A WEIR BRIDGE.
And now Stanley had clarified the situation behind him, which stretched over 800 miles of African continent. But lookingtoward the Atlantic, there lay stretched a 1000 miles of absolutely unknown country. Into this he plunged, and pursued his course till he struck the great northward running river—the Lualaba.
The path was broken and difficult. Rivers ran frequent and deep, and crossing was a source of delay, except where, occasionally, ingeniously constructed bridges were found, which answered the double purpose of crossing and fish-weir. These are built of poles, forty feet long, driven into the bed of the stream and crossing each other near the top. Other poles are laid lengthwise at the point of junction, and all are securely tied together with bamboo ropes. Below them the nets of the fishermen are spread, and over them a person may pass in safety.
Stanley’s party had been greatly thinned out, but it still consisted of 140 men. Cameron had found it impossible to follow the Lualaba. Livingstone had tried it again and again, to meet a more formidable obstacle in the hostility of the natives than in the forests, fens and animals. Could Stanley master its secret?
He was better equipped than any of his predecessors, just as earnest, and not averse to using force where milder means could not avail. He had settled so many knotty African problems, that this the greatest of all had peculiar fascination for him. He would “freeze to this river” and see whether it went toward the Nile, or come out, as he suspected it would, through the Congo into the Atlantic.
It was a mighty stream where he struck it, at the mouth of the Luama—“full 1400 yards wide and moving with a placid current”—and close to Nyangwe which was the highest point Livingstone had reached. Here he marshalled his forces for the unknown depths beyond. He had only one of his European attendants left—Frank Pocock. Not a native attendant faltered. It would have been death to desert, in that hostile region.
Such woods, so tall, dense and sombre, the traveller had never before seen. Those of Uganda and Tanganyika were mere jungle in comparison. Even the Manyuema had penetrated but a little their depths. They line the course of the Lualaba for 1500 miles from Nyangwe. At first Stanley’s partywas well protected, for ahead of it went a large group of Arab traders. It was the opinion of these men that the “Lualaba flowed northward forever.” Soon the Arabs tired of their tramp through the dark dripping woods, and Stanley found it impracticable to carry the heavy sections of the “Lady Alice.” It was resolved to take to the river and face its rapids and savage cannibal tribes, rather than continue the struggle through these thorny and gloomy shades.
The river was soon reached and the “Lady Alice” launched. From this on, Stanley resolved to call the river the “Livingstone.” He divided his party, so that part took to the boat, and part kept even pace on the land. The stream and the natives were not long in giving the adventurers a taste of their peculiarities. A dangerous rapid had to be shot. The natives swarmed out in their canoes. The passage of the river was like a running fight.
On November 23, 1877, while the expedition was encamped on the banks of the river at the mouth of the Ruiki, thirty native canoes made a determined attack, which was only repulsed by force. On December 8, the expedition was again attacked by fourteen canoes, which had to be driven back with a volley. But the fiercest attack was toward the end of December, when a fleet of canoes containing 600 men bore down upon them with a fearful din of war-drums and horns, and the battle cry “Bo-bo, Bo-bo, bo-bo-o-o-oh!” Simultaneously with the canoe attack a terrible uproar broke out in the forest behind and a shower of arrows rained on Stanley and his followers.
There were but two courses for the leader, either to fight the best he knew how in defense of his followers, or meet a surer death by surrender. The battle was a fierce one for half an hour, for Stanley’s men fought with desperation. At length the canoes were beaten back, and thirty-six of them captured by an adroit ruse. This gave Stanley the advantage and brought the natives to terms. Peace was declared.
Here the Arab traders declared they could go no further amid such a country. So they returned, leaving Stanley only his original followers, numbering 140. The year 1877 closed indisaster. No sooner had he embarked all his force in canoes, for the purpose of continuing his journey, than a storm upset some of them, drowning two men and occasioning the loss of guns and supplies.
But the new year opened more auspiciously. It was a bright day and all were happily afloat on the broad bosom of the Lualaba, where safety lay in keeping in mid-stream, or darting to opposite shores when attacked. What a wealth of affluents the great river had and how its volume had been swelled! The Lomame had emptied through a mouth 600 yards wide.
On the right the Luama had sent in its volume through 400 yards of width, the Lira with 300 yards, the Urindi with 500 yards, the Lowwa with 1200 yards, the Mbura with two branches of 200 yards each, and 200 miles further on, the Aruwimi, 2000 yards from shore to shore.
The Lualaba (Livingstone) had now become 4000 yards wide and was flowing persistently northward. The equator has been reached and passed. Can it be that all these waters are the floods of the Nile and that Livingstone was right? There was little time for reflection. The natives were ever present and hostile, and the waters themselves were full of dangers.
But we have ran ahead of our party. Just after the mouth of the Lomame was passed the expedition reached that series of cataracts, which have been named Stanley Falls. Their roar was heard long before the canoes reached them, and high above the din of waters were heard the war-shouts of the Mwana savages on both sides of the stream. Either a way must be fought through these dusky foes, or the cataract with its terrors must be faced.
STANLEY FIGHTING HIS WAY.Larger.
