“With these, lean dogs in herds obscene repair,And every kind that snuffs the tainted air.”—(Lucan.)
“With these, lean dogs in herds obscene repair,And every kind that snuffs the tainted air.”—(Lucan.)
enlarge-imageJackals disintering Dead Bodies.Jackals disintering Dead Bodies.
Others diversify the scene with the graceful form of the gazelle, withthe ungainly body, immensely long neck, and spotted hide of the giraffe; or with the ostrich, the camel of the bird-world, spreading his plumes to the wind, and flying with swift feet from the hunter or the wild beast that pursues him. But, in truth, these are bold fancies, artistic or poetic licenses, rather than exact representations of what one really sees in the Desert; and most of the animals with which we people, at our pleasure, the immense solitudes of Africa and Asia actually belong to neighbouring regions of a less arid character. And, in the first place, the lion of the Desert is a myth, or nearly so. “When you speak,” says Carrette, “to the inhabitants of the Desert of these ferocious beasts which Europeans give them as companions, they reply with imperturbable coolness, ‘You have, then, in your own country, lions which drink air and browse on leaves? But, among us, lions must have running water and live flesh. Therefore they only appear in those parts of the Sahara where are wooded hills and an abundance of water. We dread nothing but the viper (lefa) and theinnumerable swarms of mosquitoes; the latter being found wherever any humidity prevails.’”[74]
enlarge-image1. Gypaëtos, or Bearded Vulture. 2. Sociable Vulture. 3. Cathartes Percnopterus.1. Gypaëtos, or Bearded Vulture. 2. Sociable Vulture. 3. Cathartes Percnopterus.
What Carrette relates of the lion is also true of the other carnivora, of the panther and the leopard, as well as of the hyæna and the jackal. It is surely easy to understand that these animals greatly prefer to sojourn in fertile and well-watered countries, where they enjoy freshness, shelter, copious supplies of water, and abundant prey, than in hot glaring plains of sand, which offer them no asylum, and where they run the risk of perishing of hunger and thirst. It is, then, only on exceptional occasions that the lions and other largefelidæof Africa issue from their caverns or their lairs, and wander into the Desert (properly so called) in pursuit of prey. The hyæna and the jackal venture there more willingly. We know that these carnivora only attack living animals at the last extremity; their food is the dead and even putrid flesh; it is a nutriment which costs them less trouble to obtain, and probably, also, most pleases their taste. Thus, it is by no means an uncommon occurrence to see them in the towns andq’sours, devouring the carrion, or in the cemeteries disinterring the corpses; they follow also in the Desert the caravans and detachments of troops on the march, and at night prowl around their encampments, in the hope of some windfall, which they seldom expect in vain, but which the dogs, the vultures (Cathartes percnopterusandvultur fulvus), thegypaëtos, and the crows rarely fail to dispute with them.
The region of the table-lands, or Saharan Steppes, the valleys of Erosion, and certain parts of the Gobi—Persia, Syria, and Arabia—which are not absolutely deprived of rain, or which are refreshed by mountain-streams, nourish several species of mammifers: gazelles, hedgehogs, porcupines, hares, offering both to man and the carnivora an abundant variety of game. Of all these animals, the most interesting are the gazelles, several species of which inhabit the desert region. I shall refer in the first place to the gazelle properly so called, orAntilope dorcas, so remarkable for the grace of his movements, his slender limbs, and the expressive gentleness of his eyes. This beautiful species is common in Central Sahara, Nubia, and Asia. He lives in numerous troops, is of small stature, with a yellowish or yellow-brown skin on the back, and a white belly, a brown or blackish belt marking the sides. The horns, larger and stronger in the male than in the female, have a double curve, are lyrated, and without projections. The Ariel Gazelle is about twenty inches high at the shoulder. TheGazella Sœmmeringiibelongs to Abyssinia and Sennaar. The gazellenangueris found as far as Morocco, Nubia, and in the Cordofou; some varieties occur at the Senegal. Finally, the oryx-leucoryx inhabits Tropical Africa, and rarely makes his appearance inthe Deserts; he differs from the gazelle in his arched horns, but his skin is nearly the same. Although the gazelles are generally considered extremely timid animals, which, moreover, their weakness would fully justify, they display on emergency a surprising courage. When they cannot escape from danger through agility, they bravely confront the enemy which attacks them. Menaced by a panther or a leopard, they form themselves into a circle, which, bristling everywhere with keen-pointed horns, compels the antagonist to retreat.
enlarge-image1. Gazelle. 2. Antelope (Oryx-leucoryx). 3. Gazelle (of Sœmmering). 4. Nanguer.1. Gazelle.3. Gazelle (of Sœmmering).2. Antelope (Oryx-leucoryx).4. Nanguer.
