CHAPTER XSERVITUDE

A HAUSA SLAVE WOMAN OF A TUAREG FAMILYGRINDING WHEAT BETWEEN STONES

A HAUSA SLAVE WOMAN OF A TUAREG FAMILY

GRINDING WHEAT BETWEEN STONES

CHAPTER XSERVITUDE

TheTuareg nomads of the Sahara consider themselves the superiors of all who toil with their hands, and there is a wide distinction between nobleman and serf.

The nomads are the overlords of the land. It is they who saw to it in the past that the oases were kept supplied with labour to till the soil and reap the harvest, promote bazaars and build towns, on which they might draw heavily for dates and cereals and other rare luxuries of their table; exacted as tribute for playing the part of guardians, or bartered for in more creditable exchange. The Tuaregs were ever cavaliers and soldiers of fortune, who scorned manual labour as an indignity. Nevertheless, it was an economic convenience for their country to grow food where the land could give of it, and to this end they acquired their workmen.

Slave-raids to Hausaland, slave-caravans, slave-markets in the heart of the Sahara, were the common custom of the land up till quite recent times, and were the outcome of the need for labour in the oases, and in the camps of the overlords.

The ideal society of the Tuareg is that which is without government of any kind, to permit that they may freely execute their turbulent authority unhindered, and exact homage at the point of the sword. But the old regime is passing; though the stock of the slave class remain, either as servants to their old masters or as sedentary tribes within themselves.

The active practice of slavery has ceased, though the frame of mind still persists. Boys and girls are still sold out of families, quietly, but there is no cruelty in the transaction, for the slave class of a Tuareg family are permitted the complete freedom of the household so long as they observe the laws of their position. As a rule, the serf has not a very brilliant mentality, and the lifelong habit of toil is not easily disturbed. They are accustomed to serve, and, indeed, so long as they are fed and have a place to sleep, they appear as content as those in their natural homes in Hausaland or elsewhere. Many of these serfs who are alive to-day, were in the first instance bought and sold in the market-place, or were direct captives of nomadic raids. Under the military regime of the French they are more or less free to go their way to-day; but they make no change. They remain in the families as before, assured of protection and livelihood that might not be theirs if they cast adrift.

It is on this slave class that all the hard work falls, whether in the Tuareg camps or in the centresof cultivation or commercial enterprise; and all are accustomed to their nomad overlords.

A TEBU WOMAN

A TEBU MANSEDENTARY IN OASES OF KOWAR

A TEBU MAN

SEDENTARY IN OASES OF KOWAR

The widely scattered places of sedentary occupation in the Sahara may take two forms: they may be oases in the midst of sandy desert, or they may be havens among the mountains.

The desert oasis has its planted belt of date palms and plentiful supply of water, usually drawn from wells, sometimes from springs in open ditches. Under the shade of the palms are the irrigated gardens, where constant labour, at the seasons of cultivation, is demanded to flood the soil and nurse the plants to maturity in surroundings that would give no life without artificial aid.

The gardens are sandy and small: a network of closely crowded allotments, each fenced with palm staves to hold in check the driving sand. By means of a regular system of irrigation channels the soil is fed with water at intervals each day; drawn to the surface by oxen, or by hand, at the expense of a good deal of patient labour. The consequent dampness and humidity breed malaria, which is, perhaps, a further reason for the importation of the negroid serf, who is, through hereditary environment, familiar with the destructive malady. Indeed, in this respect, at the time of rain it is common practice for many semi-nomadic masters to evacuate the oases altogether and roam far out into the more healthy desert, tending their flocks while leaving their serfs alone to look after the cultivation.

The palms produce dates, which ripen in the autumn, and the gardens principally wheat, millet, tomatoes, and onions in sparing quantities. All the work of cultivation is done by hand.

The dwellings of the desert oases have the character of towns, not villages. In a sense that designation may appear overdrawn, insomuch that many oases are no larger than the tiniest of villages, but against that should be set an environment that is so appallingly blank that any society of dwellings takes on the glamour of urban life. The market-places have their bazaars and their movement of people, the sandy streets are tolerably well laid out, while the clay-built buildings are compact and complete, and sometimes ornamental.

But they are few and very widely scattered, and vary greatly in standard. Some are mere hovels, others towns in the full sense of the word; and these latter are chiefly in the Algerian Sahara near to Arab civilisation, though Bilma, Fachi, and like outstanding ports in the desert should on no account be overlooked.

