Chuma and SusiChuma and Susi
26th June, 1870.—Now my people failed me; so, with only three attendants, Susi, Chuma, and Gardner, I started off to the north-west for the Lualaba. The numbers of running rivulets to be crossed were surprising, and at each, for some forty yards, the path had been worked by the feet of passengers into adhesive mud: we crossed fourteen in one day—some thigh deep; most of them run into the Liya, which we crossed, and it flows to the Lualaba. We passed through many villages, for the paths all lead through human dwellings. Many people presented bananas, and seemed surprised when I made a small return gift; one man ran after me with a sugar-cane; I paid for lodgings too: here the Arabs never do.
28th June, 1870.—The driver ants were in millions in some partof the way; on this side of the continent they seem less fierce than I have found them in the west.
29th June, 1870.—At one village musicians with calabashes, having holes in them, flute-fashion, tried to please me by their vigorous acting, and by beating drums in time.
30th June, 1870.—We passed through the nine villages burned for a single string of beads, and slept in the village of Malola.
July, 1870.—While I was sleeping quietly here, some trading Arabs camped at Nasangwa's, and at dead of night one was pinned to the earth by a spear; no doubt this was in revenge for relations slain in the forty mentioned: the survivors now wished to run a muck in all directions against the Manyuema.
When I came up I proposed to ask the chief if he knew the assassin, and he replied that he was not sure of him, for he could only conjecture who it was; but death to all Manyuemas glared from the eyes of half-castes and slaves. Fortunately, before this affair was settled in their way, I met Mohamad Bogharib coming back from Kasonga's, and he joined in enforcing peace: the traders went off, but let my three people know, what I knew long before, that they hated having a spy in me on their deeds. I told some of them who were civil tongued that ivory obtained by bloodshed was unclean evil—"unlucky" as they say: my advice to them was, "Don't shed human blood, my friends; it has guilt not to be wiped off by water." Off they went; and afterwards the bloodthirsty party got only one tusk and a half, while another party, which avoided shooting men, got fifty-four tusks!
From Mohamad's people I learned that the Lualaba was not in the N.W. course I had pursued, for in fact it flows W.S.W. in another great bend, and they had gone far to the north without seeing it, but the country was exceedingly difficult from forest and water. As I had alreadyseen, trees fallen across the path formed a breast-high wall which had to be climbed over: flooded rivers, breast and neck deep, had to be crossed, the mud was awful, and nothing but villages eight or ten miles apart.
In the clearances around these villages alone could the sun be seen. For the first time in my life my feet failed me, and now having but three attendants it would have been unwise to go further in that direction. Instead of healing quietly as heretofore, when torn by hard travel, irritable-eating ulcers fastened on both feet; and I limped back to Bambarré on 22nd.
The accounts of Ramadân (who was desired by me to take notes as he went in the forest) were discouraging, and made me glad I did not go. At one part, where the tortuous river was flooded, they were five hours in the water, and a man in a small canoe went before them sounding for places not too deep for them, breast and chin deep, and Hassani fell and hurt himself sorely in a hole. The people have goats and sheep, and love them as they do children.
[Fairly baffled by the difficulties in his way, and sorely troubled by the demoralised state of his men, who appear not to have been proof against the contaminating presence of the Arabs, the Doctor turns back at this point.]
6th July, 1870.—Back to Mamohela, and welcomed by the Arabs, who all approved of my turning back. Katomba presented abundant provisions for all the way to Bambarré. Before we reached this, Mohamad made a forced march, and Moene-mokaia's people came out drunk: the Arabs assaulted them, and they ran off.
23rd July, 1870.—The sores on my feet now laid me up as irritable-eating ulcers. If the foot were put to the ground, a discharge of bloody ichor flowed, and the same discharge happened every night with considerable pain, that prevented sleep: the wailing of the slaves tortured withthese sores is one of the night sounds of a slave-camp: they eat through everything—muscle, tendon, and bone, and often lame permanently if they do not kill the poor things. Medicines have very little effect on such wounds: their periodicity seems to say that they are allied to fever. The Arabs make a salve of bees'-wax and sulphate of copper, and this applied hot, and held on by a bandage affords support, but the necessity of letting the ichor escape renders it a painful remedy: I had three ulcers, and no medicine. The native plan of support by means of a stiff leaf or bit of calabash was too irritating, and so they continued to eat in and enlarge in spite of everything: the vicinity was hot, and the pain increased with the size of the wound.
2nd August, 1870.—An eclipse at midnight: the Moslems called loudly on Moses. Very cold.
On17th August, 1870,Monanyembé, the chief who was punished by Mohamad Bogharib, lately came bringing two goats; one he gave to Mohamad, the other to Moenékuss' son, acknowledging that he had killed his elder brother: he had killed eleven persons over at Linamo in our absence, in addition to those killed in villages on our S.E. when we were away. It transpired that Kandahara, brother of old Moenékuss, whose village is near this, killed three women and a child, and that a trading man came over from Kasangangayé, and was murdered too, for no reason but to eat his body. Mohamad ordered old Kandahara to bring ten goats and take them over to Kasangangayé to pay for the murdered man. When they tell of each other's deeds they disclose a horrid state of bloodthirsty callousness. The people over a hill N.N.E. of this killed a person out hoeing; if a cultivator is alone, he is almost sure of being slain. Some said that people in the vicinity, or hyænas, stole the buried dead; but Posho's wife died, and in Wanyamesi fashion was thrown out of camp unburied. Mohamad threatened an attack if Manyuema did not cease exhumingthe dead; it was effectual, neither men nor hyænas touched her, though exposed now for seven days.
The head of Moenékuss is said to be preserved in a pot in his house, and all public matters are gravely communicated to it, as if his spirit dwelt therein: his body was eaten, the flesh was removed from the head and eaten too; his father's head is said to be kept also: the foregoing refers to Bambarré alone. In other districts graves show that sepulture is customary, but here no grave appears: some admit the existence of the practice here; others deny it. In the Metamba country adjacent to the Lualaba, a quarrel with a wife often ends in the husband killing her and eating her heart, mixed up in a huge mess of goat's flesh: this has the charm character. Fingers are taken as charms in other parts, but in Bambarré alone is the depraved taste the motive for cannibalism.
Bambarré, 18th August, 1870.—I learn from Josut and Moenepembé, who have been to Katañga and beyond, that there is a Lake N.N.W. of the copper mines, and twelve days distant; it is called Chibungo, and is said to be large. Seven days west of Katañga flows another Lualaba, the dividing line between Rua and Lunda or Londa; it is very large, and as the Lufira flows into Chibungo, it is probable that the Lualaba West and the Lufira form the Lake. Lualaba West and Lufira rise by fountains south of Katañga, three or four days off. Luambai and Lunga fountains are only about ten miles distant from Lualaba West and Lufira fountains: a mound rises between them, the most remarkable in Africa. Were this spot in Armenia it would serve exactly the description of the garden of Eden in Genesis, with its four rivers, the Gihon, Pison, Hiddekel, and Euphrates; as it is, it possibly gave occasion to the story told to Herodotus by the Secretary of Minerva in the City of Saïs, about two hills with conical tops, Crophi and Mophi. "Midway between them," said he, "are the fountains of the Nile, fountainswhich it is impossible to fathom: half the water runs northward into Egypt; half to the south towards Ethiopia."
Four fountains rising so near to each other would readily be supposed to have one source, and half the water flowing into the Nile and the other half to the Zambesi, required but little imagination to originate, seeing the actual visitor would not feel bound to say how the division was effected. He could only know the fact of waters rising at one spot, and separating to flow north and south. The conical tops to the mound look like invention, as also do the names.
