The further Park proceeded east the drier and purer became the climate, and the more interesting the landscape. In Kajaaga, lying between the Falemé and the Senegal, he found a country everywhere interspersed with a pleasing variety of hills and valleys, to which the serpentine windings of the Senegal descending from the rocky heights gave both picturesqueness and beauty. The inhabitants, unlike the Fulahs, were jet black in complexion, resembling in this respect the Joloffs nearer the coast.
The people of Kajaaga are known as Serawulies, and are noted for their keen trading propensities—at this time chiefly directed towards supplying slaves to the British factories on the Gambia.
On the 24th December Park entered Joag, the western frontier town, and was there hospitably received by the chief man of the place, officially known as Dooty or Duté. The town was surrounded by a high mud wall, as was also every individual private establishment. Though the headman and the principal inhabitants were Mohammedans, it appeared that the great mass of the people were still Pagans, as was sufficiently shown by the nature of their wild night revelries—“the ladies in their dances vying with each other in displaying the most voluptuous movements imaginable.”
Park’s trials were now about to commence. During the night a number of horsemen arrived, and after talking with the host, took up their quarters in the Palaver House beside the traveller himself. Thinking the latter was asleep, one of them attempted to steal his gun, but finding he could not effect his purpose undiscovered, he desisted from the attempt. This, however, was but a foretaste of coming trouble. It was easy to see that Johnson was growing very uneasy at the aspect of affairs; not without cause either, as very soon became evident. Two of Park’s companions, who had been at a dance in a neighbouring village, came in with the news that a party of the king’s horsemen had been heard inquiring if the white man had passed, and on being told that he was at Joag, had immediately galloped off in that direction.
Even while they were speaking the horsemen arrived, and next moment Park found himself surrounded by some twenty soldiers, each carrying a musket. Resistance was useless; he could only wait in much anxiety to hear his fate.
At length, after a brief interval, a member of the party, who was loaded with an enormous number of charms to ward off all forms of evil, opened their business in a long harangue. The white man, they said, had violated the laws of the country by entering it without paying the customary duties, and had accordingly forfeited everything he possessed. The soldiers had orders to take him to the king by force if necessary.
Conceive the position Park was now in. Utter ruin stared him in the face, and the collapse of all his cherished schemes. To fight was out of the question. All he could do was to try to gain a little time to think matters out,and seek the advice of his companions and host. They were unanimous in declaring that it would be disastrous to him to accompany the horsemen. A long argument with the spokesman ensued, by dint of which, and the present of Almami’s five drachms of gold, the messenger became somewhat mollified.
They demanded, however, to be shown the baggage, from which they helped themselves to whatever they happened to fancy; and having thus despoiled their victim of half his goods, they left him to his gloomy reflections and an indifferent supper after a day of fast.
Thus reduced in his already scanty resources, and his power to travel correspondingly limited, Park found but Job’s comforters in his companions. One and all they urged him to turn back from his hopeless task. Johnson, especially, laughed at the very idea of proceeding further, miserably provided as they were. But the spirit of the leader rose superior to his misfortunes, and he never for a moment admitted the idea of retreat. While strength remained there could be no flinching from his task. Yet his thoughts were gloomy enough that night as he sat reviewing his situation through the hours of darkness by the side of a smouldering fire. Morning brought no improvement to his position. The scanty supper was followed by no breakfast.
What few articles still remained dared not be produced, lest they too should be plundered. It was resolved, therefore, to pass the day without food, trusting to Providence for a stray meal sooner or later.
As the day wore on the pangs of hunger began to make themselves felt. To allay this in some measure the unfortunate travellers chewed straws, a make-believe yielding as scant comfort as it did sustenance.But Park’s faith in God was not belied. Towards evening an old female slave passed by with a basket on her head, and struck by his woe-begone, famished look, she asked him if he had had his dinner. Thinking she spoke in jest, he did not reply. Not so his boy Demba, who volubly, and with the eloquence of suffering, told the story of their misfortunes and their needs. In a moment the old woman had her basket on the ground, and a plentiful supply of ground-nuts was placed in their hands, the donor thereafter marching away without waiting for a word of thanks.
Further good fortune was now in store for them. It happened that Demba Sego Jalla, the Mandingo king of Kasson further east, had sent his nephew to the King of Kajaaga to try to arrange some disputes which were threatening to lead to war. The embassy, however, had met with no success. Returning homeward, the king’s nephew had heard of there being a white man at Joag who was desirous of visiting Kasson, and curiosity brought him to see the stranger. On hearing Park’s story, the young noble offered him his protection all the way—an offer that was eagerly and gratefully accepted.
Thus guided and protected, Park set out for Kasson on the 27th. Some distance on the way Johnson, in spite of his life in Jamaica and his seven years’ residence in England, showed that he still was saturated with the superstitious ideas of his youth by producing a white chicken and tying it by the leg to a particular tree as an offering to the spirits of the woods. The same belief in nature spirits has already been alluded to in a previous chapter. Anthropologists tell us that it must at one time have been universal, and evidences of it arefound not only in the charming legends of the Greeks, with their nymphs of meadow, grove, and spring, and dryads growing with the oaks and pines, but also in our own Anglo-Saxon words.
In the evening the party safely arrived at Sami, on the banks of the Senegal. Park describes the sister river to the Gambia as being at this point a beautiful but shallow stream, flowing slowly over a bed of sand and gravel. The banks are high and covered with verdure, and are backed by an open cultivated country, the distant hills of Felow and Bambuk adding an additional beauty to the landscape. A few miles below Sami was the former French trading station of St. Joseph, founded by Sieur Brue, but abandoned in the time of Park. Next morning the party proceeded a little further up the river to Kayi, where they crossed with no small difficulty and danger, the animals being swum over, and the baggage conveyed in a miserable canoe.
While Park was crossing by the same means the canoe was capsized by an injudicious movement on the part of his protector, but being near the bank, no harm came of it, and a second attempt landed him safely in the country of Kasson.
The young noble, having once brought the white traveller into his own country, soon showed that no generous motives had prompted his assistance. Unhesitatingly he demanded a handsome present. Park, seeing that it was useless either to upbraid or to complain, with a heavy heart made the necessary selection from his scanty stock of goods, and presented the offering forthwith.
On the evening of the 29th the party reached Tisi, where Park was lodged with his protector’s father,Tiggity Sego, the head man of the place. Next morning a slave having run away, the use of Park’s horse was asked for the chase, to which he “readily consented, and in about an hour they all returned with the slave, who was severely flogged, and afterwards put in irons.”