The sedentary havens among mountains such as Ahaggar and parts of Aïr are different from the desert oases. They are in character villages, and the life is entirely rural, as a place is rural that herds flocks about its doors and lives, for the most part, in grass-covered hutments.

In Aïr in particular, and in some cases in Ahaggar, these permanent villages are occupied by Tuaregs who, having fallen on evil days and lost theircamels and means of getting about, have taken to semi-sedentary life with bitterness in their hearts. Those have their slave-people, who, besides doing all the manual work in camp, labour at cultivation, as in the oases, when water permits of cultivation. But such harvest as they gather is meagre indeed, and insufficient to serve the needs of the community, since there is little scope for cultivation in the narrow, stony valleys between the slopes of the mountains; and lack of water adds a further drawback. On that account, also, only a few date-palms are planted near such villages.

SEMI-SEDENTARYA TUAREG OF THE EGUMMI TRIBE

SEMI-SEDENTARY

A TUAREG OF THE EGUMMI TRIBE

On the whole, there is poor encouragement to toil because of the adverse conditions, and prolonged spells of idleness have no doubt developed the spirit of laziness that is prevalent in all these places.

Tuaregs are the authoritative owners of the villages, and have a definite residence there; though every now and again a family or two, with their herds, wander away on the open trail for a time, giving expression to the restless spirit that hungers for the life of the untrammelled wilderness.

Whether desert oasis or mountain village, all go to make up a part of the social fabric of the Sahara, and the nomad camps the other part. Each depends on the other. The nomads rely on the sedentary people for markets for the goods transported by their caravans—foreign, or products of their camps—and for such foods as are the outcome of cultivation. On the other hand, the sedentary people look to the nomad to keep upcommunication with the outer world, and guard them against enemies in time of dispute or war. It would be difficult for one to subsist without the other, so that there is logically a certain intimate relation between the nomad and “The Sons of Toil,” despite the proud bearing of the former, which has behind it something of the instincts of aloofness that are disposed to be characteristics of untamed creatures of the wild.

One fact emerges that is of more than ordinary interest in consideration of the social restlessness in civilised countries to-day. It is true, in effect, that anysolidityof human existence that obtains in the Sahara, frail though it be, centres round these permanent places of production. Moreover, I believe that the whole future of the Sahara lies at their door, and that the entire land will ultimately survive or go under according to the efforts they put forth. The need to labour is clearly defined before the mighty forces of unstifled Nature. There is no alternative, except starvation and death, which is, after all, a primary, if primitive, law of Nature, age-old and irrefutable, though often overlooked. The object-lessons of this need industriously to struggle for existence are about us in every country-side, down the lanes or out in the fields, wherever living thing has dwelling and the ways of Nature are closely observed. So much is barren in the Sahara that the labour of man stands forth in all its merit; and, insignificant though the Great Desert is among the peopledcountries of the world, the little society it contains owes gratitude to the hands of toil that have made life to some extent possible.

DRAWING WATER TO IRRIGATE GARDEN CULTIVATION

In most cases the sedentary cultivators are of negroid origin, drawn largely, at one time or another, from the vast populations of the Western Sudan. Hausa and Beri-Beri blood predominate. In the Tuareg camps in the south they are known asBelas’orBuzus’, in Kowar they hold to the race names ofBeri-BeriandTebu, in Ahaggar they areImrads, and thence, northward,Haratin. All have the general features of the negro, and are dark-skinned.

They toil simply and live simply, and have a happier composure than the Tuareg, aided by a somewhat dull mentality that does not possess the activity that leads to fretfulness and brooding. About their dwellings they appear to see no shame, or drawback, in living in considerable squalor; and filthy hovels are not uncommon, with unclean occupants in ragged clothing.

Between seasons of harvest many of the sedentary people know severe poverty, sometimes famine, and at such times almost anything is eaten: even the hides of camels or goats are boiled down to a chewable substance, and the questionable soup consumed.

It is not generally realised that there are large stretches of the Sahara without fuel for fires.[17]Many oases suffer great inconvenience from dearth of the commodity, and fires to cook even a single meal a day are sometimes not procurable. Pieces of palm-stems often furnish the chief material, but are poor, dense-smoking fuel. However, anything that burns will do, and I have often known a dozen women and children hover about my caravan encampment with baskets to collect the droppings of the camels.

