CHAPTER VIFROM FAFA TO SAY

TUAREGS.

The English would have made him a peer, and put up statues in his honour; the ignorance of the French, I will not use a harsher word, drove him to commit suicide.

The example is certainly not encouraging to us later explorers.

I should have been more likely to win applause if I had pictured the Tuaregs as irreclaimable savages, relating a thousand entanglements with them, such as imaginary conflicts with their armed bands, where my own presence of mind and the courage of my party saved the expedition from massacre.

I have preferred in the interests of my country to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

Even as I write these words, I hear of the death of two young officers and their men, who were killed near Timbuktu in a fight with a Hoggar razzi. The Hoggars again!

This does but confirm what I insisted on when I was at Timbuktu, that we shall never succeed in gettingenrapportwith the nomad tribes except with the aid of those tribes themselves.

We must first subjugate certain tribes, and then form from amongst them auxiliary levies, or, as the natives call them,maghzen, which will aid us, at a minimum cost to ourselves, to establish French influence over the Tuaregs.

Amongst the tribes who would best lend themselves to this purpose, I place the Awellimiden in the very first rank, and they are the hereditary enemies of the Hoggars. Or perhaps I should rather have said, if we wish to bring about a complete pacification of the country, and at the same time win the friendship of the Awellimiden chief, we ought to strengthen his hands.

With this idea in my mind I make the following suggestions. We should arm the Awellimiden with a hundred or a couple of hundreds of percussion rifles, with very large nipples, which would only admit of the use of special caps turned out in French manufactories.

With one hundred such guns the Awellimiden would be invincible, and could soon butcher all their enemies, whether Kel Gheres or Hoggars.

The absolute necessity of having French percussion caps would place them entirely in our hands, and by doling out the ammunition needed little by little, we should force them to submit to and serve us. We should, moreover, have it in our power to break up their strength directly they showed any reluctance to fall in with our wishes.

In return for a service such as this supply of fire-arms, the Amenokal would protect our traders; he has already in fact promised to do so, not only by word of mouth but in writing.

These traders must, however, act with prudence and circumspection. I am quite convinced that I and my companions might fearlessly return to the Awellimiden becausethey know us now. I have suggested to our Government that we should return, but I have not been more successful in that direction than I have in getting the rifles I asked for.

Strangers must not attempt with a light heart to penetrate into the Tuareg districts, without having secured the formal protection of the chief.

What would you have? When a Grand Duke announces his intention of visiting the wine-shops of the outlying boulevards, don’t we always take care to send anhabituéof those boulevards with him to look after him? AJaumeor aRossignol[8]is always in attendance. And if a protector is useful in Paris, can we not well understand that one would be indispensable in the Sahara?

When Madidu has once said to a traveller “Yes, come,” or “You can go,” I am convinced that no danger would be run in the districts subject to him.

With the Awellimiden on our side we could conquer the Sahara, and the Tuaregs would help us to push on towards Lake Tchad, Air, Tunis and Algeria. He would find it to his own advantage to do so, and the conditions of his existence would be manifestly ameliorated.

Do you imagine that these Tuaregs are stupid enough to miss a chance of getting stuffs for clothes, coverlids, glass beads, and all the things they covet? If the men were sufficiently blind to their own interests, I’ll warrant you their wives would not be.

The Tuareg race will be tamed at last, their faults, all the result of the fierce struggle for existence, will disappear, and modern civilization will have conquered a new district in Africa!

One afterthought does, however, occur to me. Will the change be a good thing for the Tuaregs themselves?

When I think of their wandering life, free from all restraint, when I remember their courage, which to them is the highest of virtues, when I consider how truly equal all those worthy of equality are, I ask myself whether after all they are not happier than we Europeans?

Their life is a hard one, and their habits are frugal, but has not custom made this life natural to them, and are they really sensible of its privations?

Good fortune with them is the reward of the brave who know how to win the victory, and it is inrazzisthat the victory is gained. To spoil the vanquished is also to wash out the stain of an hereditary injury, for the vendetta is not confined to Italy, but often makes friendship impossible between certain tribes in Africa. The goods of him who perishes by the sword are the property of the wielder of that sword, and the death of the vanquished avenges some pillaged or massacred ancestor, as well as enriches the conqueror.

A rough rendering is given below of theSong of R’Otman, quoted by Duveyrier, who justly calls it the TuaregMarseillaise, which is chanted in defiance of the Chambas by the Azgueurs, who are their hereditary enemies.