A slave, bought on Lualaba East, came from Lualaba West in about twelve days: these two Lualabas may form the loop depicted by Ptolemy, and upper and lower Tanganyika be a third arm of the Nile.
Patience is all I can exercise: these irritable ulcers hedge me in now, as did my attendants in June, but all will be for the best, for it is in Providence and not in me.
The watershed is between 700 and 800 miles long from west to east, or say from 22° or 23° to 34° or 35° East longitude. Parts of it are enormous sponges; in other parts innumerable rills unite into rivulets, which again form rivers—Lufira, for instance, has nine rivulets, and Lekulwé other nine. The convex surface of the rose of a garden watering-can is a tolerably apt similitude, as the rills do not spring off the face of it, and it is 700 miles across the circle; but in the numbers of rills coming out at different heights on the slope, there is a faint resemblance, and I can at present think of no other example.
I am a little thankful to old Nile for so hiding his head that all "theoretical discoverers" are left out in the cold. With all real explorers I have a hearty sympathy, and I have some regret at being obliged, in a manner compelled, to speak somewhat disparagingly of the opinions formed by my predecessors. The work of Speke and Grant is part of the history of this region, and since the discovery of thesources of the Nile was asserted so positively, it seems necessary to explain, not offensively, I hope, wherein their mistake lay, in making a somewhat similar claim. My opinions may yet be shown to be mistaken too, but at present I cannot conceive how. When Speke discovered Victoria Nyanza in 1858, he at once concluded that therein lay the sources of the Nile. His work after that was simply following a foregone conclusion, and as soon as he and Grant looked towards the Victoria Nyanza, they turned their backs on the Nile fountains; so every step of their splendid achievement of following the river down took them further and further away from the Caput Nili. When it was perceived that the little river that leaves the Nyanza, though they called it the White Nile, would not account for that great river, they might have gone west and found headwaters (as the Lualaba) to which it can bear no comparison. Taking their White Nile at 80 or 90 yards, or say 100 yards broad, the Lualaba, far south of the latitude of its point of departure, shows an average breadth of from 4000 to 6000 yards, and always deep.
Considering that more than sixteen hundred years have elapsed since Ptolemy put down the results of early explorers, and emperors, kings, philosophers—all the great men of antiquity in short longed to know the fountains whence flowed the famous river, and longed in vain—exploration does not seem to have been very becoming to the other sex either. Madame Tinné came further up the river than the centurions sent by Nero Cæsar, and showed such indomitable pluck as to reflect honour on her race. I know nothing about her save what has appeared in the public papers, but taking her exploration along with what was done by Mrs. Baker, no long time could have elapsed before the laurels for the modern re-discovery of the sources of the Nile should have been plucked by the ladies. In 1841 the Egyptian Expedition under D'Arnauld and Sabatier reached lat. 4° 42':this was a great advance into the interior as compared with Linant in 1827, 13° 30' N., and even on the explorations of Jomard(?); but it turned when nearly a thousand miles from the sources.
Manuema Hunters killing SokosManuema Hunters killing Sokos
[The subjoined account of the soko—which is in all probability an entirely new species of chimpanzee, andnotthe gorilla, is exceedingly interesting, and no doubt Livingstone had plenty of stories from which to select. Neither Susi nor Chuma can identify the soko of Manyuema with the gorilla, as we have it stuffed in the British Museum. They think, however, that the soko is quite as large and as strong as the gorilla, judging by the specimens shown to them, although they could have decided with greater certainty, if the natives had not invariably brought in the dead sokos disembowelled; as they point out, and as we imagine from Dr. Livingstone's description, the carcase would then appear much less bulky. Livingstone gives an animated sketch of a soko hunt.]
24th August, 1870.—Four gorillas or sokos were killed yesterday: an extensive grass-burning forced them out of their usual haunt, and coming on the plain they were speared. They often go erect, but place the hand on the head, as if to steady the body. When seen thus, the soko is an ungainly beast. The most sentimental young lady would not call him a "dear," but a bandy-legged, pot-bellied, low-looking villain, without a particle of the gentleman in him. Other animals, especially the antelopes, are graceful, and it is pleasant to see them, either at rest or in motion: the natives also are well made, lithe and comely to behold, but the soko, if large, would do well to stand for a picture of the Devil.
He takes away my appetite by his disgusting bestiality of appearance. His light-yellow face shows off his ugly whiskers, and faint apology for a beard; the foreheadvillainously low, with high ears, is well in the back-ground of the great dog-mouth; the teeth are slightly human, but the canines show the beast by their large development. The hands, or rather the fingers, are like those of the natives. The flesh of the feet is yellow, and the eagerness with which the Manyuema devour it leaves the impression that eating sokos was the first stage by which they arrived at being cannibals; they say the flesh is delicious. The soko is represented by some to be extremely knowing, successfully stalking men and women while at their work, kidnapping children, and running up trees with them—he seems to be amused by the sight of the young native in his arms, but comes down when tempted by a bunch of bananas, and as he lifts that, drops the child: the young soko in such a case would cling closely to the armpit of the elder. One man was cutting out honey from a tree, and naked, when a soko suddenly appeared and caught him, then let him go: another man was hunting, and missed in his attempt to stab a soko: it seized the spear and broke it, then grappled with the man, who called to his companions, "Soko has caught me," the soko bit off the ends of his fingers and escaped unharmed. Both men are now alive at Bambarré.
The soko is so cunning, and has such sharp eyes, that no one can stalk him in front without being seen, hence, when shot, it is always in the back; when surrounded by men and nets, he is generally speared in the back too, otherwise he is not a very formidable beast: he is nothing, as compared in power of damaging his assailant, to a leopard or lion, but is more like a man unarmed, for it does not occur to him to use his canine teeth, which are long and formidable. Numbers of them come down in the forest, within a hundred yards of our camp, and would be unknown but for giving tongue like fox-hounds: this is their nearest approach to speech. A man hoeing was stalked by a soko,and seized; he roared out, but the soko giggled and grinned, and left him as if he had done it in play. A child caught up by a soko is often abused by being pinched and scratched, and let fall.
The soko kills the leopard occasionally, by seizing both paws, and biting them so as to disable them, he then goes up a tree, groans over his wounds, and sometimes recovers, while the leopard dies: at other times, both soko and leopard die. The lion kills him at once, and sometimes tears his limbs off, but does not eat him. The soko eats no flesh—small bananas are his dainties, but not maize. His food consists of wild fruits, which abound: one, Staféné, or Manyuema Mamwa, is like large sweet sop but indifferent in taste and flesh. The soko brings forth at times twins. A very large soko was seen by Mohamad's hunters sitting picking his nails; they tried to stalk him, but he vanished. Some Manyuema think that their buried dead rise as sokos, and one was killed with holes in his ears, as if he had been a man. He is very strong and fears guns but not spears: he never catches women.
Sokos collect together, and make a drumming noise, some say with hollow trees, then burst forth into loud yells which are well imitated by the natives' embryotic music. If a man has no spear the soko goes away satisfied, but if wounded he seizes the wrist, lops off the fingers, and spits them out, slaps the cheeks of his victim, and bites without breaking the skin: he draws out a spear (but never uses it), and takes some leaves and stuffs them into his wound to staunch the blood; he does not wish an encounter with an armed man. He sees women do him no harm, and never molests them; a man without a spear is nearly safe from him. They beat hollow trees as drums with hands, and then scream as music to it; when men hear them, they go to the sokos; but sokos never go to men with hostility. Manyuema say, "Soko is a man, and nothing bad in him."
Portrait of a Young SokoPortrait of a Young Soko
They live in communities of about ten, each having his own female; an intruder from another camp is beaten off with their fists and loud yells. If one tries to seize the female of another, he is caught on the ground, and all unite in boxing and biting the offender. A male often carries a child, especially if they are passing from one patch of forest to another over a grassy space; he then gives it to the mother.