Like all else in the Sahara, the oases suffer a perpetual onslaught of sand, which fills their gardens, their streets, and their homes; often banking up like drifts of snow against the dwellings, or forming in eddies and pools where the sweep of the wind circles a bend. Outside some oases sand is banked in huge dunes, which have to be continually fought against by the inhabitants, or they would engulf all. The predominance of sand everywhere does not add to cleanliness.

One of the most pleasant experiences that one can have in the Sahara is to come suddenly, without any forewarning from the character of the country, upon a place of human habitation after long weeks in barren wastes. The joy of the society of mankind is great, and the chatter of people about their homes contains a quality of comfort that is akin to home.

The scattered oases in the Sahara are as ports to those who roam the highways of the ocean. And in that there is one startling revelation in the fact that, like most big harbours of civilisation, the chief oases have their underworld of vice and wickedness.And this is entirely a custom of the Sahara; which, once again, points strongly to its resemblance to the sea, for I have never known like habits to prevail anywhere among the populated regions of the Sudan. Bilma, which is a notable port in the land, might be taken as an instance, since the reputation of theOulad Nails, in the Northern Sahara, is already widely known.

A DATE GROVE OF AN OASIS

We find there a powerful and openly recognised guild, with a chief woman at its head, known by the nameDiarabba. It has been in existence so long as the Beri-Beri and Tebu natives of the oasis can remember. The cold-eyed, gaudily ornamented women of the Guild—and most of the women of Bilma belong to it—perform an extraordinary dance which is only crudely graceful, yet picturesque because of the peculiarly shaped, coloured plume-like palm-fans, which each dancer waves in rhythm with the tom-tom music. They dance in a line before the musicians, moving their feet in accurate time and swaying to right and to left. The dance waxes faster and faster, while the men of the caravans look on.

At last one of the musicians drops his drum and runs forward to seize one of the women, whom he lifts bodily in his arms, and carries to place on a rug on the sand, the while the others continue to dance. The “belle” that has been chosen remains still, crouched upon the ground, while, one by one, men in the crowd who court her favour go forward and place money or other gifts on her head.

One shudders and turns away; the barbarism of the East is not dead—yet neither is religion nor quaint superstition. I walked outside the north walls of the town, seeking the pure open air. A solitary tomb loomed in my path. I inquired its history and was told:

“There a great Marabout died, and our fathers say that people passing the dead man’s grave saw green lights at night, and said:‘There lies a man who is glad even in death’; and so they built a tomb over him.”

In the belief that the oases and the sedentary people are the mainspring of the Sahara’s system, it may be worth while to bear in mind the state of the people, in picturing any possibility of resuscitating the land, of which we hear projects from time to time. Prolonged immorality brings decadence in its wake, and extreme poverty can do likewise. I see in the oases to-day human life at a very low ebb; human life that has been allowed to go to rot, because, through the ages, the Sahara has had no strongfriendsto reach out a hand and lift it from “the Slough of Despond.”

If the oases could be rejuvenated it is possible to believe that, despite the awe-inspiring forces of Nature, great things might yet be accomplished in reviving the Sahara; for the oases were ever the keystones of the land.

But that is a vast undertaking to attempt, andalmost impossible of accomplishment. The low ebb is running fast, and the back eddies of the land are full of wreckage that slide toward oblivion in the end. Which is a clear illustration that,when the character of the people of a country weakens, so must that country suffer.

A WOMAN OF THE “DIARABBA”

CHAPTER XISTRANGE CAMP-FIRES

Whenmankind pack up their goods and chattels in dunnage bags and bits of boxes and take to the open road, the life that ensues is that of the nomad, whether the wanderings are from place to place within the bounds of civilisation or beyond recognised frontiers. In either case the quality of adventure is there to quicken the pulses; for the instinct to explore is in all of us, whether the field be far-flung or near at hand. And while it is true that, in minor walks, light-hearted travel may have little purpose in its conception beyond that of pleasure, particularly at the onset, there is nevertheless reason why the smallest of these nomadic propensities should be thoughtfully considered since there is a very tangible utility in them, insomuch that travel of any kind is disposed to enlarge one’s notion of the world as a whole, while, at the same time, it broadcasts the character of a race; which shall be judged of repute or disrepute, abroad, according to the conduct of those who, wittingly or unwittingly, carry the standard far afield.

