CHAPTER VI.
Staying at Dulhull.—March 31st, Journey to Segallo, distance one and a-half miles, general direction S.S.W.—Halt for the night.—Journey to Daddahue, distance ten miles, general direction W.S.W.—Attack of the Bursane subdivision of the Ad’alee tribe.—Halt for the night.
March 30th.—During the night, Ohmed Mahomed made his appearance, and at day-break his loud voice, calling to load the camels, awakened me with a start. Zaido, with a small kid-skin filled with very dirty water, poured a little into my hands, which I then threw over my face, wiped it dry with my silk handkerchief (my napkin having been stolen the night before), and thus finished my hasty toilet. After having troubled myself to saddle my own mule, I found that the camels were being unloaded again, and on inquiry, learned that there was a division in the camp. One party wishing to remain for some more camels to join us, and the other desirous of starting without any delay. It was at length agreed that the camels going to take up salt at Bahr Assal should go on to that place one day in advance of the Kafilah I belonged to, soas to give them time to load. We were to follow the next morning, to enable the camels to come up, belonging to some parties who had sent a messenger from Tajourah to say they would join us in the course of the day. To this course no reasonable objection could be raised, as it was the interest of the Ras, or head of the Kafilah, and of every camel-owner that composed it, to get as great a number of people together as possible to resist any extortion, or repel any attack that might be made by the different tribes we should meet with on the road. Ohmed Mahomed, therefore, consented to this arrangement, and we were detained at Dulhull another day in consequence. I noticed after Ohmed Mahomed’s arrival in camp, that great, and I thought very unnecessary, care was taken to guard me from any attack at night. My place being more securely shut in, and Ohmed Mahomed and his servants taking care to lie at the entrance, and around it. Ohmed had his reason for this, and I should not have slept very comfortably had I been then fully aware of the threats held out by the Debenee against any unfortunate Engreez travelling through their country, and of which I was only subsequently informed.
Our Kafilah during this day was increased by twenty-four camels, which made the total number, with the few that had gone on to the Bahr Assal, eighty-four, and we could muster altogether about forty fighting men; we had besides a few womenand boys in company. Five Bedouins from the Hy Soumaulee tribe, who had been transacting some business in Tajourah, also accompanied us, and offered for five dollars each to be my personal guard on the road, and the rumours of intended attacks, and the evident anticipation of such by Ohmed Mahomed, made me agree to the proposal. Garahmee, Moosa Gra, Adam Burrah, Moomen, and Omah Suis were accordingly enlisted into my service.
It must be observed, that in the first instance in Tajourah, these men had been passed off to Mr. Cruttenden as being part of the escort of ten men which had been agreed upon should be provided, and for which Mr. Cruttenden had paid twenty-five dollars per man to Izaak and Cassim. I now learnt that besides the owners of the camels themselves, none had been so engaged to defend the property of the Mission, and that these Bedouins belonged to us no farther than I chose to engage them, and feeling the necessity of the case, I did not hesitate in coming to a conclusion upon the subject, protesting at the same time against the deception practised upon Mr. Cruttenden.
Subsequent events proved how greatly I was obliged to these men and their tribe for the protection they afforded me, and without their assistance I feel assured I could never have delivered the stores safe in Shoa, or have brought also along with me a quantity of other property belonging to theMission that I found on the road, and which had been abandoned by the officers of the preceding division. Their fidelity to our engagement was also remarkable, considering the reported bad character of this people, which I must say was confirmed by my own observation; but as by the terms of our engagement they were to receive no money until our arrival in Abyssinia, it was their interest, of course, to be faithful to their charge, for in case of any accident preventing me or the stores reaching our destination, it was understood they were not to receive their pay.
