The Life and Adventures of Bruce, the African Traveller Part 16

"For the first two minutes after I mounted," says Bruce, "I do not know whether I was most in the earth or in the air; he kicked behind, reared before, leaped like a deer, all four off the ground, and it was some time before I recollected myself; he then attempted to gallop, taking the bridle in his teeth, but got a check which staggered him; he however continued to gallop, and, finding I slackened the bridle on his neck, and that he was at ease, he set off and ran away as hard as he could, flinging out behind every ten feet; the ground was very favourable, smooth, soft, and up-hill. I then, between two hills, half up the one and half up the other, wrought him so that he had no longer either breath or strength, and I began to think he would scarce carry me to the camp.

"The poor beast made a sad figure, cut in the sides to pieces, and bleeding at the jaws; and the seis, the rascal that put me upon him, being there when I dismounted, held up his hands upon seeing the horse so mangled, and began to testify great surprise upon the supposed harm I had done. I took no notice of this, and only said, 'Carry that horse to your master; he may venture to ride him now, which is more than either he or you dared to have done in the morning.'"

Bruce then mounted his own horse, and took with him his double-barrelled gun. The Galla were encamped close to him, and, anxious to raise himself in the estimation of these wild people by those sort of feats which they most admire, he galloped about, twisting and turning his horse in every direction. A vast number of kites were following the camp, living upon the carrion; and choosing two which were gliding near him, he shot first one on the right, then one on the left, when a great shout immediately followed from the spectators, to which Bruce seemingly paid no attention, pretending the most complete indifference, as if nothing extraordinary had been done.

Fasil was at the door of the tent, and, having beheld the shots and horsemans.h.i.+p, ordered the kites immediately to be brought to him: his servants had laboured in vain to find the hole where the ball with which Bruce must needs have killed the birds had entered; for none of them had ever seen small shot, and he took care not to undeceive them.

Bruce had no sooner entered his tent than he asked him, with great earnestness, to show him where the ball had pa.s.sed through. Before this difficulty, however, could be solved, Fasil, perceiving the quant.i.ty of blood upon Bruce's trousers, held up his hands with a show of horror and concern which plainly was not counterfeited: he protested, by every oath he could devise, that he knew nothing about the matter, and was asleep at the time; that he had no horses with him worth Bruce's acceptance except the one he himself rode; but that any horse known to be his, driven before the traveller, would be a pa.s.sport, and procure him respect among all the wild people whom he might meet, and for that reason only he had thought of offering him a horse. He repeated his protestations that he was innocent, and heartily sorry for the accident, which, indeed, he appeared to be: adding that the groom was in irons, and that, before many hours pa.s.sed, he would put him to death. "Sir,"

said Bruce, "as this man has attempted my life, according to the laws of the country, it is I that should name the punishment." "It is very true," replied Fasil; "take him, Yagoube, and cut him in a thousand pieces if you please, and give his body to the kites." "Are you really sincere in what you say," said I, "and will you have no after excuses?"

He swore solemnly he would not. "Then," said I, "I am a Christian: the way my religion teaches me to punish my enemies is by doing good for evil; and therefore I keep you to the oath you have sworn, and desire you to set the man at liberty, and put him in the place he held before, for he has not been undutiful to you."

Every one present seemed pleased with these sentiments; one of the attendants could not contain himself, but, turning to Fasil, said, "Did not I tell you what my brother thought about this man? He was just the same all through Tigre." Fasil, in a low voice, very justly replied, "A man that behaves as he does may go through any country!"

In an interview which Bruce afterward had with Fasil, he made him some handsome presents, for which he appeared to be exceedingly grateful. "I have nothing to return you for the present you have given me," said Fasil, "for I did not expect to meet a man like you here in the fields; but you will quickly be back; we shall meet on better terms at Gondar; the head of the Nile is near at hand; a horseman, express, will arrive there in a day. I have given you a good man, well known in this country to be my servant; he will go to Geesh with you, and return you to a friend of Ayto Aylo's and mine, Shalaka Welled Amlac; he has the dangerous part of the country wholly in his hands, and will carry you safe to Gondar; my wife is at present in his house: fear nothing, I shall answer for your safety. When will you set out? to-morrow?"