In the deserts of Africa and Arabia the traveller frequently meets with small rodents, which excavate their burrows in the sandy soil, and only issue from them at night in quest of food. These are thejerboas and jerbilles. The jerboas are easily recognized by the length of their hind-legs and the disposition of their toes—three to each hind-foot, the middle larger than the rest; five to each fore-foot; and all furnished with sharp, strong, crooked claws; their structure resembling that of theraptoresamong birds. These animals leap with great celerity, and to an extraordinary distance. The tail, which is a fifth longer than the body, and terminated by a tuft of black hair, forms at one and the same time a sort of balance, a rudder, and a lever. It enables the jerboa to preserve his equilibrium, and to direct himself when he has taken his spring; or, in a state of repose, furnishes him with a substantial support.
enlarge-imageGazelles of Arabia opposing a Panther.Gazelles of Arabia opposing a Panther.
The jerboas constitute, in the family ofdipodidæ, a tribe composed of several species, which are found in eastern and central Europe, Asia, and Africa.
The jerbilles, owing to the similarity of name, are often confounded with the jerboas; but the only things they have in commonare a certain conformity of habits, and a nearly equal aptitude for leaping.
Otherwise, their organization rather resembles that of the rat, along with which it is classed by zoologists. Their hind-legs are much shorter than those of the jerboa, and their tail is garnished with but a few short, stiff hairs. Like the jerboas, they inhabit the sandy wildernesses of Africa, Asia, and eastern Europe.
enlarge-imageJerboas Attacked by a Horned Viper.Jerboas Attacked by a Horned Viper.
These small animals, exclusively frugivorous and graminivorous, seem able, in the solitary places where they make their retreats, to multiply themselvesad infinitum; but, while a great number perish through famine, they are also decimated by a host of enemies in the reptiles of the Desert, and especially by the terrible horned viper, orcerastes, and a great saurian, intermediate between the lizard and crocodile—the “varan of the Desert.”
The horned viper (vipera cerastes) is thus named on account of the two horns or protuberances on its forehead, which give it aphysiognomy more hideous, perhaps, than that of any of its congeners. It attains the length of two to three feet. Its head is depressed, very obtuse, swollen behind the eyes, and, so to speak, truncated in front. Its body, cased in shells of a tawny-like yellow, marked with brown spots, blends curiously with the sand, half-buried in which it lurks to surprise its prey or escape from its enemies. The cerastes frequents the deserts of Lybia, Arabia, the Sahara, and the valley of the Nile. Its bite is exceedingly dangerous.
enlarge-image1. Varan of the Nile. 2. Varan of the Desert.1. Varan of the Nile. 2. Varan of the Desert.
Thevarans, ormonitors, called alsotupinambisby the ancient naturalists, form a genus represented in tropical climes by several species of great size. English writers commonly designate them monitors, the French sauvegardes, because they frequent the haunts of crocodiles and alligators, and give warning of their approach by a whistling sound. Two species belong to Africa: one, aquatic, the varan of the Nile (varanus dracæna); the other, sand-burrowing, the varan of the Desert (varanus sunius, orarenarius), called bythe Arabsonaran-el-ard. Their usual size is from three feet to three feet four inches. The varan of the Nile wears an armour of alternately green and black scales. Its congener exhibits a mixture of brown and yellow, more suitable to its sandy lairs. It is rare in the Sahara, but common enough in the deserts of Egypt, Syria, and Nubia.
Poor as may be the Fauna of the Desert, there is yet cause enough for astonishment that the species which compose it, especially the herbivora, should be able to find subsistence in these seas of sand, where they can find but a few saline plants scattered at rare intervals, and where fresh water is almost wholly wanting. It is, however, well known now-a-days that the wilderness provides its denizens with an aliment, which is sometimes very abundant, suitable for man, the camel, and the beasts, and is considered identical by many authorities with themannaof the Bible.[75]This substance is a cryptogamous vegetable, variously christenedlichen esculentus(Acharius),lecanora esculenta(Pallas),luttarut(by the Arabs), andvasseh-el-ard, or “earth-dung” (by the Algerines). It sometimes forms on the sand, in the morning, a layer one or two inches in thickness, and appears to have dropped from heaven, or to have sprung spontaneously from the soil, during the night. It is probable that its spores, transported by the wind, are developed by the humidity which is condensed through the nocturnal coldness.
