mixed feelings; but they submitted to the arrangement without murmuring, and at the feast, in which fifty of the principal men among the Wa Kikuyu who had accompanied us took part, the new friendship between the two races was more firmly established.
The feast consisted of a two days' great carousing, at which we provided enormous quantities of flesh, baked food, fruits, and punch for not less than 6,000 guests, without reckoning women and children. The chief feature consisted of some splendid fireworks. During these two days 150 fat young bulls, 260 antelopes of various kinds, 25 giraffes, innumerable feathered game, and an enormous quantity of vegetables were consumed. The punch was brewed in 100 vessels, each holding above six gallons, and each filled on the average four times. Nevertheless, this colossal hospitality--apart from the fireworks--cost us nothing at all. The cattle were presents, and indeed were a part of the number brought to us by numerous tribes as tokens of grateful esteem; the game we had, of course, not bought, but shot; and the vegetables were here, on the borders of Kikuyu, so cheap that the price may be regarded as merely nominal. As to the punch, the chief ingredient, rum--fortunately not a home production in Masailand and Kikuyuland--our experts had made on the spot, without touching the nearly exhausted supply we had brought with us. For among our other machinery there was a still. This was unpacked, wild-growing sugar-cane was to be had in abundance, and hence we had rum in plenty. Care was taken that the process was not so watched by the natives as to be learnt by them, for we did not wish to introduce among our neighbours that curse of negroland, the rum-bottle. The hot punch which we served out to them did not contain more than one part of rum to ten of water; yet nearly three hundred gallons of this noble spirit had to be used in the improvised bowls during the two days of the feast. The jubilation, particularly during the letting-off of the fireworks, was indescribable; and when finally, after silence had been obtained by flourish of trumpets, we had it proclaimed by strong-voiced heralds that the nation of the Masai were invited by us to be our guests at the same place every year on the 19th and 20th of June, the people nearly tore us to pieces out of pure delight.
The 21st of June was devoted to rest after the fatigues of the feast, and to the arrangement of the baggage; on the 22nd the march to Kikuyu was begun. To avoid taking the sumpter beasts over the steep acclivities of the hills that skirted the Naivasha valley, we turned back towards Ngongo-a-Bagas, which we reached on the 24th. Here we decided to establish an express communication with the sea, in order that the news of our arrival at our goal, which we expected to reach in a few days, might be carried as quickly as possible to Mombasa, and thence to the committee of the International Free Society. From Mombasa to Ngongo our engineers had measured 500 miles; we had done the distance in 38 days--from May 5 to June 12--of which, however, only 27 were real marching days. We calculated that our Arab horses, if put to the strain for only one day, could easily cover more than 60 miles in the day, and that therefore the whole distance could be covered in eight stages of a day each. Therefore sixteen of our best riders, with twenty-four of the best-winded racers, were ordered back. These couriers were directed to distribute themselves in twos at distances of about sixty miles--where the roads were bad a little less, and where they were good a little more. As baggage, besides their weapons and ammunition, they were furnished with merely so much of European necessaries and of articles for barter on the way as could be easily carried by the eight supernumerary horses, which were at the same time to serve as a reserve. For the rest we could safely rely upon their being received with open arms and hospitably entertained by the natives they might meet with along the route we had taken. A similar service of couriers was established between Ngongo and the Kenia; as this latter distance was about 120 miles it was covered by two stages. Thus there was a total of ten stages, and it was anticipated that news from Kenia would reach Mombasa in ten days--an anticipation which proved to be correct.
The march through the forest-land of Kikuyu, which was entered on the 25th, was marked by no noteworthy incident. When, early on the morning of the 27th, we reached the open, we found ourselves at first in a thick fog, which was inconvenient to us Caucasians merely in so far as it hid the view from us; but our Swahili people, who had never before experienced a temperature of 53° Fahr. in connection with a damp atmosphere, had their teeth set chattering. To the northerners, and particularly to the mountaineers among us, there was something suggestive of home in the rolling masses of fog permeated with the balmy odours of the trees and shrubs. About eight A.M. there suddenly sprang up a light warm breeze from the north; the fog broke with magical rapidity, and before us lay, in the brilliant sunshine, a landscape, the overpowering grandeur of which mocks description. Behind us and on our left was the marvellous forest which we had not long since left; right in front of us was a gently sloping stretch of country in which emerald meadows alternated with dark banana-groves and small patches of waving corn. The ground was everywhere covered with brilliant flowers, whose sweet perfume was wafted towards us in rich abundance by the genial breeze. Here and there were scattered small groups of tall palms, some gigantic wide-spreading fig-trees, planes, and sycamores; and numerous herds of different kinds of wild animals gave life to the scene. Here frolicked a troop of zebras; there grazed quietly some giraffes and delicate antelopes; on the left two uncouth rhinoceroses chased each other, grunting; about 1,100 yards from us a score of elephants were making their way towards the forest; and at a greater distance still some hundreds of buffaloes were trotting towards the same goal.
This splendid country stretched out of sight towards the east and the south-east, traversed by the broad silver band of the Guaso Amboni, which, some five miles off, and perhaps at a level of above 300 feet below where we were standing, flowed towards the east, and, so far as we could see, received at least a dozen small tributaries from sources on both of the enclosing slopes. The tributaries springing from the Kikuyu forest on the southern side--on which we were--are the smaller; those from the northern side are incomparably more copious, for their source is the Kenia range. This giant among the mountains of Africa, which covers an area of nearly 800 square miles and rises to a height of nearly 20,000 feet, now--despite the 50 miles between us and that--showed itself to our intoxicated gaze as an enormous icefield with two crystalline peaks sharply projected against the dark firmament.
Even the Swahili, who are generally indifferent to the beauties of nature, broke out into deafening shouts of delight; but we whites stood in speechless rapture, silently pressed each other's hands, and not a few furtively brushed a tear from the eye. The Land of Promise lay before us, more beautiful, grander, than we had dared to dream--the cradle of a happy future for us and, if our hopes and wishes were not vain, for the latest generations of mankind.
From thence onward it was as if our feet and the feet of our beasts had wings. The pure invigorating air of this beautiful tableland, freshened by the winds from the Kenia, the pleasant road over the soft short grass, and the sumptuous and easily obtained provisions, enabled us to make our daily marches longer than we had yet done. On the evening of the 27th we crossed the eastern boundary of Kikuyu, where we had to lay in large stores of provisions, because we then entered a district where the only population consisted of a few nomadic Andorobbo. As far as we could see, the country resembled a garden, but man had not yet taken possession of this paradise. The 28th and the greater part of the 29th found us marching through flowery meadows and picturesque little woodlands, and crossing murmuring brooks and streams of considerable size; but the only living things we met with were giraffes, elephants, rhinoceroses, buffaloes, zebras, antelopes, and ostriches, with hippopotamuses and flamingoes on the river banks. Most of these creatures were so tame that they scarcely got out of our way, and several overbold zebras accompanied us for some distance, neighing and capering as they went along. On the afternoon of the 29th we entered the thick highland forest, which stretched before us farther than we could see, and through the dense underwood of which the axe of our pioneers had to cut us a way. The ground had been gradually ascending for two days--that is, ever since we had left the Amboni--and it now became steeper; we had reached the foot of the Kenia mountain. The forest zone proved to be of comparatively small breadth, and on the morning of the 30th we emerged from it again into open undulating park-land. When we had scaled one of the heights in front of us, there lay before us, almost within reach of our hands, the Kenia in all the icy magnificence of its glacier-world.