I was a witness to-day of the barbarous manner in which the Dankalli brand the camel. It seems two different marks are required, both of which are made with a red-hot iron. One intimates the tribe of the owner, the other his private mark. Two camels had been purchased by another Ibrahim, a cousin of Ebin Izaak, a young quiet-looking fellow, and less violent in his manner than is usual among his countrymen; he, however, did not practise the less forbearance towards his new purchase, but proceeded at once to stamp them as his property. The fore legs of one of the camels being first secured by a strong leathern thong; another was afterwards fastened around the hind ones in a similar manner. A rope attached to the former was then made to run through the loop of the latter, and this being pulled by three or four men the feet were all drawn together, and the consequence was that the poor animalfell with tremendous force to the ground, uttering the most horrible cries. A piece of iron about half an inch thick, and some two feet long, being heated red-hot was then applied to the shoulder, nearly the whole length, and three successive marks were thus inflicted. The iron being heated afresh each time, remained until it was quite cold upon the skin, which curled up in a most sickening manner as the rude instrument was taken off. Three similar marks were also made upon the rump, after which the animal was liberated, and allowed to get up. I was glad there were only these two to be operated upon, for I never heard such bellowing shrieks that disturbed the camp during the operation, such only as camels can produce when suffering bodily pain.
A goat being killed to-day for my use, and all the meat not being required, it was cut into long strips, about an inch in thickness, and hung up in the sun to dry, being festooned about the sides of my hut, from the projecting ends of the saddle-staves, which assisted in forming the roof. Zaido set me to watch, that no hungry kite out of the number which were circling above us should pounce upon, and carry the meat away. I, however, amused myself more with their impudent stoops, and Zaido, on his return from watering his camels, found the goat’s flesh rapidly disappearing, more to the satisfaction of the birds than his own. What remained, however, being sufficiently dry, he hastily put intoa large skin bag, which he tied up ready for loading on the morrow, our start being announced by public criers to take place next morning.
March 31st.—Zaido and Allee being busy loading the camels, I started with Ohmed Mahomed, and my body-guard on foot, leaving my mule to follow. Our road lay still along the sea-shore, the sand having become more shingly than before, and mixed with great quantities of broken shells, and rolled pieces of red and madrapore coral. I took the opportunity of bathing while the party I was with performed their ablutions, and repeated the morning prayers.
This was a very short march, the halting-place, Segallo, not being more than half an hour, or one and a-half miles from Dulhull. Ohmed Mahomed endeavoured to allay my disappointment by saying we should start again at night; but of course I did not believe him. I remained in my hut, which was made as usual, all day, not feeling very well; in the evening, however, I strolled from the low jungle that here skirts the sea, and in which our camp was made, to the beach, where I amused myself observing some sea-gulls that exhibited no little sagacity in the manner in which they obtained their food. All along the Bay of Tajourah the small hermit crab abounds, and formed, I should suppose, from what I saw, the principal prey of these birds. It would be a difficult thing to get at this kind of Crustacea, with all the means that seagullscan command; but instinct has taught them to have recourse to a method of unshelling the crabs that certainly I should not have thought of. Seizing the one they intend to operate upon, they fly up to the height of ten or twelve feet, and letting it drop it naturally falls on the heaviest, or topside of the shell. Before the little animal can recover itself, the gull has caught it again, and flying up with it the same height as before, he lets it drop a second time, and so he continues till the repeated falls have fractured the shell, and he gets at the animal without further trouble. It takes ten or twelve of these short flights to accomplish the object, but it never fails; and as the birds are certainly patterns of perseverance in their pursuit, they get, no doubt, a good living in this very singular manner. Besides this instance of their sagacity, I have seen gulls over and over again defeat the attempts of the hawk to pounce upon them, by making a very successful but very unusual flight for them, which was to vie with the hawk himself in the elevation he was obliged to take for the success of his swoop. In such cases they seek not to shun the butcher of their kind, but following him in each gyration he makes, afford him no opportunity of attack, and soon tire him out. I was called away from my musing occupation by Moosa, who came with a great deal of mystery to inform me of something that he was not quite able to tell me, but on returning with him to the camp, I found two boxeshad been broken, during the short march from Dulhull, by falling from the back of the camel. I was requested to put them to rights, as driving nails was what the Dankalli did not understand. My carpentering amused them very much; and the job being settled to their satisfaction, I adjourned to my hut and turned in for the night.