Park was detained for several days at Tisi, while his horse was further used by his host on a more extended mission. During his enforced detention our traveller had an opportunity of seeing a somewhat more drastic method of propagating Islam than any he had yet witnessed. An embassy of ten persons arrived from the King of Futa Larra, a country to the west of Bondou, and announced to the assembled inhabitants that unless all the people of Kasson embraced the Mohammedan religion, and evinced their conversion by saying solemn public prayers, he, the King of Futa Larra, would certainly join his arms to those of Kajaaga.
Such a coalition would have been disastrous to Kasson, and without a moment’s hesitation the conversion was agreed to. Accordingly, one and all did as was desired, offering up solemn prayers in token that they were no longer Pagans, but followers of Mohammed.
It was not till the 8th of January 1796 that Demba Sego, the young noble, returned with the traveller’s horse, whereupon Park, impatient at the delay, declared that he could spend no more time at Tisi, and must proceed to the capital. He was informed he could not do so until he had paid the customary trading duties. Some amber and tobacco were offered, but they were laid aside as totally inadequate for a present to a man of Tiggity Sego’s importance. Once more Park had to submit to seeing his baggage ransacked. One-half he had already lost at Joag, and now half of what remained had tobe similarly sacrificed to satisfy the rapacity of his tormentors.
Thus despoiled, Park was permitted to depart next morning. His course, which so far had been E.N.E., was now E.S.E. In the afternoon the party arrived at the village of Jumbo, the birthplace of the blacksmith who had faithfully accompanied Park from Pisania. The entire population turned out to welcome back their townsman with dance and songs. The poor fellow’s meeting with his blind mother was most touching. Unable to see him, she stretched out her arms to welcome him, and after eagerly satisfying herself by touch of face and hands that it was indeed her son who had returned, she gave wild expression to her delight. From which Park concludes, “that whatever differences there are between the Negro and the European in the conformation of the nose and the colour of the skin, there is none in the genuine sympathies and characteristic feelings of our common nature.”
This affectionate welcome over, the villagers had time to turn their attention to the white man. At first they looked or affected to look upon him as a being dropped from the clouds, the women and children shrinking from him half in fear, half in awe. On being assured by their countryman that he was a good-tempered and inoffensive creature, they gradually laid aside their misgivings, and began to feel the texture of his clothes, and assure themselves that he was indeed cast in much the same mould as themselves. Still his slightest movement was sufficient to arouse their tremors and make them scamper off like a flock of sheep which had valorously marched up to view a sleeping dog.
Next day Park continued his journey to a place calledSulu, where he had an order from Dr. Laidley on a slatee for the value of five slaves. Hardly had he been hospitably received by Dr. Laidley’s client, when messengers arrived from Kuniakary with orders that he should proceed at once to the king. Thither accordingly he journeyed, arriving late in the evening.
The rule of “like master, like man” did not hold good in relation to the King of Kasson and such of his subordinates as Park so far had come in contact with. His reception by one whose “success in war and the mildness of his behaviour in times of peace had much endeared him to his subjects,” was an agreeable variation to the hard fate which had lately dogged his footsteps. The king was not only satisfied with his visitor’s story and his poor present, but promised him every assistance in his power. He warned him, however, that the road to Bambarra was for the time being rendered extremely dangerous, if not altogether impassable, by the outbreak of war between that state and the adjoining one of Kaarta. In the hope of the arrival of more reassuring news Park waited four days, staying the while with the Sulu slatee, from whom he received gold dust to the value of three slaves. This transaction coming to the ears of the king, Park was compelled to add considerably to the value of his former present.
The country around Sulu presented an enchanting prospect of simple rural plenty, while the scenery surpassed in richness and variety any Park had yet seen. The density of the population was illustrated by the fact that the King of Kasson could raise within sound of his great war drum an army of four thousand fighting men. The one drawback to the amenities of the place was the numerous bands of wolves and hyenas which nightlyattacked the cattle, and were only to be driven off by organised parties of men with fires and torches.
From Sulu, Park proceeded S.E. up the rocky valley of the Kriko, meeting everywhere swarms of people leaving the expected seat of war in Kaarta.
On the 8th he left the charming valley of the Kriko, and travelled over a rough stony country to the ridge of hills which forms the boundary-line between Kasson and Kaarta. Thence his way lay down a stony precipitous path into the dried-up bed of a stream, whose overarching trees afforded to the wayfarer a grateful shade. Emerging from this romantic glen, the party found itself on the level sandy plains of Kaarta, having the hilly ranges of Fuludu on their right.
On the third day from Sulu, Park witnessed a new method of consulting the Oracle as to the fate in store for them on the road. To his great alarm, their guide, who was a Mohammedan in name and a Pagan at heart, came to an abrupt standstill in a dark lonely part of a wood. Taking a hollow piece of bamboo he whistled very loud three times. Thereafter he dismounted, laid his spear across the pathway, and again whistled thrice. For a short time he listened as if for an answer, and receiving none, told Park that now they might proceed, for the way was clear of danger.
Next day the superstitious ideas cherished by the natives were further illustrated. Park had wandered some distance from his party, when, just as he reached the brow of a slight eminence, a couple of negro horsemen galloped from the bushes. Immediately on seeing each other Park and the negroes alike came to an abrupt stop, each equally filled with alarm. The white man was the first to regain his presence of mind, and concludingthat advance was his safer course, he moved towards them. This was too much for the terrified natives, who thought they saw in the strange figure before them some terrible spirit. One of them, with a wild look of horror, turned and fled; the other, paralysed beyond action, could only cover his eyes and mutter his prayers. In this position he would have remained stationary, but for the instinct of his horse, which led him to follow his companion.
On the afternoon of the 12th, Park and his party entered the capital of Kaarta. On announcing their arrival to the king, a messenger was sent to convey them to a hut and protect them from the inquisitive crowd. In carrying out the latter part of his commission the messenger signally failed, and for the rest of the afternoon our explorer remained on exhibition, the hut being filled and emptied thirteen times by an admiring and curious mob.
In the evening his majesty gave Park an audience, seated on a clay divan raised a couple of feet above the floor, and covered with a leopard’s skin, the sign of authority. The way to the throne lay through a long lane formed by a huge crowd of fighting men on the one side, and of women and children on the other.
The reception of the stranger was highly encouraging. He was told, however, that he had chosen a most inopportune time to attempt to pass into Bambarra, and he was advised to return to Kasson, and there await the end of the war just commencing. That, however, meant the loss of the dry season, and Park dreaded the thought of spending the rainy season in the interior. “These considerations, and the aversion I felt at the idea of returning without having made a greater progress in discovery, made me determined to go forward.”