We had reached our goal!
It was eight weeks since we had left Mombasa, a shorter time than had ever been taken by any caravan in Equatorial Africa to cover a distance of more than 600 miles. During the whole time we had all been, with unimportant exceptions, in good health. There had been seven cases of fever among us whites, caused by the chills that followed sudden storms of rain; the fever in all these cases disappeared again in from two to eight days, and left no evil results. Twice a number of cases of colic occurred among both whites and blacks, on both occasions resulting simply from gastronomic excesses, first in Teita and then at the Naivasha lake; and these were also cured, without evil results, by the use of tartar emetic. These sanitary conditions, exceptionally favourable for African journeys, even in the healthy highlands, were the result of the judicious marching arrangements, and, particularly among us whites, of the care taken to provide for all the customary requirements of civilised men. Tea, coffee, cocoa, meat extract, cognac to use with bad water, light wine for the evening meals, tobacco, and cigars, were always abundantly within reach; our mackintoshes and waterproof boots while marching, and the waterproof tents in camp, protected us from the wet--the chief source of fever; and we were assisted to bear our lesser privations and inconveniences by our zeal for our task, and not least by the fine balmy air which, from Teita onwards, we almost always breathed. Our saddle-horses and sumpter beasts also were, by the nourishing feed and the judicious treatment which they received, enabled to bear well the heavy labours of the march.
I cannot forbear expressing the opinion that the heavy losses of other caravans, which sometimes lose all their beasts in a few days, are to be ascribed less to the climate or to the--in the lowlands, certainly very troublesome--insect pests, than to the utter inexperience of the Swahili in the treatment of animals. Had we relied merely upon our blacks, we should have left most of our beasts, and certainly all our horses, on the road to feed the vultures and hyenas. The horses would never have been allowed to cool before they drank, they never would have been properly groomed, if we had not continually insisted upon these things being done, and given a good example by attending to our saddle-horses ourselves. That the 'white gentleman' attended to his horse's wants before he attended to his own wrought such an effect upon the Swahili that at last their care for their beasts developed into a kind of tenderness. The consequence was that during the whole journey we lost only one camel, three horses, and five asses--and of these last only two died of disease, the other three having been killed by wild beasts. Of the dogs, we lost three by wild beasts--one by a rhinoceros, and two by buffaloes.
From the moment of our arrival at the Kenia, the conduct of the expedition devolved into my hands. My first care on the next morning was to despatch to our friends in Europe my detailed journal of the events which had already happened, together with a brief closing report. In the latter I stated that we could undertake to have everything ready for the reception of many thousands of our brethren by the next harvest--that is, according to the African calendar, by the end of October. We could also undertake to get finished a road suitable for slow-going vehicles from Mombasa to Kenia by the end of September at the latest, with draught oxen in sufficient number. I asked the managers of the Society, on their part, to have a sufficient number of suitable waggons constructed in good time; and I, on my part, engaged that, from and after the first of October, any number of duly announced immigrant members should be conveyed to their new home safely and with as little inconvenience as was possible under the circumstances. In conclusion, I asked them to send at once several hundredweight of different kinds of goods, accompanied by a new troop of vigorous young members.
The two couriers with this despatch--the couriers had always to ride in twos--started before dawn on the 1st of July; punctually on the 10th the despatch was in Mombasa, on the 11th at Zanzibar; on the same day the committee received my report by telegraph from our agents in Zanzibar, and the journal, which went by mail-ship, they received twenty days later. On the evening of the 11th the reply reached Zanzibar; and on the 22nd I was myself able to read to my deeply affected brethren these first tidings from our distant friends. The message was very brief: 'Thanks for the joyful news; membership more than 10,000; waggons, for ten persons and twenty hundredweight load each, ordered as per request, will begin to reach Mombasa by the end of September; 260 horsemen, with 300 sumpter beasts, and 800 cwt. of goods start end of July. Send news as often as possible.' I had already anticipated the wish expressed in the last sentence, for not less than five further despatches had been sent off between the 6th and the 21st of July. What they contained will be best learnt from the following narrative of our experiences and our labours; and from this time forward a distinction has to be made between the work of preparing the new home on the Kenia and the arrangements necessary for keeping up and improving our communication with the coast.
On the evening of the last day of June we had pitched our camp on the bank of a considerable stream, the largest we had yet seen. Its breadth is from thirty to forty yards, and its depth from one to three yards. The water is clear and cool, but its current is strikingly sluggish. It flows from north-west to south-east, through a trough-like plateau about eighteen miles long, which bends, crescent-shaped, round the foot-hills of the Kenia. The greatest breadth of this plateau in the middle is nearly nine miles, whilst it narrows at the west end to less than a mile, and at the east end to two miles and a half. This trough-like area of about 100 square miles consists entirely of rich grass-land, with numerous small groves of palms, bananas, and sycamores. It is bounded on the south by the grassy hills which we had crossed over, on the west by abrupt rocky walls, on the north partly by dark forest-hills, and partly by barren lofty rocks which hide from view the main part of the Kenia lying behind them. On the east, between the hills to the south and the rocks to the north, there is an opening through which the stream finds its outlet by a waterfall of above 300 feet, and the thunder and plashing of which were audible at the great distance at which we were. This river, which was later found to be the upper course of the Dana, entering the Indian Ocean on the Witu coast, enters our plateau by a narrow gate of rocks through which we were not at first able to pass. From the north, down the declivities of the foot-hills of the Kenia, four larger and many smaller streams hurry to the Dana, and in their course through their rocky basins form a number of more or less picturesque cascades. The height of this large park-like plateau above the sea-level, measured at its lowest point--the stream-bed--is nearly 6,000 feet.
Whilst we were engaged in the detailed examination of this lofty plateau, I sent out several expeditions, whose duty it was to penetrate as far as possible into the Kenia range, in order to find elevated points from which to make exact observations of the form and character of the district lying around us. For though the country immediately about us charmed us so much, yet I would not definitively decide to lay the foundation-stone of our first settlement until I had obtained at least a superficial view of the whole region of the Kenia. The information which Sakemba was able to give us was but little, and insufficient. We were therefore much delighted when eight natives, whom we recognised as Andorobbo, showed themselves before our camp. They had seen our camp-fires on the previous night, and now wished to see who we were, Sakemba, who went out to them, quickly inspired them with confidence, and we now had the best guides we could have wished for. With Sakemba's help we soon informed them of our first purpose--namely, to send out eight different expeditions, each under the guidance of an Andorobbo. The first expedition returned on the evening of the same day, and the last at the end of a week, and all with tolerably exhaustive reports.