These are small words, and may convey little ornothing of a mighty subject that will, one day, surely be our tremendous concern. For the kingdom of mankind is rapidly enlarging; and the time has come when it is fast being realised that insular completeness is over-narrow to withstand the rising flood alone. Wherefore it is no longer sufficient for any individual or country to look upon the prospect from comfortable doorstep and cry: “All is well.” Rather should each of us desire to see beyond, and comprehend the composition of the comradeship of the world as a whole, and build therefrom the character that shall fit us to sit by the fireside of any race, knowing, in the end, that we are welcomed, and have laboured faithfully to play the part of broad-minded men.

And it is significant that, along the highways of the world, a vastly important part of the history of Races and Empires has been written, and not only may wise men build for strength within their abodes, but also along all paths that lead to them.

Wherefore the Open Road may lead toward a goal, and nomadic restlessness be more than mere inherent instinct.

However, to return to the subject of travel in the Sahara, we, as islanders, can clearly comprehend the vastness of the oceans, and the importance of the routes across them, and thereby understand the conditions that confront the inhabitants of the shores and in the “ports” of the Sahara who seek, at times, to find passage across the grim, silent wastes of the desert. But ocean and desertto-day present diverse phases of travel. The one has all that modern science and civilisation can command to make travel easy, while the other remains unchanged from the darkest ages, and is wholly primitive.

A HALT AT AN OLD WELL

It is with the latter that this narrative has to deal in endeavour to give a few impressions of camp-fires I have known in out-of-the-way places while moving through the land, living as a nomad, carrying trivial possessions by the aid of humble beasts of burden, and camping wherever chance befell when the sun swung into the western sky—a life where one experiences the rugged edge of existence and comes to be vastly content with little pleasures, since these occur but seldom.

One of the rarest occurrences in the Sahara is rain, and the nomads tell that they have known seven years and even ten years pass without any in some localities. Twice, on the trail, I have witnessed the coming of the greatest boon that the Sahara can know; on 3rd August 1920, and again on 13th July 1922. They were memorable occurrences, and one is herein described as an incident of outdoor life not readily forgotten.

We were camped for a few days on a small, rocky knoll on the bank of a dry, deep-channelled river-bed. For months past the heat of the desert had waxed greater and greater, until the weather had become unbearably stifling and oppressive. Therewas no relief in the surroundings; a wasteland of sad colourings, made up of pale sand and occasional sun-bleached grass tufts. It was the kind of environment that drives men to madness if the mind is not occupied.

There was a subdued tenseness abroad; and almost a gesture of mute appeal, for in truth the whole land was overstrained and panting for relief—and rains were due, if they were to come this year.

For an evening or two heat lightning lit the eastern horizon, and a few distant clouds hung about. . . . And then the great gift of the gods was delivered.

The big storm descended with astonishing suddenness, one early afternoon, and in no time the clear blue sky and sun-flooded land became transformed into a dark inferno of raging elements.

Our first warning of impending events came from a huge, ominous cloud that rolled over the land from the south-west, like a low black column of bush-fire smoke. It was the vanguard dust-churnings of a mighty hurricane, and with something of consternation the frail encampment prepared to crouch before the onslaught. But we had barely time to bundle valued possessions under canvas, and run round tent-ropes to test their security, before a fierce gale, filled with stinging dust and sand, swooped hungrily upon camp. And then the battle raged. All hands struggled to keep the tents intact, orders were bawled thatwent unheard, for they were torn at the point of utterance and ruthlessly tossed into the vortex of the storm. Lurid lightning flashed and thunder roared above our heads; followed by a hissing deluge of torrential rains. Still we battled with unruly ropes and canvas that buffeted in the gale like ship-sails fouled in a treacherous wind, while all were drenched to the skin, and water literally streamed from our thin clothing. Matches, maps, notes—everything that happened to be in my pockets—was drowned to clammy pulp.

AN ANCIENT SAHARAN WELLNOTE HOW BEAMS ARE CUT WITH FRICTION OF ROPES. BELOW-GROUND THE SIDES ARE OF MASONRY

AN ANCIENT SAHARAN WELL

NOTE HOW BEAMS ARE CUT WITH FRICTION OF ROPES. BELOW-GROUND THE SIDES ARE OF MASONRY

Camp-fires hissed and spluttered, and were quickly quenched; and in no time the tranquil camp of half an hour ago was no more than a skeleton of bedraggled possessions and woebegone occupants.