Hearing this determination, the king showed his kindly intentions by pointing out that there was another—though a more dangerous and circuitous route—to Bambarra, namely, that by way of Ludamar, an Arab district to the north-west of Kaarta. At the same time he promised to give the white man guides for this route as far as Jarra, his frontier town. With this offer Park only too gladly closed.
Before the audience ended a horseman arrived in foaming haste to announce that the Bambarra army had left Fuludu for Kaarta.
Next morning, after Park had sent his horse-pistols and holsters as a present to his royal host, a large escort was provided to protect and lead him on his way to Ludamar.
It must have been with no pleasant sensations that Park turned aside from his direct route E.S.E. to the Niger, and proceeded north instead to Ludamar. In addition to the increased distance, there were the hundredfold greater dangers to be encountered. Houghton had preceded him over the same road, with what results his successor only too well knew. And yet, as matters turned out, it was perhaps as well that he elected to try his fate by the more circuitous route. Before many days were over Kaarta was desolated by the Bambarra army, which only retired laden with spoil on finding that the last refuge of the king could neither be stormed nor reduced by starvation. The trouble of the Kaartans did not end with the war with Bambarra, for they fell out with the people of Kasson, and before the year was ended had to face a coalition of various enemies.
On the 13th February Park started for Ludamar. His escort of over two hundred horsemen seems to have been of little use, for in the evening the hut in which his luggage was deposited was entered, and some of his rapidly diminishing stores stolen. Next day he came upon some negroes gathering the fruit of theRhamnus lotus, which being converted into a species of bread, forms no inconsiderable addition to the food of thenatives of Kaarta and Ludamar. This shrub, Park does not doubt, is the lotus mentioned by Pliny as the food of the Libyan Lotophagi.
The increased dangers of the new route were amply illustrated as Ludamar was approached. Bands of marauding Moors were taking advantage of the unsettled state of the country to carry off cattle with impunity. At one town Park saw five Moors calmly select sixteen of the finest oxen of a herd, and in the presence of five hundred negroes drive them away without even a show of resistance. One young man who had been out in the fields, and had shown more courage, had been shot, and was brought in dying. His mother, frantic with grief, filled the air with her shrill shrieks and lamentations, clapping her hands the while. “He never told a lie” was the astonishing encomium passed upon him, a phenomenal occurrence in a continent where lying is a virtue, and the art is raised to its utmost perfection. On being assured that all hope of saving the boy’s life was gone, some good Mohammedans did their best to ensure him—though hitherto a Pagan—a place in Paradise, by getting him to repeat the sacred formula of Islam, in which pious effort they happily were successful.
On the 17th, Park, in company with numbers of people flying from the terrors of war, travelled during the night, to escape the more immediate danger of Moorish robbers. After resting during the early morning, they resumed their journey at daybreak. Two hours later they passed Simbing, from which Houghton had despatched the graphic letter, already quoted, telling of his destitute condition, but unalterable intention of proceeding to Timbuktu. At noon, Jarra, the southern frontier town of Ludamar, was reached. It was from thisplace that Park’s predecessor was decoyed into the desert by Moors, and after being stripped, was left either to die of starvation or be murdered by passing ruffians, a point never satisfactorily cleared up, though Park was shown the spot where he breathed his last.
At Jarra, Park was hospitably received by a Gambia slatee, who had borrowed goods from Dr. Laidley to the value of six slaves, for which debt Park was provided with an order. The debt was acknowledged, but the merchant pleaded inability to pay more than two slaves.
Our traveller had now entered a more inhospitable region. Ludamar was found to be inhabited by negroes, an Arab race largely intermixed with negro blood forming the rulers and possessing the worst characteristics of both sides of descent.
Park and his attendants were not long in experiencing the brutal and inhospitable character of this degraded hybrid people.
Difficulties had met them at every step of their journey, and now nothing but new terrors loomed up before them. So great did these seem, and so overbearing and threatening was the attitude of the Moors, that Park’s servants declared they would rather lose everything they possessed than proceed further. Not only were they liable to robbery and ill-usage, but not improbable to slavery also. These facts were so patent that, though unwavering in his own determination to push on, Park could not bring himself to force his men to follow him. Accordingly he made arrangements for parting with them. Among other things, he prepared duplicates of his papers to put into the hands of Johnson. Meanwhile a messenger had been sent to Ali, chief of the country, to ask permission to pass through his country to Bambarra. Therequest was accompanied by a present of fine garments of cotton cloth which Park purchased from the slatee in exchange for his fowling-piece. Fourteen days elapsed before an answer was returned, and then he was told to follow Ali’s messenger to Gumba.
On preparing to depart, hopeful as ever that yet he should live to see the Niger, he was further cheered by the fidelity of his boy Demba, who seeing his master was not to be dissuaded from his determination to proceed, resolved not to desert him, whatever might be the result. It then came out that Johnson, whose residence among Europeans had only served to corrupt him, had treacherously tried to seduce Demba to return with him and leave the white man to his fate.
To diminish the inducements to plunder, Park, before starting, left as many of his personal effects behind him as he could spare. For two days the little party toiled over a sandy country. On the third day they reached Dina, a large town built of stone and clay. The reception Park here met with at the hands of the natives was atrocious. Every opprobrious epithet which their vocabulary could supply was hurled at him. Not content with words, they proceeded to spit upon and otherwise heap ignominy upon the stranger, ending by tearing open his bundles and helping themselves to whatever they had a mind. For the victim of these outrages there was nothing but patience and resignation, with which virtues, indeed, he seems to have been amply endowed. He might be robbed of his material resources, but his spiritual stores remained untouched. With him, while there was life there was hope.
Not so with his servants. They had no magnet to draw them on, no higher impulse than monetary reward.Further forward they would not go. So be it! Their retreat was excusable, butOnwardmust be their master’s watchword so long as any pencil of light glimmered through a loophole—Onwardas long as limbs and strength and hope held out.
Not daring to face another day of insult and plunder, nor yet a night of gloomy reflection, Park gathered together such valuables as he could carry, left the village under cover of darkness, and with magnificent resolution started alone on his forlorn hope of reaching the Niger.
As the huts disappeared behind him, the moon shone out bright and clear in the heavens, filling the night with its mellow beauty, both literally and figuratively lighting up the dark path before him.
From all sides came the roar of wild beasts, adding to the terrors of the situation. Undismayed, however, and still unwavering, he plodded onward through the night. He had not proceeded far when a clear halloo stopped his resolute footsteps. The accents sounded familiar, and in a few moments more he was joined by his faithful servant Demba. Park then found that the boy had made up his mind to stand by him, though Ali’s messenger returned to his master.