Not one of the expeditions had got near the summit of the Kenia. Nevertheless, grand views had been obtained from various easily accessible points of the main body of the mountain, some of them at an altitude of above 10,000 feet. It had been found that the side of the Kenia best adapted to the rearing of stock and to agriculture was that by which we had approached it. To the eastward and northward were large stretches of what appeared to be very fertile land; but that on the east was very monotonous, and lacked the not merely picturesque, but also practically advantageous, diversity of open country and forest, hill and plain, which we found in the south. On the north the country was too damp; and on the west there spread out an endless extent of forest broken by only a small quantity of open ground. It might all be converted into most productive cultivated land at a later date; but, at the outset, soil that was ready for use was naturally to be preferred. The inner portions of the mountain district before us were filled with wooded hills and rocks traversed by numberless valleys and gorges. These foot-hills reached on all sides close to the abruptly rising central mass of the Kenia; only in the south-west, about three miles from the western end of our plateau, did the foot-hills retire to make room for an extensive open valley-basin, in the middle of which was a lake, the outflow from which was the Dana. Our experts estimated the superficies of this valley at nearly sixty square miles; and all agreed that it was very fertile, and that its situation made it a veritable miracle of beauty. The best way into this valley was through the gorge by which the Dana flowed; but, so long as we were without suitable boats, we were obliged to enter the valley not directly from our plateau, but by a circuitous route through a small valley to the south.
I received this report on the morning of the 3rd of July. Next day, without waiting for the return of two of the expeditions which were still absent, I started for this much-lauded lake and valley. The indicated route, which proved to be, in fact, a very practicable one, led from our camp to the western end of the plateau, then bending towards the south and skirting a small, rocky, wooded hill, it entered a narrow valley leading in a northerly direction. This valley opened into the Dana gorge, which is here neither so narrow nor so impassable as at its opening into the plateau. Following this gorge upwards, in an hour we found ourselves suddenly standing in the sought-for valley.
The view was perfectly indescribable. Imagine an amphitheatre of almost geometrical regularity, about eleven miles long by seven miles and a half broad, the semicircle bounded by a series of gently rising wooded hills from 300 to 500 feet high, with a background formed by the abrupt and rugged precipices and cloud-piercing snowy summit of the Kenia. This majestic amphitheatre is occupied on the side nearest to the Kenia by a clear deep-blue lake; on the other side by a flowery park-land and meadows. The whole suggests an arena in which a grand piece, that may be called 'The Cascades of the Kenia Glaciers,' is being performed to an auditory consisting of innumerable elephants, giraffes, zebras, and antelopes. At an inaccessible height above, numberless veins of water, kissed by the dazzling sunlight, spring from the blue-green shimmering crevasses. Foaming and sparkling--now shattered into vapour reflecting all the hues of the rainbow, now forming sheets of polished whiteness--they rush downwards with ever increasing mass and tumult, until at length they are all united into one great torrent which, with a thundering roar plainly audible in a favourable wind six miles away, hurries from its glacier home towards the precipitous rocks. There the whole colossal mass of water--which a few miles off forms the Dana river--falls perpendicularly down from a height of 1,640 feet, so dashed into vapour-dust as to form a great rainbow-cloud. The stream suddenly disappears in mid-air, and the eye seeks in vain to track its course against the background of dark glistening cliffs until, more than 1,600 feet below, the masses of falling vapour are again collected into flowing water, thence, with the noise and foam of many smaller cascades, to reach the lake by circuitous routes.
Speechless with delight, we gazed long at this unparalleled natural miracle, whose grandeur and beauty words cannot describe. The eye eagerly took in the flood of light and glittering colour, and the ear the noise of the water pealing down from a fabulous height; the breast greedily inhaled as a cordial the odorous air which was wafted through this enchanted valley. The woman who was with us--Ellen Fox--was the first to find words. Like a prophetess in an ecstasy, she looked long at the play of the water; then, suddenly, as a stronger breath of wind completely dissipated the vaporous veil of the waterfall, which just before had formed a waving, sabre-like, shimmering band, she cried, 'Behold, the flaming sword of the archangel, guarding the gate of Paradise, has vanished at our approach! Let us call this place Eden!'
The name Eden was unanimously adopted. That this valley must be our future place of abode was at once decided by all of us. A more careful examination showed its superficies to be over sixty-two square miles. Allowing thirteen miles for the elliptical lake stretching out under the Kenia cliffs, and fifteen miles for the woods which clothed the heights around the valley, there remained above thirty miles of open park-land surrounding the lake, except where the Kenia cliffs touched the water, stretching in narrow strips to the Kenia on the north-east, and broadening on the other sides to from 1,100 yards to four miles. The glacier-water forming the Dana entered the valley on the north-west, and left it on the south-east. The water, which was not so cold when it entered the lake as might have been expected, rapidly acquired a higher temperature in the lake; on hot days the lake rose to 75° Fahr. Other streams fall into the lake, some of them from the Kenia cliffs, and others from the various hills which surround the valley. We counted not less than eleven such streams, among them a hot one with a temperature of 125° Fahr.
Naturally we had not been idle during the four days which preceded our discovery of Eden Vale. On the 1st of July, a few hours after the couriers with the first despatches, the expeditions appointed to establish regular communication with Mombasa were sent off. There were two such expeditions: one, under Demestre and three other engineers, had to construct the road; and the other, under Johnston, had to procure the draught oxen--of which it was estimated about 5,000 would be required--and to arrange for the provisioning of the whole distance. To the first expedition were allotted twenty of our members and two hundred of our Swahili men, with a train of fifty draught beasts; with Johnston went merely ten of ourselves, twenty draught beasts, and ten sheep-dogs. How these expeditions accomplished their tasks shall be told later.
I had now sent away altogether 58 of our own people, 200 Swahili men, and 181 saddle and draught beasts, besides having lost nine of the latter by death during the journey. I had, therefore, now with me at the Kenia 149 whites, 80 Swahili, and 475 beasts, besides the dogs and the elephants. In addition to the above, we were offered the services of several hundred of the Wa-Kikuyu, who had followed us. Of these latter I retained 150 of the most capable; the others, in charge of five of ourselves, I sent back at once to their home, with the commission to purchase and send on to the Kenia 800 strong draught oxen, 150 cows, 400 oxen for slaughter, and several thousand hundredweight of various kinds of corn and food. Having attended to these things, I allotted and gave out to the most suitable hands the many different kinds of work which had first to be done. One of our workmen had charge of the forge and smithy, another the saw-mill, with, of course, the requisite assistance. A special section was told off for the tree-felling, and another section had to get ready and complete the agricultural implements. One of the engineers who remained at the Kenia was appointed, with one hundred blacks under him, to construct the requisite means of communication in the settlement--particularly to build bridges over the Dana.
On the 5th of July we shifted our settlement to Eden Vale. The ground was exactly measured, and on the shores of the lake the future town was marked out, with its streets, open spaces, public buildings, and places of recreation. In this projected town we allowed space for 25,000 family houses, each with a considerable garden; and this covered thirteen square miles. Outside of the building area--which could be afterwards enlarged at pleasure--2,500 acres were selected for temporary cultivation, and irrigated with a network of small canals; as soon as possible it was to be fenced in to protect it against the incursions of the numberless wild animals that swarmed around it, as well as from our domestic animals which, though shut up at night in a strong pen, were allowed during the day, when they were not in use, to pasture in the open country under the care of some of the Swahili men and the dogs.