A shower of this lichen was observed, in April 1846, in the Russian government of Wilna. It covered the soil for three or four inches in depth, and the inhabitants lived upon it for several days. Its form is that of a small, anfractuous, rounded grain, about the size of a pea, externally of a gray colour, but white and farinaceous within. Its taste is weak, amygdalaceous, with a faint, mushroom-like aroma. Boiled in water, it swells, becomes gelatinous, and may be served up in various ways. In the Sahara, as well as in Arabia,it adheres to any foreign body. Cattle feed upon it eagerly. It certainly facilitates digestion, and contains all the assimilating principles which form the constituents of the wholesomest vegetable food. Such as it is, thelichen esculentusis an inestimable boon to the wandering tribes of the Desert, who would perish of hunger in years of famine but for its heaven-sent nutriment.
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WHENI use the terms “Men of the Desert,” “Populations of the Desert,” evidently I must not be understood to employ them in their absolute sense. Man, no more than that other so-called “lord of animals”—the lion, makes a voluntary sojourn in countries where game, verdure, and fresh water are wanting. The peoples whom we entitle “Inhabitants of the Desert” are then, in reality, those who dwell upon its borders or in its oases, but whom the necessity of traversing and frequently abiding in it has familiarized with its gloom and its peril, as a similar necessity has familiarized the mariner with the ocean. We have seen, however, that some pastoral tribes pitch their tents and pasture their flocks in those districts where vegetation is favoured and cherished by a supply of rain or subterranean waters, and which should more accurately be designated as Steppes than Deserts. Some authorities have, indeed, affixed the name of “the Saharan Steppe” to the region of high table-lands which lies at the base of the Atlas range.
Other groups, who are partly shepherds and partly hunters, inhabit, in the Southern and Western Sahara, those plateaux where ostriches, gazelles, and hares abound. The more peaceful and industrious tribes occupy the oases. As for those who encamp or habitually wander in the Sandy Desert—where all cultivation is impossible,where the herds can obtain but an insufficient pasture, where game very seldom shows itself-the reader will suppose that they can only subsist by plundering or ransoming the caravans. These are the rovers, the pirates of the Sea of Sand. There are “land-rats,” Shakspeare tells us, as well as “water-rats.” Others, again, there are who seem convinced that “honesty is the best policy,” who give themselves up exclusively to commercial transactions, and act as agents and intermediaries between nations separated from one another by leagues of rock and sand, for the exchange of their respective products. It might be said of these that they discharged a useful and honourable function, if the purchase and sale of slaves were not the most ordinary, and unfortunately the most lucrative, of their operations.
In our previous examination of the peoples of the Steppes, we discovered that all were more or less directly sprung from the same sources;—the yellow or Mongolian race, which blends in the north with the Hyperborean race, and in the west with the Japhetic or Indo-Germanic. We have now to note a not less remarkable fact—that the whole Desert zone is likewise occupied by one family, the Semitic, modified in certain parts of Africa by commixture with the Negro race. Soon we shall see the latter peopling of itself the plains of Central and Southern Africa; the Malayo-Polynesian and Papuan, but slightly distinguished from the preceding, in possession of the islands of the Indian Ocean, those of Oceania, and the Australian continent; the Hyperborean race, scattered through the Arctic solitudes; and, finally, the “Red Man,” gradually dying away among the prairies and forests of the two Americas: so that, to each of the great divisions of the Savage or Desert World corresponds one of the great fractions of the human species.
The Shemites—so named because the Bible attributes their origin to Shem, the eldest son of Noah—are now-a-days represented only by the Jews and the Arabs, though they formerly included also the Assyrians, the Chaldæans or Babylonians, the Syrians, Phœnicians, and Ethiopians. Of their modern representatives, the Jews alonehave displayed any real aptitude for civilization. The Arabs, whose name is derived from the wordArâba, which signifies “desert,” seem almost exclusively adapted for a nomadic life; and it is to them can most correctly be applied the characteristics which Renan too broadly attributes to the entire Shemitic race.