To dare the cataract was certain death. The canoes were brought to anchor, and a battle with the natives began. They were too strong, and Stanley retraced his course a little way, where he landed and encamped. Another trial, a fierce surge through the ranks armed with lances and poisoned arrows, gave them headway. The first cataract was rounded, and now they were in the midst of that wonderful series of waterfalls, where the Lualaba cuts its way for seventy miles through a range ofhigh hills, with seven distinct cataracts, in a channel contracted to a third of its ordinary breadth, where the stream tumbles and boils, flinging itself over ledges of rock, or dashing frantically against the walls that hem it in, as if it were struggling with all its giant power to escape from its prison. Within the gorge the ear is stunned with the continual din of the rushing waters, and the attention kept constantly on the strain to avoid the perils of rock, rapid, whirlpool, and cataract with which the course is strewn. With extreme caution and good-luck the rapids may be run in safety; but how are frail canoes to survive the experiment of a plunge over a perpendicular ledge, in company with millions of tons of falling water, into an abyss of seething and gyrating foam?
Ashore, the cannibal natives lie in wait to oppose a landing, or better still, to slay or capture victims for their sport or larder. A toilsome ascent has to be made to the summit of the bluffs forming the river banks over rough boulders and through tangled forest. In places where the fall of the stream is slight it may be possible to lower down the boats, by means of strong hawsers of creepers, to the pool below; but in other cases the canoes have to be dragged painfully up the cliffs, and launched again with almost equal toil where the current seems a little calmer. All this while the poisoned arrows are hissing through the air, spears are launched out of every thicket, and stones are slung or thrown at the unlucky pioneers from each spot of vantage. Only by van and rear guards and flanking parties, and maintaining a brisk fire can the assailants be kept at bay. The vindictive foe are as incessant in their attacks by night as by day; and the whiz of the flying arrow, the hurtling of lances through the temporary stockade and the sharp crack of the rifle, mingle with the dreams of the sleeper.
The descent of Stanley Falls was not made without loss of life and property. In spite of every precaution, canoes would be dragged from their moorings and be sucked down by the whirlpools or swept over the falls; or the occupants would lose nerve in the presence of danger, and allow their craft to drift into the powerful centre current, whence escape was hopeless.
During their passage occurred one of the most thrilling scenes in all this long journey through the Dark Continent. The canoes were being floated down a long rapid. Six had passed in safety. The seventh, manned by Muscati, Uledi Muscati, and Zaidi, a chief, was overturned in a difficult piece of the water. Muscati and Uledi were rescued by the eighth canoe; but Zaidi, clinging to the upturned canoe, was swept past, and seemed on the point of being hurled over the brink of the fall. The canoe was instantly split in two, one part being caught fast below the water, while the other protruded above the surface. To the upper part Zaidi clung, seated on the rock, his feet in the water. Below him leapt and roared the fall, about fifty yards in depth; above him stretched fifty feet of gradually sloping water.
Mr. Stanley and a part of the expedition were at this time on the banks. No more strange and perilous position than that of Zaidi can be imagined. A small canoe was lowered by means of a cable of ratans; but the rope snapped and the canoe went over the falls. Poles tied to creepers were thrown toward him but they failed to reach. The rock was full fifty yards from the shore. Stanley ordered another canoe, fastened by cables, to be lowered. Only two men could be found to man it—Uledi, the coxswain of the “Lady Alice,” and Marzouk, a boat boy. “Mamba Kwa Mungu,” exclaimed Uledi, “My fate is in the hands of God.”
The two men took their places in the canoe and paddled across the stream. The cables which held the boat against the current were slackened, and it dropped to within twenty yards of the falls. A third cable was thrown from the boat toward Zaidi, but he failed to catch it till the sixth throw. Just as he grasped it the water caught him and carried him over the precipice. All thought him lost, but presently his head appeared, and he seemed still to have hold of the cable. Stanley ordered the canoemen to pull. They did so, but the upper cables of the canoe broke and it was carried toward the falls. Fortunately it caught on a rock, and Uledi and Marzouk were saved. They still had hold of the cable which Zaidi clung to. By dint of hard pulling they were enabled to save, for they dragged himback up the falls to their own perilous position. There were three now on the rock instead of one. Twenty times a cable loaded with a stone was thrown to them before they caught it. They drew it taut and thus had frail communication with the shore. But it was now dark and nothing more could be done till light came. In the morning it was decided that the cable was strong enough to hold the men if they would but try to wade and swim to shore. Uledi dared it, and reached land in safety. The others followed, and terminated an anxious scene.
RESCUE OF ZAIDI.
Stanley was in the midst of these falls for twenty-two days and nights. On January 28, 1878, his peril and hardship ended by passing the last fall. By February 8, Rubanga, a village of the Nganza was reached, where he found friendly natives. And not a moment too soon, for his men were fainting for want of food. This was encouraging, but his heart was further rejoiced that the Lualaba had not only assumed its wide, placid flow, but had suddenly changed its northern direction to one almost westward toward the Atlantic. He was then not going toward the Nile. No, it was not a Nile water, but must be the Congo. What a rare discovery was then in store for him!
And the natives verified the thought. For the Rubanga chief, on being questioned, first mentioned the Congo. “Ikutu ya Kongo,” said he, “that is the river’s name.” The words thrilled Stanley. The Lualaba had ceased to flow, the Congo had taken up its song and would witness the further adventures of the brave explorer. It was a mile and a half wide, with a magnificent bosom. Green, fertile islands sprinkled its glassy surface. The party enjoyed needed rest, in this paradise, and then February 10, the boats pulled down stream again, the rowers bending gleefully and hopefully to their arduous task.