April 1st.—We were up very early this morning, at least one hour before sunrise, and all started together for Daddahue, or Wadalissan, two different names that were given me for the next halt. I was desired to keep with the Kafilah, for fear of our being attacked, and also informed that it would be near mid-day before we should arrive at the encamping ground.
Our first hour’s march lay along the sea-shore, which was of the same character as yesterday, but I observed great quantities of sponge washed high upon the beach, and picked up some very good specimens. Pebbles of a beautiful opaline chalcedony were very common, and with the coral and rich pearly shells of some large bivalve, would have been sufficient foundation for an imaginative fancy to have here described a very bright pavement of fairy land.
Leaving the sea-coast, we entered a narrow gully, or dry bed of a stream, overhung by a thick jungle of different kinds of shrubs and bushes. The road thus naturally formed, was most wretched to travel upon, being strewed with blocks of black lava, of all shapesand sizes. We continued along its serpentine channel for nearly two hours; and it would have been useless to have endeavoured to find another road, for the surface of the adjoining country on either side was in a much worse condition; besides, the thick thorny bushes presented insurmountable obstacles in every direction save the watercourses we followed. We at length arrived at a gorge, or narrow pass, where it appeared as if the collected waters of some large reservoir had at a former period broken through a wall of lava, and thus escaped to the neighbouring sea, spreading over the intervening ground the debris of its forced passage. This remarkable looking spot was called Galla Lafue, from a tree of a very singular character, which abounds in this neighbourhood. It is about six feet high, its leaves thick, smooth, and fleshy, covered with a silvery down on the underside, and of a pale green above. It bore a large purple and white flower, the bark was of a light grey colour, and abounded with a white acid juice. That it was employed in any manner amongst the Dankalli for medicine, I could not learn. It only grows in the beds of temporary streams. I met with it first at Dulhull, on the sea-shore, and have seen it also in more elevated situations in Abyssinia.
The pass of Galla Lafue is not more than three hundred yards long, and winds between high perpendicular and flat-topped rocks of black lava. Its greatest width did not extend thirty yards. Gnawedbones were strewn about, on several parts, and on looking up I saw the low cave of a wild beast, whose traces were too recent to leave any doubt of it having only retired upon our approach. We soon emerged from this narrow ravine, and then passed along some broken ground of irregular heaps of boulders and stones, that reminded me of the bottom of some former lake, situated in a country where the fierce rush of water had only allowed the heavier debris of the surrounding rocks to accumulate; and of this character, I should imagine, was the bursting torrent that at last had made its escape through the pass of Galla Lafue into the sea.
The Kafilah did not proceed in the direction of the dry stony bed, but turning to the left hand, ascended the sloping banks, which at this point assumed a less precipitous character than immediately in the pass.
Some of the camel-drivers and Bedouins went, however, to pools of water in the neighbourhood, and filled their affaleetahs, small neatly-made kid-skin bags, one of which it is necessary every traveller should be provided with, and which, when not in use, is rolled closely up and carried, hanging from the handle of the shield. Mine hung from my saddle-bow, and I generally took care to have it filled before we started in the morning. To-day, however, as I walked with a crowd of the natives, I did not wait for my lagging mule, but refreshedmyself, when thirsty, at the little cup-like depressions in the cellular blocks of lava that had been filled by a shower of rain the preceding night, but which had not extended to our camp at Seggallo. We crossed an extensive plain of loose volcanic stones, where we marched as if we were passing upon stepping-stones over some brook in England, and as this uneasy kind of walking was compulsory for some hours, it became very tiresome, and I felt a great relief when we came to a district which did afford a little more opportunity for some stunted and straggling mimosa-trees to bloom, but with a very melancholy dirty green verdure. Our path was here greatly improved, but just as I was congratulating myself upon the change, and thinking I should be able to continue walking another hour or two, we came upon the Kafilah, which had started the day before us from Dulhull, and to whose farther advance some obstacle had arisen. This induced Ohmed Mahomed, our Ras, to halt here also, and in the course of the day I was enabled to learn the cause of our detention, which had surprised me; for, but a short time before we halted, Ohmed had told me, with evident sincerity, that he intended us to proceed for two more hours.