I now spoke with my friend Mohamad, and he offered to go with me to see Lualaba from Luamo, but I explained that merely to see and measure its depth would not do, I must see whither it went. This would require a number of his people in lieu of my deserters, and to take them away from his ivory trade, which at present is like gold digging, I must make amends, and I offered him 2000 rupees, and a gun worth 700 rupees, R. 2700 in all, or 270l.He agreed, and should he enable me to finish up my work in one trip down Lualaba, and round to Lualaba West, it would be a great favour.
[How severely he felt the effects of the terrible illnesses of the last two years may be imagined by some few words here, and it must ever be regretted that the conviction which he speaks of was not acted up to.]
The severe pneumonia in Marunga, the choleraic complaint in Manyuema, and now irritable ulcers warn me to retire while life lasts. Mohamad's people went north, and east, and west, from Kasonga's: sixteen marches north, ten ditto west, and four ditto E. and S.E. The average march was 6-1/2 hours, say 12' about 200' N. and W., lat. of Kasongo, say 4° south. They may have reached 1°, 2° S. They were now in the Baléggé country, and turned. It was all dense forest, they never saw the sun except when at a village, and then the villages were too far apart. The people were very fond of sheep, which they call ngombé, or ox, and tusks arenever used. They went off to where an elephant had formerly been killed, and brought the tusks rotted and eaten or gnawed by "Déré" (?)—a Rodent, probably theAulocaudatus Swindermanus. Three large rivers were crossed, breast and chin deep; in one they were five hours, and a man in a small canoe went ahead sounding for water capable of being waded. Much water and mud in the forest. This report makes me thankful I did not go, for I should have seen nothing, and been worn out by fatigue and mud. They tell me that the River Metunda had black water, and took two hours to cross it, breast deep. They crossed about forty smaller rivers over the River Mohunga, breast deep. The River of Mbité also is large. All along Lualaba and Metumbé the sheep have hairy dew-laps, no wool, Tartar breed (?), small thin tails.
A broad belt of meadow-land, with no trees, lies along Lualaba, beyond that it is all dense forest, and trees so large, that one lying across the path is breast high: clearances exist only around the villages. The people are very expert smiths and weavers of the "Lamba," and make fine large spears, knives, and needles. Market-places, called "Tokos," are numerous all along Lualaba; to these the Barua of the other bank come daily in large canoes, bringing grass-cloth, salt, flour, cassava, fowls, goats, pigs, and slaves. The women are beautiful, with straight noses, and well-clothed; when the men of the districts are at war, the women take their goods to market as if at peace and are never molested: all are very keen traders, buying one thing with another, and changing back again, and any profit made is one of the enjoyments of life.
I knew that my deserters hoped to be fed by Mohamad Bogharib when we left the camp at Mamohela, but he told them that he would not have them; this took them aback, but they went and lifted his ivory for him, and when a parley was thus brought about, talked him over, sayingthat they would go to me, and do all I desired: they never came, but, as no one else would take them, I gave them three loads to go to Bambarré; there they told Mohamad that I would not give them beads, and they did not like to steal; they were now trying to get his food by lies. I invited them three times to come and take beads, but having supplies of food from the camp women, they hoped to get the upper hand with me, and take what they liked by refusing to carry or work. Mohamad spoke long to them, but speaking mildly makes them imagine that the spokesman is afraid of them. They kept away from my work and would fain join Mohamad's, but he won't have them. I gave beads to all but the ringleaders. Their conduct looks as if a quarrel had taken place between us, but no such excuse have they.
I am powerless, as they have left me, and think that they may do as they like, and the "Manyuema are bad" is the song. Their badness consists in being dreadfully afraid of guns, and the Arabs can do just as they like with them and their goods. If spears alone were used the Manyuema would be considered brave, for they fear no one, though he has many spears. They tell us truly "that were it not for our guns not one of us would return to our own country." Moene-mokaia killed two Arab agents, and took their guns; this success led to their asserting, in answer to the remonstrances of the women, "We shall take their goats, guns, and women from them." The chief, in reporting the matter to Moenemger(?) at Luamo, said, "The Englishman told my people to go away as he did not like fighting, but my men were filled with 'malofu,' or palm-toddy, and refused to their own hurt." Elsewhere they made regular preparation to have a fight with Dugumbé's people, just to see who was strongest—they with their spears and wooden shields, and the Arabs with what in derision they called tobacco-pipes (guns). They killed eight or nine Arabs.
No traders seem ever to have come in before this. Banna brought copper and skins for tusks, and the Babisa and Baguha coarse beads. The Bavira are now enraged at seeing Ujijians pass into their ivory field, and no wonder; they took the tusks which cost them a few strings of beads, and received weight for weight in beads, thick brass wire, and loads of calico.
FOOTNOTES:[7]Susi and Chuma say that the third tusk grew out from the base of the trunk, that is, midway between the other two.—ED.
[7]Susi and Chuma say that the third tusk grew out from the base of the trunk, that is, midway between the other two.—ED.
[7]Susi and Chuma say that the third tusk grew out from the base of the trunk, that is, midway between the other two.—ED.
Footsteps of Moses. Geology of Manyuema land. "A drop of comfort." Continued sufferings. A stationary explorer. Consequences of trusting to theory. Nomenclature of Rivers and Lakes. Plunder and murder is Ujijian trading. Comes out of hut for first time after eighty days' illness. Arab cure for ulcerated sores. Rumour of letters. The loss of medicines a great trial now. The broken-hearted chief. Return of Arab ivory traders. Future plans. Thankfulness for Mr. Edward Young's Search Expedition. The Hornbilled Phoenix. Tedious delays. The bargain for the boy. Sends letters to Zanzibar. Exasperation of Manyuema against Arabs. The "Sassassa bird." The disease "Safura."
Footsteps of Moses. Geology of Manyuema land. "A drop of comfort." Continued sufferings. A stationary explorer. Consequences of trusting to theory. Nomenclature of Rivers and Lakes. Plunder and murder is Ujijian trading. Comes out of hut for first time after eighty days' illness. Arab cure for ulcerated sores. Rumour of letters. The loss of medicines a great trial now. The broken-hearted chief. Return of Arab ivory traders. Future plans. Thankfulness for Mr. Edward Young's Search Expedition. The Hornbilled Phoenix. Tedious delays. The bargain for the boy. Sends letters to Zanzibar. Exasperation of Manyuema against Arabs. The "Sassassa bird." The disease "Safura."
Bambarré,25th August, 1870.—One of my waking dreams is that the legendary tales about Moses coming up into Inner Ethiopia with Merr his foster-mother, and founding a city which he called in her honour "Meroe," may have a substratum of fact. He was evidently a man of transcendent genius, and we learn from the speech of St. Stephen that "he was learned in all the wisdom of the Egyptians, and was mighty in words and in deeds." His deeds must have been well known in Egypt, for "he supposed that his brethren would have understood how that God by His hand would deliver them, but they understood not." His supposition could not be founded on his success in smiting a single Egyptian; he was too great a man to be elated by a single act of prowess, but his success on a large scale in Ethiopia afforded reasonable grounds for believing that his brethren would be proud of their countryman, and disposed to follow his leadership, but they were slaves. The noticetaken of the matter by Pharaoh showed that he was eyed by the great as a dangerous, if not powerful, man. He "dwelt" in Midian for some time before his gallant bearing towards the shepherds by the well, commended him to the priest or prince of the country. An uninteresting wife, and the want of intercourse with kindred spirits during the long forty years' solitude of a herdsman's life, seem to have acted injuriously on his spirits, and it was not till he had with Aaron struck terror into the Egyptian mind, that the "man Moses" again became "very great in the eyes of Pharaoh and his servants." The Ethiopian woman whom he married could scarcely be the daughter of Renel or Jethro, for Midian was descended from Keturah, Abraham's concubine, and they were never considered Cushite or Ethiopian. If he left his wife in Egypt she would now be some fifty or sixty years old, and all the more likely to be despised by the proud prophetess Miriam as a daughter of Ham.