Bruce replied, with many thanks for his kindness, "that he wished to proceed immediately, and that his servants were already far on the way."

"You are very much in the right," says Fasil; "it was only in the idea that you were hurt with that accursed horse that I would have wished you to stay till to-morrow; but throw off these b.l.o.o.d.y clothes; they are not decent; I must give you new ones; you are my va.s.sal. The king has granted you Geesh, where you are going, and I must invest you." A number of his servants hurried Bruce out, and he was brought back in a few minutes to Fasil's tent with a fine, loose muslin under-garment or cloth round him which reached to his feet. Fasil now took off the one that he had put on himself new in the morning, and placed it on Bruce's shoulders with his own hand (his servants throwing another immediately over him), saying at the same time to the people, "Bear witness, I give to you, Yagoube, the Agow Geesh, as fully and freely as the king has given it me." Bruce bowed and kissed his hand, as is customary for feudatories, and he then pointed to him to sit down.

"Hear what I say to you," continued Fasil; "I think it right for you to make the best of your way now, for you will be the sooner back at Gondar. You need not be alarmed at the wild people you speak of who are going after you, though it is better to meet them coming this way than when they are going to their homes; they are commanded by Welleta Yasous, who is your friend, and is very grateful for the medicines you sent him from Gondar: he has not been able to see you, being so much busied with those wild people; but he loves you, and will take care of you, and you must give me more of that physic when we meet at Gondar."

Bruce again bowed, and he continued: "Hear me what I say: you see those seven people (I never saw, says Bruce, more thief-like fellows in my life); these are all leaders and chiefs of the Galla--savages, if you please; they are all our brethren." Bruce dutifully bowed. Fasil then jabbered something to them in Galla. They all answered by a wild scream or howl, then struck themselves upon the breast as a mark of a.s.sent, and attempted to kiss Bruce's hand. "Now," continued Fasil, "before all these men, ask me anything you have at heart, and, be it what it may, they know I cannot deny it you."

Bruce, of course, asked to be conducted immediately to the head of the Nile. Fasil then turned again to his seven chiefs, who rose up: they all stood round in a circle, and raised the palm of their hands, while he and his Galla together repeated, with great apparent devotion, a prayer about a minute long. "Now," says Fasil, "go in peace, you are a Galla; this is a curse upon them and their children, their corn, gra.s.s, and cattle, if ever they lift their hand against you or yours, or do not defend you to the utmost if attacked by others, or endeavour to defeat any design they may hear is intended against you." Upon this Bruce offered to kiss his hand, and they all went to the door of the tent, where there stood a very handsome gray horse, saddled and bridled. "Take this horse," says Fasil, "as a present from me; but do not mount it yourself; drive it before you, saddled and bridled as it is; no man of Maitsha will touch you when he sees that horse." Bruce then took leave of Fasil, and having, according to the custom of the country towards superiors, asked permission to mount on horseback before him, was speedily out of sight.

On the 31st of October Bruce and his little party once more set out in search of the source of the Nile; Fasil's horse being driven before them--a magician to lead them towards their object--an aegis to s.h.i.+eld them on their way.

After travelling till one o'clock in the morning, they reached a small village near that dangerous ford on the Nile which, with the king's army, Bruce had before pa.s.sed with so much difficulty. They there found some of the Galla, commanded by a robber called the Jumper. Bruce next morning waited upon this personage, who was quite naked, except a towel about his loins. When Bruce entered this hero was at his toilet: in other words, he was rubbing melted tallow on his arms and body, and twining in his hair the entrails of an ox, some of which hung like a necklace round his throat. Bruce paid his respects; but, overcome with the perfume of blood and carrion, escaped as soon as possible from his presence.

At the village of Maitsha Bruce was informed that such was the dread these people entertained of the smallpox, if it made its appearance in a village the custom was at once to surround the house, set fire to it, and burn both it and its inhabitants.

After pa.s.sing the a.s.sar river they entered the province of Goutto, where they found the people richer and better lodged than in the province of Maitsha. The whole country is full of large and beautiful cattle of all colours, and is finely shaded with the acacia vera, or Egyptian thorn, the tree which, in the sultry parts of Africa, produces the gum-arabic.