The camels being unloaded, my hut was built as usual, into which I retired with some pleasure, the day having been exceedingly hot, and the long fatiguing march of at least five hours, had completely wearied me. I slept for two or three hours,when Ohmed Mahomed came and awakened me, to ask me to load my guns and pistols, as the Bedouins were collecting on the opposite height to oppose our farther progress. I always kept my carbine, and three waist-pistols in readiness for such anticipated occasions, but on this intimation I soon charged, in addition, a fowling-piece I had with me, and also produced two other holster pistols from my saddle-bags.
It was now nearly three o’clock, and a slight sea-breeze blowing over the land, cooled the air, whilst groups of our merchants and camel-drivers were performing their afternoon prayers. A valley at least three miles broad stretched from north to south as far as the eye could reach. From our low position, we could not see anything above the level line of the flat top parallel banks which, not sixty feet high, sloped gently into the plain below. The banks were of rough loose stones of a very large size, but the plain consisted of rich alluvial soil, which supported by its produce the flocks of one of the largest tribes in the neighbourhood of Tajourah, the Bursane Bedouins, and the fighting men of whom had now gathered for the purpose, as they avowed, of plundering the Kafilah, and destroying the white man who accompanied it.
As the prayers went on amongst our people, the loud whooping of the collecting tribe was answered by my Hy Soumaulee escort, who stood upon the slope on our right, and facing that upon whichwere our opponents. Garahmee, Moosa Gra, and Adam Burrah, spear and shield in hand, leaped round and round, yelling with every bound, and then with lesser jumps, seemed to trample upon the body of some fallen foe. Whilst jumping in this manner, Adam Burrah fell down, and rolling over and over, was very much bruised.
Ohmed Mahomed took measures in the first place to conciliate, if possible, the opposite party, and some half-bloods of the tribe among our Kafilah went for the purpose of effecting a treaty, but were unsuccessful, and on their return, they were followed by a cloud of the enemy, who now seemed to cover the whole further side of the valley. All this time I had kept out of sight at the express desire of Ohmed Mahomed; Zaido, Allee, and myself being left with the stores, every other member of the Kafilah, after the prayers had ended, having joined the Hy Soumaulee, were now sitting together in a large semicircle on a level spot that occurred upon the slope of the hill. I was anxiously watching the progress of events; for being some hundreds of yards from the men of the Kafilah I expected for a certainty being cut off by some rush of the whooping Bedouins, who, fast advancing, I could now see with my glass, from the inglorious position assigned to me; their bright spear-heads glistening in the sun, over the tops of the low jungle through which they were passing. At length they approached far too near to be pleasant to thefeelings of Ohmed Mahomed, who had depended upon the mere rumour of my firearms deterring them from making an attack upon the Kafilah. At first it was not his policy for me to be seen, for fear the parade might be deemed by the suspicious and jealous natives as a kind of threat, and thus interfere with the pacific arrangements he contemplated, and was most willing to see effected, but finding that they had advanced within three or four hundred yards without any symptom of the usual halt, preliminary to overtures of peace, Ohmed Mahomed sprang to his feet, and brandished his spear in defiance, leaping and yelling to deter their nearer approach. His efforts were answered only by similar cries, and seeing this, he turned suddenly round, and called out for me, Zaido, and Allee to come immediately, and join them. I understood him and his position in a moment, so pointing to my pistols, I bade Allee bring them along with him, and taking a gun in each hand, with head uncovered, ran quickly up, and, as if inoculated with the same savage ferocity as my companions, yelled in a manner that delighted, and astonished even them. Adam Burrah, with a loud shout of welcome, came running to meet me, and seizing hold of my wrist, dragged me into the front rank with him, where, squatting down on his heels like the rest, he pulled me down by his side. Ohmed Mahomed now came and placed himself on my other