On the 14 the mouth of the Aruwimi was passed and they were in the Bangala country. Here they suffered from the most formidable attack yet made. It was the thirty-first struggle through which the party had passed on the Lualaba, or Congo, or Livingstone, though the latter name now seems out of place since we know that all is Congo, clear to Bangweolo, on whose shores Livingstone perished.
The shores of both the Congo and Aruwimi resounded with the din of the everlasting war-drums, and from every cove and island swarmed a crowd of canoes, that began forming into line to intercept and attack the travellers. These crafts were larger than any that had yet been encountered. The leading canoe of the savages was of portentous length, with forty paddlers on each side, while on a platform at the bow were stationed ten redoubtable young warriors, with crimson plumes of the parrot stuck in their hair, and poising long spears. Eight steersmen were placed on the stern, with large paddles ornamented with balls of ivory; while a dozen others, apparently chiefs, rushed from end to end of the boat directing the attack. Fifty-two other vessels of scarcely smaller dimensions followed in its wake. From the bow of each waved a long mane of palm fibre; every warrior was decorated with feathers and ornaments of ivory; and the sound of a hundred horns carved out of elephants’ tusks, and a song of challenge and defiance chanted from two thousand savage throats, added to the wild excitement of the scene. Their wild war-cry was “Yaha-ha-ha, ya Bengala.”
The assailants were put to flight after a series of charges more determined and prolonged than usual. This time, however, the blood of the strangers was fully up. They were tired of standing everlastingly on the defensive, of finding all their advances repelled with scorn and hatred. They carried the war into the enemy’s camp, and drove them out of their principal village into the forest. In the centre of the village was found a singular structure—a temple of ivory, the circular roof supported by thirty-three large tusks, and surmounting a hideous idol, four feet high, dyed a bright vermillion color, with black eyes, beard and hair. Ivory here was “abundant as fuel,” and was found carved into armlets, balls, mallets, wedges, grain pestles, and other articles of ornament and use; while numerous other weapons and implements of iron, wood, hide, and earthenware attested the ingenuity of the people. Their cannibal propensities were as plainly shown in the rows of skulls that grinned from poles, and the bones and other grisly remains of human feasts scattered about the village streets.
ATTACK BY THE BANGALA.Larger.
They had now a peaceful river for a time, or rather they were enabled to float in its middle, or dodge from shore to shore, without direct attack. But food became scarce. On February 20, they got a supply from natives whom they propitiated. On the 23, Amima, wife of the faithful Kacheche died. Her last words to Stanley were, “Ah, master, I shall never see the sea again. Your child Amima, is dying. I have wished to see the cocoa-nuts and the mangoes, but, no, Amima is dying, dying in a Pagan land. She will never see Zanzibar again. The master has been very good to his children, and Amima remembers it. It is a bad world master, and you have lost your way in it. Good bye, master, and do not forget poor little Amima.” The simple pathos of this African girl sweetened a death-bed scene as much as a Christian’s prayer could have done.
For a distance of 1000 miles from Stanley Falls the river is without cataracts, flowing placidly here, and there widening to ten miles, with numerous channels through reedy islands. Every thing was densely tropical—trees, flowers, plants, birds, animals. Crocodiles were especially plenty in the water, and all the large land animals of the equatorial regions could be seen at intervals. There were few adventures with these, for the party clung rigidly to their boats; but once in a while, a coterie, organized for a hunting bout, would come back with such stirring tales of attack and escape as we are accustomed to read of in connection with the eastern coasts of the continent where hunting the elephant, rhinoceros, lion, hippopotamus, is more of a regular business, and where spicy stories of adventure are accepted without question.
After a treacherous attack by the people of King Chumbiri—Stanley’s thirty-second battle—the natives showed a more peaceable disposition. They had heard of western coast white men and knew something of their ways. So there was a pleasant flow of water and a safe shore, for many days. But now the river was about to change. It received the Ikelemba, a powerful stream of tea-colored water, 1000 yards wide. Its waters flowed along in the same bed, unmixed with those of the Congo, for 150 miles. This immense tributary and that ofthe Ibari, were reported to come from great lakes, 800 miles to the south, and probably the same that Livingstone and Cameron both mention in their travels.
For 900 miles the Congo has had a fall of only 364 feet, or a third of a foot to the mile. We are now within 400 miles of the Atlantic, yet 1150 feet above it, and on the edge of the great table lands of Central Africa. The days of smooth sailing are at an end. The mountains come close to the stream, and the channel narrows. The white chalky cliffs remind Frank Pocock of the coasts of Dover in his own England. A roar is heard in advance. The cataracts have begun again, and they sound as ominously as the war-cry of the natives hundreds of miles back in the woods and jungles.
We have now been over four months on this river, and the next two hundred miles are to be the most tedious, laborious and disastrous of all. The terrors of Stanley Falls are here duplicated a thousand times. Bluffs rise 1500 feet high. Between them the river rushes over piles of boulders, or shoots with frightful velocity past the bases of impending crags, up which one must quickly scramble or else be carried into the boiling whirlpools below.
These falls we shall call the “Livingstone Falls.” In their general features they are not like Niagara, or Victoria on the Zambesi, but a succession of headlong rushes, as if the river were tearing down a gigantic rock stairway.