“As far as concerns the civil and political life,” says that distinguished orientalist, “the Shemites are distinguished by the same character of simplicity. They have never understood civilization in the sense which we apply to the word. We do not find among them any great organized empires, or commerce, or public spirit—nothing which recalls the absolute monarchy of Egypt and Persia. The true Shemitic society is that of the tent and the tribe: it owns no political or judiciary institution; its principle is, man free, without any controlling authority, and without any other security than that of the family tie. The questions of aristocracy, democracy, feudality, which sum up all the history of the Aryan peoples, have no meaning for the Shemites. Aristocracy, not having among them a military origin, is accepted without protest and without repugnance. The Shemitic nobility is purely patriarchal: it owes nothing to conquest; it has its origin in blood.”
As far as their physique is concerned, the Arabs are in general tall, thin, nimble, not very strong. Their face is pale and long, their forehead low, their nose aquiline, their mouth large, their chin receding. The complexion is brown, as becomes those who live for months under a glaring sun; the eyes are keen and glowing; the port is free and even haughty. They have black hair and beard.
Of their history, prior to the day when Mohammed’s genius knit them into a great proselytizing military people, little certain is known. A Shemitic tribe, descended from Joktan, grandson of Shem, settled in Arabia at a remote period of antiquity, and Joktan’s great-grandson, Himzar or Homin, founded a dynasty which ruled in Yemen for upwards of two thousand years. Even the Romans could not utterly subdue them, but gradually the different tribes fell apart from one another, and for centuries waged against each otherthe most desperate wars, until Mohammed supplied them with a rallying-point in the creed of Islam. Thenceforth their mission was to propagate the new faith by fire and sword, and bursting from their rocky highlands like a torrent, they poured along the shores of the Mediterranean to Gibraltar on the north, and Tangier on the south. In Northern Africa they gradually mingled with the Berbers, the Numidians, and the Getulians, and from the fusion sprang the Kabyles, the Tibbous, and the Touaregs, while the Shemites themselves lost a portion of their original character.
All the tribes of the desert are Moslems. The precepts of the Koran, and certain traditional usages, are almost the only laws which they recognize.
The Koran authorizes polygamy, and the Arab women, therefore, are less the wives than the slaves of their husbands, who enforce upon them the strictest seclusion, and impose upon them the most arduous labours. The tyranny which weighs upon the women is, however, in inverse proportion to the degree of welfare and civilization of the various tribes. Among the poor and almost barbarous peoples of the desert, these unfortunate creatures are reduced to a condition of degradation and brutishness which inspires in the European almost as much disgust as pity.
The instinct of rapine which most writers have signalized as one of the leading features of the Arab character, appears to have been greatly exaggerated, or, at least, too much generalized. This vice is a special result of their position, and, we must own, of the very antiquated views they hold upon the “rights of man,” which, indeed, they sum up in much the same manner as Wordsworth’sRob Roy:—[76]
“The creatures see of flood and field,And those that travel on the wind!With them no strife can last; they liveIn peace, and peace of mind.“For why?—because the good old ruleSufficeth them, the simple plan,That they should take who have the power,And they should keep who can.”
“The creatures see of flood and field,And those that travel on the wind!With them no strife can last; they liveIn peace, and peace of mind.
“For why?—because the good old ruleSufficeth them, the simple plan,That they should take who have the power,And they should keep who can.”
We must also take into account the spirit of hostility which their religion fosters against the infidel—against, that is, all who do not accept the laws of the Prophet. “The sword,” says Mohammed, “is the key of heaven and of hell; a drop of blood shed in the cause of God, a night spent in arms, is of more avail than two months of fasting or prayer: whosoever falls in battle, his sins are forgiven: at the day of judgment his wounds shall be resplendent as vermilion and odoriferous as musk; and the loss of his limbs shall be supplied by the wings of angels and cherubim.” Such a declaration could not but fire the enthusiasm of the Arab, and whet their swords against the enemies of Islam.
The leading features of his character have been discriminated by Gibbon with his usual sagacity, and described with his wonted stateliness of language.
“In private life,” he says,[77]“every man, at least every family, is the judge and avenger of his own cause. The nice sensibility of honour, which weighs the insult rather than the injury, sheds its deadly venom on the quarrels of the Arabs; the honour of their women, and theirbeards, is most easily wounded; an indecent action, a contemptuous word, can be expiated only by the blood of the offender; and such is their patient inveteracy, that they expect whole months and years the opportunity of revenge. A fine or compensation for murder is familiar to the barbarians of every age; but with the Arabs the kinsmen of the dead are at liberty to accept the atonement, or to exercise with their own hands the law of retaliation. Their refined malice refuses even the head of the murderer, substitutes an innocent for the guilty person, and transfers the penalty to the best and most considerable of the race by whom they have been injured. If he falls by their hands, they are exposed in their turn to the danger of reprisals, the interest and principal of the bloody debt are accumulated; the individuals of either family lead a life of malice and suspicion, and fifty years may sometimes elapse before the account of vengeance be finally settled. This sanguinary spirit, ignorant ofpity or forgiveness, has been moderated, however, by the maxims of honour, which require in every private encounter some decent equality of age and strength, of numbers and weapons....
