by John Keay
We resorted to various plans in order to get a sight of the monsters. Trees were climbed and the treacherous edge of the mere was patiently investigated, but all to no purpose. The natives began to look disappointed, and evidently we were fast falling in their estimation. This rather nettled us. The idea of an ignominious retreat was anything but acceptable. Still the attempt to reach the open water seemed to mean an amount of trouble and discomfort out of all proportion to the value of the possible sport.
Chopfallen, we were therefore about to retire to our camp, when from the haunt of the hippos came three distinct grunts. We were fairly electrified. Were we to brook these notes of satiric triumph, and meekly accept our defeat? It was impossible! At once boots and coats were off, and in a minute Johnston dashed into the open track through the floating vegetation.
Struck with admiration, I stood and watched him. His footing seemed to be rather shaky from the way in which he moved forward, with “light springing footsteps.” Further and further he boldly ventured. Deeper and deeper he got, while ever and anon the hippos grunted out defiance, and the mob shouted encouragement on the banks. The liquid mud reached his hip, then his waist, and gradually crept up till his armpits were reached, and still he had not attained the open water. It was a critical moment. He paused and looked back; then sternly making another step forward, he suddenly dropped out of sight, with only his gun above water. A few minutes later, he was hauled to the bank, covered with a thick integument of odoriferous mud, baffled and defeated; and loud rose the victorious grunt of the hippos.
While the men scraped off the obnoxious cuticle, I made an attempt in another direction, and returned in like manner to take my turn under the scraper. Johnston the while stood shivering and chilly. Feeling as if it would relieve us to indulge in a little strong language we commenced our return, crest-fallen, and in a most pitiable plight, thought before we once more re-entered Mkamba the pouring rain had pretty well washed the mud out of our clothes, and saved our washerman that trouble. We concluded that night that hippopotamus hunting was not exhilarating.
On the following morning, Johnston felt a pain in his back which he supposed to be rheumatic, and under that belief, took what he understood to be appropriate medicines. All too late, however, he found out that it was the commencement of a more deadly disease, as we shall see, in the course of our narrative.
Previous to this excursion, some capital observations were made, which fixed the latitude of Mkamba. From the very first day’s march, Johnston had assiduously attempted to take meridian altitudes of various stars, but owing to the cloudy condition of the skies, had failed on every occasion.
On the third day after his departure, our guide returned from his reconnaissance of the country ahead, and brought a very unfavourable report. There would be eight days’ march, in which no food could be got. Supplies would therefore require to be provided at Mkamba and a village two days further on. To this task, then, we immediately set ourselves. Men were despatched to every village to buy rice. In an hour, the camp when they returned, laden with bags of food.
On the following day, all the wooden mortars of the place were secured for husking the rice, and round these, animated groups pounded vigorously, keeping time to most peculiar chants. These mortars or “kinus” are wineglass-shaped blocks of wood, hollowed out to receive the rice, which is belaboured with a pole four feet long, struck vertically downwards. The process is very slow and laborious. The husks are removed by the horizontal motion of an almost flat basket, which separates the heavy grain from its light covering.
Having occasion here to flog one of the men for flagrant disobedience, I was greatly disgusted to see how much the others enjoyed the sight of the man’s punishment. Yelling with laughter, they seized him with savage glee, had him down in a minute, turned him on his face, and held him as with a vice, while the punishment proceeded under the cane of Chuma.
There is, however, one good trait in the men’s character. They never harbour any grudge or revengeful feeling if their punishment has been just. Half an hour after the ordeal they may be seen laughing and joking with the very men who held them. This of course may arise from the fact that no sense of degradation accompanies punishment, not even that of flogging; and being naturally lighthearted, and of a devil-may-care disposition, they soon forget.
While preparing for renewing our march, one of our porters disappeared, and suspecting that he had made direct for the coast, we despatched one of the headmen and a porter to hunt him up.