Of the Great Ntamo Fall, Stanley says: “Take a strip of sea, blown over by a hurricane, four miles in length by half a mile in breadth, and a pretty accurate conception of its rushing waves may be obtained. Some of the troughs were one hundred yards in length, and from one to another the mad river plunged. There was first a rush down into the middle of an immense trough, and then, by sheer force, the enormous volume would lift itself upwards steeply until, gathering itself into a ridge, it suddenly hurled itself twenty or thirty feet straight upwards before rolling down into another trough. The roar was deafening and tremendous. I can only compare it to the thunder of an express train through a rock tunnel.”
In this vast current, rushing along at the rate of thirty miles an hour, the strongest steamer would be as helpless as a cockle-shell, and as for frail canoes, they had to be dragged from rock to rock, or taken clear from the water and borne by land around the obstructions. Frequently canoes were wrecked and then a halt had to be ordered till new ones were hewn from trees. Yet amid trial, sickness and sore distress they had to pause at times in wonder before the imposing sights that opened on them. One was that of the Edwin Arnold River which flings itself with a single bound of 300 feet into the Congo, clearing the base of its cliff by ten yards. Still more wonderful is the cascade of the Nkenke, which is a plunge of a 1000 feet; and near by another with a fall of 400 feet.
Many gaps were made in the ranks of Stanley’s companions through this “Valley of Shadow.” In one day (March 28) he saw eleven of his men swept over a cataract and disappear in the boiling waters below. First a boat, in which was Kalulu, an attendant of Stanley in all his journeys, was sucked within the power of a fall and plunged into the abyss. Hardly had the eye turned from this horror when another canoe was seen shooting down the stream toward what appeared to be certain death. By almost a miracle it made an easy part of the cataract and the occupants succeeded in reaching the shore in safety. Close behind came a third with a single occupant. As the boat made its plunge the occupant rose and shouted a farewell to his companions on the shore. Then boat and man disappeared. A few days afterwards he re-appeared like an apparition in camp. He had been tossed ashore far below and held a prisoner by the natives, who had picked him up more dead than alive.
THE LADY ALICE IN THE CONGO RAPIDS.
On April 12, the “Lady Alice” herself, with her crew, came to the very verge of destruction. The boat was approaching a bay in which the camp for the night was to be made, when a noise like distant thunder fell on the ears of the crew. The river rose before them into a hill of water. It was a whirlpool, at its full. All hands bent to their paddles and the boat was plunged into the hill of water before it broke. They thusescaped being sucked into a vortex which would have sunk the boat and drowned all. As it was, the boat was whirled round and round through a succession of rapids, before the crew could bring her under control again.
Fortunately the natives were still friendly and of superior type. They had many European manufactures, which pass from tribe to tribe in regular traffic, and enjoyed a higher civilization than those of the Central African regions. Stanley rested with these people for several days while his carpenter made two new canoes.
On June 3, he lost his servant, comrade and friend, last of the Europeans, the brave and faithful Frank Pocock. All the boats had been taken from the water and carried past the Massase Falls, except the canoe “Jason,” in which were Pocock, Uledi and eleven others. This had gotten behind on account of Frank’s ulcerated feet. Chafing at the delay he urged Uledi to “shoot the falls,” against the latter’s judgment, and even taunted the crew with cowardice.
“Boys,” cried Uledi, addressing the crew, “our little master is saying that we are afraid of death. I know there is death in the cataract; but come, let us show him that black men fear death as little as white men.”
“A man can die but once!” “Who can contend with his fate?” “Our fate is in the hands of God,” were the various replies of the men.
“You are men,” exclaimed Frank.
The boat was headed for the falls. They were reached, and in another moment the canoe had plunged into the foaming rapid. Spun round like a top in the furious waters, the boat was whirled down to the foaming pit below. Then she was sucked below the surface and anon hurled up again with several men clinging to her, among them Uledi. Presently the form of the “little master” was seen floating on the surface. Uledi swam to him, seized him, and both sunk. When the brave Uledi appeared again he was alone. Poor Pocock’s tragic death was a blow to the whole expedition. Most of the party gave way to superstitious dread of the river and many deserted, but quickly returned, after a trial of the dreary woods.
DEATH OF FRANK POCOCK.
On June 23, the carpenter of the expedition was swept over the Zinga Falls, in the canoe, “Livingstone,” and drowned. Stanley’s food supply was frequently very short amid the difficulties of Livingstone Falls. Not that there was not plenty on theshores, but his means of buying were exhausted, and such a thing as charity is not common to the African tribes. Even where most friendly, they are always on the lookout for a trade, and a bargain at that. It is a great hardship for them to give, without a consideration.
The appearance of his attendants cut Mr. Stanley to the heart every day—so emaciated, gaunt, and sunken-eyed were they; bent and crippled with weakness who had once been erect and full of manly vigor. And the leader’s condition was no better. Gone now was all the keen ardor for discovery, the burning desire to penetrate where no white man had yet penetrated which animated his heart at the outset of his journey. Sickness that had drained his strength, anxiety that had strained to its utmost pitch the mind, sorrow for loss and bereavement that had wearied the spirit—these had left Mr. Stanley a very different man from that which he was when he set out full of hope and ardor from Zanzibar. All his endeavor now was to push on as fast as possible, to reach the ocean with as little more of pain and death to his followers as possible.