The little party of two now continued their journey, travelling steadily on over a sandy country covered with asclepias. At midday they reached a few huts, but were prevented from drawing water from the village well by the appearance of a lion. They therefore had to endure the pangs of thirst with patience till the evening, when they entered a town occupied by Fulahs. Park now seemed to have touched the bottom of his misfortunes. For several days he proceeded unmolestedthrough Ludamar, each new day, each mile nearer his goal, filling his sanguine mind with brighter and fresher hopes.
On the 5th March he reached Dalli. The villagers, hearing that a white man had arrived, deserted the revelries attendant on a feast, and hastened to see the phenomenal stranger. Not pell-mell, however, like the rude mob of Dina, but in a decorous procession, and headed by flute-players, as if they felt themselves honoured by the visit. Round Park’s hut they continued to dance and sing till midnight, during which time he had to keep himself continuously on exhibition to satisfy their simple and kindly if somewhat overwhelming curiosity.
Next day Park moved on to a village to the east of Dalli to escape the crowd which usually assembled there in the evening. Again his reception was most hospitable. The head man considered himself highly distinguished by having such a guest in his house, and showed it practically by killing two fine sheep to feast him and his own friends.
Park was now only two days from Gumba, the first town of Bambarra. He had but to reach that place to be safe from the thieving and brutal half-caste Moors, whose rule of the unhappy negroes was but another name for rapine and plunder. His hopes were high that now the success of his mission was almost assured. In fancy he saw himself already on the bank of the Niger, which he had come so far and suffered so much to see. His imagination revelled in a thousand delightful scenes in his future progress.
Thus buoyed up with glowing thoughts, he abandoned himself with unrestrained gaiety to the harmless festivities organised by his negro host, whose manners were in striking contrast to his experience of those of the Ludamar Moors.
But just when his golden dream was at its brightest, it was shattered by a rude awakening. Messengers arrived from Ali with orders to convey the white man either peaceably or by force to his camp at Benaun. Park was struck dumb with painful emotions, though slightly relieved on hearing that the sole cause of his being taken back was the curiosity of Fatima, Ali’s favourite wife. That lady’s desire to see a white man being satisfied, the chief promised that he should be conveyed safely on his way to Bambarra.
There was no gainsaying Ali’s orders, and argument was of no avail. Once more Park must fall back on his patience and his hope. Now practically prisoners, he and his faithful boy Demba were carried back to Dina, where his reception had already been so brutal. Here he was brought before one of Ali’s sons, who soon gave him a taste of the dangers and indignities in store for him. Barely was he seated when a gun was handed to him, and he was told to repair the lock and dye the stock blue. Knowing nothing of such matters, Park could only declare his ignorance. He was then ordered to produce his knives and scissors, and hand them over to the young tyrant. On Demba attempting to explain that they had no such articles, their tormentor sprang up in a fury, seized a musket, and was about to blow out the poor boy’s brains, when the bystanders interfered and saved his life.
After this unpleasant incident master and man beat a hasty retreat from the hut, and it is little to be wondered at that the latter tried to escape altogether.
Next day the prisoners were conveyed to Benaun, the headquarters of the paramount chief of Ludamar, under a terrible sun, and over burning sands. They travelled all day with almost no water, the pangs of thirst being slightly alleviated by the use of gum, which keeps the mouth moist and allays the pain in the throat. In the evening they arrived at their destination, a temporary camp, consisting of a great number of dirty-looking tents scattered without order, among which were large herds of camels, cattle, and goats. At the outskirts of the camp, Park, by much entreaty, procured a little water.
The arrival of the white traveller was the signal for a great commotion. Women hastened from their domestic avocations and forsook their waterpots at the well. The men mounted their horses—every one came running or galloping helter-skelter, amid wild screaming and shouting. In a ferocious mob they surrounded the unhappy cause of their excitement, pouncing upon him like a pack of hyenas, tugging and pulling his clothes, threatening him with all sorts of penalties if he would not acknowledge the One God and His Prophet. In this sad plight, half dead with the pangs of thirst and the fatigues of a desert march, he was hustled and pulled towards the chief’s tent. When at last he found himself in the presence of the great man, a single glance at his face was sufficient to dispel the last hope of better treatment. Ali was an old man, with an Arab cast of countenance, on whose every lineament were marked sullenness and cruelty. While he passively examined the unfortunate man before him, the women of his household were more actively engaged inspecting the dress of the victim and searching his pockets. Theyaffected to doubt that he was a man at all, and counted his fingers and toes to assure themselves that he was indeed like themselves. Not content even with that, they must needs have a peep at his white skin, and pushed aside his garments in order to effect their purpose.
When the excitement was at its height, the sacred call to prayers resounded through the camp, but before the people fell upon their knees before the One God All Compassionate and Merciful, with bent body and face pressed in the dust to acknowledge His Omnipotence, they had a new indignity to put upon the helpless stranger. Showing him a wild hog, they bade him kill and eat it. This he wisely refused. The hog was then let loose in the belief that it would at once attack the white man, but instead it rushed at his tormentors. The sport thus missing its mark, the Moors proceeded to their devotions, and Park was conveyed to the door of the tent of Ali’s chief slave, where after much entreaty he was supplied with a little boiled corn with salt and water, and then left to pass the night on a mat, exposed to cold and the dews, and still worse, to the insults and ribald mirth of the mob which swarmed about him.
The treatment which Park now experienced in the camp of Ali was brutal and barbarous beyond description.
In the eyes of the degenerate Arabs of Ludamar he was an object detestable both to God and man—a Christian and a spy. Everything, therefore, that savage ingenuity could invent to insult and torture him was heaped upon him with fiendish glee and eagerness.
On the morning after his arrival he was confined in a small square flat-roofed hut built of corn stalks, which happily admitted the breeze and excluded the sun. The hog was tied to the hut as a suitable companion to the hated Christian.
From morning till night the unhappy prisoner had to place himself on exhibition, and incessantly demonstrate the whiteness of his skin, the number of his toes, and the method of adjusting his dress—for all which torment he was repaid with curses. In common with the hog, he was made the sport of men, women, and children alike. Not even at night was he left to himself, being continually disturbed by his guards bent on satisfying themselves that he was safe in the hut, or by thieves seeking what they could carry away. To these tortures of mind and body was added the uncertainty of what might be before him. A council of elders had considered his case, andhe was variously told that death, the loss of the right hand, or the putting out of his eyes, was the fate reserved for him.