Beneath these trees were growing wild oats, of such a prodigious height and size that they are capable of concealing both a horse and his rider: some of the stalks were little less than an inch in circ.u.mference, and they have, when ripe, the appearance of small canes.

The soil is a fine, black garden mould; and Bruce supposes that the oat is here in its original state, and that it is degenerated with us.

With these magnificent oats before him, Bruce could not resist cooking some oat-cakes, after the fas.h.i.+on of Scotland; but his companions, regarding these dainties with all the disdain of a Dr. Johnson, declared that they were "bitter; that they burned their stomachs, and made them thirsty."

Though the Galla guides paid but little attention to Bruce, it was curious to observe the respect they all showed to Fasil's horse. Some gave him handfuls of barley, while others, with more refined knowledge of the world, courted his favour "by respectfully addressing him."

After pa.s.sing several streams, they came to the cataract or cascade of the a.s.sar, which runs into the Nile. This river is about eighty yards broad, and the fall is about twenty feet. The stream entirely covers the rock over which it is precipitated, and in solemn magnificence rushes down with irresistible violence and force.

"The strength of vegetation," says Bruce, "which the moisture of this river produces, supported by the action of a very warm sun, is such as one might naturally expect from theory, though we cannot help being surprised at the effects when we see them before us; trees and shrubs covered with flowers of every colour, all new and extraordinary in their shapes, crowded with birds of many uncouth forms, all of them richly adorned with variety of plumage, and seeming to fix their residence upon the banks of this river, without a desire of wandering to any distance in the neighbouring fields. But as there is nothing, though ever so beautiful, that has not some defect or imperfection, among all these feathered beauties there is not one songster; and, unless of the rose or jasmine kind, none of their flowers have any smell; we hear, indeed, many squalling, noisy birds of the jay kind, and we find two varieties of wild roses, white and yellow, to which I may add jasmine (called Leham), which becomes a large tree; but all the rest may be considered as liable to the general observation that the flowers are dest.i.tute of odour and the birds of song."

After pa.s.sing the a.s.sar, and several villages belonging to Goutto, Bruce, on the 2d of November, 1770, for the first time obtained a distinct view of the mountain of Geesh, the long-wished-for object of his most dangerous and troublesome journey; and now, in sight of his goal, he bent firmly forward, and proceeded with redoubled strength and determination.

The Nile was before him, and he joyfully descended to its banks, which were ornamented on the west with high trees of the salix or willow tribe, while on the east appeared "black, dark, and thick groves, with craggy, pointed rocks, and overshaded with old, tall timber-trees, going to decay with age: a very rude and awful face of nature; a cover from which fancy suggested that a lion might issue, or some animal or monster yet more savage and ferocious."

Having reached the pa.s.sage, the ancient inhabitants, in whose hearts a veneration for their river seemed to be more firmly rooted than the more recent doctrines of Christianity, crowded to the ford, and protested against any man's riding across the stream either on a horse or mule.

They insisted that Bruce and his party should take off their shoes, and they even signified that they would stone those who attempted to wash the dirt from their clothes. The servants naturally returned rudeness for rudeness; "but," says Bruce, "I sat by, exceedingly happy at having so unexpectedly found the remnants of veneration for that ancient deity still subsisting in such vigour."

The people now asked Woldo, Bruce's guide from Fasil, to pay them for carrying over the baggage and instruments. In a most violent pa.s.sion, the man threw away his pipe, and, seizing a stick, exclaimed, "Who am I, then? a girl, a woman, a pagan dog, like yourselves? And who is Waragna Fasil? are you not his slaves? But you want payment, do you?" upon which he fell upon them and beat them. Not contented with this, he pretended that they had robbed him of some money, which they consented to pay to him, fearing lest some fine or heavy chastis.e.m.e.nt should fall upon their village.

As Bruce proceeded, he had some little difficulty in obtaining meat or provisions of any sort; for, although these poor people, with the utmost curiosity, would have flocked around him had they known that he was a stranger from Gondar, the sight of Fasil's horse drove them away; for they fancied that some contribution was to be levied upon them.