In the meantime, the saw-mill, which had been set up in the Dana plateau, hard by the river, and had for its motive-power one of the rapid streams that came down from the hills, had begun its work. The first timber which it cut up was used in the construction of two large flat boats, in which the transportation of the building timber up the river to the Eden lake was at once begun. A few weeks later, on the shores of the lake, there had arisen forty spacious wooden buildings, into which we whites removed from the confined camp-tents we had previously occupied. The negroes preferred to remain in the grass huts which they had made for themselves in the shelter of a little wood. By this time the cattle were also furnished with their pen, which was high and strong enough to offer an insurmountable obstacle to any invasion by quadrupeds. In this pen there was room for about two thousand beasts, and it was, moreover, provided with a covered space for protection against rain.
By the 9th of July, our smiths, wheelwrights, and carpenters had converted ten of the ploughshares we had brought with us into ploughs, and by the same date the first consignment of cattle had come in from Kikuyu--120 oxen and 50 cows, together with 200 sheep and a large quantity of poultry. Ploughing was at once attempted, under the direction of our agriculturists. The Kikuyu oxen struggled a little against the yoke, and at first they could not be made to keep in the furrow; but in three days we were able to work them with ease in teams of eight to a plough. This expenditure of force was necessary, as the black fat soil, matted by the thick virgin turf, was extremely difficult to break up. At first it was necessary to have a driver to every pair of oxen, and the furrows were not so straight as if ploughed by long-domesticated oxen; but at any rate the ground was broken up, and in a comparatively short time the beasts got accustomed to their work and went through it most satisfactorily. On the 15th of July a fresh arrival of oxen brought fifteen more ploughs into use; and again on the 20th. By the end of the month, with these forty ploughs, some 750 acres had been broken up. This was at once harrowed and prepared for the seed. It was then sown with what seed-corn we had brought with us--chiefly wheat and barley--supplemented to the extent of about three-fourths by African wheat andmtamacorn. The ground was then rolled again, and the work was finished in the second half of August. The whole of the cultivated area was then hedged in, and we cheerfully greeted the beginning of the shorter rainy season.
In the meantime a garden--provisionally of about twenty-five acres--had been laid out, a little farther from the precincts of the town than the arable land; for whilst the latter could easily be removed farther away as the town increased, it was necessary to find for the garden as permanent a site as possible--one therefore that lay outside of the range of the growth of the town. As we had among us no less than eighteen skilled gardeners, and as these had as much assistance as they required from the Swahili and Wa-Kikuyu, the twenty-five acres were in a few months planted with the choicest kinds of fruits and berries, vegetables, flowers--in short, with all kinds of useful and ornamental plants which we had brought from our old homes, had collected on our way, or had met with in the neighbourhoods in which we had settled. The garden also was covered with a network of irrigating canals, and enclosed against unwelcome intruders by a high and strong fence.
Against accidental inroads of monkeys there was no other protection than the vigilance of our dogs and the guns of the gardeners. A war of annihilation was therefore begun against the monkeys of the whole district, of which there were untold legions in the woods that girdled Eden Vale and in some small groves in the vale itself. While we shot other animals only when we needed their flesh, the monkeys were destroyed wherever they showed themselves in the neighbourhood of Eden Vale; and very soon the cunning creatures began carefully to avoid the inhospitable valley, whilst outside of it they retained their former daring. Several other animals were also excluded from the general law of mercy, and that even more rigorously than the monkeys, which were proscribed only within the boundaries of the valley. These animals were leopards and lions, against which we organised, whenever we had time, serious hunting expeditions. After a few months these animals entirely disappeared from the whole district; and subsequently they almost voluntarily forsook all the districts into which we penetrated with our weapons and with our noisy activity. They have room enough elsewhere, and hold it to be unnecessary to expose their skin to the bullets of white men. On the other hand, we did not molest the hyenas; the harm which they now and then did by the theft of a sheep was more than compensated for by their usefulness as devourers of carrion. They are shy, cowardly beasts, which do not readily attack anything that is alive; but in the character of unwearied sanitary police they scour field and forest for dead animals. In the list of beasts not to be spared stood at first the hippopotamuses, which haunted the Eden lake and the Dana in large herds. We should have had nothing to object to in these uncouth brutes if they had not molested our boats and behaved aggressively towards our bathers. But, after our shells had somewhat lessened their number, and in particular after certain uncommonly daring old fellows had been disposed of, the rest acquired respect for us and kept at a distance whenever they saw a man; we then relaxed our severity, and for the time contented ourselves with keeping them out of Eden Vale. But of course we showed no mercy to the numberless crocodiles that infested the lake and the river. We attacked these with bullet and spear, with hook and poison, day and night, in every conceivable way; for we were anxious that our women and children, when they came, should be able to bathe in the refreshing waters without endangering their precious limbs. As the district which these animals frequented was in the present case a very circumscribed one--fresh individuals could come neither down from the Kenia nor over the waterfall at the end of the great plateau--we soon succeeded in so thinning their numbers that only a few examples were left, the destruction of which we handed over to our Andorobbo huntsmen, whom we furnished with weapons for this Purpose, and to whom we offered a large premium for every crocodile slain in the Eden lake or in the Dana above the waterfall. As a fact, before the arrival of the first caravan of immigrants, the last crocodile had disappeared from Eden Vale and from the basin of the Dana.
Agriculture, gardening, and the chase had not absorbed all the strength at our disposal. We were at the same time busy constructing a number of practicable roads round the lake, along the river-bank to the east end of the plateau, and a number of branches from this main road to different parts of our district. It must not be imagined that these roads were works of art--they were merely fieldways, which, however, made it possible to carry about considerable loads without the expenditure of an enormous amount of force. In three places the Dana was bridged over for vehicular traffic, and in two others for foot traffic. Only in two places was much work required--at the end of the gorge through which the Dana passed from Eden Vale into the great plateau, and at a place where the Kenia cliffs touched the lake. At these places several cubic yards of rock had to be blown away, in order to make room for a road.
As in the meanwhile neither wheelwrights nor smiths had been standing still, when the roads were ready there were also ready for use upon them a number of stout waggons and barrows.
The construction of the flour-mill demanded a greater expenditure of labour. The mill was fixed on the upper course of the Dana, 1,100 yards above the entrance of the river into the Eden lake, and was furnished with ten complete sets of machinery. The site was chosen because just above there was a strong rapid, while below the Dana flowed calmly with a very trifling fall until it reached the great cataract. Thus we had, through the whole of the provisionally occupied district, a splendid waterway to the mill, and yet for the mill we could take advantage of the rapid flow of the upper Dana. We had brought from Europe the more complicated and delicate parts of this mill; but the wheels, shafts, and the ten millstones we manufactured ourselves. This mill--which was provisionally constructed of wood only--was ready by the end of September, thanks to the additional assistance of the two instalments of members which had reached us in the early part of the same month.