To add to the miseries of his condition, he had to suffer the hardships attendant on the observance of Rhamadan, the month of fasting, during which the faithful are not permitted to eat or drink between sunrise and sunset. This fast from meat and drink, bad enough at any time in a scorching climate, was rendered doubly painful to the unhappy traveller by the extreme scantiness of the supply doled out to him once in the twenty-four hours at midnight. Then, too, it was the hottest time of the year, and so scorching at times were the winds from the desert, that it was impossible to hold the hand in a draught without pain. Sandstorms, too, now and again filled the air to the point of suffocation, while the heavens overhead were as brass, and the sands under foot as the floor of an oven.
Under these distressing conditions Park’s onlyrôlewas to comply with every command, and patiently endure every insult, compatible with appearing as useless as possible to the tyrants, so that they might not be tempted to detain him for the value of his services.
Day after day thus passed, each one more miserable than the preceding, but Park’s iron frame and indomitable spirit stood it all. Where his savage gaolers failed, however, the fears and doubts for his future progress and the ultimate success of his mission threatened to succeed. The excessive heat and scarcity of water in the wilderness made escape in the hot season out of the question, while the hardships and dangers of travel to be faced in the wet season appeared scarcely less appalling.
The blackness of the outlook began to cloud even his sanguine temperament, and the heart sickness of hope deferred frequently manifested itself in fits of melancholy and despondency. With the lowering of his mental tone came also the bodily reaction, and a smart fever was the result.
Even then he obtained no alleviation of his sufferings. His distress was a matter of sport to the Arabs, till life became a burden to him. He trembled at times lest the peevishness, irritability, and enfeebled power of self-command accompanying the disease should cause him to overleap the bounds of prudence, and in the height of an outburst of passion commit some act of resentment which would lead to his death—death, and with his work unfinished.
On one of these occasions he left his hut and walked to some shady trees at a short distance from the camp, where he lay down in the hope of obtaining a little solitude. He was discovered by Ali’s son and a band of horsemen, who ordered him to get up and follow them back to camp. Park begged to be allowed to stay a few hours. For answer one of the horsemen drew his pistol, and presenting it at Park’s head, pulled the trigger. Happily it did not go off. Once more the brute essayed his weapon with the same result. None of his companions made the least attempt to stop him. Helpless, Park could but sit awaiting his doom, what indeed would have been a happy release from his miseries, only that as yet the task he had set himself was unaccomplished. With renewed precautions the pistol was presented a third time, when the hapless victim, who so far had not spoken, begged his would-be murderer to desist, promising at the same time to return with him to the camp.
Before Ali his position was no better. With fiendish malignity the latter played with his prisoner as a cat does with a mouse, opening and shutting the pan of his pistol and watching the while the effect on the demeanour of the white man before him. Getting but small amusement out of his resolute and indifferent mien, he sent him off at last with the threat that the next time he was found wandering outside the camp he would be shot forthwith.
“One whole month had now elapsed since I was led into captivity, during which time each returning day brought me fresh distresses. I watched the lingering course of the sun with anxiety, and blessed his waning beams as they shed a yellow lustre along the sandy floor of my hut, for it was then that my oppressors left me, and allowed me to pass the sultry night in solitude and reflection.”
With habit and time Park began to be inured to his situation. Hunger and thirst were more easy to bear than at first, and the people getting accustomed to his presence, were not quite so troublesome. To beguile the time he made inquiries regarding the route to Timbuktu and the Haussa countries, and even got some of his tormentors to teach him the letters of the Arabic alphabet.
About the middle of April Ali proceeded north to bring back his chief wife Fatima. During the chief’s absence, though Park was less molested than usual, he was also less regularly supplied with his scanty rations. For two successive days he received none at all, and had to endure the pangs of hunger as best he might. This he found painful enough at first, but soon discovered that temporary relief might be had by swallowing copious and repeated draughts of water.
Johnson—who meanwhile had been brought from Dina before he could leave for the coast—and Demba, not having the spirit of their master to bear them up in the midst of misfortune, sank into the deepest dejection, remaining for the most part prostrate on the sands in a sort of torpid slumber, from which they could scarcely be roused even when food arrived.
To the languor and debility brought on by semi-starvation was added on Park’s part the affliction of sleeplessness; deep convulsive respirations shook him from head to foot; semi-blindness seized him, and with difficulty he fought a frequent tendency to faint.
But the cup of his misery was not yet full. The King of Bambarra, incensed at Ali’s refusal to join him against Daisy, King of Kaarta, proclaimed war against him. This threw the country into confusion. The camp at Benaun was at once broken up, and a retreat further north commenced. On the first day a halt was made at a negro town called Farreni.
Again Park’s rations were forgotten. Next day, foreseeing similar treatment, he proceeded himself to the head man of the town and begged some food. This was not only granted, but promised to be continued as long as he remained in the neighbourhood.
On the 3rd of May Ali’s camp was reached, and found to be pitched in the midst of a thick wood. Here Park was presented to Fatima. This lady was singularly beautiful, according to the Ludamar Arab idea—that is to say, she was remarkably corpulent. “A woman of even moderate pretensions to appearance must be one who cannot walk without a slave under each arm to support her, and a perfect beauty is a load for a camel.” To attain this pinnacle of perfection, the girls are gorgedby their mothers with great quantities of kuskus and camel’s milk, which must be taken no matter what the appetite may be. “I have seen a poor girl sit crying with the bowl at her lips for more than an hour, and her mother watching her all the while with a stick in her hand, and using it without mercy whenever she observed that her daughter was not swallowing.”
At first Fatima affected to be shocked at Park’s appearance, but showed that she had a woman’s heart by presenting him with a bowl of milk. Later on she proved to be his best friend.
The heat had now become insufferable. Everything vegetable was scorched up, and the whole country presented a dreary expanse of sand dotted over with a few stunted trees and thorny acacia bushes. Water was almost unattainable, and night and day the wells were crowded with cattle lowing and fighting with each other to get at the troughs. The pangs of thirst rendered many of them furious and ungovernable, while the weak, unable to contend for a place, endeavoured to quench their thirst by licking up the liquid mud from the gutters—frequently with fatal consequences.
The suffering due to the scarcity of water extended to the people, and to no one more than the white captive among them. If his boy Demba attempted to get a supply of water, he was usually soundly thrashed for his presumption. This treatment became so intolerable in the end that Demba would rather have died than go near the wells. Park and his attendants were in this way reduced to begging from the negro slaves, but with indifferent success. Fatima, however, more than once relieved their necessities. Nevertheless, time after time, Park “passed the night in the situation ofTantalus. No sooner had I shut my eyes than fancy would convey me to the streams and rivers of my native land; then, as I wandered along the verdant brink, I surveyed the clear stream with transport, and hastened to swallow the delightful draught; but, alas! disappointment awakened me, and I found myself a lonely captive perishing of thirst amidst the wilds of Africa!”