“According to the remark of Pliny, the Arabian tribes are equally addicted to theft and merchandize; the caravans that traverse the desert are ransomed or pillaged; and their neighbours, since the remote times of Job and Sesostris, have been the victims of their rapacious spirit. If a Bedouin discovers from afar a solitary traveller, he rides furiously against him, crying, with a loud voice, ‘Undress thyself, thy aunt (my wife) is without a garment.’ A ready submission entitles him to mercy; resistance will provoke the aggressor, and his own blood must expiate the blood which he presumes to shed in legitimate defence. A single robber, or a few associates, are branded with their genuine name; but the exploits of a numerous band assume the character of lawful and honourable war. The temper of a people thus armed against mankind, was doubly inflamed by the domestic license of rapine, murder, and revenge.”
The name of “Bedouins” (frombedaouî, “man of the Desert”) has been bestowed on the nomades of Arabia, Egypt, and the Northern Sahara. The majority of them are shepherds; a few add to this industry the much less honourable occupation of plundering trade-caravans; some prefer to devote themselves wholly to this pursuit. All the Bedouins are children of the sword. They exult in strife and the clash of arms. It is theiracméof happiness to mount the war-steed and ride against the foe. The theme of the Arab and his horse, of the attachment which subsists between them, of the services which the latter renders to his master, of his physical and moral qualities, his courage, his swiftness, his fidelity, has been worn so threadbare that I need not here insist upon it.
I must state, however, that as there are two varieties of Arab camels, so are there of Arab horses: the noble and the common, the beast of blood and the beast of burden. The former seem to be growing scarcer every year. He is namedkoleïl. The nobility of a horse depends entirely upon that of his mother, so that anauthentic certificate of birth is always delivered to the purchaser of a “high-bred steed.” This certificate is enclosed in a small bag, which also contains a mysterious writing, and suspended to the animal’s neck will be an omen of good fortune, it is hoped, to him and his owner.
enlarge-imageBedouin Shepherds and Bedouin Nomades.Bedouin Shepherds and Bedouin Nomades.
The arms of the Bedouins are the curved sword, the yataghan, and the long musket. Pistols are sometimes added, and the lance. They fight hand to hand, and without any strategical method. They never venture upon night attacks. They seek to surprise the enemy by rapid marches and unexpected diversions, by ensnaring him in ambuscades, and harassing him when he is the strongest in numbers. The most trifling fortification, however, arrests them—a wall of brick, a simple ditch, a hedge of the fig-tree, will suffice to protect a village from their depredations.
enlarge-imageTouaregs.Touaregs.
enlarge-imageAttack upon a Q’sour.Attack upon a Q’sour.
The nomades of the Southern Sahara have not, like the Bedouins, preserved in its purity the Shemitic type, but they have fostered and developed the spirit of adventure and rapine which characterizes the Arab of the desert, and they have added something of the ferocity of the still barbarous tribes of Ham, with whom they have intermarried. These nomades form two principal groups—the Tibboos on the east, and Touaregs (Touarick, Touereug, or Tawarik) on the west. The former, according to Humboldt, are called “birds,” on account of their agility; they are still imperfectly known to Europeans, despite of the labours of Richardson, Clapperton, and Barth. The second are divided into the Touaregs of Aghadez and the Touaregs of Tagazi. It was not until 1862 that the French army, crossing the Sahara from north to south, entered into direct relations with these fiercechildren of the desert. In the same year their ambassadors attracted the curiosity of ever-curious Paris. They are the despots, the tyrants of the southern Sahara. The charge of their lean flocks is their least occupation. They are, it is true, skilful and enthusiastic hunters; but their veritable industry is the exploration of the desert: an exploration which changes in form according to circumstances. For a proper remuneration they undertake the guidance and protection of the caravans; but whoever has not purchased their safeguard they treat as an enemy, and if not adequately ransomed sell into slavery. The Berbers of the oasis not unjustly regard these marauders with alarm. For they pitilessly exact from the peaceful cultivator a share of his harvest, which is always the lion’s share; the right of thestrongest being the only right they recognize, and each man for himself the only principle they respect. A troop of Touaregs, for instance, descends upon an oasis, and summons its inhabitants to deliver up immediately a certain number of bags of dates. In case of refusal they withdraw, but the people of the oasis may prepare to defend themselves with arms, for the dreaded blow will very shortly be delivered. The Touaregs, leaving their maharis and their baggage at a convenient distance, penetrate at night into the palm-gardens, scale the walls, and, unless very energetically repelled, seize upon the tribute they had demanded.