I have already mentioned that, as soon as we had reached the Kenia, I asked our committee for fresh supplies and a fresh body of pioneers; and that the committee had informed me that at the end of July there would start an expedition of 260 horsemen and 800 cwt. of goods upon 300 beasts. This expedition reached Mombasa on the 18th of August. Then it divided into two groups: one group, containing the most adventurous 145 horsemen, started at once on the 18th of August with fifty very lightly loaded led-horses--the whole of the 300 sumpter beasts were horses--without taking with them a single native except an interpreter. They relied upon the assistance of those of our men who were constructing the roads, and of the population friendly to us; but they were at the same time resolved to bear without murmuring any deprivations and fatigue that might await them. A forced ride of twenty days, with only a one day's rest at Taveta, brought these brave fellows among us on the 9th of September. Five horses had died, seven others had to be left behind knocked up; they themselves, however, all reached us, except one who had broken his leg in a fall, and was left in good hands in Miveruni, somewhat exhausted, but otherwise in good condition. The newly arrived joined us heartily in our work two days after. The 115 others reached us ten days later, with 250 sumpter horses and 100 Swahili drivers. The greater part of the goods they had given to Johnston on the way, who met with them at Useri, where he had been eagerly awaiting them. The articles brought to us at the Kenia--in all something over 300 cwt.--contained a quantity of tools and machinery; these, and especially the considerable addition of workmen, contributed in no small degree to expedite our various works.
The flour-mill was--as has been stated--ready by the end of September. It at once found abundant employment. It is true that our harvest was not yet gathered in; but we had been gradually purchasing different kinds of grain--to the amount of 10,000 cwt.--of the Wa-Kikuyu, and had stored it near the lake in granaries, for which the saw-mill had supplied the building material. All this grain was ground by the end of October; and, even if our harvest had failed, the first few thousands of those who were coming would not have had to suffer hunger.
But our harvest did not fail. A few weeks after the beginning of the hot season--which begins in October--the fertile soil, which had been continuously kept moist by our system of irrigation, blessed us with a crop that mocked all European conceptions. Every grain sowed yielded on an average a hundred and twenty fold. Our 750 acres yielded 42,000 cwt, of different kinds of grain, for each haulm ended, not in single lean ears, but in thick heavy bunches of ears--our European wheat and barley not less than the African kinds. We had fortunately made ample preparation for the work of the harvest. Before the end of August a machine-factory had been erected a few hundred yards above the flour-mill. Water-power was used, and the work of manufacture began at once. Partly of materials brought with us, but mainly of materials prepared by ourselves, we had constructed several reaping-machines and two threshing-machines, worked by horse-power.
Our factories were able to produce these machines because our geologists had discovered, among other valuable mineral treasures, iron and coal in our district. The coal lay in one of the foot-hills of the Kenia, on the Dana plateau, nearly two miles from the river; the iron in one of the foot-hills which the Dana in its upper course had cut through, a mile and a quarter above Eden Yale. The coal was moderately good anthracite, and the iron ore was a rich forty-percent. ferro-manganese. A smelting and refining furnace, as well as an iron-works, were at once put up near the source of the iron; they were of a, primitive and provisional character, but they sufficed to supply us with serviceable cast and wrought iron, and thus to make us at once independent of the supplies brought from Europe. We now possessed a small but independent iron industry, and this enabled us to gather in and work up within a few weeks the unexpectedly rich harvest.
A further use which we immediately made of our increased powers of production was to put up two new saw-mills and a brewery. The saw-mills were needed to supply material for the shelter of the continually increasing stream of fresh arrivals; and the brewery was intended to serve as a means of agreeably surprising the new-comers with a welcome draught of a familiar beverage with which most of them would be sorry to dispense. As soon as the barley was cut and threshed, it was malted. Our gardeners had grown hops of very acceptable quality on the sides of the Kenia foot-hills; and soon a cool cellar, made by utilising some natural caverns, was filled with casks of the noble drink.
By the end of October we were able to contemplate our four months' labours with a restful satisfaction. Six hundred neat block-houses awaited as many families; 50,000 cwt. of corn and flour, copious supplies of cattle for slaughter and draught, building material and tools, were ready for the food, shelter, and equipment of many thousands of members. The garden had been not less successfully cultivated, and its dainty gifts were already beginning to be enjoyed. Our own garden-produce did not, as yet, suffice to cover our anticipated requirements; but it continued to be supplemented by a brisk barter trade with the Wa-Kikuyu. For these natives we had established a regular weekly market in Eden Vale, which several hundreds of them attended, bringing with them their goods upon ox-carts, the use of which we had introduced among them and had made possible by means of the roads our engineers had constructed through their country. Since we had set up our iron-works, the Wa-Kikuyu came to us principally for iron either in a raw condition or made up into tools. For this they at first bartered cattle and vegetables; afterwards, when we no longer needed these things, they offered mainly ivory, of which we had already acquired 138 tons, partly through our trade with the Wa-Kikuyu and the Andorobbo, and partly as the fruits of our own hunting. For ivory is as cheap here as blackberries; the Wa-Kikuyu and the Andorobbo are glad to buy our wrought iron for double its weight in the material which is so valuable in the West. An iron implement, whether hammer, nail, or knife, is exchanged for from ten to twenty times its weight in ivory. Thus almost the whole cost of our expedition was already covered by our ivory--the cattle and provisions, the implements and machinery, not to speak of the land, being thrown in gratis.
Whilst we at the Kenia were thus busily preparing a comfortable home for our brethren who were expected from the Old World, our colleagues, under the direction of Demestre and Johnston, were working not less successfully on the tasks allotted to them.
Demestre had nothing to do with the construction of roads within the Kenia district; his work began with the great forests that girdled this district. The execution of the work from thence to the boundary between Kikuyu and Masailand, at Ngongo, he deputed to the engineer Frank, an American; the second section, from Ngongo to Masimani in Masailand, midway between Ngongo and Taveta, was allotted to the engineer Möllendorf, a German; the third section, from Masimani to Taveta, to Lermanoff, a Russian, as his name shows; the last and most difficult section, from Taveta to Mombasa, including two of the worst deserts, Demestre reserved to himself. To each of the four sections five whites were appointed. His 200 Swahili, strengthened by double that number of Wa-Kikuyu hired on the march through their land, Demestre divided between the first two sections, allotting 50 Swahili and 300 Wa-Kikuyu to the first in Kikuyuland, and 150 Swahili and 100 Wa-Kikuyu to the second in Masailand. The third section was organised from Taveta. Lermanoff and a companion rode thither from Kenia, by making use of our courier-stages, in six days. He engaged 100 Swahili men in Taveta--where Swahili caravans are always to be met with--and 250 natives in Useri and Chaga. In the meantime his four colleagues had arrived and brought with them the pack-horses allotted to his--as to each--section; and the work from Taveta to Useri was begun on the 15th of July. Demestre also made use of the courier-stages, and rode, with no other breaks than night-rests, first to Teita, where he hired 400 Wa-Teita, whom he at once set to work, under the direction of one of his colleagues, upon the road between Teita and Taveta. He then hastened on to Mombasa, and by the 20th of July he was able to put 500 people of the coast upon the most difficult part of the work--the road from Mombasa to Teita.