side, told me that I must only fire when he placedhis hand on my arm, and adding the word “kill” in Arabic, pointed with his spear to a tall young man who, with unparalleled boldness, had advanced to less than one hundred yards of us, and stood making some inquiries from one of the women of our Kafilah, unheeding the loud cries of “cutta, cutta” (go away, go away,) that my friends were shouting with all their might to drive him off. Excited by his insolent bearing, Adam Burrah at last started up from my side, and having called “cutta” several times without the young man deigning to take the least notice, he rushed towards him. On perceiving this, the man instantly dropped on to his heels, so that only his head and his poised spear could be seen above his shield, and coolly awaited the attack, but Adam, seeing his foe thus prepared, dropt to the ground himself in the same manner behind his shield, at the distance of about twenty yards, and both began sparring with their spears. Garahmee, Moosa, and others, called to Adam Burrah to come back, and Ohmed Mahomed, willing to avoid bloodshed, sprang after him, suddenly snatched away his spear, and thus disarmed, he was obliged, but very reluctantly, to return to my side.
Considering that this was to be the commencement of the fray, I had taken up my gun, and the man observing this, and the determined front our little band sustained, thought it best to imitate Adam Burrah, and slowly walked back tohis now retiring countrymen, who had immediately, on seeing me and the bright glaring barrel of my long fowling-piece, with one consent turned, and began a slow retreat, in a long straggling line to their original position on the opposite height, where, squatting down, they assumed, like ourselves, an attitude of defence, as if influenced by a desire to oppose our passage through their country rather than to make a gratuitous attack, which was certainly their first intention, before being acted upon by the wholesome fear of “the villanous saltpetre.” Garahmee now appeared to have assumed the character of commander-in-chief of our forces, walking backwards and forwards between the two extremities of the little semicircle we formed. In one hand, he held a small twig, which he waved about most energetically, as he recited some long speech of a very fiercely-sounding character. Occasionally, he tapped upon the head any of the party who, tired of the sitting position, attempted to rest himself by standing up. This part of their tactics, I observed, was particularly insisted upon, and was done, I was told, with a view of preventing the enemy from obtaining a correct knowledge of the numbers of their opponents. Garahmee was a recognised authority, for in his directions a marshal with his baton would not have been more implicitly obeyed by his army, than was this half-naked savage with his little stick by his wild companions.
We did not stir from our position whilst the sun was up, but kept sitting in a very uncomfortable posture for me, some time even after it had set, when Ohmed Mahomed, touching my elbow, intimated I could go to my hut, for pointing to the men opposed to us, with a significant laugh, he said, “they are very good friends.” Zaido and Allee accompanied me to my hut, but the rest of the Kafilah remained in the same squatting position until after nine o’clock, by which time a peace had been made, and sworn to upon the Koran, between us and the Bedouins, a safe conduct being given to the Kafilah through their country, which extended to the Bahr assal, by a regular official-like document, drawn up in Arabic.
The present required by the chief was exceedingly moderate; three pieces of blue Surat cotton cloth to distribute among the tribe, being all that was asked for. At my request, one bag of rice was subsequently divided among some of the principal people, as an extraordinary present on the occasion of an Engreez coming into their country. All being settled most satisfactorily to myself, and to every one else, I got my rice supper, and slept the remainder of the night as soundly on the hard irregular surface of the rocky ground as if reposing on the softest couch. It is the excitement occasioned by scenes similar to the one I have endeavoured to describe, which gives a zest to desert life, besides the consciousness of having escaped a great perilattaches a value to existence itself of which we have had no previous idea, for, like health, it is sometimes held of little moment until we are on the eve of losing it for ever.