Death to thy mother! Ma’atalla the devil is in thee!Call’st thou the Tuaregs traitors, the men of the plain?Ha! but they know how to travel, to fight in the battle,Sally at morn and return in the evening again!Aye, and they know how to fall on the enemy sleeping—Sleeping at ease in the tent with his flocks at his side,Lapped in his fine woollen garments, his curtains and carpetsSpreading full length in the shade of the canopy wide.What though with milk newly-drawn from the udders of camels,What though with meat and with butter his paunch he has filled,Straight as a nail to the ground pins the lance of the victor,Out with a shriek and a yell flies the soul of the killed!Sunk in despair lies the heart-broken wife of the victim,Scattered and vanished their goods like as water o’erspilled!

Death to thy mother! Ma’atalla the devil is in thee!

Call’st thou the Tuaregs traitors, the men of the plain?

Ha! but they know how to travel, to fight in the battle,

Sally at morn and return in the evening again!

Aye, and they know how to fall on the enemy sleeping—

Sleeping at ease in the tent with his flocks at his side,

Lapped in his fine woollen garments, his curtains and carpets

Spreading full length in the shade of the canopy wide.

What though with milk newly-drawn from the udders of camels,

What though with meat and with butter his paunch he has filled,

Straight as a nail to the ground pins the lance of the victor,

Out with a shriek and a yell flies the soul of the killed!

Sunk in despair lies the heart-broken wife of the victim,

Scattered and vanished their goods like as water o’erspilled!

Wild manners truly do these lines describe, but they also express proud and heroic sentiments. What will the Tuaregs gain by their transformation into civilized people?

In a few centuries, where the tents of the Amezzar are pitched there will be permanent towns. The descendants of the Ihaggaren of the present day will be citizens. There will be nothing about them to remind their contemporaries of the wild knights of the desert.

No more will they go to war; no more will they leadrazzisto ravage the camps of their neighbours, for they will have given up pillage altogether; but perhaps in a bank, which will take the place of the tent of their Amenokal, they will try to float rotten companies, and mines which exist nowhere but in the imagination of their chiefs. What will they be then? Not pillagers but thieves!

Truth to tell, I think I prefer my marauders, who fall on their prey like the lion Ahar!

AN AFRICAN CAMEL.

AN ISOLATED TREE AT FAFA.

Ourdread of the passage of the river at Fafa may have seemed almost childish, and we have since had experience of many another like it, but for a first attempt it must be admitted it was rather a teaser.

Narrow and much encumbered, made more difficult by a violent current, such is the pass of Fafa.

We took as guide the son of the chief of the village, who was later to pay us a visit at Say. Thanks to him and with the help of his men we crossed the first rapids without too much difficulty; but, alas! the rope which was used to transmit to the rudder the movements of the helm broke just as we emerged from them. Had this happened thirty seconds sooner theDavoustcould not have answered to her helm, and would have been flung upon the rocks. The damage repaired, we steered once more into the current, wending our way cautiously amongst the numerous islands, skirting the course of the reef, our good star bringing ussafely into a quiet reach extending as far as Wataguna, where we again came to flints lining the bed of the stream.

In the evening we reached Karu, theAubehaving struck once by the way, but without sustaining much damage; still all these shocks did not add to her waterproof qualities, and as she shipped more and more water our anxiety and fatigue became greater and greater. We had constantly to empty the hold, which did not conduce to the repose of the passengers, who were often woke up by the noise we made with our buckets.

FAFA.

Karu is a pretty little village with thatched huts, amongst which were many of the barns of a bee-hive shape used for storing millet alluded to by Barth. We had noticed a good number during the last few days. The inhabitants of this village are Rimaïbes or serfs of the Fulahs and Bellates or slaves of the Tuaregs.

The chief of the latter told us how glad he was to see some white men before he died. He added that he would like to give us some sheep, but he understood that we never ate anything except the flesh of black animals, and he had none of that colour.

I said that the colour of the wool did not trouble us at all; all we cared for was the quality of the flesh, and he went and fetched us a fine ram. It was the marabouts, who, to add to the probability of their report that we were sorcerers, had made this assertion about black animals. There is a custom in the Sudan that animals given as presents should be as white as possible, as a sign of peace between donor and receiver. We were now told that Bokar Wandieïdu, chief of the Logomaten, had assembled a column of troops and was about to attack us.