Nothing is there to be remarked in the Arabs of theq’soursbut their misery and degradation. A French officer, M. Tremblet, has described with exactness and force their physiognomy, manners, character, ideas, and history.[78]One rises from the perusal of his book with a painful impression. In the narrow and pestilential streets of theq’sours, where vermin are as numerous as men and women, in those mud palaces where the sultans are enthroned in rags, the same passions, the same ambitions, the same all-potent appetites, the same struggles, intrigues, and crimes prevail, as occupy so large a place in the history of the great states of Europe and Asia.
Among the inhabitants of the Desert I would include the possessors of the great Egyptian oasis,—that ancient cradle of civilization—that strange and mysterious land which, after throbbing with so full and brilliant a life in the days of the Pharaohs and the Ptolemies, slumbered for centuries under the leaden domination of the Moslem. Let us note only that the Egyptian people have undergone no special modification; the features of the fellahs of to-day are exactly those which we trace in the pictures that cover the walls of palace and tomb, the monuments that carry us back in imagination to the erection of the Pyramids or the glories of hundred-gated Thebes. It is the old Egypto-Berber race, wherein we recognize the mixture of the black and Shemitic blood, or perhaps the still incomplete result of theinfluences which have transformed into negroes the whites who emigrated, some thousands of years ago, from Western Asia into Africa.
enlarge-imageNubian Women.Nubian Women.
The Egyptians establish, very clearly, the transition between the Shemites and the population of Nubia and Ethiopia. With the latter the skin is black or of a deep bronze; but the form, the features, the hair, approach much more nearly the Caucasian than the Negro type. The Nubian women especially exhibit a grace and dignity of movement which reveal the nobleness of their origin. “It is in these far lands,” says Trémaux, “we meet with the modern Rebecca, attired with the antique Biblical simplicity, and carrying the water vessel onher head. Their air, at once easy and reserved, their black modest eyes, recall those images of the holy history which every one has seen; only, instead of a cotton stuff gaily coloured, imagine a piece very dirty and often in tatters, and you will have the portrait of the Nubian woman; this garment is otherwise so naturally draped and so proudly worn, that it yields in nothing to the ancient models.”
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WHEN we have crossed the 18th parallel (or nearly so) of north latitude in Africa and the 30th in Asia—the southern boundary of the Rainless District—countries of extreme fertility and exuberant product succeed to the dreary solitudes we have hitherto traversed.
At intervals, indeed, the traveller encounters some vast blighted and accursed area, where, for a part of each year, a deadly aridity prevails; but ever there comes a happy moment, even in these desolate wastes, when genial Nature resumes her rights, abundant rains nourish vegetable and animal life, and the glowing scene constrains us to exclaim with thankful heart, “The earth is the Lord’s, and the fulness thereof.”
The Asiatic plains in the south, are, however, preserved from such abrupt alternations; numerous water-courses, leaping downward from the snowy fountains of the Himalayan chain, refresh and fertilize these countries, which are almost everywhere subject to the dominion of man. Analagous causes, in the grand rich islands of the warm Indian seas, produce similar effects; there, also, the very deserts are humid regions, and tall grasses, bushes, shrubs, reeds, and climbingplants grow in a rank and luxuriant chaos which we designate by the name of jungles, in whose dense obscurity the tiger makes his lair, and the serpent conceals his deadly venom!
In the immense triangle defined by that portion of the African continent which extends from the Mountains of the Moon to the Cape of Good Hope, nature has maintained almost intact her savage independence; but she displays there her most varied forms, from the snow-crested ice-bound mountain to the lowest and most monotonous plain, from the impenetrable forest to the nakedest and barrenest steppe.
To enable the reader to comprehend these widely different aspects, and to describe the peculiar characteristics of each region of this immense continent, it will be necessary for us to recapitulate its most important geographical features.