The work to be done in all cases was threefold. First, in the places where there was a deficiency of water--of which places there were several in the lower sections, particularly in the deserts of Duruma, Teita, and Ngiri--wells had to be dug and, where there was no spring-water, cisterns made capacious enough to supply water sufficient not merely for the workmen during the construction of the road, but afterwards for the men and cattle of the caravans that passed that way. As there occur in Equatorial Africa at all seasons of the year heavy storms of rain, which in the so-called hot season are only much less frequent than in the so-called rainy season, there was no danger that large cisterns draining the rain-water from a sufficiently wide area would be exhausted even in the hot months; but the cisterns had to be protected from the direct rays of the sun as well as from impurities. The former was effected by providing the cisterns with covering and shelter; the second by making the rain-water filter through layers, several yards thick, of sand and gravel. The natural water-holes, which are found in all deserts, but which dry up in times of protracted drought, indicated the spots where it would be most practicable to construct cisterns, for such spots were naturally the lowest points. The larger of these water-holes needed only to be deepened, the evaporation of the water guarded against, and the cisterns surrounded by the above-mentioned natural filter, and the work was then finished. Of these in the different sections twenty five were dug, with a depth of from nine to sixteen yards and a diameter of from two to nine yards. Of ordinary wells with spring-water thirty-nine were made. Each of these artificial supplies of water was placed under the protection of a watchman.
In the second place, there was the road-making itself. In general, the route which the expedition had taken from Mombasa to the Kenia was chosen, and merely freed from obstacles and widened to twice its original width where it led through bush. But at certain places, particularly where steep heights had to be traversed, it was necessary to look for a fresh and less hilly track. That several bridges had to be built scarcely need be mentioned.
The third part of the work consisted in the erection of primitive houses of shelter, at suitable places, for both men and cattle. Accommodation for several hundred men, pens for cattle, and storehouses for provisions, were constructed at sixty-five stations, at distances varying from seven to twelve miles.
These works were all completed between Mombasa and Teita by the end of September, and in all the other sections fourteen days later. The workmen, however, were not discharged, as a part of them were required for guarding and maintaining the road and buildings, and another part found occupation in the transport service on the newly made highway. The cost of construction for the whole by no means small undertaking was £14,500, half of which went in wages and half in rations; the material used in the work cost nothing.
By this time Johnston had completed the purchase of the draught-beasts required for the transport service, and had organised the commissariat of the caravans. His Masai friends procured for him in a few weeks the originally ordered 5,000 head of cattle; and as every despatch from the committee of the Free Society reported a larger and larger number of members on their way to the settlement, our order was increased to 9,000, exclusive of the 750 head of cattle, the unused remnant of our presents which we had left behind us in Useri and Masailand. As the committee had reason to anticipate that by the end of October the number of members intending at once to join the colony would reach 20,000, they had enlarged their orders for waggons to 1,000, and announced that fact to us in the course of September. Therefore, as every waggon--which weighed 14 cwt., and would carry ten persons, with 20 cwt. of luggage--would require four yoke of oxen, the total number of draught-oxen needed would be 8,000, in addition to a reserve of 200 head, and 1,550 oxen and cows for slaughter. Johnston received this message on the southern frontier of Masailand, and, as there was not time to return, he had to complete his provisioning in the districts of Kilima and Teita. Nevertheless he succeeded in collecting the full number of cattle and distributing them along the sixty-five stages between Mombasa and the Kenia without materially raising prices by his purchases in these favoured districts. He bought 8,500 oxen and 500 cows, and the cost--including the travelling expenses and wages of the buyers and drivers--amounted to no more than £8,650--that is, the goods which we bartered for them had cost us this amount. Each head of cattle cost on the average a little over eight shillings, half of which represented incidental expenses, the bare selling price being less than four shillings a head.
Johnston so arranged the transport service that every day twenty-five waggons left Mombasa, and at every one of the sixty-five stations found fresh draught-oxen ready. Arrived at Eden Vale, the waggons had to return to Mombasa in the same manner. By this simple and practical arrangement, all the waggons were kept constantly in motion between Mombasa and the Kenia, whilst the draught-oxen merely moved to and fro in fixed teams between neighbouring stations. In this way 250 persons could be conveyed every day, and to convey 20,000--the total number of members reported by the committee--would require eighty days, unless some of them made the journey on horseback.
The waggons constructed in England, America, and Germany arrived punctually at Mombasa. They were in every respect models of skilful construction, solidly and yet, in proportion to their size, lightly built, affording many conveniences without sacrificing simplicity. Each one accommodated ten persons with sitting space in the day and with good sleeping space at night. By a very simple alteration of the seats, room could be made for ten persons--four above and six beneath. Strong springs made the riding easy, a movable leathern covering gave shelter from rain or sun, and the mattrasses which served as beds at night were by day so buckled on the under-side of the leathern covering as to afford double protection against the heat of the sun. Accommodation for the baggage was provided in a similarly practical manner.
The first ship, with 900 members, arrived on the 30th of September. This ship, like all that followed, was the property of the Society. Anticipating that the stream of emigrants would not soon cease, would probably continue to increase, and desirous to keep the transportation of the emigrants as much as possible in their hands, the Society had bought twelve large, swift-sailing steamships, averaging 3,500 tons burden, and had had them adapted to their purpose. They could do this without overstraining their resources; for, though the £940,000 which these twelve steamers cost exceeded the amount actually in hand, the Society could safely reckon that the deficit would soon be made good by the contributions of new members, to accommodate whom the vessels and all the other provisions were intended. In fact, by the middle of September the number of members exceeded 20,000, and the property of the Society had grown to £750,000. Of this amount, however, £150,000 had been spent independently of the purchase of the ships, and a similar amount would in the immediate future be required for the general purposes of the Society; thus less than half of the cost of the ships was in hand and available for payment. But the sellers readily gave the Society credit, and handed over the vessels without delay, even before any money was paid. They risked nothing by this, for the Society's executive were fully justified in calculating that the future income from new members would be at least £100,000 a month, while the Society's property was quite worth all the money they had hitherto spent upon it.
The chief thing, however, was that people were getting to have more and more faith in the success of the Society's undertaking, and to look upon that undertaking as representative of the great commonwealth of the future. Several governments already offered their assistance to the committee, who accepted those offers only so far as they afforded a moral support. A number of scientific and other public associations took a most lively interest in the aims of the Society. For example, the Geographical Societies of London and Rome gave, the one £4,000 and the other 50,000 lires, merely stipulating in return that a periodical report should be sent to them of all the scientifically interesting experiences of the Society. That the business world should also interest themselves in the Society's doings is not surprising. For the vessels which had been bought the Society made an immediate payment of forty per cent., and undertook to pay the remainder within three years. The whole was, however, paid off before the end of the second year.
The ships thus bought were employed to convey the emigrant members from Trieste to Mombasa. As each vessel carried from 900 to 1,000 passengers, while the waggons could convey 200 persons daily from Mombasa to the settlement, it was necessary that two ships should reach Mombasa per week; it being assumed that a part of the emigrants would prefer to travel from Mombasa on horseback. And as the average length of a voyage to Mombasa and back was thirty-five days, the twelve vessels were sufficient to maintain a continuous service, with an occasional extra voyage for the transport of goods, particularly of horses. There was no distinction of class on board the vessels of the Society; no fee was taken from anyone, either for transport or for board during the whole voyage, and everyone was therefore obliged to be content with the same kind of accommodation, which certainly was not deficient in comfort. On deck were large dining-rooms and rooms for social intercourse; below deck was a small sleeping-cabin for each family, comfortably fitted up and admirably ventilated. The members were received on board in the order in which they had entered the Society, the earlier members thus having the priority. Of course it was optional for any member to make the voyage on any ship not belonging to the Society, without losing his place in the list of claimants when he arrived at Mombasa.