Bruce being now within the sound of a cataract which he was desirous to visit, took the liberty of mounting Fasil's horse, and, with a single guide, he galloped about four or five miles to see it; but he was disappointed in its appearance, the river being only about sixty yards broad, and the fall only sixteen feet. On his return he found that a cow was about to be killed for his party. Woldo had managed to discover one by bellowing through his hands in a manner which induced the unfortunate animal to reply, and the hiding-place in which she had been concealed by her owner was thus detected.

Bruce now thought proper to inform Woldo that the king had granted to him the small territory of Geesh, and that it was his intention to forgive to its poor inhabitants the taxes which they had been in the habit of paying: a n.o.ble act, but one which appeared to Woldo to savour much more of the ridiculous; for he not only most conscientiously approved of taxes, but appeared to agree in opinion with the Englishman, whose little pamphlet in favour of the same commenced with, "It is in the nature of taxes, as it is in the nature of lead, to be heavy!"

Bruce, however, insisting that the burden should be removed, Woldo reluctantly yielded to his mandate.

The next day, the 3d of November, they proceeded through a plain covered with acacias. Several of the tops of these trees had been cut off for the purpose of making baskets for bees, which were hung outside the houses like bird-cages: numerous hives were at work, and although they took no notice of the inhabitants, yet they waged war against Bruce and his party, and stung them very severely.

After pa.s.sing some hills, they descended into a large plain full of marshes. "In this plain," says Bruce, "the Nile winds more in the s.p.a.ce of four miles than, I believe, any river in the world: it makes above a hundred turns in that distance, one of which advances so abruptly into the plain, that we concluded we must pa.s.s it, and were preparing accordingly, when we saw it make as sharp a turn to the right, and run far on in a contrary direction, as if we were never to have met it again." The Nile here is not above twenty feet broad nor more than a foot deep.

In crossing the plain of Goutto the sun had been intensely hot, and here it became so dreadfully oppressive that it quite overcame them all. Even Woldo declared himself to be ill, and talked of going no farther: however, by Bruce's persuasions, they pushed towards three ranges of mountains, among which were situated the small village of Geesh, and the long-expected fountains of the Nile.

Bruce says, "This triple ridge of mountains, disposed one range behind the other, nearly in form of portions of three concentric circles, seems to suggest an idea that they are the Mountains of the Moon, or the _Montes Lunae_ of antiquity, at the foot of which the Nile was said to rise; in fact, there are no others. Amid-amid may perhaps exceed half a mile in height; they certainly do not arrive at three quarters, and are greatly short of that fabulous height given them by Kircher. These mountains are all of them excellent soil, and everywhere covered with fine pasture; but, as this unfortunate country had been for ages the seat of war, the inhabitants have only ploughed and sown the top of them, out of the reach of enemies or marching armies. On the middle of the mountain are villages built of a white sort of gra.s.s, which makes them conspicuous at a great distance; the bottom is all gra.s.s, where their cattle feed continually under their eye; these, upon any alarm, they drive up to the top of the mountains out of danger. The hail lies often upon the top of Amid-amid for hours, but snow was never seen in this country, nor have they a word in their language for it. It is also remarkable, though we had often violent hail at Gondar, and when the sun was vertical, it never came but with the wind blowing directly from Amid-amid."

As they proceeded the people continued to fly from their little villages, scared by the appearance of Fasil's horse. In one village they found only one earthen pot containing food, which Bruce took possession of, leaving in its place a wedge of salt, which, strange to say, is still used as small money in Gondar, and all over Abyssinia. The following day they continued their journey, and, although they saw no inhabitants, they often heard voices whispering among the trees and canes. Bruce made many endeavours to catch some of these people, in order to apprize them of the real object of his visit, but "equo ne credite Teucri!" it was quite impossible, for they fled much faster than he could follow.

He therefore determined to conceal Fasil's horse, that scarecrow which created such universal alarm; but as it is considered treason at Gondar to sit on the king's chair or on his saddle, Woldo was for some time very anxious to maintain inviolate the dignity of his master. Bruce compromised the matter, however, by proposing to ride upon his own saddle, and with this proviso mounted Fasil's horse.

After proceeding for some little time along the side of a valley, they began to ascend a mountain; and, reaching its summit about noon, came in sight of Sacala which joins the village of Geesh. Shortly afterward they pa.s.sed the Googueri, a stream of about sixty feet broad and about eighteen inches deep, very clear and rapid, and running over a rugged, uneven bottom of black rock. At a quarter past twelve they halted on a small eminence, where the market of Sacala is held every Sat.u.r.day.