I dream of discovering some monumental relics of Meroe, and if anything confirmatory of sacred history does remain, I pray to be guided thereunto. If the sacred chronology would thereby be confirmed, I would not grudge the toil and hardships, hunger and pain, I have endured—the irritable ulcers would only be discipline.
Above the fine yellow clay schist of Manyuema the banks of Tanganyika reveal 50 feet of shingle mixed with red earth; above this at some parts great boulders lie; after this 60 feet of fine clay schist, then 5 strata of gravel underneath, with a foot stratum of schist between them. The first seam of gravel is about 2 feet, the second 4 feet, and the lowest of all about 30 feet thick. The fine schist was formed in still water, but the shingle must have been produced in stormy troubled seas if not carried hither and thither by ice and at different epochs.
This Manyuema country is unhealthy, not so much fromfever as from debility of the whole system, induced by damp, cold, and indigestion: this general weakness is ascribed by some to maize being the common food, it shows itself in weakness of bowels and choleraic purging. This may be owing to bad water, of which there is no scarcity, but it is so impregnated with dead vegetable matter as to have the colour of tea. Irritable ulcers fasten on any part abraded by accident, and it seems to be a spreading fungus, for the matter settling on any part near becomes a fresh centre of propagation. The vicinity of the ulcer is very tender, and it eats in frightfully if not allowed rest. Many slaves die of it, and its periodical discharges of bloody ichor makes me suspect it to be a development of fever. I have found lunar caustic useful: a plaister of wax, and a little finely-ground sulphate of copper is used by the Arabs, and so is cocoa-nut oil and butter. These ulcers are excessively intractable, there is no healing them before they eat into the bone, especially on the shins.
Rheumatism is also common, and it cuts the natives off. The traders fear these diseases, and come to a stand if attacked, in order to use rest in the cure. "Taema," or Tape-worm, is frequently met with, and no remedy is known among the Arabs and natives for it.
[Searching in his closely-written pocket-books we find many little mementoes of his travels; such, for instance, as two or three tsetse flies pressed between the leaves of one book; some bees, some leaves and moths in another, but, hidden away in the pocket of the note-book which Livingstone used during the longest and most painful illness he ever underwent lies a small scrap of printed paper which tells a tale in its own simple way. On one side there is written in his well-known hand:—]
"Turn over and see a drop of comfort found when sufferingfrom irritable eating ulcers on the feet in Manyuema, August, 1870."
"Turn over and see a drop of comfort found when sufferingfrom irritable eating ulcers on the feet in Manyuema, August, 1870."
[On the reverse we see that the scrap was evidently snipped off a list of books advertised at the end of some volume which, with the tea and other things sent to Ujiji, had reached him before setting out on this perilous journey. The "drop of comfort" is as follows:—]
"A NARRATIVE OF AN EXPEDITION TO THE ZAMBESI AND ITS TRIBUTARIES,"And the discovery of Lakes Shirwa and Nyassa."Fifth Thousand. With Map and Illustrations. 8vo. 21s."'Few achievements in our day have made a greater impression than that of the adventurous missionary who unaided crossed the Continent of Equatorial Africa. His unassuming simplicity, his varied intelligence, his indomitable pluck, his steady religious purpose, form a combination of qualities rarely found in one man. By common consent, Dr. Livingstone has come to be regarded as one of the most remarkable travellers of his own or of any other age.'—British Quarterly Review."
"A NARRATIVE OF AN EXPEDITION TO THE ZAMBESI AND ITS TRIBUTARIES,
"And the discovery of Lakes Shirwa and Nyassa.
"Fifth Thousand. With Map and Illustrations. 8vo. 21s.
"'Few achievements in our day have made a greater impression than that of the adventurous missionary who unaided crossed the Continent of Equatorial Africa. His unassuming simplicity, his varied intelligence, his indomitable pluck, his steady religious purpose, form a combination of qualities rarely found in one man. By common consent, Dr. Livingstone has come to be regarded as one of the most remarkable travellers of his own or of any other age.'—British Quarterly Review."
[The kindly pen of the reviewer served a good turn when there was "no medicine" but the following:—]
I was at last advised to try malachite, rubbed down with water on a stone, and applied with a feather: this is the only thing that has any beneficial effect.
9th September, 1870.—A Londa slave stole ten goats from the Manyuema; he was bound, but broke loose, and killed two goats yesterday. He was given to the Manyuema. The Balonda evidently sold their criminals only. He was shornof his ears and would have been killed, but Monangoi said: "Don't let the blood of a freeman touch our soil."
26th September, 1870.—I am able now to report the ulcers healing. For eighty days I have been completely laid up by them, and it will be long ere the lost substance will be replaced. They kill many slaves; and an epidemic came to us which carried off thirty in our small camp.[8]
[We come to a very important note under the next date. It may be necessary to remind the reader that when Livingstone left the neighbourhood of Lake Nyassa and bent his steps northwards, he believed that the "Chambezé" River, which the natives reported to be ahead of him, was in reality the Zambezi, for he held in his hand a map manufactured at home, and so conveniently manipulated as to clear up a great difficulty by simply inserting "New Zambezi" in the place of the Chambezé. As we now see, Livingstone handed back this addled geographical egg to its progenitor, who, we regret to say, has not only smashed it in wrath, but has treated us to so much of its savour in a pamphlet written against the deceased explorer, that few will care to turn over its leaves.
However, the African traveller has a warning held up before him which may be briefly summed up in a caution to be on the look out for constant repetitions in one form or another of the same name. Endless confusion has arisen from Nyassas and Nyanzas, from Chiroas and Kiroas and Shirwas, to say nothing of Zambesis and Ohambezés.The natives are just as prone to perpetuate Zambezi or Lufira in Africa as we are to multiply our Avons and Ouses in England.]
4th October, 1870.—A trading party from Ujiji reports an epidemic raging between the coast and Ujiji, and very fatal. Syde bin Habib and Dugumbé are coming, and they have letters and perhaps people for me, so I remain, though the irritable ulcers are well-nigh healed. I fear that my packet for the coast may have fared badly, for the Lewalé has kept Musa Kamaal by him, so that no evidence against himself or the dishonest man Musa bin Saloom should be given: my box and guns, with despatches, I fear will never be sent. Zahor, to whom I gave calico to pay carriers, has been sent off to Lobemba.
Mohamad sowed rice yesterday, and has to send his people (who were unsuccessful among the Balégga) away to the Metambé, where they got ivory before.
I cannot understand very well what a "Theoretical Discoverer" is. If anyone got up and declared in a public meeting that he was the theoretical discoverer of the philosopher's stone, or of perpetual motion for watches, should we not mark him as a little wrong in the head? So of the Nile sources. The Portuguese crossed the Chambezé some seventy years before I did, but to them it was a branch of the Zambezi and nothing more. Cooley put it down as the New Zambesi, and made it run backwards, up-hill, between 3000 and 4000 feet! I was misled by the similarity of names and a map, to think it the eastern branch of the Zambezi. I was told that it formed a large water in the south-west, this I readily believed to be the Liambai, in the Barotsé Valley, and it took me eighteen months of toil to come back again to the Chambezé in Lake Bangweolo, and work out the error into which I was led—twenty-two months elapsed ere I got back to the point whence I set outto explore Chambezé, Bangweolo, Luapula, Moero, and Lualaba. I spent two full years at this work, and the Chief Casembe was the first to throw light on the subject by saying, "It is the same water here as in the Chambezé, the same in Moero and Lualaba, and one piece of water is just like another. Will you draw out calico from it that you wish to see it? As your chief desired you to see Bangweolo, go to it, and if in going north you see a travelling party, join it; if not, come back to me, and I will send you safely by my path along Moero."