At Mombasa everyone was at liberty to continue his journey either on horseback or in a waggon. The horsemen might either accompany the caravans or ride in advance in such stages as they pleased, only the horses must be changed regularly at the sixty-five stations, provision being made for a sufficient supply of horses. The travellers in waggons had, moreover, the option of going on night and day uninterruptedly, pausing only to effect the necessary changes of oxen; or of travelling more deliberately, halting as long as they pleased at the midday or the night stations. In the former case they could, in favourable weather, reach Eden Vale in fourteen days, or even less; in the latter case twenty days or more would be spent on the journey.
All the arrangements were perfectly carried out. There was no hitch anywhere. The commissariat left nothing to be desired. An escort of ten Masai, which Johnston had organised for each station, kept guard against wild beasts during the night journeys, and had to serve as auxiliaries in any difficulty; while four commissioners sent from among our members, and located respectively at Teita, Taveta, Miveruni, and Ngongo, superintended the whole. The natives greeted the first train of waggons with jubilant astonishment, but received all with the greatest friendliness and helpfulness. Particularly the Wa-Taveta, the Sultan of Useri, and the Masai tribes did not fail to overwhelm our travellers with proofs of their respect and love for the white brethren who had 'settled on the great mountain.'
The first new arrivals--among them our beloved master--entered Eden Valley on the 14th of October; they were followed by an uninterrupted series of fresh companies. But, before the story of this new era in the history of our undertaking is told, a brief account must be given of what had been taking place at the Kenia.
As early as August, a numerous deputation of Masai tribes from Lykipia--the country to the north-west of the Kenia--and from the districts between the Naivasha and the Baringo lakes, arrived at Eden Vale offering friendship, and asking to be admitted into the alliance between us and the other Masai. This very affecting request was made with evident consciousness of its importance, and the granting of it certainly placed us under new and heavy obligations. Yet I granted it without a moment's hesitation, and my act received the approval of all the members. For the pacification of the most quarrelsome and unquestionably the bravest of all the tribes of the equatorial zone was not too dearly bought by the sacrifice of a few thousand pounds sterling per annum. We now had a satisfactory guarantee that civilisation would gradually develop in these regions, which had hitherto been cursed by incessant feuds and pillage; that we should be able so to educate the black and brown natives that they would become more and more useful associates in our great work; and that, in proportion as we taught them to create prosperity and luxury for themselves, we should be increasing the sources of our own prosperity. So I addressed to the brown warriors a flattering panegyric, declared myself touched by the friendly sentiments they had expressed, and promised with all speed to send an embassy to them in order to conclude the treaty of alliance and to do them honour. They were sent away richly laden with presents; and they on their part had not come empty-handed, for they brought with them a hundred choice beasts, and two hundred fat-tailed sheep. Johnston, whom I at once informed of the incident, undertook the fulfilment of the promise I had given. I have already stated that for this purpose he provided himself with a full supply of the necessary goods from the baggage of the expedition which he met with in September on its way to the Kenia. When his task in the road-stages was finished, he started, about the beginning of October, for the Naivasha lake, and went thence through the extensive and, for the most part, exceedingly fertile high plateau--6,000 feet above the sea--which, bounded by hills from 3,300 to 6,600 feet higher, contains the elevated lakes of Masailand--namely, not only the Naivasha lake, the marvellous Elmeteita lake, and the salt lake of Nakuro, but also a series of smaller basins. On the 20th of October he reached the Baringo lake, on the northern limit of Masailand, a lake that covers 77 square miles in a depression of the land not more than 2,500 feet above the sea. Thence, in a westerly direction, he went over ground, rising again, past the grand Thomson Falls, through the wooded and well-watered Lykipia, and in the second week of November he reached us at the Kenia, having on the way contracted alliance with all the Masai tribes through whose lands he had passed, as well as with the 'Njemps' at the Baringo lake.
In the next place an account has to be given of the successful attempts made, at the instigation of our two ladies, to tame several of the wild animals indigenous to the Kenia. The idea was originated by Miss Fox, who in the first instance wished merely to provide pleasure for the women and children of the expected new arrivals. Miss Fox won over my sister, a great friend to animals, to this idea; and so they hired several Andorobbo and Wa-Kikuyu to capture monkeys and parrots, of which in Eden Vale there were several very charming species. The attempts to tame these creatures were successful beyond expectation--so much so that after a few weeks the captives, when let loose, voluntarily followed their mistresses. This excited the ambition of both of the ladies, and the Andorobbo were commissioned to capture some specimens of a particularly pretty species of antelope, which our naturalists decided to be a variety of the tufted antelope (Cephalophus rufilatus), which is almost peculiar to Western Africa. This attempt was also successful. It is true that the old animals proved to be so shy and intractable that they were at last allowed to go free; but several young ones became attached to their guardians with surprising rapidity, and followed them like dogs. These antelopes are not larger than a medium-sized sheep, and the young ones in particular look exceedingly pretty with their red tufts, and disport themselves like frisky kids. Miss Ellen and my sister soon had about them a whole menagerie of antelopes, monkeys, and parrots, trained to perform all sorts of tricks for the delectation of the children who were expected.
Thus matters stood when one of the elephant-keepers whom Miss Ellen had brought with her to the Kenia, and who had given up all thoughts of returning to their home, ventured to ask his 'mistress'--for the Indians could not accustom themselves to the idea that they were perfectly independent men--whether she would not like an elephant-baby also as a pet? Receiving an affirmative answer, he undertook to capture one or more, if he were allowed to go with the four elephants and their keepers into the woods for a few days. As Miss Ellen had allowed her elephants to be employed in the building operations, where these interesting colossi were of invaluable service, and as the work could not be interrupted for the sake of a plaything, she told the Indian that she would forego her wish, or at least would wait until the elephants could be more easily spared from the work. The Indian went away, but the idea that his beloved mistress should be deprived of anything that would--as he had at once perceived--have given her great pleasure, roused him out of his customary fatalistic indolence. He brooded over the matter for a couple of days, and on the third he appeared with the proposal to make good the loss of time occasioned by the temporary absence of the four elephants by capturing, with the aid of the other Cornaks, not only a young elephant, but also several old elephants, and training them for work. 'But African elephants cannot be trained like the Indian ones,' objected Miss Ellen. The Indian ventured to question this, and his seven colleagues were all of his opinion. Elephants were elephants; they would like to see an animal with a trunk that they could not tame in a few weeks if he only got into their hands. 'If it is really so, why have you not said so before; for you must have seen what good use can be made of elephants here?' asked the American, and received for answer merely a laconic 'Because you have not asked us.'