Horned cattle, many of the highest possible beauty, with which all this country abounds, large a.s.ses, honey, b.u.t.ter, ensete for food, and a manufacture of the leaf of that plant, painted with different colours like mosaic-work, for mats, were here exposed for sale in great plenty.

At a quarter after one o'clock they pa.s.sed the river Gometti, the boundary of the plain: they were now ascending a very steep and rugged mountain, the worst pa.s.s they had met on the whole journey. They had no other path but one made by the sheep or goats, and which had no appearance of having been frequented by men; for it was broken, full of holes, and in some places obstructed with large stones, that seemed to have been there from the creation. Besides this, the whole was covered with thick wood, which often occupied the very edge of the precipices on which they stood, and they were everywhere stopped and entangled by that execrable thorn the kantuffa, and several other thorns and brambles nearly as inconvenient. Bruce ascended, however, with great alacrity, as he conceived he was surmounting the last difficulty of the many thousands he had been doomed to struggle with.

At three quarters after one they arrived at the top of the mountain, from whence they had a distinct view of all the remaining territory of Sacala, the Mountain of Geesh, and the Church of St. Michael Geesh.

"Immediately below us," says Bruce, "appeared the Nile itself, strangely diminished in size, and now only a brook that had scarcely water to turn a mill. I could not satiate myself with the sight, revolving in my mind all those cla.s.sical prophecies that had given the Nile up to perpetual obscurity and concealment."

Bruce was roused from this revery by an alarm that Woldo the guide was missing. The servants could not agree when they saw him last. Strates the Greek, with another of the party, was in the wood shooting; but they soon appeared without Woldo. They said that they had seen some enormous s.h.a.ggy apes or baboons without tails, several of which were walking upright, and they therefore concluded either that these creatures had torn Woldo to pieces, or that he was lagging behind for some purpose of treachery; however, while they were thus talking, Woldo was seen approaching, pretending to be very ill, and declaring that he could go no farther. Bruce was at this moment occupied in sketching a yellow rose-tree, several of which species were hanging over the river.

"The Nile," he says, "here is not four yards over, and not above four inches deep where we crossed; it was indeed become a very trifling brook, but ran swiftly over a bottom of small stones, with hard black rock appearing among them: it is at this place very easy to pa.s.s and very limpid, but a little lower, full of inconsiderable falls; the ground rises gently from the river to the southward, full of small hills and eminences, which you ascend and descend almost imperceptibly. The day had been very hot for some hours, and my party were sitting in the shade of a grove of magnificent cedars, intermixed with some very large and beautiful cusso-trees, all in flower; the men were lying on the gra.s.s, and the beasts fed with their burdens on their backs in most luxuriant herbage." Above was a small ford, where the Nile was so narrow that Bruce had stepped across it more than fifty times: it had now dwindled to the size of a common mill-stream.

When Woldo came to Bruce, he declared that he was too ill to proceed; but this imposition being detected, he then confessed that he was afraid to enter Geesh, having once killed several of its inhabitants; Bruce, however, gave him a very handsome sash, which he took, making many apologies. "Come, come," said Bruce, "we understand each other: no more words; it is now late; lose no more time, but carry me to Geesh and the head of the Nile directly, without preamble, and show me the hill that separates me from it. He then carried me round to the south side of the church, out of the grove of trees that surrounded it.... 'This is the hill,' says he, looking archly, 'that, when you were on the other side of it, was between you and the fountains of the Nile; there is no other. Look at that hillock of green sod in the middle of that watery spot; IT IS IN THAT THE TWO FOUNTAINS OF THE NILE ARE TO BE FOUND! Geesh is on the face of the rock where yon green trees are. If you go to the length of the fountains, pull off your shoes, as you did the other day, for these people are all pagans, worse than those who were at the ford; and they believe in nothing that you believe, but only in this river, to which they pray every day as if it were G.o.d; but this perhaps you may do likewise.'