One night, driven half wild by his tortures, he started off in search of relief. At every well he found struggling herdsmen, and from one and all he was driven away with outrageous abuse. At length at one he found only an old man and two boys, from whom he was on the point of receiving what he sought, when, discovering whom they were about to supply, they dashed the water into the trough, and told him to drink with the cattle. Too glad to get water in any way, “I thrust my head between two of the cows, and drank with great pleasure, until the water was nearly exhausted, and the cows began to contend with each other for the last mouthful.”
Signs that the wet season was approaching began to show themselves towards the end of May in frequent changes of the wind, gathering clouds, and distant lightning. At the same time Park’s fate was approaching a crisis, and he began to revolve schemes of escape. His hopes rose high when discovering that Ali was about to join some rebellious Kaartans in attacking Daisy, through the intervention of Fatima, he was permitted to accompany the expedition as far as Jarra. Once in Kaarta, he hoped that means would be found to escape from his barbarous captors.
Fatima next conferred a further favour on him by returning part of his clothes, of which he had beendeprived since he fell into Ali’s hands. Following these came his horse, now reduced, by hard work and starvation feeding, to skin and bone, but still fit for work.
On the 26th of May, Park set out with the Moors towards Jarra, accompanied by Johnson and Demba. At night they camped at a watering-place in the woods, but the accommodation being limited, Park was compelled to sleep in the open in the centre of the huts, where he could more easily be watched.
In the morning they had to face unprotected all the violence of a sandstorm, which raged with great fury the whole day. At times it was impossible to look up. The cattle, maddened by the driving sand, ran recklessly hither and thither, threatening to trample the prisoners to death.
Next day our traveller’s rising hopes received a serious check. While preparing to depart a messenger arrived, who, seizing Demba, told him that henceforth Ali was to be his master, and that he must return at once to the camp they had left. With him were to go all his present master’s effects, though “the old fool” Johnson might go on to Jarra.
Park was completely overwhelmed at the idea of his faithful boy being sent back to such a life of misery as would be his lot in the household of Ali. Unable to say a word to the messenger, he ran straight to the chief himself, and his indignation for once getting the better of him, he upbraided him in passionate language for the new injustice he was about to commit, compared to which all else was in his eyes as nothing.
To this generous but unwise outburst Ali made no reply, beyond ordering him, with haughty air and malignant smile, to mount his horse immediately or be sent back likewise. Terrible was the struggle in Park’s inmost soul to refrain from ridding the world of such a monster, and giving vent to all the suppressed feelings of the last two months in one passionate outburst.
Happily he had not lost complete control over himself nor the ability to comprehend his situation, and he retired from the tent a prey to a hundred harassing emotions.
“Poor Demba was not less affected than myself. He had formed a strong attachment towards me, and had a cheerfulness of disposition which often beguiled the tedious hours of captivity.” But part they must. “So having shaken hands with the unfortunate boy, and blended my tears with his, I saw him led off by three of Ali’s slaves towards the camp at Bubaker.”
On the 1st of June, Jarra was once more re-entered, and Park became again the guest of the slatee. Everything else now became subordinate for the time being to the one object of procuring the liberty of Demba. Before this duty even his own escape became of secondary importance. All his attempts were ineffectual, however. Ali could not be prevailed upon to sell or return his new-made slave, though he never ceased to hold out hopes that Demba might yet be let off for a consideration.
On the 8th, Ali with his horsemen returned to camp to celebrate a festival, Park, to his great joy, being left behind in the house of the slatee. Once more he began to think of his own safety, seeing that now it was proved beyond a doubt he could be of no use to Demba.
Meanwhile troubles began to gather rapidly round Jarra. Ali, after securing the price of his co-operation, treacherously left his allies to their fate. Daisy with his army was rapidly approaching the town, whose inhabitants could expect no mercy from their enraged king. Finding themselves left to their own resources, the latter made such preparation as was in their power to defend themselves, at the same time sending away their women and children, with such corn and cattle as they could take with them. Park prepared to depart along with these. He saw clearly that if he continued where he was he would run the risk of being involved in the general slaughter if Daisy were successful, or if the reverse, that he would sooner or later fall a victim to the Moors. And yet to go forward alone seemed terrible enough—for Johnson flatly refused to proceed—without means of protection or goods to purchase the necessaries of life, or an interpreter to make himself understood in the Bambarra language.
The one comparatively easy road was that to the coast, but “to return to England without accomplishing the object of my mission was worse than all.”
The old spirit, never quite killed, was beginning to reassert itself, with the enjoyment of a certain measure of free will and liberty. Whatever was to be his fate, he should meet it, he determined, with his face towards the Niger.
On the night of the 26th, the women worked incessantly, preparing food and packing articles that were not absolutely necessary for the flight. Early in the morning they took the road for Bambarra.
The exodus was affecting in the extreme—the women and children weeping, the men sullen and dejected—all of them looking back with regret to the spot where they had passed their lives, and shuddering at the possiblefate before them. Amid many heartrending scenes Park mounted his horse, and taking a large bag of corn before him, set forth with the flying multitude.
In this fashion he travelled onward for two days, accompanied so far by Johnson and the slatee. At Koiro a halt of two days had to be made to recruit his half-starved animal—an unfortunate delay, since it gave time for Ali’s chief slave and four Moors to arrive in quest of their white prisoner. This new calamity had to be met with prompt action if Park was not to face an indefinite period of miserable captivity. At once he resolved to escape by flight—a “measure which I thought offered the only chance of saving my life and gaining the object of my mission.”
Johnson was ready to applaud his master’s resolution, but flatly refused to join him.
The Moors, thinking the white man safe, did not trouble themselves about him, and he was thus able to prepare a few articles to take with him. Two suits of clothes and a pair of boots were all he possessed. He had not now a single bead or other article of commercial value to purchase food for himself.
About daybreak the Moors were all asleep. Now was the time to make good his opportunity. Liberty and possible success were in the balance with renewed captivity and possible death. A cold sweat moistened his forehead as the importance of the step he was about to take was brought with twofold force to his consciousness. But to deliberate was to lose the only chance of escape. He must make one more bold attempt to regain liberty and reach the Niger. The thought was inspiration. He picked up his bundle, stepped stealthily over the sleeping negroes, and reached his horse. Johnsonwas bidden farewell, and once more begged to take particular care of the papers entrusted to him, and to inform his friends on the Gambia “that he had left me in good health, on my way to Bambarra.”