After this unpleasant detention, we with pleasure got once more en route, though Mr. Johnston was much pained by his illness; and the rain, which had never ceased during our stay, still continued with unabated violence, submerging all the low-lying tracts, and turning the footpaths in the higher ground into raging torrents, along which it was a weariness to struggle. Still these were pleasant days to us, when with robust frames and eager enthusiasm we only rejoiced in the troubles and hardships of our march. We had come prepared for all this; indeed, we should almost have felt disappointed if our route had proved easy and pleasant. Ridiculous as it may seem, we thought ourselves entirely unworthy of the honourable title of African travellers until we should have undergone such an apprenticeship of endurance and physical discipline. Disease and bad food had not then broken our spirits and undermined our constitutions. But that time came only too soon, and then one of us was added to a roll which in the sanguine hopefulness of good health we did not anticipate.
At Madodo, where we camped the first night after leaving Mkamba, we were astonished at the reappearance of our lost porter. He gave a most creditable account of himself. Hearing at Mkamba through some unknown source that his wife was very ill on the coast, he clandestinely went off to see her, fearing that, if we knew, he would not be allowed to go. In three days he traversed more than 120 miles, saw his wife, and returned like a faithful fellow to his work. Such a deed is worthy of honour in any land, but is especially noteworthy among such a race as the reviled Waswahili. During the night the men sent after the runaway returned, having followed him to the coast, marching night and day. There they heard the true version of the affair, and came back to find him safe in our camp.
Two more days’ toil under the afore-mentioned wretched conditions brought us to the village of Msangapwani, where, as we had now reached the borders of the inhabited and populated district, we were compelled to halt to collect more food in anticipation of the desert marches.
When we arrived at Msangapwani neither of us had a single dry article of clothing, so little had the sun shone to give us an opportunity of freeing them from moisture. As one suit got wet another was put on, till at last we had to be content with a wet one. Even our blankets were damp and clammy, while the close steaming air was impregnated with malaria. The natural consequence of this was that Johnston became much worse. Here also he discovered, what he had not hitherto suspected, that it was dysentery, and not rheumatism with which he was troubled. Meanwhile I was likewise laid low with an attack of fever.
In these circumstances matters looked rather lugubrious and melancholy. We tried to joke feebly with each other on our ailments; but I could hardly hold my head erect, and Johnston was looking the agonies he would not express in words. While the men were employed collecting and preparing food, we resolved, after a council of war, to dismiss the guide we engaged at Zanzibar, as he clearly knew nothing about the road.
We had here a visit from an Mganga, or medicine man, fantastically dressed. He had with him an obscene image of a woman, clothed with beads, and looking like an absurd toy. Though he did not appear to have very much respect for his goddess, if such we might call it, yet he would not sell it under an exorbitant price. When using it, he irreverently shakes it in a bag, and, thus awakened, the oracle speaks, unheard, of course, by the materialistic ear of the mob, and declares its mind on whatever subject it may be consulted.
After a three days’ enforced stay at Msangapwani, we once more got under weigh. We b
oth presented a very pitiable and woe-begone aspect when we stepped out. We were by no means promising-looking leaders. As usual, I was in front, trying, like a drunken man, to assume some dignity of appearance, though I have no doubt the attempt was rather comical. Johnston was in the rear, even in a worse condition. Our march was, as before, made miserable by drenching rains, and we had to struggle successively through long grass, swamps, and deep swollen streams. At midday our efforts ended in a complete collapse. Johnston arrived an hour after me. As he appeared, I tried to look jolly, and to hail him with a consolatory remark, but his only response to my weak attempt was a groan, as he sank exhausted on the ground.
Two hours’ rest and a cup of hot tea somewhat reinvigorated us, and as we could not camp where we were, we staggered on a little further to a more suitable locality in the forest. The tents were pitched, and a boma, or thorn fence formed, inside which the men made their huts. For three days we were confined in our tents hors de combat, and unable to do anything. Chuma, however, was equal to the occasion, and kept everything in order. It is under such circumstances that the value of a man like Chuma is understood. One with less influence and tact would be unable to keep down riot and disorder. One with less honesty would certainly take the opportunity to help himself in various ways. The worst of my attack was soon over, and I recovered with remarkable rapidity. Johnston also decidedly improved.