Meanwhile the whole aspect of the country rapidly changed. Miniature streams began to form and gurgle all about us, and grew at an alarming pace. A low murmuring arose in the hills behind and drew nearer and nearer until we witnessed the remarkable sight of a foam-crested, rolling billow advancing down the hitherto empty river-bed. Like a sea-wave on a long, sandy beach it rolled on its way, except that there was no moment when it would break and subside. Impelled by the weight of water behind, it passed our camp hurrying southward, leaving a full river in its wake.

Soon the stream was breast-high; and already soaked beyond the caring, some of the natives, in high glee at the wonderful sight of flowing water, plunged into the stream for a frolic. In the mêlée,Sakari, one of my followers, lost his fez and crossed to the opposite bank to try to recover it. The water was rising so rapidly that when he came to recross, about fifteen minutes later, the stream was a tumbling torrent that nothing could live in; and so he had to sit and shiver on the opposite bank, until the flood subsided some hours later.

At the time of this incident rivers of water were flowing on three sides of the knoll. Immediately to the west ran the true river; on the east, parallel to the river, a waterfall tumbled off a small plateau, and thereafter swung in a broad, shallow stream across our south front over the completely swamped-out picketing ground of our camels. And still the torrential rains kept on.

Then came a time when we grew actively alarmed for the safety of our camp and baggage, and anxiously stood watching the river rise till it threatened to overflow even the high, rocky banks. Slowly the water crept up and up, till part of the bank actually overflowed, and water flooded into the tent nearest the brink. With all haste it was dismantled and removed. A rise of a foot, and everything we possessed would be in the flood and swept away. Gravely we watched the issue. The head camel-man, Elatu, advised trying to move everything away at once along a narrow neck on the north side. It seemed too late for that, and we held on.

And these were the critical moments that saw the tide turn in our favour. For a tantalisingperiod the water appeared, to our anxious eyes, to pause and hold to the one mark—then slowly it was noticed to recede, uncertainly, then decidedly, until we breathed thankfully in relief. A memorable moment was past.

The sky cleared at sundown; and the storm ceased.

Whereupon there was a glorious uplifting of spirits, and sheer delight in the exhilarating new-found freshness of earth and sky, and wealth of bountiful rain.

Masters joked as they changed into dry clothing, camp-boys and camel-men sang their native songs and laughed, while they ran from place to place to marvel at the quantity of water.

“Great rain for our country,” declared the Tuaregs. “Soon our lean camels shall have plenty to eat: Allah be praised!”

And to look upon the flooded land and think that only some hours before we had dug in the river-bed, and dug in vain, in search of good water; that was almost like a far-off dream.

In the dusk, when enough firewood had been salvaged, camp-fires were kindled, and we sat around the golden glow of their friendly warmth to still the shiverings of unaccustomed dampness. And in the hearts of all there was a rich and unusual exuberance because of the rare events of the day that had gifted succour for the present to the Great Lone Land of Thirst.

At another time the scene shifts from the abnormal back to the normal parched dryness, and I look out upon desert that is clothed in the character by which it is best known and recognised:an awe-inspiring, sun-mastered immensity of sand and stone; secret as eternity, and filled with the stillness and brooding melancholy of a place of the dead.

The moment happens to be one of uneasiness. There are shadows of storm aslant the trail, and we hasten the caravan forward. But only with temporary purpose, knowing full well that nothing can stay the unleashing of the pent-up furies of the elements that already whisper and cry in their eagerness to descend in one great avalanche of whirling madness.

The black columns of a sandstorm are approaching. For our puny caravan there is no escape. Distant at first, it draws within the range of minutes and moments; and then, swift as the flight of keen-winged birds, and swifter than the flames of a forest fire, the terrifying storm overtakes us.

At once there is faltering and trembling before the shock. Vain are shouts to urge the camels onward. One or two flop instantly to the ground, while others struggle to keep their balance. . . . In a moment more all have broken from the line to crowd in panic with backs to the seething, stinging sand. We have completely halted—the camels have mutinied; and no power on earth can induce them to move while the storm continues.

A WELL SUNK THROUGH SOLID ROCKNOTE HOW ROPES HAVE GROOVED THE ROCK FACE

A WELL SUNK THROUGH SOLID ROCK

NOTE HOW ROPES HAVE GROOVED THE ROCK FACE

We are caught in the sandstorm with a vengeance. There is no shelter whatever. Dazed, blinded men, working as in a shroud of dense smoke, grope for knot-ends and relieve the camels of their loads. These, banked as barricades, and the camels, are our only protection. But little they avail, for soon the encampment is literally buried.