A few years before, Major Houghton had sent an almost identical message to the same Gambian friends.
Once outside the village, it behoved Park to be on the alert, and get as quickly from the vicinity of the Moors as possible. With his horse reduced to skin and bone speed was out of the question, while the darkness and the nature of the country otherwise made progress slow. And yet how much was staked on every dragging mile—every moment might mean freedom or bondage, life or death to him. Half frantic at the thought of recapture, he imagined an enemy behind each bush, in every sound the tramp of pursuing horsemen.
It looked as if his worst apprehensions were about to be realised when unawares he stumbled upon a Moorish watering-place. Before he could retreat he was discovered by the shepherds. Immediately there was a howl of execration, and he was set upon with stones and curses, and driven forth as if he had been a prowling beast of prey.
Thankful to have escaped unhurt, Park, once rid of the fanatics, began to be more hopeful. He was not to get away so easily, however. Suddenly a shout rang behind bidding him halt. He hardly needed to look to know the nature of the danger that threatened. Three Moors on horseback were in full pursuit, ferociously brandishing their weapons, and screaming outthreats as they bore down on him. Escape was impossible—his jaded steed was beyond all urging. With the dogged indifference of despair he turned and rode back prepared for the worst. Unmoved he looked at the upraised muskets of his pursuers—almost unheeding, so benumbed were his faculties, he heard that they were sent to bring him back to Ali. In reality, however, the Moors were robbers, and their object merely plunder.
On reaching a wood the wretches ordered their prisoner to untie his bundle. Great was their disgust to find nothing worth taking but a cloak. But to Park his cloak was the sole protection from the rains by day and the mosquitoes by night, and in vain he followed the robbers, trying to move their compassion, and earnestly begging them to return the garment. For sole reply, one of the band, annoyed at his persistence, presented a musket at him, while another struck his horse a brutal blow over the head. There was no resisting these hints, and once more possessed by the keen desire for life and liberty, Park parleyed no longer, but turned and rode off.
The moment he was out of sight he struck into the woods to avoid similar encounters. As he passed on, the sense of security growing ever stronger with the passing night, his sanguine temperament gradually resumed its sway. He felt as one recovered from a dangerous illness—he breathed freer, his limbs were as if released from cramping fetters, while the Niger magnet drew him on irresistibly as ever. Life became more desirable, earth and heaven more beautiful, and even the desert lost half its terrors. Beggary and the miseries of the rainy season grew less terrible toface with the growth of the hope that the guerdon of success was yet to be won.
But man cannot live on hope alone. However fair it might paint the vision of the future, it could not stifle the present demands of nature. Only too painfully Park awoke to the fact that starvation stared him in the face. He was destitute, and could not buy; unarmed, and therefore could not take; hunted, and therefore dared not beg. His every step was beset with innumerable dangers. His one chance lay in reaching a Bambarra village, where he would be among the negroes, and safe at least from the Moors.
To the pangs of hunger was speedily added the yet more painful agony of thirst. The sun overhead beat down upon him from heavens of lurid brilliancy. The scorching white sands, blinding to look upon, reflected back the heat as from the mouth of a furnace.
From the tree tops not a trace of human habitation was to be seen. Alone patches of thick scrub and hillocks of barren sand met the eye. In pushing on lay the only hope of escaping death. With his old undaunted spirit Park elected to push on—to struggle while his legs would carry him.
Towards four in the afternoon he came suddenly upon the dreaded yet welcome sight of a herd of goats. They were at once an indication of a great danger, and of possible food and water. His joy was great when after a cautious examination he discovered that the herd was tended only by two boys. With difficulty he approached them.
“Water! water!” he gasped. For answer the goatherds showed their empty water-skins, telling him at the same time that no water was to be found in thewoods. Sick at heart and well-nigh exhausted, Park turned away to resume his weary tramp and almost hopeless quest.
Night was approaching, and already his limbs were failing him. His thirst had become intolerable, and his mouth was parched and inflamed. Sudden attacks of dimness at times came over his eyes, and more than once he almost fainted. Each moment it became increasingly clear that if he did not reach water before the dawn of another day he must inevitably perish. To relieve the pains in his throat and mouth he chewed the leaves of different shrubs, but only added to his agony.
In the evening he reached a ridge, and climbing a tree, gazed eagerly over the land—only a barren wilderness deserted by God and man spread out before him. “The same dismal uniformity of shrub and sand everywhere presented itself, and the horizon was as level and uninterrupted as that of the sea.”
The sun sank, and with it went the fugitive’s last hope. He was too weak to walk, and his horse, as much exhausted as himself, could not carry him. Even in his own extremity he had yet a kind thought for his faithful dumb companion, and that it might the better shift for itself he took off its bridle. Even as he did so a horrid sensation of sickness and giddiness seized him, and he fell on the sand, believing that his last hour had come.
In one swift flash of thought he saw the end of his weary struggle, and with it all his hopes of doing something worthy of remembrance. Then the shadow of death gathered over him, and he sank back unconscious.
But all was not yet over—for Park life had stillsomewhat in store of work and gladness. With the lowering of the temperature and the rising of the cool night breeze he awoke from his death-like swoon, and, gathering himself together, he resolved to make one more attempt to keep death at bay. With his old strength of will, though weak in limb, he staggered forward into the darkness of night, which seemed only too like the prospect before him. A few minutes more and a flash of lightning illumined the surrounding landscape. To him that flash was a promise of rain, and gave birth to a new hope that his agonies from thirst would soon be at an end. Soon flash followed flash, more and more dazzling, nearer and nearer. With a painful eagerness the exhausted wanderer watched the coming storm. He had no further occasion to struggle forward. He had but to sit still and wait. But what hopes and fears the while! Would it rain or not? Would the storm break on him, or career past on either side? Another hour and the answer came. On his ear fell the welcome sound of trees bending before the blast. His fevered face felt the first cool puffs of wind. A black column, dimly discerned in the darkness, and laden with moisture, as he thought, reared itself before him. It blotted out earth and sky, and tore onward borne on the wings of the wind. He rose to meet and welcome it. His parched mouth was opened to taste the heaven-sent rain. When, oh, misery! he found himself enveloped in a suffocating sandstorm. Stricken with unutterable disappointment, he sank to the ground behind a sheltering bush.
For above an hour the storm swept over him in choking whirlwinds. When it ceased, Park with undaunted spirit resumed his way in the darkness, thoughwith ever intensifying thirst, ever lessening strength—perilously near his last struggle.