KARU WITH MILLET GRANARIES.

At Karu the mountains were pointed out to us which line the famous rapid of Labezenga, which we expected to reach the next day. A guide was given to us who was said to be wonderfully clever, but we saw no particular sign of his intelligence.

It was on March 14 that we first saw the terrible Labezenga rapid, and I am very sure that we shall none of us ever forget it.

Our guide began the day by performing a number of mummeries, the aim of which appears to have been to make various evil genii propitious to us. From a leather bag he took out a lot of flat and shaly flints which hadbeen picked up in the rapid. He wrapped each one of these flints in a separate piece of cloth, spat upon them, and arranged them here and there all over the boat.

The current rapidly swept us into a part of the river pretty free from obstruction, and every now and then I tried to distract our guide’s attention from his spells and to get him to give me a little information, but he merely replied without looking at me that there was no danger, and that he would stop us at the right time.

THE LABEZENGA RAPIDS.

Often from behind some little jutting out point which intercepted our view I heard a peculiar noise, a sort of dull but vague roar. The rate of the current too increased rapidly, and we rushed along at a rate of five miles an hour at the least. We listened eagerly, but all of a sudden we saw that the stream was barred from side to side, adistance of something like a thousand yards, by a positive wall of rocks against which the water was dashing up in foam.

Our idiot of a guide looked up at last and saw the danger. He motioned to us to steer for the bank, but rushing along as we were with the tremendous current, to attempt to do so would have been merely to drift helplessly on to the line of rocks, so we continued to dash on with a speed which almost made me giddy, and presently, to my intense relief, I saw a place on the right where there was less foam. Yes, it was the pass, it was the gate of safety, we must make for it, but was there any hope of our reaching it?

Our coolies bent to their oars and rowed so hard that they were in danger of breaking them, whilst the sweat poured down their shining black skins. I had just time to hoist the signal “Do as we do!” which most fortunately Baudry and the captain of theDantecunderstood. They were just behind us. Now up with the oars and trust to our luck! The speed increases yet more, the stream sweeps the boat towards the pass, where it flings itself into the lower reach: we feel ourselves falling, we shudder, we realize the fatal attraction drawing us in the direction of the whirlpool; then like an arrow we shoot safely through the opening. All is well with us at least. Our next anxiety is for our comrades; we look behind, and a cry of terror bursts from our lips. TheDantec, which is the next to attempt the pass, has stopped suddenly; her mast is swept asunder, and has been flung across the bow by the violence of the shock. All the men were thrown at the same moment to the bottom of the boat, for the unlucky barge, which had tried to pass about three feet on one side of the place where we had got safely through, had struck against a rock which was hiddenby the whirling foam. She received a tremendous blow, but fortunately did not sink.

But where was theAube? That was our care now. She was approaching rapidly, borne on by the current, but the whole pass was blocked before her. She would crash into theDantec, and both vessels must inevitably be wrecked.

But no! Clouds of spray dash up over bow and stern alike; Baudry has flung out the anchor and the grappling-iron: oh that they may grip properly!

Thank God! They have. TheAubestops short some three hundred yards at least from theDantecat the brink of the rapid.

But what in the world is up now? TheAubeis tilted at an angle of some 45 degrees! The force of the current is such that it has taken her in the rear and forced her into this extraordinary position, whilst the grappling-chains and those of the anchor are strained to the uttermost, producing the terrifying result described.

I now moored theDavoustto the bank, for we must try to save our other boats.

With regard to theDantecit was a simple affair enough, for she is a wonderful little craft, answering readily to the helm, and so buoyant that we got off with no worse damage than the bursting asunder of a couple of planks of her bottom. I sent Digui to help the men on board of her, and she got safely through.

The rescue of theAubewas a more difficult matter, especially as her rudder had got broken in the struggle. The anchor was raised all right, but when it came to the grappling-iron we could not make it budge; it had probably got jammed between two rocks, and all our efforts to move it were in vain, indeed they only seemed to fix it more firmly.

Driven on by the wind and whirled round by the strongeddies of the current, the unfortunate barge began to describe semicircles round her own grappling-iron. Of course when we once cut the chain there would be no time to steer her, and we must therefore manage to divide it exactly at the moment when she was opposite to the opening she had to pass through. One second too soon or too late and she would be lost.