We huddle together, blinded, spluttering and choking, not daring to speak or expose ourselves further to the awful blizzard. It is trial enough to sit still, for, whatever the covering of protection, fine dust penetrates to the inmost recesses to sting eyes and lips, already smarting and swollen, and fill our throats and nostrils.

Effort is absolutely futile, and we turn dormant as stones that wait the passing of time under unhappy exposure. Indeed, except for agitations beneath our coverings when pain becomes unbearable, we lie as in our graves. And all the while the sand-burdened blizzard seethed and boiled and rushed ever onward; darkening the day almost to night, and fogging the landscape so that eye could not see more than a yard within the haze.

Hour succeeded hour . . . and the day passed. . . . and there was no camp-fire, no food, and no happiness, for the wrath of Allah continued through the land.

Again, with rude storms past, the elements lapse drearily to their accustomed routine, governed, without heart, by the Power of the Sun.

And it is under those conditions that the traveller in the desert must chiefly toil, or, failing to toil, sink beneath the weight of undermining, brain-drugging heat and monotony.

Wherefore a commonplace day finds me toiling the sand in a God-forgotten recess of the world. I have killed some meat for the camp, but that hardly interests me. I am aware that I am “off colour”—almost ill. But I am more disturbed still by the knowledge that I am weary, and not so strong as I was; and that slowly, insidiously, the sun is sapping my life-blood.

A Tuareg stranger is with my follower, who carries the gazelle. I hear the man being told exaggerated stories of my shooting capabilities:

“He kills whether they stand or run.”

And again:

“If a man walk for two days this white man still fit to reach him with gun.”

I wanly smile; in no mood for laughter.

Slowly we trudge toward camp. It is about noon, and desperately hot. But I am thinking neither of the remorseless sting of the sun nor of the desolation of Africa:I am wondering if I dare break into one of our last bottles of whisky if I go under again with fever. It is the priceless medicine of the exhausted and malaria-stricken, and the meagre store cannot last to the end.

On entering camp, however, my thoughts are turned into other channels. The camels have just been watered, and recline on the sand. About halfof them have sores to be doctored, ugly, suppurating saddle wounds and foot wounds, fly-ridden and ill healing; so bad that every now and then they claim a victim in death. For an hour I work with scissors and knife among filth and disinfectant: crude, intimate surgery that might have turned me sick if it had not been a daily task for a long time.

The animals were then turned loose to find what scrub they could about the old well-head. But soon they lay down in the hot sun,for there was next to nothing to eat.

Elatu, the head camel-man, had gravely told me, while we worked together over the wounds, his fears and doubts of the land we travelled, and his fears and doubts of the well-being of our beasts of burden. We had camped that morning atwater, but he advised that we should not stay through the day, because there was no fit pasturage for our weary, used-up camels.

Wherefore, after a meal that I barely touched, except to gulp down cup after cup of tea, we reloaded the tired camels in the small hours of the afternoon and continued slowly on our way.

Ten hours later we wearily camped, and men scarcely spoke while, in the deep darkness, they unburdened the camels, and laid themselves down to rest . . . and then the kindly hand of night was mercifully laid upon the cares of an impoverished band.

The caravan is in want of water, and desperately anxious to find it. Having lately detected a frayed rope and some pellets of wasted camel-dung, we are fairly certain that an old trail has been picked up.

Some hours later we become sure of water ahead when we pass a number of heaps of stones piled by human hands; the Token Stones of grateful wayfarers who have slaked their thirst in the desert, and surreptitiously left behind this expression of their thanks. The Tuaregs say that most of these token heaps are the work of slaves, who, in the past, in this way endeavoured to mark the places of water over the route they were borne as captives, in case they should ever escape. Nevertheless, few nomads of the land to-day, having drunk their fill, will pass from place of water without stooping to add further stones to the piles that sit, like symbols of some weird religion, in their path.

Two camels shoot ahead of the line. Wild, saddle-perfect Tuaregs ride them to water at a swinging trot. They mean to return, with goatskins of water, to slake the pressing thirst of the men, long before we camp.

The noon hours recede, but not the oven heat, and slowly under that weight, the long span of the afternoon drags on.