The central Lualaba I would fain call the Lake River Webb; the western, the Lake River Young. The Lufira and Lualaba West form a Lake, the native name of which, "Chibungo," must give way to Lake Lincoln. I wish to name the fountain of the Liambai or Upper Zambesi, Palmerston Fountain, and adding that of Sir Bartle Frere to the fountain of Lufira, three names of men who have done more to abolish slavery and the slave-trade than any of their contemporaries.
[Through the courtesy of the Earl of Derby we are able to insert a paragraph here which occurs in a despatch written to Her Majesty's Foreign Office by Dr. Livingstone a few weeks before his death. He treats more fully in it upon the different names that he gave to the most important rivers and lakes which he discovered, and we see how he cherished to the last the fond memory of old well-tried friendships, and the great examples of men like President Lincoln and Lord Palmerston.]
"I have tried to honour the name of the good Lord Palmerston, in fond remembrance of his long and unwearied labour for the abolition of the Slave Trade; and I venture to place the name of the good and noble Lincoln on the Lake, in gratitude to him who gave freedom to 4,000,000 of slaves. These two great men are no longer among us; butit pleases me, here in the wilds, to place, as it were, my poor little garland of love on their tombs. Sir Bartle Frere having accomplished the grand work of abolishing slavery in Scindiah, Upper India, deserves the gratitude of every lover of human kind.
"Private friendship guided me in the selection of other names where distinctive epithets were urgently needed. 'Paraffin' Young, one of my teachers in chemistry, raised himself to be a merchant prince by his science and art, and has shed pure white light in many lowly cottages, and in some rich palaces. Leaving him and chemistry, I went away to try and bless others. I, too, have shed light of another kind, and am fain to believe that I have performed a small part in the grand revolution which our Maker has been for ages carrying on, by multitudes of conscious, and many unconscious agents, all over the world. Young's friendship never faltered.
"Oswell and Webb were fellow-travellers, and mighty hunters. Too much engrossed myself with mission-work to hunt, except for the children's larder, when going to visit distant tribes, I relished the sight of fair stand-up fights by my friends with the large denizens of the forest, and admired the true Nimrod class for their great courage, truthfulness, and honour. Being a warm lover of natural history, the entire butcher tribe, bent only on making 'a bag,' without regard to animal suffering, have not a single kindly word from me. An Ambonda man, named Mokantju, told Oswell and me in 1851 that the Liambai and Kafué rose as one fountain and then separated, but after a long course came together again in the Zambezi above Zumbo."
8th October, 1870.—Mbarawa and party came yesterday from Katomba at Mamohela. He reports that Jangeongé (?) with Moeneokela's men had been killing people of the Metamba or forest, and four of his people were slain. He intendedfighting, hence his desire to get rid of me when I went north: he got one and a half tusks, but little ivory, but Katomba's party got fifty tusks; Abdullah had got two tusks, and had also been fighting, and Katomba had sent a fighting party down to Lolindé; plunder and murder is Ujijian trading. Mbarawa got his ivory on the Lindi, or as he says, "Urindi," which has black water, and is very large: an arrow could not be shot across its stream, 400 or 500 yards wide, it had to be crossed by canoes, and goes into Lualaba. It is curious that all think it necessary to say to me, "The Manyuema are bad, very bad;" the Balégga will be let alone, because they can fight, and we shall hear nothing of their badness.
10th October, 1870.—I came out of my hut to-day, after being confined to it since the 22nd July, or eighty days, by irritable ulcers on the feet. The last twenty days I suffered from fever, which reduced my strength, taking away my voice, and purging me. My appetite was good, but the third mouthful of any food caused nausea and vomiting—purging took place and profuse sweating; it was choleraic, and how many Manyuema died of it we could not ascertain. While this epidemic raged here, we heard of cholera terribly severe on the way to the coast. I am thankful to feel myself well.
Only one ulcer is open, the size of a split pea: malachite was the remedy most useful, but the beginning of the rains may have helped the cure, as it does to others; copper rubbed down is used when malachite cannot be had. We expect Syde bin Habib soon: he will take to the river, and I hope so shall I. The native traders reached people who had horns of oxen, got from the left bank of the Lualaba. Katomba's people got most ivory, namely, fifty tusks; the others only four. The Metamba or forest is of immense extent, and there is room for much ivory to be picked up at five or seven bracelets of copper per tusk, if the slaves sent will only be merciful. The nine villages destroyed,and 100 men killed, by Katomba's slaves at Nasangwa's, were all about a string of beads fastened to a powder horn, which a Manyuema man tried in vain to steal!
Katomba gets twenty-five of the fifty tusks brought by his people. We expect letters, and perhaps men by Syde bin Habib. No news from the coast had come to Ujiji, save a rumour that some one was building a large house at Bagamoio, but whether French or English no one can say: possibly the erection of a huge establishment on the mainland may be a way of laboriously proving that it is more healthy than the island. It will take a long time to prove by stone and lime that the higher lands, 200 miles inland, are better still, both for longevity and work.[9]I am in agony for news from home; all I feel sure of now is that my friends will all wish me to complete my task. I join in the wish now, as better than doing it in vain afterwards.
The Manyuema hoeing is little better than scraping the soil, and cutting through the roots of grass and weeds, by a horizontal motion of the hoe or knife; they leave the roots of maize, ground-nuts, sweet potatoes, and dura, to find their way into the rich soft soil, and well they succeed, so there is no need for deep ploughing: the ground-nuts and cassava hold their own against grass for years, and bananas, if cleared of weeds, yield abundantly. Mohamad sowed rice just outside the camp without any advantage being secured by the vicinity of a rivulet, and it yielded forone measure of seed one hundred and twenty measures of increase. This season he plants along the rivulet called "Bondé," and on the damp soil.
The rain-water does not percolate far, for the clay retains it about two feet beneath the surface: this is a cause of unhealthiness to man. Fowls and goats have been cut off this year in large numbers by an epidemic.
The visits of the Ujijian traders must be felt by the Manyuema to be a severe infliction, for the huts are appropriated, and no leave asked: firewood, pots, baskets, and food are used without scruple, and anything that pleases is taken away; usually the women flee into the forest, and return to find the whole place a litter of broken food. I tried to pay the owners of the huts in which I slept, but often in vain, for they hid in the forest, and feared to come near. It was common for old men to come forward to me with a present of bananas as I passed, uttering with trembling accents, "Bolongo, Bolongo!" ("Friendship, Friendship!"), and if I stopped to make a little return present, others ran for plantains or palm-toddy. The Arabs' men ate up what they demanded, without one word of thanks, and turned round to me and said, "They are bad, don't give them anything." "Why, what badness is there in giving food?" I replied. "Oh! they like you, but hate us." One man gave me an iron ring, and all seemed inclined to be friendly, yet they are undoubtedly bloodthirsty to other Manyuema, and kill each other.