I had climbed to the top of a little ridge, and with fast beating heart I watched Baudry making his dispositions for the manœuvre he had to attempt. A Tuareg chose this moment of awful suspense to tap me on the shoulder and greet me with the formal salutation,Salam radicum mahindia, and you can imagine how much notice I took of him.

Without being at all put out by my silence, however, he went on—

“I see that you are in trouble. I have watched all that has been going on from my camp behind the hills, and ever since early morning I have felt sure that you were all lost. But God has saved you and your people. I have forbidden my tribe to come and bother you, for you know that we always beg of every one. Well, I am going now, but if you have need of us, Tuaregs and negroes alike are ready to help you, you have only to send me a messenger. Our Amenokal has ordered us to meet your wishes.”

As he finished his speech, I saw Digui deal a great blow to the chain of the grappling-iron. TheAubefell into the rapid, but she could not avoid the rock on which theDantechad struck already. She strikes, and the whole of her starboard side is completely immersed. Is she staved in? No, her speed is such that she rushes on as if nothing had happened. She is saved. A moment later she is moored beside theDavoust.

“Not so much as a hole in her, Baudry!” I cried.

“No, I don’t think there is,” he replied, “but we had a narrow escape.” We overhauled her, and there was not a leak anywhere. In fact, Baudry declared that her planks were really more watertight than ever.

Then my Tuareg, who had not gone away after all, but whom I had completely forgotten, spoke to me again: “Enhi!” he said, which means simply “look!” but his great wild black eyes shone with pleasure from out of his veil as if some piece of good luck had happened to himself.

Now are these Tuaregs brutes? are they men who can only be swayed by interested motives? What nonsense to say they are!

Where did the interested motives come in here? Would it not have been better for him if our boats had all been sucked down in the rapids? We ourselves and all our goods would then have been his lawful prey.

May Providence only grant that I never find any of my fellow-countrymen worse than the Tuaregs.

You may be sure the brave fellow got his parcel of goods and many other things as well. With his long swinging step he went off to his people again, shouting to us by way of adieu, “Ikfak iallah el Kheir” (“may God give thee all good things!”)

This was, however, but the first of the Labezenga rapids, and that the easiest. We had scarcely gone a hundred yards further when we came to a regular cataract some two feet high, barring our passage. On one side rose lofty heights, on the left the stream was broken into several arms by islands. In fact, there did not seem to be any opening on either side, and we were all but in despair of getting through this time.

Baudry spent the whole afternoon with our guide from Karu, seeking a practicable pass, but everywhere the scenebefore him was most forbidding, one cataract succeeding another and alternating with boiling whirlpools, whilst the current rushed on at a rate of seven or eight miles at the least. The river simply seems to writhe in its course, and here and there it dashes backwards and forwards from one side to the other of its bed as if in a state of frenzy. There must be a difference of something like seven feet in the height of the water.

The least impracticable place seemed to be on the left of our anchorage between two islands, but I never should have believed that any boat could pass through even that. We had, however, to make the venture, and any delay would only render it more difficult, for the water was falling rapidly.

THE ‘AUBE’ IN THE RAPIDS.

On the morning of Sunday the 15th Father Hacquart celebrated mass and we then prepared for the passage. The crew of our two big barges was not strong enough to navigate both at once, so we decided to send each vessel separately past the dangerous spots, supplementing one crew from the other, and later we always adopted this plan, which worked well on emergencies.

Digui was the only one of our captains who could manage suchtours de force, for really there is no other word for the work he had to perform. Idris, the quarter-master of theAube, rather loses his head amongst the rapids, and is absolutely no good as a leader. Of course all that can be done is to give a general indication of the course to be pursued, and when the manœuvre has once begun everything must be left to the intelligence of thepilot, and Digui alone of all my men was really worthy to be trusted at the helm.

We fortified ourselves with a good cup of coffee, feeling that it might be our last, and theDavouststarted, Baudry following us in a canoe.

The scene before us was very much what it had been the day before—a narrow pass, a diabolical current producing an impression of unfathomable depth, which made our hearts sink and our breath come in gasps. On either side the water whirled and surged and roared unceasingly as it dashed over the huge rocks. Suddenly there was a tremendous shock, and the boat seemed to slide away from under our feet. It was theDavoust’sturn to-day. A hidden rock had battered a hole in her bow in my cabin. Through the gap, some 20 inches big, the water came in in floods, and in less than ten seconds it was a couple of feet deep.