At last Stanley struck a number of intelligent tribes who gave much information about the rest of the river and the coast. There were three great falls still below them, and any number of dangerous rapids. It would be folly to risk them with their frail barks. Moreover, he learned that the town of Boma, on the Atlantic coast, could be reached by easy journeys across the country. His main problem, as to whether the Lualaba and the Congo were the same, had long since been solved. He had been following the Congo all the time, had seen its splendid forests and mighty affluents, its dashing rapids and bewildering whirlpools and falls, had even, through the spectacles of Livingstone, seen its head waters in Lake Bangweolo, amid whose marshes the veteran explorer laid down his life.
What need then to risk life further at this time, and in his very poor condition. He resolved to leave the river and make direct for the coast at Boma. When he assembled his followers to make this welcome announcement to them, they were overcome with joy. Poor Safeni, coxswain of the “Lady Alice,” wentmad with rapture and fled into the forest. Three days were spent in searching for him, but he was never seen more.
Relinquishing his boat and all unnecessary equipage at the cataract of Isangila, the party struck for Boma, but only to give out entirely when still three days distant. A messenger was sent in advance for aid. He came back in two days with a strong band of carriers and abundance of food. The perishing party was thus saved, and was soon receiving the care of the good people of Boma. Here all forgot their toils and perils amid civilized comforts and the pardonable pride aroused by their achievements. Stanley’s exploit is unparalleled in the history of African adventure. Though not the first to cross the Continent, he hewed an unknown way and every step was a startling revelation. He did more to unravel African mysteries and settle geographic problems than any other explorer.
And, August 12, 1877, three years after his start from Zanzibar on the Indian Ocean, and eight months after setting out from Nyangwe to follow the Lualaba, he stood on the Atlantic shores at Boma and gazed on the mouth of the Congo, whose waters shot an unmixed current fifty miles out to sea. Though he had proved it to be so, he could still hardly believe that this vast flood pouring 2,000,000 cubic feet of water a second into the ocean, through a channel ten miles wide and 1300 feet deep, was the same that he had followed through wood and morass, rapid and cataract, rock bound channel and wide expanse, for so long a time, and that it was the same which Diego Cam discovered by its color and reedy track four hundred years before, while sailing the ocean out of sight of land.
In the journey of 7200 miles, one hundred and fourteen of Stanley’s original party had perished. Many had fallen in battle or by treachery, more were the victims of disease, and some had succumbed to toil or been “washed down by the gulfs.” But a goodly remnant survived. These were returned, according to contract, to their Zanzibar home. Stanley went with them by steamer around the Cape of Good Hope.
It needs not to tell the joy with which the people again beheld their home; how they leaped ashore from the boat; howtheir friends rushed down to the beach to welcome back the wanderers; how wives and husbands, children and parents, “literally leaped into each other’s arms,” while “with weeping and with laughter” the wonderful story of the long and terrible journey is told to the eager listeners.
Stanley, having paid his followers in full, according to the terms of his contract, and rewarded some over and above their lawful claims, so that not a few of the men were able to purchase neat little houses and gardens with their savings, prepared to quit Zanzibar forever.
The scene on the beach on the day of Stanley’s departure was a strange and an affecting one. The people of the expedition pressed eagerly around him, wrung his hand again and again, and finally, lifting him upon their shoulders, carried him through the surf to his boat. Then the men, headed by Uledi the coxswain, manned a lighter and followed Mr. Stanley’s boat to the steamer, and there bade their leader a last farewell.
Stanley’s own feelings at this moment were no less keen. As the steamer which bore him home left the shore of Zanzibar behind, his thoughts were busy with the past; he was living once again in retrospect the three strange, eventful years, during which these simple black people had followed him with a fidelity at once simple and noble, childlike and heroic. For him, his comrades in travel through the Dark Continent must ever remain heroes; for it was their obedient and loyal aid that had enabled him to bring his expedition to a successful and noble issue, to accomplish each of the three tasks he had set himself to do,—the exploration of the great Victoria Nyanza Lake, the circumnavigation of Tanganyika, and the identification of Livingstone’s Lualaba River with the Congo.
Ever since this memorable journey, Mr. Stanley has been enthusiastically working to found a great Congo free Government and commercial empire, which all the nations shall recognize and to which all shall contribute. He has projected a steamer system, of heavy draught vessels, from the mouth of the river to the first cataracts. Here a commercial emporium is to be founded. A railway is to start thence and lead to thesmooth waters above. This would open 7000 miles of navigable waters on the Upper Congo and a trade of $50,000,000 a year. It would redeem one of the largest fertile tracts of land on the globe and bring peace, prosperity and civilization to millions of human beings. Only climate seems to be against his plans, for it is undoubtedly hostile to Europeans. But if native energies can be enlisted sufficiently to make a permanent ground work for his ideal state, he may yet rank not only as the greatest of discoverers but as the foremost of statesmen and humanitarians. The possibilities of the Congo region are boundless.
A missionary just returned from the Congo country thus writes of it:
“The bounds of this ‘Congo Free State’ are not yet defined, but they will ultimately embrace the main stream and its immense system of navigable tributaries, some of which are 800 miles long. The Congo itself waters a country more than 900 miles square, or an area of 1,000,000 square miles. These rivers make access to Equatorial Africa and to the Soudan country quite easy.