"Half undressed as I was by loss of my sash, and throwing my shoes off, I ran down the hill towards the little island of green sods, which was about two hundred yards distant; the whole side of the hill was thick grown with flowers, the large bulbous roots of which appearing above the surface of the ground, and their skins coming off on treading upon them, occasioned me two very severe falls before I reached the brink of the marsh. I after this came to the altar of green turf, which was in form of an altar, apparently the work of art, and I stood in rapture over the princ.i.p.al fountain, which rises in the middle of it.

"It is easier to guess than to describe the situation of my mind at that moment--standing in that spot which had baffled the genius, industry, and inquiry of both ancients and moderns for the course of near three thousand years! Kings had attempted this discovery at the head of armies, and each expedition was distinguished from the last only by the difference of the numbers which had perished, and agreed alone in the disappointment which had uniformly and without exception followed them all. Fame, riches, and honour had been held out for a series of ages to every individual of those myriads these princes commanded, without having produced one man capable of gratifying the curiosity of his sovereign, or wiping off this stain upon the enterprise and abilities of mankind, or adding this desideratum for the encouragement of geography.

Though a mere private Briton, I triumphed here, in my own mind, over kings and their armies! and every comparison was leading nearer and nearer to presumption, when the place itself where I stood, the object of my vainglory, suggested what depressed my short-lived triumph. I was but a few minutes arrived at the sources of the Nile, through numberless dangers and sufferings, the least of which would have overwhelmed me but for the continual goodness and protection of Providence. I was, however, but then half through my journey, and all those dangers which I had already pa.s.sed awaited me again on my return: I found a despondency gaining ground fast upon me, and blasting the crown of laurels I had too rashly woven for myself."

There is nothing which stamps authenticity more strongly upon Bruce's narrative than the artless simplicity with which he writes; and it is only justice to infer, that he, who so honestly expresses what he feels, must be equally faithful in relating what he sees; for how many more inducements have we to conceal the truth in the one case than in the other! To describe what we see is an easy and no unpleasing task; but to unbosom our feelings is almost always to expose our weakness! But Bruce has no concealments; and his thoughts and sentiments, whatever they are, are always frankly thrown before his reader. How very natural are his feelings on reaching the fountains of the Nile, and what a serious moral do they offer! For a few moments he riots in the extravagance of his triumph, exulting that a Briton had done what kings and armies had been unable to accomplish; and yet he suddenly finds himself overpowered with a melancholy which, at such a moment, might first appear even more singular than any of the very extraordinary scenes which he had previously described; still, as the artless child of nature, how much real cause had he for such feelings! It may appear strange that Bruce should dread, on his return, dangers which, in advancing, he had so carelessly and daringly encountered; but he had then his object to gain: the inestimable prize was before him, to his ardent imagination decked with ten thousand charms, and beckoning to him to advance: when, however, he had reached the goal, he suddenly awoke as from a dream--the vision now vanishes--nothing remains before him but "a hillock of green sod;" and then, with Byron, he is ready to exclaim,

"The lovely toy, so keenly sought, Has lost its charms by being caught."

The Nile was no more an object of anxious curiosity. Bruce had no longer to fly towards its source on the light wings of expectation; but, like the bee laden with its honey, he must now carry his burden to his distant hive; and, thus freighted, his shattered frame worn by fatigue, exhausted by a burning sun, and no longer supported by the excitement of his mind, he naturally trembled at the dangers which threatened to intercept him.

The texture of the human mind is so delicately fine, that it is often affected by causes which to the judgment are imperceptible; and, although Bruce does not declare it, yet it is not improbable that his melancholy sprang mainly from the thought, how little, after all, his discovery was worth the trouble it had cost him. It had, it was true, "baffled the genius, industry, and inquiry of both ancients and moderns for near three thousand years," and it was equally true that "a mere private Briton had triumphed over kings and their armies;" but, after all, did the source of the Nile, in the great scheme of creation, rank as an object worthy of so much attention? What proportion did a puny rill, that might flow through a pipe of two inches in diameter, bear to that vast rolling ma.s.s of waters which gave fertility to Egypt? And again, Was the "hillock of green sod before him" actually the source of that immense river, or did it only nourish one of the innumerable streams which fed the "father of waters?" In short, had not human curiosity been pushed too far, and had it made any other discovery than of its own weakness?