I am told that journeying inland the safe way to avoid tsetse in going to Meréré's is to go to Mdongé, Makindé, Zungoméro, Masapi, Irundu, Nyangoré, then turn north to the Nyannugams, and thence to Nyémbé, and so on south to Meréré's. A woman chief lies in the straight way to Meréré, but no cattle live in the land. Another insect lights on the animals, and when licked off bites the tongue, or breeds, and is fatal as well as tsetse: it is larger in size. Tipo Tipoand Syde bin Ali come to Nyémbé, thence to Nsama's, cross Lualaba at Mpwéto's, follow left bank of that river till they cross the next Lualaba, and so into Lunda of Matiamvo. Much ivory may be obtained by this course, and it shows enterprise. Syde bin Habib and Dugumbé will open up the Lualaba this year, and I am hoping to enter the West Lualaba, or Young's River, and if possible go up to Katanga. The Lord be my guide and helper. I feel the want of medicine strongly, almost as much as the want of men.
16th October, 1870.—Moenemgoi, the chief, came to tell me that Monamyembo had sent five goats to Lohombo to get a charm to kill him. "Would the English and Kolokolo (Mohamad) allow him to be killed while they were here?" I said that it was a false report, but he believes it firmly: Monamyembo sent his son to assure us that he was slandered, but thus quarrels and bloodshed feuds arise!
The great want of the Manyuema is national life, of this they have none: each headman is independent of every other. Of industry they have no lack, and the villagers are orderly towards each other, but they go no further. If a man of another district ventures among them, it is at his peril; he is not regarded with more favour as a Manyuema than one of a herd of buffaloes is by the rest: and he is almost sure to be killed.
Moenékuss had more wisdom than his countrymen: his eldest son went over to Monamyembo (one of his subjects) and was there murdered by five spear wounds. The old chief went and asked who had slain his son. All professed ignorance, whilst some suggested "perhaps the Bahombo did it," so he went off to them, but they also denied it and laid it at the door of Monamdenda, from whom he got the same reply when he arrived at his place—no one knew, and so the old man died. This, though he was heartbroken, was called witchcraft by Monamyembo. Eleven people were murdered, and after this cruel man was punished he sent a goat withthe confession that he had killed Moenékuss' son. This son had some of the father's wisdom: the others he never could get to act like men of sense.
19th October, 1870.—Bambarré. The ringleading deserters sent Chuma to say that they were going with the people of Mohamad (who left to-day), to the Metamba, but I said that I had nought to say to them. They would go now to the Metamba, whom, on deserting, they said they so much feared, and they think nothing of having left me to go with only three attendants, and get my feet torn to pieces in mud and sand. They probably meant to go back to the women at Mamohela, who fed them in the absence of their husbands. They were told by Mohamad that they must not follow his people, and he gave orders to bind them, and send them back if they did. They think that no punishment will reach them whatever they do: they are freemen, and need not work or do anything but beg. "English," they call themselves, and the Arabs fear them, though the eagerness with which they engaged in slave-hunting showed them to be genuine niggers.
20th October, 1870.—The first heavy rain of this season fell yesterday afternoon. It is observable that the permanent halt to which the Manyuema have come is not affected by the appearance of superior men among them: they are stationary, and improvement is unknown. Moenékuss paid smiths to teach his sons, and they learned to work in copper and iron, but he never could get them to imitate his own generous and obliging deportment to others; he had to reprove them perpetually for mean shortsightedness, and when he died he virtually left no successor, for his sons are both narrowminded, mean, shortsighted creatures, without dignity or honour. All they can say of their forefathers is that they came from Lualaba up Luamo, then to Luelo, and thence here. The name seems to mean "forest people"—Manyuema.
The party under Hassani crossed the Logumba at Kanyingéré's, and went N. and N.N.E. They found the country becoming more and more mountainous, till at last, approaching Moreré, it was perpetually up and down. They slept at a village on the top, and could send for water to the bottom only once, it took so much time to descend and ascend. The rivers all flowed into Kereré or Lower Tanganyika. There is a hot fountain whose water could not be touched nor stones stood upon. The Balégga were very unfriendly, and collected in thousands. "We come to buy ivory," said Hassani, "and if there is none we go away." "Nay," shouted they, "you come to die here!" and then they shot with arrows; when musket-balls were returned they fled, and would not come to receive the captives.
25th October, 1870.—Bambarré. In this journey I have endeavoured to follow with unswerving fidelity the line of duty. My course has been an even one, turning neither to the right hand nor to the left, though my route has been tortuous enough. All the hardship, hunger, and toil were met with the full conviction that I was right in persevering to make a complete work of the exploration of the sources of the Nile. Mine has been a calm, hopeful endeavour to do the work that has been given me to do, whether I succeed or whether I fail. The prospect of death in pursuing what I knew to be right did not make me veer to one side or the other. I had a strong presentiment during the first three years that I should never live through the enterprise, but it weakened as I came near to the end of the journey, and an eager desire to discover any evidence of the great Moses having visited these parts bound me, spell-bound me, I may say, for if I could bring to light anything to confirm the Sacred Oracles, I should not grudge one whit all the labour expended. I have to go down the Central Lualaba or Webb's Lake River, then up the Western or Young'sLake River to Katanga head waters and then retire. I pray that it may be to my native home.
Syde bin Habib, Dugumbé, Juma Merikano, Abdullah Masendi are coming in with 700 muskets, and an immense store of beads, copper, &c. They will cross Lualaba and trade west of it: I wait for them because they may have letters for me.
28th October, 1870.—Moenemokata, who has travelled further than most Arabs, said to me, "If a man goes with a good-natured, civil tongue, he may pass through the worst people in Africa unharmed:" this is true, but time also is required: one must not run through a country, but give the people time to become acquainted with you, and let their first fears subside.
29th October, 1870.—The Manyuema buy their wives from each other; a pretty girl brings ten goats. I saw one brought home to-day; she came jauntily with but one attendant, and her husband walking behind. They stop five days, then go back and remain other five days at home: then the husband fetches her again. Many are pretty, and have perfect forms and limbs.
31st October, 1870.—Monangoi, of Luamo, married to the sister of Moenékuss, came some time ago to beg that Kanyingeré might be attacked by Mohamad's people: no fault has he, "but he is bad." Monangoi, the chief here, offered two tusks to effect the same thing; on refusal, he sends the tusks to Katomba, and may get his countryman spoiled by him. "He is bad," is all they can allege as a reason. Meantime this chief here caught a slave who escaped, a prisoner from Moene-mokia's, and sold him or her to Moene-mokia for thirty spears and some knives; when asked about this captive, he said, "She died:" it was simply theft, but he does not consider himself bad.
2nd November, 1870.—The plain without trees that flanks the Lualaba on the right bank, called Mbuga, is denselypeopled, and the inhabitants are all civil and friendly. From fifty to sixty large canoes come over from the left bank daily to hold markets; these people too "are good," but the dwellers in the Metamba or dense forest are treacherous and murder a single person without scruple: the dead body is easily concealed, while on the plain all would become aware of it.
I long with intense desire to move on and finish my work, I have also an excessive wish to find anything that may exist proving the visit of the great Moses and the ancient kingdom of Tirhaka, but I pray give me just what pleases Thee my Lord, and make me submissive to Thy will in all things.
I received information about Mr. Young's search trip up the Shiré and Nyassa only in February 1870, and now take the first opportunity of offering hearty thanks in a despatch to Her Majesty's Government, and all concerned in kindly inquiring after my fate.
Musa and his companions were fair average specimens for heartlessness and falsehood of the lower classes of Mohamadans in East Africa. When we were on the Shiré we used to swing the ship into mid-stream every night, in order to let the air which was put in motion by the water, pass from end to end. Musa's brother-in-law stepped into the water one morning, in order to swim off for a boat, and was seized by a crocodile, the poor fellow held up his hand imploringly, but Musa and the rest allowed him to perish. On my denouncing his heartlessness, Musa-replied, "Well, no one tell him go in there." When at Senna a slave woman was seized by a crocodile: four Makololo rushed in unbidden, and rescued her, though they knew nothing about her: from long intercourse with both Johanna men and Makololo I take these incidents as typical of the two races. Those of mixed blood possess the vices of both races, and the virtues of neither.