Towards dusk the journey ends, and our column moves into a curious narrow declivity that finishesin a quarry-like space. We descend, and are lost from the landscape above. There is no sign of water or living soul; but the cliffs and dishevelled rocks of the den are literally covered with strange drawings and writings. With whisperings of awe one of the men who had gone in front tells that we are in a secret place of water that he has recognised. “Not many know of it,” he assures me. “A few of my people, and robbers from Ahaggar; but not the robbers from Tibesti. You are the first white man who has seen it.”

A CAMP-FIREBENEATH THE SHADE OF ROCKS

A CAMP-FIRE

BENEATH THE SHADE OF ROCKS

“But where is the water?” I exclaim, scanning the rocks and the sand carpet beneath my feet.

He beckoned me to go with him, and we proceeded until we came to the closed end, orcul-de-sacof the defile. Picking the way among giant boulders until the straight cliff base was reached, my camel-man then halted and pointed with a smile to a dark hole in the wall at the ground’s edge, no larger than the den of hyena or jackal. “Ama!” he exclaimed.

I sat down and lit my pipe; the place was unusual and uncanny. “Water in there, Mohammed? How the devil do you get it out? Go back and bring Sili with a waterskin, and ask Sakari to give you a candle: I want to have a look.”

When he got back we wormed our way into the hole. Past the entrance there was a cavern where a man could stand stooping. Crossing it, another long tunnel led to a further cave, lower than the first, and there, in the bowels of the earth, gleamingin the candle-light, lay a black pool of water, clean, clear, and deliciously cool.

In that mysterious haven of secrecy we camped beside water in abundance . . . and thus it came to pass that the camp-fires of the white man lit the eerie, strangely scrawled cliffs of Inzanenet as the fires of those on many an escapade had often done before, if tales of the land be true.

And owls and bats and ghoul-like shadows were companions through the night, but the white vulture that points the places of water and human dwelling, marked not the sky by day, since even from him of the outer world the secret of the cave was hidden.

Strangers have drifted into camp.

The caravan, at the time, is settled among a sea of wonderful sand-dunes;Ergland of the Sahara. We have found, in lake-like basins between the dunes, some goodAlwatfor the camels, and are inclined to delay so that the animals may benefit.

Hitherto no sign of human life had been seen—and now these men, who have followed in on our tracks.

Their camels are splendid, and elaborately saddled. They dismount on a dune crest overlooking the camp. There are four of them. The senior is a small, sharp-eyed man dressed like a prosperous Arab, while the others are tall, strangely gross-looking, and less dignified.

THE WAYFARER’S POSSESSIONS

Ordinarily their presence would be accepted without question, but my suspicions are aroused because they are curiously furtive, and have suddenly appeared in a wild region where not expected.

Joining us, they profess to be traders, and have a few trivial things about their persons to offer. Questioned as to where they have come from, and whence proceeding, their answers are evasive and contradictory. However, we elicit the information that the name of the senior man is Myram, and that he is a native of Ghat.

They remained some hours; long enough to appraise all we possessed, and our strength. In the evening they departed, heading north.

They were no sooner gone than my camel-men came forward to ask me to be careful through the night. “Those men were robbers,” they declared; “there will be others at hand.”

However, a wakeful watchful night passed uneventfully. It may have been that the camp was too well armed, or too alert; in any case, we saw no living soul again.[18]

And thereafter we spent some days among the dunes—perhaps the most beautiful and most mystical environment that one may find in the Sahara; and always the colours and shadows of morn and eve were infinite and superb.

Nevertheless, the influence of these gigantic scenes of sand sometimes affects the travel-stained imagination; particularly when there is no escape from constant sameness over a prolonged period. A good illustration of how it engrosses and depresses one’s thoughts, even in sleep, is contained in a dream of Glover’s.

“I dreamt, last night, that you had received a message from the French saying that your journey had all been a mistake, and that you could not continue across the Sahara. The message went on to say that they were very sorry about the disappointment to you, but if you cared to wait you could continue northnext year. You answered, ‘All right, we will wait,’ and settled to camp among the awful sand. Then I clearly saw both of us sitting there through an eternity—waiting, always waiting.And as we sat more and more sand dust covered us!—until I saw quite six inches piled upon your shoulders and arms.

“And at last I seemed to rise up and scream—‘This is awful!’ We cannot wait here longer; the dust will rise and rise for ever!’”

So that in more ways than one, camp-fires in theErgshold mysterious dangers.

