Chapter XIX Kero to Abu-Kuka and back to Bohr
As considerable anxiety was felt as to the fate of the steamer, which had been now three months absent without sending news, Inspector Chaltin decided to send Commandant Renier with a whale-boat to Shambeh to endeavour to obtain information, and very kindly offered me the opportunity of accompanying him, with orders to assist me forward in every possible way. As I was suffering from congestion of the liver, which prevented me from standing up straight, and from a remittent fever which showed no inclination to disappear, I gladly availed myself of the chance, knowing that activity alone would keep the fever in check, and that it was advisable to reach the sea as soon as possible. The camp was beaten up for volunteers to go with me overland either from Bohr or Shambeh, as circumstances might dictate, with the result that one small boy, a Dinka, and a mad criminal in chains, were forthcoming, with which formidable recruits on December 20th, I, an old Egyptian Dervish prisoner with a broken leg, a dozen soldiers, and sundry nondescripts, departed in one of the large whale-boats. I carried away with me many pleasing souvenirs of Inspector Chaltin’s hospitality, and everybody’s kindness and welcome, and also the sincere hope that never should I set eyes on Kero or any other spot on the Upper Nile again.
For several miles the stream follows the bank, then branches off to the east, and for miles and miles loses itself in a labyrinth of isles of weed. In vain we searched for a landing-place, and it was not till 5 p.m. that we found a small plantation of millet with a few wretched Baris stifling in a fog of mosquitoes on a mud-bank. The following day we paddled for hours, seeing nothing but tall reeds, hippo, and sand-spits, and eventually reached the left bank again at a spot called Semsem, owing to the immense plantations of that grain which existed here in the time of the Dervishes. Here there is a bank nearly 6 ft. high, with a large tree tenanted by hundreds of marabouts; to the south-west and north are swamps, and to the east, beyond the river, stretches one vast howling melancholy—reach upon reach of reed and rush, strips of lagoon, and again rush and reed, till on the far horizon a thin purple haze shows the line of the right bank.
The few Baris that we met on the islands informed us that they had come thither because they had been worsted in an encounter with the Dinkas to the north-west. Their villages were very scattered, the huts being dotted in ones and twos throughout their fields of millet. They beat the ground immediately surrounding their huts into a hard concrete, which they kept well swept, and upon which they dry the seeds of the nenuphar preparatory to pounding it into flour. As most of their huts were covered with strings of drying meat and strips of hippo hide, they would appear to be expert hippopotamus hunters. All their canoes are very tiny, and they work them with consummate skill. The amount of fish that they spear is wonderful. It is very sad to think how the Baris have been wiped out by the Dervishes. It will be remembered what a formidable people they were in Sir Samuel Baker’s time; putting thousands of warriors into the field, and owning vast herds of cattle. Now, with the exception of those who took refuge in the Gondokoro hills, they are to all intents and purposes extinct. A few scattered settlements of miserable fisher-folk alone show the extent of the former Bari kingdom. The whole road from Krefi’s kraal to Fort Berkeley is lined with the stone foundations of former Bari villages, and the country is strewn with discarded stones, used for grinding the corn. There is still, according to report, plenty of cattle in the Gondokoro hills, but with that exception and the exception of the few beasts owned by Ali-madi, all those vast herds spoken of by Baker have been looted and destroyed. Fortunately the Dervish wave did not reach further than Dufilé, so that the southern Nile above the rapids was left untouched. The country east of the Nile, except on the actual river-banks, was also practically untouched, hence the Eastern Dinkas escaped their depredations, and still own enormous heads of cattle. The Western Dinkas were less fortunate, as the Dervishes from the Bahr-el-Djebel and the Bahr-el-Ghazal penetrated far into the Niam-Niam country, and were at one time a serious menace to the Congo Free State. This is the only valid excuse for the Belgian occupation of the Nile; but I think the result could have been equally well accomplished by protecting the Congo Nile watershed. Still, the Belgians carried out their expedition with consummate ability, and all honour is due to Inspector Chaltin for his able leadership. It was a gross error of statesmanship that ever permitted them to obtain a footing on the Nile. For, however good their intentions, their methods are not ours; and their presence cannot but tend to unsettle the natives.