But it was written in the book of fate that we were to go down to the sea in theDavoust, and in spite of all our misfortunes, in spite of everything being against us, in spite of reason, in spite of logic, something always turned up to save us even at what seemed the very last moment. The expected miracle always happened, and it is no exaggeration to say that we experienced dozens of such miracles.

We were going at such a rate when we struck the rock that for one instant the barge remained as it were suspended on it, but the next it was over it and in deep water again.

It so happened, as good luck would have it, that my servant Mamé was in my cabin when the boat struck, and the water rushed in at his very feet.

For the brave fellow to tear off his burnous, roll it into a ball and shove it into the gap in the planks was the work of a few seconds; that is to say, of just the timeduring which the rock held us fixed, preventing us from settling down. We were saved once more. The miracle had been performed. Only do not fail to notice what a combination of circumstances was required to bring about the result: the immense speed with which we were going making us actually mount the rock, with the presence of Mamé in my cabin all ready to stop up the hole!

TheDantecpassed through with us without difficulty, and it was now the turn of theAube. Digui attempted a manœuvre with her of positively extraordinary audacity. Knowing all too well that the rock which had been nearly fatal to us could not possibly be evaded, he simply flung the boat upon the grass-covered bank, and she climbed up, driven on by the great speed of the current. Then he let her slide down again backwards, or, to use the strictly nautical term, to fall astern.

For all this, however, we every one of us had to pay toll in one way or another at this infernal Labezenga. TheAubegrated on the point of a hidden rock just as she was about to join us again in quiet water.

It was now two o’clock in the afternoon, and we had been eight hours getting over a little more than half a mile in a straight line. We were famished with hunger, and our craving for food became almost unbearable. I constituted myself cook, and drawing upon our reserves of tinned meats and preserved vegetables, which we all felt we were justified in doing under the circumstances, I seized what came first, and tumbled everything helter-skelter into a saucepan. We all devoured the result, which I calledtripes à la Labezenga, without in the least knowing what we were eating. I will give the recipe to all who wish to emulate Vatel:tripes à la mode de Caen, truffles, esculent boletus,haricots verts, with plenty of pepper and spice, served hot. In N. Lat. 14° 57′ 30″, after just escapingfrom drowning or from death in the jaws of a crocodile, nothing could be more delicious, but somehow I have never ventured to try myolla podridaagain in France.

After a little rest, which was indeed well earned, Baudry went with Digui to the village of Labezenga to try and get guides. He came back in a state of terror at what he had seen.

For more than a month we had to lead a life such as I have just described. What I have said will give an idea of all we went through. I don’t want to dwell too much on our sufferings now that they are over. Once embarked on such an enterprise as this there is nothing for it but to go straight ahead, and by degrees one gets accustomed to the danger to a certain extent. I swear, however, that not all the gold in the world would induce me to do again what we did on this trip under similar conditions. Ten times a day at least we had to face these awful rapids, to go through all the agony of suspense, succeeded by the awful sensation of passing over the obstacles before us, whilst the boat seemed to rush from beneath us and plunge into the foam, from which it seemed simply impossible that she should ever again emerge.

Or again some rock barred our passage, and only by force of moving were we able to make our way inch by inch against the current which threatened to sweep us away. Then, as we literally scraped the rock, we knew that two or three inches made all the difference between life and death! For there would have been no hope of escape if we were once upset in these awful rapids. Death would have been inevitable, for the best swimmer could not have made head against such currents as these, but would have been dashed to pieces by them against the rocks.

Or supposing that by a miracle he should escape deathby drowning or by being flung upon the rocks, a yet more awful danger awaited him after he had safely passed the rapids, for beneath all of them many terrible crocodiles lie concealed, on the watch for the luckless fish, which, rendered giddy by the whirling turmoil of water, simply swim into their jaws. Crocodiles, you must know, do not kill their prey as sharks do, and no death could be more terrible than that inflicted by these awful denizens of the Niger, for they plunge their victims under water and drown them. Imagine what it must be to feel oneself gripped by the huge teeth of a merciless brute and dragged along until death from suffocation ensues.

THE ‘AUBE’ IN THE LAST LABEZENGA RAPID.

General Skobeleff said one day, “If any one says to you that he has never been afraid, spit in his face and tell him he is a liar!”