“The resources of this fine region are exhaustless. The forests are dense and valuable. Their rubber wealth is untouched, and equal to the world’s supply. Everywhere there is a vast amount of ivory, which lies unused or is turned into the commonest utensils by the natives. There are palms which yield oil, plantains, bananas, maize, tobacco, peanuts, yams, wild coffee, and soil equal to any in the world for fertility. Europeans must guard against the climate, but it is possible to get enured to it, with care. In the day-time the temperature averages 90° the year round, but the average of the night temperature is 70° to 75°. Rain falls frequently, and mostly in the night. The natives are hostile, only where they have suffered from invasion by Arab slave dealers.
“Already there are some 3000 white settlers in the heart of the Congo country—Portuguese, English, Belgians, Dutch, Scandinavians and Americans, and their influence is being felt for good. The completion of Stanley’s railroad around the Congo rapids will give fresh impetus to civilization and lay the basis of permanent institutions in this great country.”
The little Portuguese ship of Bartholomew Diaz was the first to round the “Cape of Storms” in 1486. When King John II. of Portugal, heard of his success he said it should thereafter be called Cape of Good Hope. The passage of this southermost point of Africa meant a route to India, on which all hearts were set at the time.
Nearly two hundred years later, in 1652, the Dutch settled at the Cape. They called the Quaique, or natives, Hottentots—from the repetition of one of the words used in their dances.
The Colony became a favorite place for banished Huguenots—from France and Peidmont. It grew, got to be strong, and at length tyrannical. The more liberal members left it and pushed into the interior, where they drove back the Kaffirs, and redeemed much valuable territory. The parent Colony tried to force its government on these pioneers, who were called “Boers”—the Dutch word for “farmers.” A rebellion ensued. The Prince of Orange asked England to help suppress it (1795). She did so, and with characteristic greed, kept it till 1803. It then passed to the Dutch, but was retaken by England in 1806.
Settlement marched rapidly up the eastern coast of Africa, and a great agricultural section was opened. The Kaffir tribes protested and five fierce wars were fought, with the loss of all Kaffraria to the natives. The Boers were never reconciled to British authority. They murmured, rebelled, and kept migrating northward, till north of the Orange River they founded the Natal, the Orange Free State, and the Transvaal Republic.
The high promontory of Cape of Good Hope—Table Mountain—is visible a long distance from the sea, owing to the dry, light atmosphere. On its spurs are many ruins of block-houses, used by the early settlers. Over it, at times, hangs a veil of cloud, called the “Table Cloth,” which, when dispersed by the sun, the inhabitants say is put away for future use.
The town of Cape Colony, or Cape Town, is now perfectly modern, and very pretty. It was here that the great missionary Robert Moffat began his African career in 1816; here that Pringle started to found his ideal town Glen Lynden.
In 1867 all Cape Colony was thrown into excitement by the discovery that diamond fields existed inland near the Kalihari Desert. There was a rush like that in our own country in 1849 when gold was discovered in California. Exaggerated stories of finds of diamonds by natives, valued at $50,000 a piece, were eagerly listened to, and in a few weeks there was a population of 10,000 in a hitherto unknown region, with the road thither, for hundreds of miles, literally alive with wagons, oxen, pack mules and footmen.
The diamond territory is Griqualand, on the headwaters of the Orange and Vaal Rivers and close to the desert—partly in it. The region is 16,000 square miles in extent and 3000 feet above the ocean. In the diamond fields the diamonds are found in the sand by washing. This is the native method of getting them, and also that adopted by thousands of people who have no capital.
But it was soon found that they could be had in larger numbers and of greater size and purity by digging. This brought capital, machinery, and regular mining tracts, called “Claims.”
At first the mining towns were made up of tents, filled with a mixed people, toiling willingly all day, and dancing, gambling, drinking and rioting at night. At one time there were 60,000 persons in these diamond fields, but now not more than 40,000.
The Kimberley mine is the favorite. It has been excavated to a depth of 250 feet and has proved very rich. It is now surrounded by quite a town, and the people—mostly native diggers—are orderly and industrious. The diggers delve with spade and pick in the deep recesses of the mine, and the sand, rock and earth are pulled to the surface in buckets, where they are sorted, sieved, and closely examined for diamonds.
Formerly the “claims” sold for fabulous prices. Many, only thirty by sixteen feet, brought $100,000. And some rare findshave been made. The great diamond, found a few years ago, and called the “Star of South Africa,” was sold, before cutting, for $55,000. And while we are writing, one is undergoing the process of cutting in Paris which is a true wonder. It arrived from South Africa in August, 1884, and was purchased by a syndicate of London and Paris diamond merchants. It weighs in the rough 457 carats and will dress to 200 carats. The great Koh-i-noor, weighs only 106 carats, the Regent of France 1363⁄4carats, the Star of South Africa 125 carats, the Piggott 821⁄4carats, and the Great Mogul 279 carats. But the latter is a lumpy stone, and if dressed to proper proportions, would not weigh over 140 carats.
ZULUS.
The Kaffraria country, lying between Cape Colony and Natal, is rich in beautiful scenery and abounds in animal life. Whilethe larger animals, as the elephant and lion, have retreated inland, there are still many beasts of prey, and the forests have not given over their troops of chattering baboons. Its greatest scourge is periodical visits of immense flights of locusts, which destroy all vegetation wherever they light. The natives make them into cakes and consider them a great delicacy. These natives are a brave, fine people, and have been conquered and held with difficulty. As they yield to civilization they make an industrious and attractive society.