The key to the difference between their methods and ours lies in the fundamentally distinct objects for which we acquire territory. We acquire territory for generations yet unborn, trusting thereby to find an outlet for surplus population in the congested days to come. It is to the future benefit of the race that we look. We expect no immediate return. It is as with a man who starts farming, and with an eye to the future buys the call on the surrounding country. But with the Belgians it is quite different. They expect immediate returns. They say this country is no good, we can get no ivory or rubber, why do we stay here? And they are advising the evacuation of the Nile stations. It is as with a man who leases a vast tract of country and cuts down all the timber for sale, hoping thereby to obtain a large and immediate return on his money, ignoring the future, or believing his lease to be merely temporary. The greatest difficulty with which the Belgians have to contend—one that paralyzes all their efforts, however genuine—is the character of the tribes from whom they recruit their soldiers. I myself, having had experience of Manyema, can fully appreciate their difficulties in this respect. The majority of the tribes drawn upon are cannibals, and they are so low in the scale of civilization, and in many cases so vice-sodden from their association with Arabs of the Tippoo Tib fraternity, that it is impossible to make any impression upon them. Most natives can be touched in their pride or sense of the responsibility of a soldier’s position. But these brutes are mere brutes, feeling the whip if it is laid on sufficiently thoroughly, and nothing else. As I pointed out to Inspector Chaltin, if the Congo State would draw its soldiers mainly from the northern tribes, such as the Makrakas and Niam-Niams, they would obtain the raw material that could be trained to a sense of responsibility and self-esteem. The ruffians that they employ at present cannot be trusted for one hour away from the superintendence of a white man. Cases of outrages committed by the mail-carriers on even the natives on the British side of the river are of daily occurrence. I can bear witness to the distress that they caused Inspector Chaltin, but they are inevitable with the existing state of the Free State forces. Another potent factor is the inadequacy of the commissariat arrangements; the Belgians are at present endeavouring to maintain about one thousand five hundred men in a country destitute of supplies. They have to make expeditions ten days’ march into the interior to obtain any supplies at all. And I am convinced by the frequency of the shooting affrays that their methods of obtaining these supplies are not, in our ideas, legitimate. Knowing, too, the difficulty that we have in buying provisions for one hundred men only on the British side, and having seen the trade goods taken out by the Belgians, I am sure that “commandeering” is largely resorted to. Anyhow it is significant that all the natives on the Congo Free State side are retiring further and further inland, while the natives on the British side are rapidly resettling on the river-bank, from which they were driven by the Dervishes. Owing to the difficulty that the Belgians find in obtaining supplies, the ration per man is one small cup of millet a day; out of this he has probably to feed a slave boy, one or two wives, and Heaven knows how many children. Yet they all look sleek and fat. How do they manage it? The conclusion is obvious. When I was hunting with Captain Dugmore, the local natives on our side dare not go alone into the bush, as they said that they would be caught and eaten. Another great source of weakness is the Belgian method of treating their natives. They are too familiar with them, and then, when, as the inevitable result, the natives become impertinent, brutally severe. In treating natives it is indispensable to emphasize the distinction between black and white, yet at the same time to let the native see that you respect him in his own line, but take your own absolute superiority for granted. Hair-splitting justice is a sine qua non; and, I believe, herein lies our success with inferior peoples; it is the one thing that they can understand, and which inspires more respect than anything else.
On the third day we met the first Dinkas, miserable, amphibious objects, eking out a precarious existence on a semi-submerged island; here we camped, in a visible—nay, tangible—atmosphere of rotting fish, mud-caked niggers, marabouts, and kites; and at sunset, with a long-drawn expectant howl the mosquitoes arrived: little ones, big ones, black ones, mottled ones, a whirling, wailing fog of miniature vampires, that kept up the mournful dirge till the cold hour before sunrise, when with a sigh of relief we pushed off in our boat, and after five hours’ paddling reached Bohr, which lies on the right bank at a sudden bend of the river. The original zaribas of the Dervishes and the more substantial earthworks thrown up when they heard of the occupation of Kero are already falling to pieces, and the elephant now takes his midday siesta midst the grinning skulls and calcined bones that are scattered about, all equally regardless of the wanton brutality of the near past. The past fades fast in Africa; yet another year, and the cotton-bush will have hid the mouldering relics of the earthworks, and the white ant will have seen the last grin of those gruesome jaws.
The fort of the Dervishes was of very considerable extent; about five hundred yards by six hundred yards, the long side lying on the river. There are still signs of a primitive effort at drainage, and the enormous quantity of cotton shrubs are a proof of the suitability of the soil to this product could it be brought within touch of a market. There are also unlimited numbers of gum-trees and tamarinds.
We had a few dynamite cartridges with us, and we obtained a good supply of fish by a couple of explosions. Amongst the numerous kinds that floated up to the surface was a curious fish similar to the species that I have mentioned as having been brought to me from the Ruo river near Chiromo. It was a long, eel-like fish, with the eyes covered by skin, the dorsal fin running down to and joining the diminutive tail. The snout was long and tubular, and the flesh lay in long, thin, delicate flakes like the flesh of the skate. Another species had the head and fore-part of the body encased in an adamantine shield armed with dangerous spikes on the back and by the pectoral fins. Its tail was shaped like the tail of a shark, which it resembles in general form, although the mouth was not underneath as with the shark’s. A third species, very common all over this section of the Nile, much prized, and justly so, for the richness of its flesh, is covered with disproportionately enormous scales of circular form; its general form approximates to that of a red mullet. The commonest kind was the gorgeous tiger-fish, which is one of the most beautiful fish that swim.
