The Albert N'Yanza Part 9

Fortunately there was an abundance of small game in the shape of wild ducks, pigeons, doves; and a great variety of birds such as herons, cranes, spoonbills, &c. Travellers should always take as large a supply of shot as possible. I had four hundred weight, and prodigious quant.i.ties of powder and caps: thus I could at all times kill sufficient game for ourselves and people. There were a series of small marshy pools scattered over the country near the stream that ran through the valley; these were the resort of numerous ducks, which afforded excellent sport.

The town of Tarrangolle is situated at the foot of the mountain, about a mile from the stream, which is about eighty yards wide, but shallow. In the dry weather, water is obtained by wells dug in the sandy bed, but during the rains it is a simple torrent not exceeding three feet in depth. The bed being sandy, the numerous banks, left dry by the fluctuations of the stream, are most inviting spots for ducks; and it was only necessary to wait under a tree, on the river's bank, to obtain thirty or forty shots in one morning as the ducks flew down the course of the stream. I found two varieties: the small brown duck with a grey head; and a magnificent variety, as large as the Muscovy, having a copper-and-blue coloured tinselled back and wings, with a white but speckled head and neck. This duck had a curious peculiarity in a fleshy protuberance on the beak about as large as a half-crown. This stands erect, like a c.o.c.k's comb. Both this, and the smaller variety, were delicious eating. There were two varieties of geese--the only two that I have ever seen on the White Nile--the common Egyptian grey goose, and a large black and white bird with a crimson head and neck, and a red and yellow h.o.r.n.y protuberance on the top of the head. This variety has a sharp spur upon the wing an inch long, and exceedingly powerful; it is used as a weapon of defence for striking, like the spurred wing of the plover.

I frequeutly shot ten or twelve ducks, and as many cranes, before breakfast; among others the beautiful crested crane, called by the Arabs "garranook." The black velvet head of this crane, surrounded by a golden crest, was a favourite ornament of the Latookas, and they were immediately arranged as crests for their helmets. The neighbourhood of my camp would have made a fortune for a feather-dealer; it was literally strewn with down and plumes. I was always attended every morning by a number of Latooka boys, who were eager sportsmen, and returned to camp daily laden with ducks and geese.

No sooner did we arrive in camp than a number of boys volunteered to pluck the birds, which they did for the sake of the longest feathers, with which they immediately decked their woolly heads. Crowds of boys were to be seen with heads like cauliflowers, all dressed with the feathers of cranes and wild ducks. It appears to be accepted, both by the savage and civilized, that birds' feathers are specially intended for ornamenting the human head.

It was fortunate that Nature had thus stocked Latooka with game. It was impossible to procure any other meat; and not only were the ducks and geese to us what the quails were to the Israelites in the desert, but they enabled me to make presents to the natives that a.s.sured them of our good will.

Although the Latookas were far better than other tribes that I had met, they were sufficiently annoying; they gave me no credit for real good will, but they attributed my forbearance to weakness. On one occasion Adda, one of the chiefs, came to ask me to join him in attacking a village to procure molotes (iron hoes); he said, "Come along with me, bring your men and guns, and we will attack a village near here, and take their molotes and cattle; you keep the cattle, and I will have the molotes." I asked him whether the village was in an enemy's country. "Oh no!" he replied, "it is close here; but the people are rather rebellious, and it will do them good to kill a few, and to take their molotes. If you are afraid, never mind, I will ask the Turks to do it."

Thus forbearance on my part was supposed to be caused from weakness, and it was difficult to persuade them that it originated in a feeling of justice. This Adda most coolly proposed that we should plunder one of his own villages that was rather too "liberal" in its views. Nothing is more heartbreaking than to be so thoroughly misunderstood, and the obtuseness of the savages was such, that I never could make them understand the existence of good principle;--their one idea was "power,"--force that could obtain all--the strong hand that could wrest from the weak. In disgust I frequently noted the feelings of the moment in my journal--a memorandum from which I copy as ill.u.s.trative of the time. "1863, 10th April, Latooka.--I wish the black sympathisers in England could see Africa's inmost heart as I do, much of their sympathy would subside. Human nature viewed in its crude state as pictured amongst African savages is quite on a level with that of the brute, and not to be compared with the n.o.ble character of the dog. There is neither grat.i.tude, pity, love, nor self-denial; no idea of duty; no religion; but covetousness, ingrat.i.tude, selfishness and cruelty. All are thieves, idle, envious, and ready to plunder and enslave their weaker neighbours."

CHAPTER VI.