CHAPTER XIIFEATHERS, AND THE PLACES THEY FREQUENT

Fromtime to time I am asked a great many questions regarding the Sahara, and nothing has pleased me more than to find that an astonishing number of people are interested in Nature, and want to know something of the wild life in the country of my travels. Invariably the first questions put by my interrogators are:“What lives in the Great Desert?”and“However do creatures exist in such a land?”

Queries of the kind bring home realisation of how firmly is planted the popular conception that the whole of the Sahara is desert, and how difficult it becomes, once a belief is firmly planted, to convey, by a broad sweep of the hand, or pen, the complete aspect of any land by proxy. In general, it can be said that awe of the Great Desert is the main feature that has taken hold in the mind’s-eye of the public up to the present time, while the manifold changes of locality, that are common to the completed character of any country, are, as secluded havens, almost entirely overlooked. The romance of the Sahara has, as it were, swept us off our balance, and the picture is out of perspective, inthe rush of workaday lives that permit of little time for deep contemplation of subjects other than those that are of immediate concern.

On the other hand, when work of exploration is undertaken in a foreign land, it is the traveller’s first purpose to seek into every nook and corner, far from the beaten track; and, where the land is richest in vegetation, water, and seclusion, he expects to find the rarest prizes.

In country like the Sahara the collector is sure of his ground. The blank ranges of sand hold nothing, or next to nothing; and the desert is vast. Wherefore he ranges far and seeks for sheltered places that give of some fertility; aware that, in a land where the struggle for existence is intense, the creatures of the wild will have sought out the havens before him.

It may be of interest to describe a few of the places where birds are found.

The caravan has been travelling for a few days over absolute desert. I have observed nothing except a single house-fly, noticeable, in exaggerated relief, simply because of the utter absence of other life. Ending this tract of desert, there are pebbly edges with scattered tufts of grass; farther back, a series of slight hollows with a few bushes; and, farther on still, a clump of acacias that screen the old uninhabited well that the caravan is heading for to refill sagging waterskins.

Approaching this welcome change of country, anArab Bustard takes to flight and clears right away; alert and very shy.

Along the stony margin the most likely birds are larks, and, as it is deep desert beyond, I am not surprised to see, matching the sand in paleness, a single large Curve-billed Desert Lark, and two or three Buff Saharan Larks.

Farther on, among the low shrubs and grass, I disturb a family of Brown Bush Babblers: birds about the size of a thrush that fly very low, and in the formation of a covey of partridges. They emit a fussy, piping call while in flight, but do not go far before they pitch into cover again.

In the clump of acacias beside the well I find a pair of Rufous Warblers and a Yellow Sunbird.

In the evening a few visitors come to the well to drink, having flown, perhaps, long distances from outlying feeding grounds. There are only three varieties: the Red-eyed Grey Dove, which I have come to call “the dove of the sand wastes,” because they are so often present in drear places, and a few tiny Red Waxbills and Grey Serin Finches.

When there is not water spilled at the mouth of the well, the birds have learned, in their need to drink, to descend the dark funnel to the water-level; and it is not uncommon to find some unfortunate ones floating on the surface that have fallen in and been drowned.

In country of this type birds live on the pickings of the sand or of withered leaf-blade; tiny grass seeds and seeds of plant blooms, grasshoppers,crickets, ants, spiders, flies, and all minute insects that gather about the hearts of plant life in a hot climate. Through the day they hide as best they can from the intense heat, huddled in little places of shade with open, panting beaks; and in the evenings and mornings feed when the sting of the sun is less formidable.

A couple of Dorcas gazelle are sighted at sundown, and one is shot; and before the caravan departs next day, there is a Desert Raven at the remains of offal not claimed by my followers.

That, with a few variations, is the sum total of bird life seen over a number of weeks of travel in drear country. Seldom, indeed, are they plentiful; and, should one chance upon flocks in a very attractive quarter, they are likely to be of only one or two species. Hence, collecting in the Sahara is a painstaking business, entailing long trying journeys of nomadic character, from one place of promise to another, much fruitless searching, and many disappointments. But enthusiasm is the life of the collector. So that rebuffs and blank days seldom evoke despair.

In country ofTassili, which is wilderness of another type, the best places for birds are where the land is very rugged and cut up by chasms that run below the surface of the ground. There is often some shrub, weed-plants, and rough grass tufts in the gullies, which furnish some food for bird life, but the spot the collector particularly prizes is where a rare pool of permanent water lies in a rocky cleft.

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