I don’t in the least mind owning that we were afraid,that we knew what fear was day by day for a whole month; fear in the day at the passage of every fresh obstacle, and yet greater fear in the night, for then nightmare exaggerated the horrors of the light, crocodiles and rapids haunting our sleep in dreams more awful even than the reality had been.

I challenge in advance the next person who goes down the Niger to say whether I have exaggerated anything in this account.

LOOKING UP STREAM FROM KATUGU.

We had to push on, however, and the first thing to be done was to replace the burnous of Mamé, which still served as a plug in the hole in theDavoust, with something a little more suitable for the purpose. We had brought with us a piece of aluminium to meet just such an emergency as this, but we had neither the time nor the means to rivet it now. So we cut a piece of wood the rightsize to serve provisionally, and fitted it into the hole, interposing a kind of mattress of tarred oakum, and making the whole thing taut with the aid of two strong bolts. Some putty made it more or less watertight, and anyhow we could now keep ourDavoustafloat.

The next day, the 16th, was as exciting as the 15th had been. Three very strong rapids succeeded each other, completing the awful pass of Labezenga. At each one the barges were halted above the fall, and a reconnaissance was made, then they passed over one by one, with the crew strengthened by every man who could be pressed into the service. Digui continued to show wonderful intrepidity, a quiet audacity and courage, and a readiness to grasp the bearings of every situation, which were beyond all praise. We can really say without exaggeration thatwe owed not only the safety of our boats, but our very lives to him.

THE CHIEF OF AYURU.

A little creek of almost calm water brought us to Katungu, where we were very well received by the inhabitants. Here we procured some fresh guides who were to take us to Ayuru.

Rapids! rapids! and yet more rapids! As we approached Ayuru the river became more and more terrible; we struck five or six times a day, again and again narrowly escaping the staving in of our boats. On the 18th, however, we safely reached Ayuru, a pretty little village of thatched huts on a rocky islet. My nerves had been overstrained, and in the evening when we were at dinner I fainted away. I did not come to again for two whole hours, and was very much surprised when I recovered consciousness to find myself lying on a mat wrapped up in coverlids, and being fanned by a coolie who was keeping watch over me.

From Ayuru I sent twenty rifles to Madidu, in token of my gratitude for the way in which his people had treated us.

We pushed on on the 19th for Kendadji, but navigation was, if possible, more difficult than ever. It became almost impossible to make our way amongst the countless islands impeding the stream and breaking it up into a confusing number of arms each with rapids of its own. These islets were all alike clothed with grand vegetation such as palms, sycamores, and other tropical trees.

The two large boats both struck on the same rock and theDavoustre-opened her old wound. How was it that in spite of this neither of our vessels sunk and our ranks remained unbroken? Only by a miracle! I have used that word before, I know, but really it is not too strong in this case either.

At last, however, after surmounting unheard-of difficulties,getting through apparently impossible obstacles, and after Digui had executed many an admirable manœuvre, we arrived opposite Kendadji.

Alas! our troubles were not yet over. The river in front of us was surging terribly, the bed everywhere encumbered by large flints. Where could we pass?

Hitherto the natives, whether Tuaregs or negroes, had helped us to the best of their ability. The orders of Madidu had been strictly obeyed, and no obstacles whatever had been thrown in our way. But at Kendadji all was changed. Our guides from Katungu had gone to the village, having begged us to let them go and palaver before we appeared, and we were kept waiting all day for the envoy of the chief to listen to reason, only to be told at last that the people were afraid of us, for a relation of ours (Captain Toutée) had killed ever so many at Sinder the year before.

AN ISLAND BETWEEN AYURU AND KENDADJI.

I did my best to reassure the messenger, and he promised that the chief himself should come to see us the next day. He did in fact do so, and at last let us have some guides.

Digui had gone to reconnoitre the rapids further down stream, and about noon he returned in a great state of agitation. “We must start at once,” he said, “there was just enough water to float our boats now, but the river was sinking rapidly, and in an hour it would perhaps be too late.”

A ROCKY HILL NEAR KENDADJI.

What a passage it was! We pushed on, actually moored, so to speak, to an anchor and a grappling-iron, using first one and then the other, sometimes both according to circumstances. We kept on bumping against rocks, here, there, and everywhere, but fortunately we were going too fast to do the boats much harm. Then we had to fling ourselves into a perfect labyrinth of obstacles, striking against themagain and again, but fortunately without making any fresh holes in our much-tried barks. Still more rocks ahead!Quousque tandem!