Miss Ellen did not know what to do. The idea of furnishing the colony of Eden Vale with herds of tame elephants--for if these animals could be tamed, there might as well be thousands as one--did not allow her to rest. On the other hand, she remembered to have read, in her natural-history studies, that African elephants were untameable. We all, when she asked us, were obliged to affirm that there were no tame elephants anywhere in Africa. She thought over this problem until she began to grow melancholy; evidently she was anxious that a trial should be made. But the Indians insisted upon the impossibility of capturing wild elephants without the assistance of the tame ones; and she shrank the more from using the latter in a doubtful attempt at a time when work urgently required doing, because the tame elephants were her own property, and therefore the decision depended entirely upon herself. Just then our zoologist, Signor Michaele Faënze, returned from a long excursion to the central mass of the Kenia; and when Miss Fox took him into her confidence, he at once sided with the Indians. He admitted that, as a matter of fact, there were no tame African elephants; but he maintained that this was simply because the Africans had forgotten how to make the noble beast serviceable to man. The reason did not lie in the character of the African elephant, for in the days of the Romans trained elephants were as well known in Africa as in Asia. They should let the Indians make an attempt; if the latter understood their business they would succeed as well in Africa as in India.
And so it turned out. The eight Cornaks with their four elephants went into the neighbouring forests; and when, as soon happened, they had found a herd of wild elephants, they did with them exactly as they had learnt to do at home. The tame elephants were sent without their attendants into the midst of the herd of wild ones, by whom they were at first greeted with some signs of surprise, but were ultimately received into companionship. The crafty animals then fixed their attention upon the leader of the herd, the strongest and handsomest bull, caressed him, whisked the flies off him, but in the meantime bound, with some strong cord they had taken with them, one of his legs to a stout tree. Having done this, they uttered their cry of alarm--a sharp trumpet-like sound--and ran off as if they had discovered some danger. On this signal, the Indians rushed forward with loud cries and the firing of guns, and thus caused the whole herd to rush off after the tame elephants. The poor prisoner, of course, could not run off with the rest, desperately as he strained at the ropes; and the Indians allowed him to stamp and trumpet, without for a while troubling themselves about him. Their next care was to follow the track of the escaped herd. In the course of an hour they had again crept up to it, to find that in the meantime the four tame elephants had repeated the same trick with a new victim, which was also fettered and then left in the same manner. In the course of the day three more elephants shared the same fate; and by that time the herd appeared to have grown suspicious, for their betrayers returned alone to their keepers.
Now first was a visit paid to the five captives, among whom was a female with a yearling about the size of a half-grown calf. The tame elephants went straight to the captives straining at the ropes, and bound their fore-feet tightly together. This was not done without furious resistance on the part of the betrayed beasts; but this resistance was overcome in a most brutal way by strokes of the trunk and by bites. Thereupon the merciless captors busied themselves removing from within their victims' reach everything that is pleasant to an elephant's palate--grass, bushes, and tree-twigs; and what their trunks could not do they enabled the keepers to do with axe and hatchet by dragging the captives down upon their sides.
When night came, all five captives were securely bound and deprived of every possibility of getting food. They were watched, however, to secure them from being attacked by lions or leopards. The next morning the tame elephants again visited their captive brethren one after the other, helped the fallen ones to get up--which was not effected without a good deal of thrashing and pushing--and then again left them to their fate.
This went on for three days; the poor captives suffered from hunger and thirst, and received barbarous blows from their treacherous brethren whenever the latter came near them. By the fourth day they had become so weak and subdued that they no longer roared, but pitifully moaned when their tormentors approached, which nevertheless fell upon them fiercely with trunk and teeth. Now a rescuing angel appeared to them, in human form. An Indian, with threatening actions and several noisy blows, drove the captors from their victim, and offered to the latter a vessel of water. If the wild elephant, struck with astonishment, took time to survey the situation, the tragi-comedy was over--the beast was tamed. For, in this case, he would, after a little hesitation, accept the proffered drink, and then a little food; he could afterwards be fed and watered without danger, and, under the escort of the tame elephants, led home for further training. If, on the contrary, the sight of the man maddened him--as was the case with three out of the five--the thrashing-and-hunger treatment had to be continued until the elephant began to understand that release from his situation could be afforded only by the terrible biped.
At last all the captives submitted to their fate. The only danger in this process consists in the necessity, on the part of the hunter, of relying upon the accuracy of his judgment concerning the captive's character when he first approaches him. It is true that the tame elephants stand by observant and ready to help; but as a single thrust of the tusk of an enraged animal may be fatal, the business requires a great deal of courage and presence of mind. However, the Indians asserted that anyone only partially accustomed to the ways of elephants could tell with certainty from the look of the animal what he meant to do; it was therefore necessary merely to take the precaution not to get very close to a captive elephant before reading in his eye submission to the inevitable, and then there was nothing to fear.
After an absence of six days, the expedition returned with the five captives, which were certainly not yet trained and serviceable for work, but were so far tame that they quietly allowed themselves to be shut up, fed, watered, and taught. In the course of another fortnight they were ready for use in all kinds of work, particularly when they had one of the veterans by their side. Miss Ellen had a double triumph: she possessed a charming baby elephant, which was certainly a little too clumsy for a lap-dog, but was nevertheless as droll a creature as could be, and soon made itself the acknowledged favourite of all Eden Vale; and she had besides opened out for the Society an inexhaustible source of very valuable motive power, of which no one would have thought but for her.
From that time forth we actively carried on the capture of elephants, so that in a little while the elephant was the chief draught-beast in the Kenia, and could be employed wherever heavy weights had to be removed to short distances or to places inaccessible to waggons.
This successful experiment with the elephants suggested to us the taming of other animals, for purposes, not merely of pleasure, but of utility. The first attempt was made upon the zebra, and was successful. Though the old animals were useless, the foals, when captured quite young, were tolerably tractable and not particularly shy; and in the second generation our tame zebras were not distinguishable from the best mules, except in colour. Ostriches and giraffes came next in the order of our domestic animals; but our trainers achieved their greatest triumph in taming the African buffalo. This is the most vicious, uncontrollable, and dangerous of all African beasts; and yet it was so thoroughly domesticated that in the course of years it completely supplanted the common ox as a draught-beast. The bulls that had grown up in a wild condition were, and remained, perfect devils; but the captured cows could be so thoroughly domesticated that they would eat out of their attendants' hands, and the buffaloes bred in a state of domestication exhibited exactly the same character as the ordinary domestic cattle. The bulls, especially when old, continued to be somewhat unreliable; but the cows and oxen, on the other hand, were as gentle and docile as any ruminant could be. They were never valued among us as milch kine--for, though their milk was rich, it was not great in quantity--but they were incomparable as draught-beasts. They were higher by half a foot than the largest domestic cattle; they measured two feet across the shoulders, and their horns were too thick at the base to be spanned by two hands. No load was too heavy for these gigantic beasts; two buffaloes would keep up their steady pace with a load that would soon have disabled four ordinary oxen. They bore hunger, thirst, heat, and rain better than their long-domesticated kindred; in short, they proved themselves invaluable in a country where good roads were not everywhere to be found.
The third incident--But this really concerns only me personally, and belongs to this narrative merely so far as it relates to the mode of life and the social conditions of Eden Vale. It will therefore be best if I next tell how we lived, what our habits were, and how we worked in the new home, before the arrival of the main body of our brethren.