Natal was so named, in honor of our Saviour, more than 300 years ago by Vasco de Gama. It was the centre of the Zulu tribes, whom King Charka formed into an all-conquering army, until the invasion of the country by the Boers. It became a British colony in 1843, and has been held with the greatest difficulty, for the Zulu warriors showed a bravery and method in their warfare which made them formidable enemies even against forces with superior arms and discipline. It was in the English wars with the Zulus that the Prince Imperial, of France, lost his life. A writer describes the Zulus “as a race of the most handsome and manly people found among savages; tall, muscular, and of remarkable symmetry, beauty and strength. Their carriage is upright, and among the chiefs, majestic.”
The Drackenberg Mountains, many of whose peaks are 10,000 feet high, shut off Natal from the Transvaal Republic. This Transvaal region was, as already seen, redeemed from the natives by the Boers, who are mostly devoted to farming, but many to a pastoral life like that of the old patriarchs, living in wagons or tents and leading, or rather following, about immense herds of cattle and sheep. They are a hardy, strong, brave people, and in subduing them and annexing their beautiful and fertile country, it is very doubtful whether Great Britain has done herself credit or humanity benefit. Boers may not be all that modern civilization could desire. In their contact with the natives they may have retrograded to a certain extent. But it is very probable they have made larger and more beneficial conquests over nature than any other more highly endowed and uncompromising people could have done in the same length of time. There is hardlya product of the soil that does not grow in the Transvaal—corn, tobacco, apricots, figs, oranges, peaches—two and sometimes three crops a year. It is finely watered with noble mountain streams, and is rich in iron, tin, copper, lead, coal and gold. The capital, Pretoria, is the centre of a rich trade in ostrich feathers.
MY CATTLE WERE SAVED.
Ostrich farming is a large industry in these South African States. Farmers buy and sell these animals like cattle. They fence them in, stable them, tend them, grow crops for them, study their habits, and cut their precious feathers, all as amatter of strict business. The animals begin to yield feathers at eight months old, and each year they grow more valuable. They are nipped or cut off, not plucked. The ostrich feather trade of South Africa is of the value of $1,000,000 a year. The birds are innocent and stupid looking, but can attack with great ferocity, and strike very powerfully with their feet. The only safe posture under attack by them is to lie down. They then can only trample on you.
BUFFALO HUNTERS.
The Transvaal region is a paradise for hunters. The elephant, rhinoceros, hippopotamus, buffalo, giraffe, zebra, springbok, gnu, lion, and indeed every African animal, finds a home amid its deep woody recesses and sparkling waters. As he entered its borders from the desert, Pinto’s camp was attacked by two lions, who scented his desert pony and herd of cattle. Thenatives became demoralized, and Pinto himself could do little toward saving his property on account of the darkness. Fortunately he got his hand on a dark lantern, in which was a splendid calcium light. Placing this in the hand of a native, he ordered him to go as near to the growling intruders as was safe, Pinto following with a double-barreled rifle. The glare of the light was then turned full in the faces of the beasts. They were dazed by it, and cowered for a moment. That moment was fatal. Pinto gave both a mortal wound and saved his cattle. And it was here that Cummings lost one of his guides, who was pounced upon by a lion as he lay asleep before a camp fire. Here also Lieutenant Moodie and his party got the ill-will of a herd of elephants, which charged upon them and gave furious chase, knocking the Lieutenant down and tramping him nearly to death. One of his companions was killed outright by the charging beasts and his body tossed angrily into the jungle with their tusks.
But the finest sport is hunting the buffalo. He is stealthy, cunning and swift. It requires a long shot or a quick ingenious chase to bag him. He never knows when he is beaten and will continue to charge and fight though riddled with bullets or pierced with many lances. Gillmore was once intent on an elephant track when suddenly his party was charged by five buffaloes. His horse saved him by a tremendous leap to one side, but one of his attendants was tossed ten feet in the air, and another landed amid the branches of a tree, one of which he fortunately caught.
Threats of war between England and Portugal bring into prominence that portion of Central Africa which is embraced in the title “Nyassaland.” While ordinarily it might be embraced in the Zambesi system, it is a land quite by itself, especially as to its topography and the position it occupies in the commercial and political world, and is in many respects the most interesting part of East Central Africa. It is a back-ground to Portugal’s Mozambique possessions, but at the same time the very heart of the British effort to cut a magnificent water way inland from the mouths of the Zambesi to the mouths of the Nile. Hence the conflict of interest there, a conflict which must go on by arbitration or by war, till Great Britain secures what she wants—control of the Shiré river and Lake Nyassa. The navigation of the Lower Zambesi is already open to all nations.
The river Shiré, which we are now about to ascend, falls into the Zambesi from the left, only some ninety miles from its mouth. Twenty years ago its course was unknown, and its banks were wildernesses untrodden by the foot of a white man. Now the stream is one of the best-known and most frequented of the highways to the Lake Regions. The Shiré is much narrower than the Zambesi, but of deeper channel, and in the upper and lower portions more easily ascended by steamers. Midway in its course, however, we meet a great impediment to the navigation of the river, and consequently to the civilization and commercial development of the regions beyond. In thirty-five miles the stream descends twelve hundred feet in a series of rapids and cataracts over a rock-encumbered bed and between sheer walls of cliff.