Our position in the forest was a somewhat awkward one, distant as we were from all food supplies, and it became necessary to move forward. Owing to the rains, the incompetency of our former guide, and the scarcity of food in the country, our progress had been exceedingly slow, and we got quite irritable in our anxiety to push ahead. As soon therefore as Johnston found himself able to rise, though still unable to walk, he determined, in spite of his illness, to set out once more. This was an unfortunate decision. He was improving rapidly, and a few days’ more rest would have given him a fair chance of throwing off the dysentery. But in his eagerness to proceed there could be no rest for him, at least until we should have reached an important village, called Behobeho, which we had heard much of. As we unhappily were not supplied with a hammock or other convenience for carrying an invalid, we set to work, and with the aid of some of the men, we contrived to fix up a rude concern, which was certainly not of the most comfortable nature, but was the best we could produce with the materials at our command.
Resuming our journey, we kept in a south-westerly direction, entering the drainage basin of the Rufiji. The streams we had crossed as far as Mkamba form the head waters and tributaries of the Mzinga River, which, as we have already noticed, flows in a northerly direction to the Dar-es-Salaam creek. Between Mkamba and Msangapwani four considerable streams, with a number of minor ones, find their way direcdy east to the coast. At the point we had now reached the versant and drainage is towards the river Rufiji.
The country maintained much of the general character which we have already described, only it was much more flat, spreading out like an immense plain. We missed the coast fruit-trees – the moisture-loving cocoa-nut, the luscious mango, and the stinking jack-fruit. No cultivated fields or inhabited villages met our eye. To add to the desolation of our surroundings, a great stillness pervaded the solitude, and nothing animate seemed to exist. There were no pretty chattering weaver-birds; no golden-vented thrush sent forth its joyous music; and the tooting of the tepe-tepe was hushed. Sunbirds, orioles, all were alike absent. Only occasionally from the surrounding forest was the cry of the hornbill, or of the omnipresent wood-pigeon heard, or it might be the caw of a parson crow.
In trudging along through some of the forest tracts, we were frequently in danger of broken legs, or sprained ankles, owing to the hundreds of deep grass-hidden pits from which the natives extract the gum-copal, of which all our best varnishes are made. As it was we several times got severe falls in very sudden and unexpected ways.
Having to occupy Mr. Johnston’s place in the caravan during his illness, I began to learn what a dreadful nuisance the ordinary Unyamwesi donkey is. We had five of them bringing up the rear, each with a load equal to what would be carried by two men. Each one, however, required the services of a man to tug, swear at, and thrash him. So that a donkey was only equal after all to one man. But their value for purposes of transport sank into insignificance when one thought of the immense amount of trouble and delay they caused to the entire caravan. In a week the donkey-boys had lost all moral control of themselves, and indulged in nothing but profane language, till it was feared they would become insane from the amount of irritation they were subjected to. While loading in the morning it required about ten men to each beast, and success was only attained after a severe struggle. Once loaded they usually took the first opportunity to walk into the nearest thorny mass of scrub, where, madly and frequently successfully, they would strive to leave their loads behind. A quarter of an hour would then be spent in releasing them from their entanglements. Finally, all ready, off we would go, though with our moral balance very much upset. The donkey for a time would look like a lamb in its meekness, till, finding our vigilance relaxed, smash it would go against a tree-trunk, breaking girths and saddle-bags, and scattering the load on the pathway. Then, with unmitigated thumps and screams of rage, the donkey-boy, at his wit’s end, would dance about shouting for help. Thus another half-hour would be wasted in mending the saddlebags and reloading.