There are large numbers of natives in the vicinity, and when we had at length convinced them of our pacific intentions, they brought milk and quantities of fish and fowls. It appears that such was the anxiety of the Dervishes in departing that the Dinkas succeeded in relieving them of their cattle. As a protection against mosquitoes the natives smother themselves in wood-ash, and the long lines of tall, gaunt, grey spectres slowly threading their way into the bush, each with a bright, broad-bladed spear, and a small gourd of milk or a decaying fish, present a very curious spectacle. Having stopped for a day to buy supplies, amongst which was a goat, rather less meaty than my hand, whose two hind legs combined would have had no chance against an English mutton-chop, we once more launched forth into the weary waste. We camped successively on a mud-bank tenanted by a few forlorn natives, from whom we obtained a small supply of grain at an exorbitant rate, and on a network of sun-dried hippo-holes whose authors resented our intrusion all night, expressing their disapproval by that strange variety of coughs, bellows, grunts, squeals, and roars peculiar to that misshapen pachyderm. Here we fired the 20 ft. reeds to modify the mosquito plague. They were very dry except at the base, and the terrific sheet of flame, capped by a vast cloud of smoke catching the red lights from the fire, afforded a picture of indescribable grandeur. It thundered away like a mighty sea of molten iron, licking up the country as it sped eastward; and we “smiled loud out” to think of the billions of mosquitoes that were perishing in its line; and the funny old hippo roared in astonishment, blinking their pink eyes at the alarming spectacle.
On the third day, having seen throughout the whole voyage from Bohr one tree at a distance of several miles, we were startled during lunch by the cry of “Steamer!” and rounding a bend in the river we saw the British steam-tub labouring up-stream with a bunch of ribbons that had once been a Jack flying at her stern. She was soon alongside, and we found on board Mr. Mulders, a naturalized American Dutchman, who built the Belgian steamer, in command, and two Belgians, one of whom was confined to his bed by a severe attack of sciatica which necessitated his return to Kero. In answer to our eager inquiries we learnt that they had spent the three months in the sudd, making prodigious efforts to cut a channel, and that eventually, after living waist-deep in water, sleeping on water, eating strange birds and being eaten by mosquitoes, steaming for miles in search of a stick or grain, they had abandoned their steamer, leaving her in charge of a few Askaris, and the whole party, including the French officer from Shambeh, who daringly followed them in a flotilla of native canoes, had started in the boats with the idea of dragging them by main force over the vegetation. The British boat was sent back with the sick men for supplies and mails, and with orders to return and patrol the vicinity of the obstructions at intervals of a week, blowing her whistle and endeavouring to find out whether the party would return, and, if no news had been obtained by the middle of March, to return with the Belgian steamer to Kero.
I consider this successful attempt of Capt. Gage of the 7th Dragoon Guards, and Dr. Milne, as one of the most daring feats ever accomplished in the history of African travel. They suffered indescribable hardships for nearly four months, during all which time they hardly slept one night on land; but were compelled to see the long hours of darkness through, night after night, cramped up in a small boat or lying on the vegetation, tormented by myriads of mosquitoes, and with very little more substantial than native porridge to keep their spirits up. Day after day, nothing but that vast expanse of weed of a hopelessness beyond civilized conception; day after day dragging their boats through and over stinking bogs and spongy masses of weed tenanted by a thousand crocodiles—not knowing where they were, nor, in characteristic British fashion, caring, yet ever keeping their face forward, strong in the knowledge that perseverance must succeed. Their food ran short, and to return was impossible. Had they not come unexpectedly upon Major Peake’s steamers they would probably all have perished. Very few people can ever have any conception of the magnitude and apparent hopelessness of their task. The terror of those stupendous wastes! They have eaten like rust into my very heart, as they must do with all those who launch forth into their seemingly unending desolation.
From information I found it was impossible to land anywhere north of Bohr on the right bank, so decided that the only course open to me was to return to that salubrious resort. Commandant Renier kindly offered to take me on if I thought it worth while to make the attempt; however, it was obviously useless, and with a heavy heart I started back on my tracks. We steamed up-river until we came to the enormous Lake Powendael, which lies between the river and the left bank six hours north of Bohr, and there we anchored till morning, when we sent a boat ashore in search of wood. The lake is about twenty miles by ten, and very shallow, numerous banks covered with ducks, geese, pelicans, and other strange birds showing above the surface. The Dervishes were reported to have sunk their steamer here, but an exhaustive search by the small boat failed to find sufficient water to cover it; probably it was sunk in the channel near Abu-kuka or Shambeh, as these are almost the only spots where it is possible to reach the left bank. The following day we reached Bohr, and as one of my Wa Ruanda who had been sick was finished off by mosquitoes, and my Dinka had bolted with what he could lay his hands on, my numbers were reduced to my four Watonga, two small boys, one Ruanda, the criminal lunatic, and the youth from Kero. With these it was obviously impossible to start, and Commandant Renier kindly offered me some Askaris. Five boys from Sierra Leone turned up in answer to a call for volunteers, and with my numbers swelled to the vast total of fourteen, I made a start on December 30th.