Beauty and use are badly adjusted on the Shiré. The scenery of the unnavigable portion of the river is full of singular and romanticbeauty. In the picturesque diversity of its charms of crag and forest and rushing water it is scarcely equalled by any other part of Africa. Monotony, on the other hand, has set its stamp on the banks of the useful, slow-flowing river beneath and above. Yet the ascent of one hundred and fifty miles from the Zambesi to the cataracts is not without its attractions. The landscape is intensely and characteristically African. If the river is fringed on either shore by tall and sombre reeds, the majestic mountains that bound the Shiré valley are always in sight. A dense tropical vegetation covers these hills to the very tops, except that patches of lighter tint show where the hands of the natives have cleared the ground for the cultivation of crops of cotton, sorghum, or maize; for these healthy uplands, above the reach of the mosquito and the deadly marsh fog, and safe also, in some degree, from the ravages of the kidnapper, are inhabited by an industrious race, the Manganjas, who have made no small progress in agriculture and native iron and metal manufactures.
This whole country is favorable for the raising of cotton, which here grows a larger and finer staple, it is said, even than in Egypt. Every Manganja village has its cotton patch, where sufficient is grown for the use riot only of the community but of neighboring tribes. The demand certainly is not large, the requirements of Africans in the matter of clothing being modest—or immodest, if you will. There is a tribe, for instance, on the Lower Zambesi, whose name, being interpreted, means the “Go-Nakeds.” The full costume of a “Go-Naked” is a coat—of red ochre. Livingstone met one of their men of rank once, and found his court suit represented by a few beads and a pipe two feet long. Unfortunately the Manganja, along with their ingenuity and industry as weavers, blacksmiths, and farmers, are inordinately fond of beer and smoking, and are great in the arts of brewing and tobacco-manufacturing. With all these disadvantages, however, it is pleasant to find, in one corner at least of Africa, a race with both the skill and the inclination to work, and a native industry ready to spring up into large proportions so soon as it receives a little encouragement.
After the Zambesi has been left behind, a great mountain called Morumbala, four thousand feet in height, bounds for many miles theview on the right as we ascend the Shiré. Beyond it we reach one of the marshes or old lake-beds which form one of the features of this valley. The bounding lines of hills make each a semicircular curve, and inclose a vast morass, through the centre of which the river drains slowly between dripping walls of sedge and mud. No human inhabitant can dwell in these impenetrable swamps; but they are far from empty of life. Great flights of wild geese, ducks, waders, and other water-fowl abound here in prodigious numbers, and rise from the brake at the noise of the passing boat or steamer—for already steamers now ply on the waters of the river below and the great lake above.
The discovery of the lake was due to Livingstone who had heard of the “Great Water” somewhere to the north of the Zambesi and far amid the mountains of the Shiré. His first attempt to reach it was a failure, through reticence of the people respecting it and the natural difficulties he encountered. But his worst enemy was his guide who misled him until all were completely lost. The party were in a desperate strait. Suspicion of treachery filled every bosom except Livingstone’s. One of his faithful Makololos came up to him, and remarked, in a matter-of-fact way, “That fellow is taking us into mischief. My spear is sharp. There is no one here. Shall I cast him into the long grass?” A gesture of assent, or even silence, and the unlucky guide would have been run through the body; but Livingstone was not the man to permit blood to be spilt, even on an apparently well-grounded suspicion of treachery. After all, it turned out to be merely a blunder, and no treachery. The party were led safely to the margin of the “great lake” of the district—the elephant marsh that they had passed some time before while ascending the river!
The second trip resulted in a discovery of an inland sea, though not the one they were in search of. Climbing over the shoulder of the high mountains east of the Shiré, the party came in sight of Lake Shirwa, lying in an isolated, pear-shaped basin, nearly two thousand feet above sea-level. Magnificent mountain scenery surrounds the lake, the waters of which, contrary to the rule in Central Africa, are salt, or rather brackish. Although the area of Shirwa is large, it is but a mill-pond compared with Nyassa and some ofthe other African lakes. Yet, girt in though it is with hills, it shows to one standing near its southern end a boundless sea-horizon towards the north. Opposite on the eastern shore a lofty range rises to a height of eight thousand feet above sea-level, while behind, the table-topped Mount Zomba, only one thousand feet lower, dominates the Shiré valley.
All this mountainous mass seems habitable, and, in fact, is inhabited to its very summits; and its temperate climate, healthful breezes, and freedom from malaria and mosquitoes, have led to its being chosen as the site of the Church of Scotland mission to the Nyassa country—their station, Blantyre, being named after the Scottish village where Livingstone first saw the light.
In ascending to the Nyassa, the opposite or western side of the Shiré is generally chosen, and travellers prefer to make a wide détour into the healthy Manganja uplands to struggling through the rocky, broken, and wooded country through which the river tears its impetuous way. It is delightful to breathe the bracing air of these high plains after escaping from the humid, stifling atmosphere of the valley. The change of scenery and climate puts a new life into the veins of the traveller. Many novel views of African life come under his notice among the Manganja highlands. The path up the long ascent is toilsome, but the eye is cheered by the glorious views of the deep valley lying below and the blue domes and peaks that rise ahead. The country is open and park-like, full of grand forest trees and flowing streams.