When a stream had to be crossed more trouble and delay ensued. The loads required to be taken off and carried across by the men. Then a grand fight would commence to get the donkeys over to be reloaded again. In this manner a day’s march in charge of the perverse brutes, became a weariness to the flesh, and left us little time to attend to anything else.
It was with a genuine feeling of relief we saw these weak creatures die off by some mysterious malady. What exactly was the occasion of their death one after the other it would be difficult to say. I do not think it was the tsetse; neither was it bad treatment, nor the want of food. The climate and the nature of the food seemed to be the chief causes. In the low swampy regions, covered with dense jungle-grass, neither bullock, horse, nor ass seems to thrive, except where the greatest care is taken of them. They require to be either fed on specially collected food, or allowed to stray only on parts which have been under cultivation, where the grass appears to become more wholesome.
Two marches from our camp in the forest brought us to the banks of the Rufiji River, at a village called Kimkumbi. These two long marches naturally told very severely upon Johnston, owing to the rude mode of conveyance at our command. The pain of his disease was much aggravated by the exceedingly unpleasant jolting trot of the carriers along slippery pathways, where a firm, steady footing was quite out of the question. On several occasions they nearly fell with their precious load. Moreover, to be carried under such a sun was of itself sufficient to knock up any one. His tortures under such circumstances were simply dreadful, and when we arrived at Kimkumbi he felt half dead. His body was stiff and swollen, and he was utterly unable to taste a particle of food. The only means by which he could sustain his waning energies was an occasional sip of brandy and water.
In order that he might recruit slightly, a day’s halt was determined on. This I took advantage of to examine the river.
The Rufiji, notwithstanding its large size and apparent importance as a water-way to the interior, has as yet been little explored, owing to the difficulties attaching to its navigation, and the malarious nature of the bordering country. The sight which met my view was exceedingly disappointing. Instead of a noble river, winding along between well-defined banks, there seemed to be only a great swamp broken here and there by sandy islands, and huge sedgy tracts, the haunt of innumerable herons, storks, ducks, geese, king-fishers, ibises, and every variety of waterfowl to be found in the tropics, along with the clumsy hippopotamus and the dangerous crocodile.
Somewhat improved by the day’s rest, Johnston, despite my anxious protestations, determined to sta
rt again. There should be no more stoppage till Behobeho was reached!
The conditions of travelling had now, however, very much changed. The rainy season was over, and from a clear cloudless sky the sun beat down with withering effect. The change in the appearance of the country was no less marked; swamps and marshes were replaced by dry, burnt-up deserts, which were extremely painful to traverse, as the mud, during the rains, had been cut up and wrinkled by the feet of wild game into a surface of the greatest irregularity, which had then got baked and hardened by the sun to the consistence of stone. Over this the men painfully limped with their bare feet. Not a drop of running water was to be got, and we had to be content with the slimy water of pits or small ponds, befouled by rotting vegetation. The dense matted bush and tall jungle-grass with which we have become acquainted in Uzaramo, gave place to open ground covered with scattered thorny acacias. These proved to be a terrible nuisance to the bare feet and legs of the porters. The fallen thorns on the pathways were continually getting into their feet, and laming them in the most painful manner.
The first day we marched for two hours along the banks of the Rufiji; then striking away from them we traversed a shrivelled up plain with small stunted trees, camping early at a village called Mtemere. We found the country bordering the river here was covered with deep lagoons and back-waters, where myriads of wading and other aquatic birds found a congenial residence. As the river could not be seen from the village I made an attempt to reach it in a most extraordinary log of hollowed wood, which rejoiced in the name of a canoe. It did not say much for the arboreal growths of the neighbourhood that no better tree could be got than one shaped like the letter S. Yet such was the elegant outline of the craft in which I took passage. However, in the quiet lagoons, I thought we could not be in much danger, and I squeezed myself in accordingly. We failed to reach the Rufiji, but none the less enjoyed the pleasant sail among the huge sedges, with their screaming feathered inhabitants flying about in immense and varied flocks.