A gentleman of superior abilities[10]has devoted life and fortune to elevate the Johanna men, but fears that they are "an unimprovable race."
The Sultan of Zanzibar, who knows his people better than any stranger, cannot entrust any branch of his revenue to even the better class of his subjects, but places all his customs, income, and money affairs, in the hands of Banians from India, and his father did before him.
When the Mohamadan gentlemen of Zanzibar are asked "why their sovereign places all his pecuniary affairs and fortune in the hands of aliens?" they frankly avow that if he allowed any Arab to farm his customs, he would receive nothing but a crop of lies.
Burton had to dismiss most of his people at Ujiji for dishonesty: Speke's followers deserted at the first approach of danger. Musa fled in terror on hearing a false report from a half-caste Arab about the Mazitu, 150 miles distant, though I promised to go due west, and not turn to the north till far past the beat of that tribe. The few liberated slaves with whom I went on had the misfortune to be Mohamadan slaves in boyhood, but did fairly till we came into close contact with Moslems again. A black Arab was released from a twelve years' bondage by Casembe, through my own influence and that of the Sultan's letter: we travelled together for a time, and he sold the favours of his female slaves to my people for goods which he perfectly well knew were stolen from me. He received my four deserters, and when I had gone off to Lake Bangweolo with only four attendants, the rest wished to follow, but he dissuaded them by saying that I had gone into a country where there was war: he was the direct cause of all my difficulties with these liberated slaves, but judged by the East African Moslem standard, as he ought to be, and not by ours, he isa very good man, and I did not think it prudent to come to a rupture with the old blackguard.
"Laba" means in the Manyuema dialect "medicine;" a charm, "boganga:" this would make Lualaba mean the River of Medicine or charms. Hassani thought that it meant "great," because it seemed to mean flowing greatly or grandly.
Casembe caught all the slaves that escaped from Mohamad, and placed them in charge of Fungafunga; so there is little hope for fugitive slaves so long as Casembe lives: this act is to the Arabs very good: he is very sensible, and upright besides.
3rd November, 1870.—Got a Kondohondo, the large double-billed Hornbill (theBuceros cristata), Kakomira, of the Shiré, and the Sassassa of Bambarré. It is good eating, and has fat of an orange tinge, like that of the zebra; I keep the bill to make a spoon of it.
An ambassador at Stamboul or Constantinople was shown a hornbill spoon, and asked if it were really the bill of the Phoenix. He replied that he did not know, but he had a friend in London who knew all these sort of things, so the Turkish ambassador in London brought the spoon to Professor Owen. He observed something in the divergences of the fibres of the horn which he knew before, and went off into the Museum of the College of Surgeons, and brought a preserved specimen of this very bird. "God is great—God is great," said the Turk, "this is the Phoenix of which we have heard so often." I heard the Professor tell this at a dinner of the London Hunterian Society in 1857.
There is no great chief in Manyuema or Balégga; all are petty headmen, each of whom considers himself a chief: it is the ethnic state, with no cohesion between the different portions of the tribe. Murder cannot be punished except by a war, in which many fall, and the feud is made worse, and transmitted to their descendants.
The heathen philosophers were content with mere guesses at the future of the soul. The elder prophets were content with the Divine support in life and in death. The later prophets advance further, as Isaiah: "Thy dead men shall live, together with my dead body shall they arise. Awake, and sing, ye that dwell in the dust: for thy dew is as the dew of herbs. The earth also shall cast out her dead." This, taken with the sublime spectacle of Hades in the fourteenth chapter, seems a forecast of the future, but Jesus instructed Mary and her sister and Lazarus; and Martha without hesitation spoke of the resurrection at the last day as a familiar doctrine, far in advance of the Mosaic law in which she had been reared.
The Arabs tell me that Monyungo, a chief, was sent for five years among the Watuta to learn their language and ways, and he sent his two sons and a daughter to Zanzibar to school. He kills many of his people, and says they are so bad that if not killed they would murder strangers. Once they were unruly, when he ordered some of them to give their huts to Mohamad; on refusing, he put fire to them, and they soon called out, "Let them alone; we will retire." He dresses like an Arab, and has ten loaded guns at his sitting-place, four pistols, two swords, several spears, and two bundles of the Batuta spears: he laments that his father filed his teeth when he was young. The name of his very numerous people is Bawungu, country Urungu: his other names are Ironga, Mohamu.
The Basango, on the other hand, consider their chief as a deity, and fear to say aught wrong, lest he should hear them: they fear both before him and when out of sight.
The father of Meréré never drank pombe or beer, and assigned as a reason that a great man who had charge of people's lives should never become intoxicated so as to do evil. Bangé he never smoked, but in council smelled at a bunch of it, in order to make his people believe that it had a greateffect on him. Meréré drinks pombe freely, but never uses bangé: he alone kills sheep; he is a lover of mutton and beef, but neither goats nor fowls are touched by him.
9th November, 1870.—I sent to Lohombo for dura, and planted some Nyumbo. I long excessively to be away and finish my work by the two Lacustrine rivers, Lualaba of Webb and Young, but wait only for Syde and Dugumbé, who may have letters, and as I do not intend to return hither, but go through Karagwé homewards, I should miss them altogether. I groan and am in bitterness at the delay, but thus it is: I pray for help to do what is right, but sorely am I perplexed, and grieved and mourn: I cannot give up making a complete work of the exploration.
10th November, 1870.—A party of Katomba's men arrived on their way to Ujiji for carriers, they report that a foray was made S.W. of Mamohela to recover four guns, which were captured from Katomba; three were recovered, and ten of the Arab party slain. The people of Manyuema fought very fiercely with arrows, and not till many were killed and others mutilated would they give up the guns; they probably expected this foray, and intended to fight till the last. They had not gone in search of ivory while this was enacting, consequently Mohamad's men have got the start of them completely, by going along Lualaba to Kasongo's, and then along the western verge of the Metamba or forest to Loindé or Rindi River. The last men sent took to fighting instead of trading, and returned empty; the experience gained thus, and at the south-west, will probably lead them to conclude that the Manyuema are not to be shot down without reasonable cause. They have sown rice and maize at Mamohela, but cannot trade now where they got so much ivory before. Five men were killed at Rindi or Loindé, and one escaped: the reason of this outbreak by men who have been so peaceable is not divulged, but anyone seeing the wholesale plunder to which the houses and gardens weresubject can easily guess the rest. Mamohela's camp had several times been set on fire at night by the tribes which suffered assault, but did not effect all that was intended. The Arabs say that the Manyuema now understand that every gunshot does not kill; the next thing they will learn will be to grapple in close quarters in the forest, where their spears will outmatch the guns in the hands of slaves, it will follow, too, that no one will be able to pass through this country; this is the usual course of Suaheli trading; it is murder and plunder, and each slave as he rises in his owner's favour is eager to show himself a mighty man of valour, by cold-blooded killing of his countrymen: if they can kill a fellow-nigger, their pride boils up. The conscience is not enlightened enough to cause uneasiness, and Islam gives less than the light of nature.
I am grievously tired of living here. Mohamad is as kind as he can be, but to sit idle or give up before I finish my work are both intolerable; I cannot bear either, yet I am forced to remain by want of people.
11th November, 1870.—I wrote to Mohamad bin Saleh at Ujiji for letters and medicines to be sent in a box of China tea, which is half empty: if he cannot get carriers for the long box itself, then he is to send these, the articles of which I stand in greatest need.