THE FUNERAL DANCE.

Drums were beating, horns blowing, and people were seen all running in one direction;--the cause was a funeral dance, and I joined the crowd, and soon found myself in the midst of the entertainment. The dancers were most grotesquely got up. About a dozen huge ostrich feathers adorned their helmets; either leopard or the black and white monkey skins were suspended from their shoulders, and a leather tied round the waist covered a large iron bell which was strapped upon the loins of each dancer, like a woman's old-fas.h.i.+oned bustle: this they rung to the time of the dance by jerking their posteriors in the most absurd manner.

A large crowd got up in this style created an indescribable hubbub, heightened by the blowing of horns and the beating of seven nogaras of various notes. Every dancer wore an antelope's horn suspended round the neck, which he blew occasionally in the height of his excitement. These instruments produced a sound partaking of the braying of a donkey and the screech of an owl. Crowds of men rushed round and round in a sort of "galop infernel," brandis.h.i.+ng their lances and iron-headed maces, and keeping tolerably in line five or six deep, following the leader who headed them, dancing backwards. The women kept outside the line, dancing a slow stupid step, and screaming a wild and most inharmonious chant; while a long string of young girls and small children, their heads and necks rubbed with red ochre and grease, and prettily ornamented with strings of beads around their loins, kept a very good line, beating the time with their feet, and jingling the numerous iron rings which adorned their ankles to keep time with the drums. One woman attended upon the men, running through the crowd with a gourd full of wood-ashes, handfuls of which she showered over their heads, powdering them like millers; the object of the operation I could not understand. The "premiere danseuse"

was immensely fat; she had pa.s.sed the bloom of youth, but, "malgre" her unwieldy state, she kept up the pace to the last, quite unconscious of her general appearance, and absorbed with the excitement of the dance.

These festivities were to be continued in honour of the dead; and as many friends had recently been killed, music and dancing would be in fas.h.i.+on for some weeks.

There was an excellent interpreter belonging to Ibrahim's party--a Bari lad of about eighteen. This boy had been in their service for some years, and had learnt Arabic, which he spoke fluently, although with a peculiar accent, owing to the extraction of the four front teeth of the lower jaw, according to the general custom. It was of great importance to obtain the confidence of Loggo, as my success depended much upon information that I might obtain from the natives; therefore, whenever I sent for him to hold any conversation with the people, I invariably gave him a little present at parting. Accordingly he obeyed any summons from me with great alacrity, knowing that the interview would terminate with a "baksheesh" (present). In this manner I succeeded in establis.h.i.+ng confidence, and he would frequently come uncalled to my tent and converse upon all manner of subjects. The Latooka language is different to the Bari, and a second interpreter was necessary; this was a sharp lad about the same age: thus the conversation was somewhat tedious, the medium being Bari and Latooka.

The chief Commoro (the "Lion") was one of the most clever and common-sense savages that I had seen in these countries, and the tribe paid far more deference to his commands than to those of his brother, "Moy," although the latter was the superior in rank.

One day I sent for Commoro after the usual funeral dance was completed, and, through my two young interpreters, I had a long conversation with him on the customs of his country. I wished if possible to fathom the origin of the extraordinary custom of exhuming the body after burial, as I imagined that in this act some idea might be traced to a belief in the resurrection.

Commoro was, like all his people, extremely tall. Upon entering my tent he took his seat upon the ground, the Latookas not using stools like the other White Nile tribes. I commenced the conversation by complimenting him on the perfection of his wives and daughters in the dance, and on his own agility in the performance; and inquired for whom the ceremony had been performed.

He replied, that it was for a man who had been recently killed, but no one of great importance, the same ceremony being observed for every person without distinction. I asked him why those slain in battle were allowed to remain unburied. He said, it had always been the custom, but that he could not explain it.

"But," I replied, "why should you disturb the bones of those whom you have already buried, and expose them on the outskirts of the town?"

"It was the custom of our forefathers," he answered, "therefore we continue to observe it."

"Have you no belief in a future existence after death? Is not some idea expressed in the act of exhuming the bones after the flesh is decayed?"

Commoro (loq.).--"Existence AFTER death! How can that be? Can a dead man get out of his grave, unless we dig him out?"

"Do you think man is like a beast, that dies and is ended?"

Commoro.--"Certainly; an ox is stronger than a man; but he dies, and his bones last longer; they are bigger. A man's bones break quickly--he is weak."

"Is not a man superior in sense to an ox? Has he not a mind to direct his actions?"