Again the lightning flashed across the sky. He hardly dared to hope, yet, nevertheless, he turned his burning face and stretched his shaking hands towards the advancing storm-clouds, that he might feel the first refreshing drops. This time there was no mistake, and tearing off his clothes, he spread them out to collect the heaven-sent rain, while all naked to the storm, amid the blinding glare of tropic lightning and the frightful crash of thunder, he sucked in the moisture by every pore of his body.
But he was only relieved of one series of pangs to be reminded that others lay behind—the miseries of starvation had still to be faced. There could be no rest, no sleep for him, till food as well as water was obtained. Accordingly he resumed his way, directing his footsteps by the compass, which the frequent flashes of lightning enabled him to consult. Soon these welcome gleams ceased, and then he had to stumble along as best he might. About two in the morning a light appeared. Thinking it might proceed from a negro town, he groped about in the darkness unsuccessfully trying to ascertain whether it was so or not, from corn-stacks or other signs of cultivation. Other lights now became visible, and he began to fear he had fallen upon a Moorish encampment.
Soon his worst doubts became certainties, and rather than fall into the hands of his late persecutors he elected to face death in the wilderness. As stealthily as possible, however, he tried to discover the water. In doing so a woman got a glimpse of him, and her scream brought up two men, who passed quite close to where hehad crouched to hide himself. Clearly this was no place for him, and once more he plunged into the sheltering woods. He had not proceeded far when the loud croaking of frogs told him where to slake his thirst.
This narrow escape inspired Park to renewed exertions. At daylight he detected a pillar of smoke at a distance of twelve miles, and towards it he painfully plodded. After five hours of extreme toil the village from which the smoke arose was reached, and from a husbandman he heard that it was a Fulah village belonging to Ali. This was unpleasant news.
To enter might possibly mean return to captivity, yet possibly, too, he might be allowed to go unmolested. Meanwhile the immediate certainty was that he was dying of hunger, and that his position could hardly be made worse. Determined, therefore, to take his chance of the result, he rode into the village. On his applying at the head man’s house, the door was slammed in his face, and his appeals for food were unheeded. Dejectedly he turned his horse’s head, seeing nothing before him but death in the woods. As he was leaving the village he remarked some mean dwellings. Might he not make another trial. Hospitality he remembered did not always prefer the dwellings of the rich.
Prompted by the thought he advanced towards an old woman spinning cotton in front of her hut. By signs he indicated that he wanted food, leaving his haggard face and sunken eyes to tell the rest. Nor did he appeal in vain. The hut was opened to him, and such food as its owner could give was placed in his hands. The first pangs of hunger allayed, Park’s next thought was for the four-footed sharer of his toils and agonies, and for it too a speedy supply of corn was forthcoming.
Meanwhile a dubious crowd gathered outside, and solemnly debated what they should do with the stranger who had thus appeared among them. Opinion was divided, however; and Park, seeing the danger of his position, thought it better to leave, however footsore and weary he might be. On seeing their unbidden guest prepare to depart, the villagers came to the conclusion that their wisest course was to do nothing.
Once clear of the town, and the boys and girls who followed him for some time, Park, who had not slept for more than two days and nights, sought the shade of a sheltering tree, and laid himself down to rest. Early in the afternoon he was awakened by two Fulahs, but without entering into conversation with them he continued his journey towards Bambarra and the Niger. It was not till midnight that finding a pool of rain water he again halted. Sleep, however, of which he stood terribly in need, was out of the question. The mosquitoes assailed him in maddening myriads, while the howling of wild beasts added to the terrors of his surroundings.
After a miserable night, the day was hailed with relief and delight. At midday another Fulah watering-place was reached, and here Park was hospitably received by a shepherd, who gave him boiled corn and dates for himself, and corn for his horse. Resuming his journey with fast returning hope and vigour, the resolute traveller pushed on, determined to journey all night.
At eight in the evening he heard wayfarers approaching, and had to hide himself in a thicket, and there hold his horse’s nose to prevent him neighing. At midnight the joyful sound of frogs apprised him of the neighbourhood of water. Having quenched his thirst, he soughtout an open space in the wood and lay down to sleep, happily unmolested till near morning, when some wild beasts compelled him to look after the safety of himself and his animal. Resuming his tramp, Park crossed the frontiers of Bambarra, and felt for the first time for many weary weeks in comparative safety and free from the horrid Moorish nightmare which had so long haunted him. At Wawra he was hospitably received by the chief of the village, and at last worn out with excessive fatigue and starvation, but rejoicing in the sweet new sense of security, was able to lay himself down and enjoy the luxury of a deep sound sleep.
To Park everything now seemed hopeful and encouraging. He was destitute and alone—a beggar in the heart of Africa; but now that he had safely escaped from the deserts of the north, and from the clutches of their fanatical and degraded Moorish inhabitants, his sanguine temperament made small account of his personal troubles. It was sufficient to know himself in a land of plenty, with villages at every mile, and among a people of kindly nature.
His hopes were not belied. Everywhere his reception was hospitable. The villagers gave of their food and shelter; the wayfarers their company, assistance, guidance, and protection. At most places he was not recognised as being a white man, but from his strange and destitute appearance was assumed to be a pilgrim from Mecca, and treated by the Faithful with the consideration such an one deserved. And thus the days passed on, ever bringing him nearer the goal of his hopes, ever adding to his assurance that the great prize for which men and nations had struggled for three centuries was to be his.
On the night of the 20th July, Park took up his quarters at a small village. Here he was told that he would see the Niger—or, as the natives called it, the Joliba or Great Waters—on the morrow.
The thought was intoxication, and between it and the myriad mosquitoes that preyed upon his unprotected body, sleep was out of the question. Before daylight he was up and doing, and had saddled his horse long ere the gates of the village were opened.
At length he got away. With eager eyes he looked towards the south—towards what for many terrible months had been his Kiblah—his Mecca. At last he was about to be rewarded for all the tortures of body and mind he had so heroically endured, so resolutely faced.
The road was crowded with natives hurrying towards the capital. Four large villages were passed, and then in the distance loomed up the smoke of Sego—Sego on the banks of the Niger! A little further and the joyful cry, “See the water!” announced to Park that the Niger was in sight. Ay, truly, there it was, sweeping along in a majestic stream towards the east, and glittering in the bright rays of the morning sun.
One long and ardent look, one sigh of supreme relief, and the pilgrim of geography hastened to the brink, and after drinking of the water, lifted up a fervent prayer to the Great Ruler of all things for having thus crowned his endeavours with success.