The relatives of a boy captured at Monanyembé brought three goats to redeem him: he is sick and emaciated; one goat was rejected. The boy shed tears when he saw his grandmother, and the father too, when his goat was rejected. "So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their oppressors there was power; but they had no comforter."—Eccles. iv. 1. The relations were told either to bring the goat, or let the boy die; this was hard-hearted. At Mamohela ten goats are demanded for a captive, andgiven too; here three are demanded. "He that is higher than the highest regardeth, and there be higher than they. Marvel not at the matter."
I did not write to the coast, for I suspect that the Lewalé Syde bin Salem Buraschid destroys my letters in order to quash the affair of robbery by his man Saloom, he kept the other thief, Kamaels, by him for the same purpose. Mohamad writes to Bin Saleh to say that I am here and well; that I sent a large packet of letters in June 1869, with money, and received neither an answer, nor my box from Unyanyembé, and this is to be communicated to the Consul by a friend at Zanzibar. If I wrote, it would only be to be burned; this is as far as I can see at present: the friend who will communicate with the Consul is Mohamad bin Abdullah the Wuzeer, Seyd Suleiman is the Lewalé of the Governor of Zanzibar, Suleiman bin Ali orSheikhSuleiman the Secretary.
The Mamohela horde is becoming terrified, for every party going to trade has lost three or four men, and in the last foray they saw that the Manyuema can fight, for they killed ten men: they will soon refuse to go among those whom they have forced to become enemies.
One of the Bazula invited a man to go with him to buy ivory; he went with him, and on getting into the Zulas country the stranger was asked by the guide if his gun killed men, and how it did it: whilst he was explaining the matter he was stabbed to death. No one knows the reason of this, but the man probably lost some of his relations elsewhere: this is called murder without cause. When Syde and Dugumbé come, I hope to get men and a canoe to finish my work among those who have not been abused by Ujijians, and still retain their natural kindness of disposition; none of the people are ferocious without cause; and the sore experience which they gain from slaves with guns in their hands usually ends in sullen hatred of all strangers.
The education of the world is a terrible one, and it has come down with relentless rigour on Africa from the most remote times! What the African will become after this awfully hard lesson is learned, is among the future developments of Providence. When He, who is higher than the highest, accomplishes His purposes, this will be a wonderful country, and again something like what it was of old, when Zerah and Tirhaka flourished, and were great.
The soil of Manyuema is clayey and remarkably fertile, the maize sown in it rushes up to seed, and everything is in rank profusion if only it be kept clear of weeds, but the Bambarré people are indifferent cultivators, planting maize, bananas and plantains, and ground-nuts only—no dura, a little cassava, no pennisetum, meleza, pumpkins, melons, or nyumbo, though they all flourish in other districts: a few sweet potatoes appear, but elsewhere all these native grains and roots are abundant and cheap. No one would choose this as a residence, except for the sake of Moenékuss. Oil is very dear, while at Lualaba a gallon may be got for a single string of beads, and beans, ground-nuts, cassava, maize, plantains in rank profusion. The Balégga, like the Bambarré people, trust chiefly to plantains and ground-nuts; to play with parrots is their great amusement.
13th November, 1870.—The men sent over to Lohombo, about thirty miles off, got two and a half loads of dura for a small goat, but the people were unwilling to trade. "If we encourage Arabs to trade, they will come and kill us with their guns," so they said, and it is true: the slaves are overbearing, and when this is resented, then slaughter ensues. I got some sweet plantains and a little oil, which is useful in cooking, and with salt, passes for butter on bread, but all were unwilling to trade. Monangoi was over near Lohombo, and heard of a large trading party coming, and not far off; this may be Syde and Dugumbé, but reports are often false. When Katomba's men were on the late foray, theywere completely overpowered, and compelled by the Manyuema to lay down their guns and powder-horns, on pain of being instantly despatched by bow-shot: they were mostly slaves, who could only draw the trigger and make a noise. Katomba had to rouse out all the Arabs who could shoot, and when they came they killed many, and gained the lost day; the Manyuema did not kill anyone who laid down his gun and powder-horn. This is the beginning of an end which was easily perceived when it became not a trading, but a foray of a murdering horde of savages.
The foray above mentioned was undertaken by Katomba for twenty goats from Kassessa!—ten men lost for twenty goats, but they will think twice before they try another foray.
A small bird follows the "Sassassa" orBuceros cristata. It screams and pecks at his tail till he discharges the contents of his bowels, and then leaves him; it is called "play" by the natives, and by the Suaheli "Utané" or "Msaha"—fun or wit; he follows other birds in the same merciless way, screaming and pecking to produce purging; Manyuema call this bird "Mambambwa." The buffalo bird warns its big friend of danger, by calling "Chachacha," and the rhinoceros bird cries out, "Tye, tye, tye, tye," for the same purpose. The Manyuema call the buffalo bird "Mojela," and the Suaheli, "Chassa." A climbing plant in Africa is known as "Ntulungopé," which mixed with flour of dura kills mice; they swarm in our camp and destroy everything, but Ntulungopé is not near this.
The Arabs tell me that one dollar a day is ample for provisions for a large family at Zanzibar; the food consists of wheat, rice, flesh of goats or ox, fowls, bananas, milk, butter, sugar, eggs, mangoes, and potatoes. Ambergris is boiled in milk and sugar, and used by the Hindoos as a means of increasing blood in their systems; a small quantity is a dose; it is found along the shore of the sea at Barawa orBrava, and at Madagascar, as if the sperm whale got rid of it while alive. Lamoo or Amu is wealthy, and well supplied with everything, as grapes, peaches, wheat, cattle, camels, &c. The trade is chiefly with Madagascar: the houses are richly furnished with furniture, dishes from India, &c. At Garaganza there are hundreds of Arab traders, there too all fruits abound, and the climate is healthy, from its elevation. Why cannot we missionaries imitate these Arabs in living on heights?
24th November, 1870.—Herpes is common at the plantations in Zanzibar, but the close crowding of the houses in the town they think prevents it; the lips and mouth are affected, and constipation sets in for three days, all this is cured by going over to the mainland. Affections of the lungs are healed by residence at Bariwa or Brava, and also on the mainland. The Tafori of Halfani took my letters from Ujiji, but who the person employed is I do not know.
29th November, 1870.—Safurais the name of the disease of clay or earth eating, at Zanzibar; it often affects slaves, and the clay is said to have a pleasant odour to the eaters, but it is not confined to slaves, nor do slaves eat in order to kill themselves; it is a diseased appetite, and rich men who have plenty to eat are often subject to it. The feet swell, flesh is lost, and the face looks haggard; the patient can scarcely walk for shortness of breath and weakness, and he continues eating till he dies. Here many slaves are now diseased with safura; the clay built in walls is preferred, and Manyuema women when pregnant often eat it. The cure is effected by drastic purges composed as follows: old vinegar of cocoa-trees is put into a large basin, and old slag red-hot cast into it, then "Moneyé," asafoetida, half a rupee in weight, copperas, sulph. ditto: a small glass of this, fasting morning and evening, produces vomiting and purging of black dejections, this is continued for seven days; no meat is to be eaten, but only old rice or dura andwater; a fowl in course of time: no fish, butter, eggs, or beef for two years on pain of death. Mohamad's father had skill in the cure, and the above is his prescription. Safura is thus a diseaseper se; it is common in Manyuema, and makes me in a measure content to wait for my medicines; from the description, inspissated bile seems to be the agent of blocking up the gall-duct and duodenum and the clay or earth may be nature trying to clear it away: the clay appears unchanged in the stools, and in large quantity. A Banyamwezi carrier, who bore an enormous load of copper, is now by safura scarcely able to walk; he took it at Lualaba where food is abundant, and he is contented with his lot. Squeeze a finger-nail, and if no blood appears beneath it, safura is the cause of the bloodlessness.