A vast plateau, of comparatively slight elevation, occupies all Southern Africa, extending eastward as far as the fifth or sixth degree north of the equator. To the north-west, it is bounded by the mountains of Senegambia; to the north-east, by those of Abyssinia. On the east and west, the mountains descend to the very shore in secondary chains; to the south the table-land is brought down to the sea in a series of terraces which separate the mountain-ranges.
At its southern extremity, the African continent is from 550 to 600 miles broad. It is occupied by the British colony of the Cape, which is bounded on the north by the Orange River. The most striking features of the physical geography of this part of Africa, and which determine in the main its climate and natural productions, are three chains of mountains disposed parallel to one another and to the southern coast. These are separated by terraces or upland plains, each range forming the boundary of the lower and the abutment of the higher terrace. The communication is maintained by transverse valleys, which are often of a highly romantic character. The loftiest and most inland chain is christened in different parts of its course the Roggeveld Bergen, the Nieuveld Bergen, and the Sneeu Bergen, or“Snowy Mountains.” Of these the loftiest summit is the Compass Berg, 10,000 feet in altitude. The second chain, the Black Mountains, though not so lofty are more massive, and, in truth, composed of two or three chains in close juxtaposition. The third, or last chain, in proceeding from south to north, varies from eighteen to fifty-four miles, enlarging towards the west.
The plain or terrace between the Black and the Snowy Mountains is much loftier than the two other steps by which we descend to the southern extremity of the continent. The lowest terrace, bordering on the sea, is well-watered and fertile. The second, or central terrace, consists of fertile districts, equally well watered, but intersected by vast dry deserts, called (from a Hottentot word)Karroos. The third terrace, commonly designated the Great Karroo, at the base of the Roggeveld and Nieuveld chain, is 300 miles in length, 80 miles in breadth, and 2000 feet above the sea-level. Its soil, says a writer in theQuarterly Review, presents throughout its whole extent, for the greater portion of the year, not a trace of vegetation. These gloomy solitudes assume a character of picturesque grandeur through their very wildness of desolation. The scene might convey to a fanciful mind the dreary image of a ruined world, where the witches and demons of Goethe’s Walpurgis-Night might fitly celebrate their revels.
“And through the cliffs with ruin strewn,The wild winds whizz, and howl, and moan.”[79]
“And through the cliffs with ruin strewn,The wild winds whizz, and howl, and moan.”[79]
During the long dry summer months, the smallest birds would not find wherewithal to sustain their existence in these sombre deserts, whose solemn silence not even the murmur of an insect interrupts.
enlarge-imageNIGHT-SCENE IN THE AFRICAN INTERIOR.NIGHT-SCENE IN THE AFRICAN INTERIOR.
Yet these regions, deprived of springs and running waters, are not always sterile deserts, are not always desolate plains. In the dry season, the soil, a yellow ferruginous clay, acquires the hardness of brick, just as if it had been exposed to the fire of a furnace; but the roots and bulbs, protected by a ligneous covering, resist the devouring heat. The first rains revive them; they put forth theirstems and branches; a myriad flowers reveal their sparkling colours; and the country which, a day or two before, had shown to the eye a bare and dreary surface, shines out in a panoply of splendour, as if a magician’s spell had suddenly transformed it into a terrestrial paradise! But as the days lengthen, and the sun’s power increases, the bloom and the beauty vanish, and the curse of fire once more descends upon the gloomy scene.
In several districts north of the Cape Colony whole years pass by without the sight or sound of running water rejoicing the wistful wanderer. Dr. Livingstone, while residing among the Bakouans, in the Bechuana country, saw the natives excavating the bed of the Kolobeng to extract a few drops of water. A centigrade thermometer, sunk two and a half inches in the earth, at noon, marked 56°. Insects placed on the surface of the ground died in a few seconds. The grass was so dry that it crumbled into powder when plucked.
The coast of Natal is rich in trees and herbage. The Zambesi, and other rivers which descend from the central plateau, refresh the plains of Mozambique and Zanzibar. But from the 4th parallel of north latitude to Cape Guardafui extends an almost continuous desert. The southern extremity of the Lupata chain also presents a vast naked country, where the presence of gold has encouraged the Portuguese to found some establishments.