At about eleven o’clock on the 22nd we reached Tumaré. The chief at first refused to give us guides, but a liberal present won him over.

Things seemed likely to be worse rather than better, for we had not gone more than four and a half miles during the whole of the 23rd. The river was now but a river in name; a mere maze of narrow channels between innumerable islets covered with fine trees and millet. The bed of these channels is encumbered with rocks, amongst which our barges had to follow a serpentine course for which they were little fitted. At two o’clock we reached the village of Desa, and the evening was wasted in a palaver without result. A feeling of sullen hostility against us was everywhere manifested, and the first question the natives asked was whether we were the same white men who had come the year before. At last, however, we succeeded in getting some guides who took us as far as Farca.

Our coolies told us that the crocodiles lay their eggs at this time of the year, when it always rains and blows hard. On this account we were obliged to remain anchored opposite Desa all the morning. We started at two o’clock in the afternoon. What a river we had to pass down! Before we arrived at the anchorage, where we remained for the night, we had to go through a pass not much more than five yards wide.

The people of Desa, we were told by the natives above Gao, are Kurteyes of a very fierce and inhospitable disposition, and, truth to tell, their first reception of us was anything but cordial. “What had we come to their village for?” they asked. “Why had we not stopped at a biggerone?” By dint of the exercise of much patience, and the use of many soothing arguments, we gradually succeeded in appeasing them. They gave us an original version of the fight which had taken place with Captain Toutée the year before. It was not, according to them, with the Tuaregs that he had fought, but with the people of Sinder.

All the negroes of the riveraine districts of the Niger wear the same kind of costume, including the veil, and use the same kind of weapons as the Tuaregs, which explains the mistake. The Tuaregs had been awaiting the expedition at Satoni, intending to attack it, but it had made adétourand avoided them. The Wagobés of Sinder by order of Bokar Wandieïdu, and also because a sentinel had by accident killed a nephew of the chief of the village, attacked the canoes of the Toutée expedition, attributing what they thought was a retreat to fear. Fifty natives were killed, and the memory of their fate was still fresh.

About noon the next day we were opposite Satoni, and we anchored the same evening near the right bank, where we could make out some lofty dunes on which were perched three villages and a Tuareg encampment.

I had a presentiment that we had now reached a critical and most perilous moment of our expedition. All the defiance we had recently met with, and the unwillingness to help us was of bad augury, and we were, as a matter of fact,entirely at the mercy of the natives.

Higher up stream, when the Kel es Suk and the Tademeket wanted to bar the road against us, the river was free from obstacles, and they were quite unable to stop us. We could afford to laugh at their futile efforts. Below Ansongo, too, though the difficulties of navigation were considerable, we could to some extent count uponthe goodwill of the people, who would, if they were not particularly ready to serve us, at least remain neutral.

Now, alas! I felt that at any moment the smouldering powder might explode, for at our approach the women and children hid themselves. To get guides I had to use every possible means: caresses, presents, even threats, for without guides we should be utterly lost.

The stream here divides literally into thousands of channels; how then were we to choose the best one amongst perhaps ten opposite to us at a time? Then again, in some pass when we are being swept along in the one finally chosen as the best, the least hesitation, the smallest slip in steering, and our boat would be lost, staved in, utterly wrecked. Here and there, too, massive rocks rose on either side of us, so covered with dense vegetation that twenty men armed with bows and arrows or spears could easily have made an end of us.

A little after our arrival at Satoni we were hailed from a canoe containing the son of the chief of Farca, who could not refrain from showing his satisfaction when he found we were not the same white men as those who had come the year before. We had scarcely entered into conversation with him when three Tuaregs also arrived to interview us.

One was a relation of Bokar Wandieïdu, chief of the Logomaten, another his blacksmith, and the third a young man, the son of El Mekki, chief of the Kel es Suk of Ansongo.

The situation was becoming interesting. Our throats were parched with our anxiety. Would peace or war be the issue of the interview?

“Bokar sends you greeting,” began his messenger, “and bids me inform you that at the news of your approach he collected a troop of his warriors; the Wagobés of Sinder,the Kourteyes, the Fulahs, and the Toucouleurs of Amadu Cheiku, have held a palaver with him, and all of one accord agreed to unite their forces, and bar the road against you. Some Toucouleurs are now, in fact, with Bokar making final arrangements.