Commoro.--"Some men are not so clever as an ox. Men must sow corn to obtain food, but the ox and wild animals can procure it without sowing."

"Do you not know that there is a spirit within you more than flesh? Do you not dream and wander in thought to distant places in your sleep?

Nevertheless, your body rests in one spot. How do you account for this?"

Commoro (laughing).--"Well, how do YOU account for it? It is a thing I cannot understand; it occurs to me every night."

"The mind is independent of the body; the actual body can be fettered, but the mind is uncontrollable; the body will die and will become dust, or be eaten by vultures, but the spirit will exist for ever."

Commoro.--"Where will the spirit live?"

"Where does fire live? Cannot you produce a fire (The natives always produce fire by rubbing two sticks together.) by rubbing two sticks together, yet you SEE not the fire in the wood. Has not that fire, that lies harmless and unseen in the sticks, the power to consume the whole country? Which is the stronger, the small stick that first PRODUCES the fire, or the fire itself? So is the spirit the element within the body, as the element of fire exists in the stick; the element being superior to the substance."

Commoro.--"Ha! Can you explain what we frequently see at night when lost in the wilderness? I have myself been lost, and wandering in the dark, I have seen a distant fire; upon approaching, the fire has vanished, and I have been unable to trace the cause--nor could I find the spot."

"Have you no idea of the existence of spirits superior to either man or beast? Have you no fear of evil except from bodily causes?"

Commoro.--"I am afraid of elephants and other animals when in the jungle at night, but of nothing else."

"Then you believe in nothing; neither in a good nor evil spirit! And you believe that when you die it will be the end of body and spirit; that you are like other animals; and that there is no distinction between man and beast; both disappear, and end at death?"

Commoro.--"Of course they do."

"Do you see no difference in good and bad actions?" Commoro.--"Yes, there are good and bad in men and beasts."

"Do you think that a good man and a bad must share the same fate, and alike die, and end?"

Commoro.--"Yes; what else can they do? How can they help dying? Good and bad all die."

"Their bodies perish, but their spirits remain; the good in happiness, the bad in misery. If you have no belief in a future state, WHY SHOULD A MAN BE GOOD? Why should he not be bad, if he can prosper by wickedness?"

Commoro.--"Most people are bad; if they are strong they take from the weak. The good people are all weak; they are good because they are not strong enough to be bad."

Some corn had been taken out of a sack for the horses, and a few grains lying scattered on the ground, I tried the beautiful metaphor of St.

Paul as an example of a future state. Making a small hole with my finger in the ground, I placed a grain within it: "That," I said, "represents you when you die." Covering it with earth, I continued, "That grain will decay, but from it will rise the plant that will produce a reappearance of the original form."

Commoro.--"Exactly so; that I understand. But the ORIGINAL grain does NOT rise again; it rots like the dead man, and is ended; the fruit produced is not the same grain that we buried, but the PRODUCTION of that grain: so it is with man--I die, and decay, and am ended; but my children grow up like the fruit of the grain. Some men have no children, and some grains perish without fruit; then all are ended."

I was obliged to change the subject of conversation. In this wild naked savage there was not even a superst.i.tion upon which to found a religious feeling; there was a belief in matter; and to his understanding everything was MATERIAL. It was extraordinary to find so much clearness of perception combined with such complete obtuseness to anything ideal.

Giving up the religious argument as a failure, I resolved upon more practical inquiries.

The Turks had only arrived in the Latooka country in the preceding year.

They had not introduced the cowrie sh.e.l.l; but I observed that every helmet was ornamented with this species; it therefore occurred to me that they must find their way into the country from Zanzibar.

In reply to my inquiries, Commoro pointed to the south, from which he said they arrived in his country, but he had no idea from whence they came. The direction was sufficient to prove that they must be sent from the east coast, as Speke and Grant had followed the Zanzibar traders as far as Karagwe, the 2 degrees S. lat.

Commoro could not possibly understand my object in visiting the Latooka country; it was in vain that I attempted to explain the intention of my journey. He said, "Suppose you get to the great lake; what will you do with it? What will be the good of it? If you find that the large river does flow from it, what then? What's the good of it?"

I could only a.s.sure him, that in England we had an intimate knowledge of the whole world, except the interior of Africa, and that our object in exploring was to benefit the hitherto unknown countries by inst.i.tuting legitimate trade, and introducing manufactures from England in exchange for ivory and other productions. He replied that the Turks would never trade fairly; that they were extremely bad people, and that they would not purchase ivory in any other way than by bartering cattle, which they stole from one tribe to sell to another.