The neighbouring zone of Kaffraria consists of great far-spreading, gently-undulating plains, characterized by extreme aridity. The western districts are much less broken than the central, and exhibit no undulations except in the vicinity of the ocean. There an immense level territory exists under the name of the Kalihari Desert, whose southern boundary is marked by the Gariep or Orange River, which drains rather than waters it. To the north this awful wilderness stretches as far as the Lake Ngami, thus covering the area comprised between the 29th and 30th parallels of south latitude. The pastoral country of Namaqua and Damaras bounds it on the west. Eastward it extends to the 24th meridian of west longitude.
Moisture is not wholly wanting in this vast region. The Kaliharihas been called a desert, says Livingstone,[80]because it contains no running water, and very little in wells. Far from being destitute of vegetation, it is covered with grass and creeping plants, and there are large patches of bushes, and even trees. It is remarkably flat; and prodigious herds of antelopes roam over its trackless plains. The soil is composed in general of a fine soft sand, lightly coloured—that is, of a nearly pure silica. In the ancient beds of dried-up rivers lie immense patches of alluvial soil, which, hardened by the sun, form great reservoirs, retaining the rain-water for several months of the year. The quantity of grass flourishing in this region is remarkable. It grows generally in thick tufts, occasionally intermingled with spaces where the earth is naked or closely overgrown with creeping plants. These, deeply rooted in the soil, suffer but little from the effects of the excessive heat. Most of them have tubercular roots, and are so organized as to furnish both food and liquid during the long droughts—an epoch when one vainly seeks elsewhere anything which can appease one’s hunger or one’s thirst.
The rich vegetation of the Kalihari is due to its geological constitution. It consists of a great valley, or rather of a vast basin, whose bottom is formed of a diluvial earth, and which is encircled by a belt of rocks, cloven at several places. It follows that where the rain is abundant, the slope of the hills directs it towards the centre of the basin, and this rain filters and deposits itself beneath the surface of the soil. And it appears to be a proof of this statement, that on digging in the sand cisterns are formed, or “sucking-places,” which are filled with water supplied by subterraneous conduits.
This so-called Desert is not without its utility. Not only does it nourish innumerable multitudes of animals of every kind, but it has become the asylum of fugitive tribes. Here at first the Bakalabaris found a refuge; and then, in their turn, other peoples of the Bechuana, whose territories had been invaded by the Kaffirs.
The Kalihari has its mirage and its sirocco. During the excessive drought which precedes the rainy season, a burning wind traversesthis desert from north to south, and during its three or four days’ duration it withers and dries up everything in its path. It is so loaded with electricity that a bundle of ostrich feathers, which remained exposed to it for a few seconds, was itself charged as if it had been in contact with a powerful electrical machine, and produced a lively disturbance, accompanied by cracking noises, when taken in the hand. As often as this wind prevails, the electricity of the atmosphere is so abundant that every movement of the natives causes sparks to be given off theirkarosses, or cloaks made of the skin of beasts.
The contrast is striking between the well-watered east coast of South Africa and the arid western coast. After the scarped mountains of the Cape, which ascend northward to the ocean, come the less lofty chains—the hills of sand which separate the interior sandy desert from the equally sandy district of the littoral. With the exception of the Walvish Bay, the coast for eight hundred miles—from the great Orange River to Cape Negro—has not a stream of water.
At Cape Negro commences a series of terraces, separated from one another by long bands of sunken ground. Thisensembledescribes a curve towards the interior, and leaves on the coast a level plain of about 110 miles in breadth.
In Benguela the plains are healthy and cultivated. More to the north, one encounters nothing but monotonous savannahs and forests with gigantic trees. The soil, at a great number of points, is saturated with water, and, so to speak, enveloped in a shroud of pestilential vapour, which the breeze never scatters.
The low plains of Biafra and Benin, and especially the Delta of the Niger, are unwholesome, rank, and foul-smelling marshes. In their mangrove swamps lurks fever, and a legion of deadly diseases.
“Macies et nova febriumTerris incubuit cohors.”—(Horace.)
“Macies et nova febriumTerris incubuit cohors.”—(Horace.)
Until the early years of the present century very little was known of the interior of Southern Africa. At this epoch somenative merchants traversed the country from one sea to another—from St. Paul de Loanda to the coast of Mozambique and Zanzibar. This exploit was repeated and outstripped by Dr. Livingstone, who, from 1850 to 1856, accomplished a marvellous journey of six thousand miles, through regions never before trodden by the white man’s foot.
Setting out from Kolobeng, the most advanced of the English missionary stations, he arrived, after having crossed some three hundred miles of a region without water, at the beautiful river Zouga, which issues from the western extremity of Lake Ngami.