“Two days ago, however, the young man you see here came to us, sent by Madidu to order us not merely to do you no harm, but to aid you if need were. Fear nothing, therefore, no one can speak further after the Amenokal has spoken. If you flung a dagger up in the air, saying, ‘That is for Madidu!’ it would not touch the ground again until it reached his hands.”

I had not then been mistaken; a formidable coalition had been formed against us, and had it taken action we should, I repeat once more, have been hopelessly lost. True to his word, worthy son of the noble race to which he belongs, chief of the most powerful of the confederations of Nigritia, the Amenokal had interposed his all-powerful influence on our behalf just at the right moment. I assert once more, and would have all my fellow-countrymen know it, that if we ever get home again, if we were the first to go down the Niger to the sea, and to trace the course of that mighty river, if we did not leave our skeletons to bleach upon its banks, it was due to the mighty chief of the Awellimiden, to Madidu Ag el Khotab, and to him alone.

I do not think I owe such a debt of gratitude as this to any man of my own race!

His task no sooner accomplished, however, our young friend, the son of El Mekki, became rather a bore, for he had taken it into his head to try and convert us to the religion of Islam. Truth to tell, the reasons he gave for this attempt at proselytism did more honour to his heart than to his head.

“We know each other now,” he said, “and you arejust going away. We like you, and we think that you like us. We cannot hope ever to see you again in this life, do not deprive us of the chance of meeting you once more in another world.

“When we are all dead, we faithful followers of the true faith will go to enjoy everlasting happiness in Paradise. You, however, who are good fellows enough, will not be able to cross El Sirat, the bridge leading to the gardens of Paradise, but will have to go to Hell, where you will burn eternally, and we shall be able to do nothing for you but pity you.

“Well then,” he went on, “do not remain in this evil case; stay amongst us for a time, and you shall be instructed in the essentials of our faith. We shall thus be enabled to hope to meet you again in eternity.”

The most amusing part of it all was that Father Hacquart, whose Arab costume had especially attracted our young visitor, was the chief victim of the ardent proselytism of the earnest Tuareg believer.

For a missionary to be attacked in this way was really too comic, and the Father roared with laughter over the incident.

When night fell we had to separate, and our friend left us, quite melancholy at the failure of all his eloquence.

We arrived at Farca the next morning, the 26th, at about two o’clock.

The chief of the village, brother of the chief of Sinder, and father of the young man who had been killed by Captain Toutée’s sentinel, with a number of other notables, came to see us.

They confirmed all we had already been told; it had really been with the people of Sinder, not with the Tuaregs, that the preceding expedition had come to blows.

Bokar had sent instructions to the Wagobés to treatus well, and they themselves intended to act as our guides. They begged me, however, not to anchor at the village of Sinder, though I was particularly anxious to visit that important centre, which is the chief mart for the vast quantities of cereals cultivated in the neighbourhood.

Farca is an island completely covered with a tropical forest, and a similar mass of verdure is to be seen on another islet opposite to it. The village, which had been deserted after the fracas with Captain Toutée’s people, was just beginning to be rebuilt.

This was the furthest point reached by the expedition which had preceded ours, and is situated in N. Lat. 14° 29′ and Long. 1° 22′ 55″, thirty kilometres from Sinder, and eight hundred and sixty from Timbuktu.[9]

The connection between the expeditions which had started from the coast of Guinea and those which had come from the French Sudan had at last been achieved, and the Niger had been navigated for its entire course by Frenchmen.

Below Farca, the stream becomes a little less difficult.We were followed the day after by a regular fleet of canoes. A nephew of the chief of Sinder, named Boso, accompanied us. I now felt that, at least until we came into actual contact with Amadu Cheiku, all danger from the hostility of the natives was at an end.

The islands dotting the river are inhabited by Kurteyes and Wagobés, and it is to the latter tribe that the inhabitants of Sinder belong, not to the Songhay race. Their name clearly indicates that they are Soninkés, and therefore related to our Saracolais coolies. Saracolais, Marka, Dafins, etc., are really all mere local names of the Soninkés. It seems at first surprising that a race supposed to be native to the districts watered by the Senegal, should be found so far away from the basin of that river; but later still, nearer to Say, we came upon another tribe of the same origin, the Sillabés, on the subject of which there cannotbe the slightest doubt, for they have preserved the language of their ancestors.

Back to Index Next