Chapter XX In Dinka-land
The native information as to my route was decidedly discouraging, but knowing by now the value of native information, it was with reasonable hopes of success that I disposed of my bed and other luxuries, and put the first of three hundred miles behind me. As I started late, I camped at the first large village that I met, a distance of six miles from Bohr. Here there was an enormous population living round the extensive lagoons that stretched in all directions, and after the first few minutes of suspense, a brisk trade started in fish and grain, and eventually in milk. On the following day we succeeded in dodging several lagoons, but had to wade up to our necks and cross another nearly a mile wide on a very treacherous layer of vegetation. Skirting the edge of the water, we came on a herd of twenty elephant, and I dropped a good bull with a couple of.303’s in the head. The quantities of goats and sheep possessed by the natives were extraordinary, enormous herds grazing in every direction in the rich vegetation growing in the swamps. After cutting off meat from the elephant, I followed one of the numerous paths which led inland, and meeting hundreds of natives on the way, arrived at a large, scattered village, where we camped.
The main population, which is very dense, lives in the bush at a distance of sometimes several miles from the river, and water is one of the most expensive supplies, though, except in seasons of severe drought, such as when I passed through, there are evidently numerous pools scattered all over the bush. Owing to the drought there was no grain obtainable, and the natives were eating the seeds of a water-plant resembling a crown-artichoke (the nenuphar) and the kernels of the before-mentioned plums. A very affable and intelligent gentleman, who had accompanied me for some miles, offered his services as guide, which I gladly accepted, and after marching for an hour I arrived at another extensive village. Here, as elsewhere, all the huts were isolated and surrounded by a fence of thorns to ward off the lions, which were very numerous. On the path we met hundreds and hundreds of natives, many of enormous stature, 6 ft. 4 to 6 ft. 6, who were going to cut up the elephant, and they were all very friendly. At the village I waited for my boys to close up, but after some time one was still missing, and as boys whom I sent back told me that they could not find him, I packed my people and belongings into one of the thorn-fences, and went back with one soldier and some Dinkas whom I persuaded to accompany me.
About a mile away I met my headman and my guide of the morning returning with the delinquent, who was none other than the criminal lunatic. It appears that he had decided to return home, and, as a preliminary, had distributed my blankets, mosquito-curtain, and clothes amongst the natives. By an extraordinary stroke of luck I recovered them intact, with the trivial exception of one of my two shirts; it was due to my guide, and he and the two men who brought them in were handsomely rewarded; so was the runaway. The flies by day, the mosquitoes by night, rendered life well-nigh impossible, and with visions of impassable swamps, waterless deserts, and famine in front, I heartily wished myself quit of Africa and all its abominations, as I have so often done before, and shall no doubt so often do again. In the afternoon, at the urgent request of many hungry Dinkas, I sallied forth and slew a good bull elephant. I had chased him for several miles, pouring in lead whenever I could see him, till at last he stood. This gave me my chance, and he dropped to a shot in the head. But as I was going up to inspect him, he suddenly rose and sloped away. I fired four shots from the 10-bore at him as he passed. At the fourth he stopped, turned his head towards me, and quite deliberately began to advance, examining carefully with his trunk every palm-bush. There was no unseemly haste about his action. He meant investigating the matter. My position was most uncomfortable, as, if I fired, I should give him my whereabouts, and certainly could not drop him; while, if I moved from the cover of the diminutive palm-tree behind which I was standing, he would immediately see me, and the country was too open to escape. So, for lack of another alternative, I waited. On he came quite quietly, that snake-like trunk writhing round every corner, till there were but two more palm-trees between him and me: out went that trunk once more; he stopped, swayed slowly to and fro, and fell with a mighty crash—dead. His tusks must have weighed about 60 lbs. apiece. It was heart-breaking to leave them lying there, and to think that I had had to kill such a magnificent beast for the sake of his meat. The natives were very much delighted, and evidently thought me a great institution, and for several days afterwards I was pestered with requests to shoot elephant, till I began to wish I had never seen such a beast. They promised to take the tusks of those I had slain to Bohr, and to give them to the steamer when she returned, but I don’t suppose I shall see them again.18
The river, which is here one vast sea of grass, the opposite bank being quite invisible even from an eminence of 20 ft., continually branches inland in the form of long, narrow, meandering lagoons, which, I suppose, are apologies for rivers in this part of the world. As some of them are several miles in length, progress is very difficult, and every moment I dreaded to see a new one. However, I successfully dodged most of them, but had some trouble with one a mile broad, which we eventually passed by wading, the water being in places up to my boys’ necks. At one time my small boy, with my revolver, prismatic compass, and coat, disappeared completely, but was extricated by an obliging Dinka of about 6 ft. 7 in. The prevalence of crocodiles, and a slimy bottom pitted with elephant-holes, did not facilitate matters.
Enormous numbers of Dinkas came to see me beaten by this obstruction; and after two hours’ exhausting conversation in signs, during which I displayed all my remaining trade goods, I had still failed to induce a guide to show me the way across. In native fashion they all wanted to see what I would do. At last, utterly disgusted, I started to wade, intending to swim if we could not manage otherwise, as I dare not waste the two or three days that would be necessary to march round. When they saw that I was quite determined, several came with me and showed me the shallowest path across. They were hugely delighted when I presented them with a Jubilee medal and some beads, but said that they dare not go any further, as the next village was not their village, signifying that if they went they would be speared. A short march soon brought us to the village in question. The natives were rather nervous at first, but soon brought us plenty of rotten fish and a little milk. Here my surviving Ruanda man succumbed to the attacks of the mosquitoes, which defied description; he had been ailing for some time, and being too desperate to keep them off, he was literally sucked dry. It was absolutely necessary to turn in half an hour before sunset and to make all the preparations possible for the night. I piled all my belongings round the edge of my net, and kept a green wood fire burning at each end: then I lay inside, smoked native tobacco (of remarkable pungency), and prayed for morning. As soon as the sun went down they started operations. It was like having a tame whirlwind in one’s tent. They could not possibly have been worse: had there been thousands more it would not have mattered, as not a single one more could have found room on any exposed part of one’s anatomy. Every night two or three hundred contrived to enter my net; I have no idea how. The most pernicious and poisonous kind was a very small black mosquito, that might possibly have penetrated the mesh. I used to turn out in the morning feeling perfectly dazed from the amount of poison that had been injected during the night. The natives of the country obviate the nuisance by lining their huts with a deep layer of burnt cow-dung, in which they lie. They also smear a paste made of this ash and cow’s urine all over their bodies. The women carefully collect all the dung and spread it out to dry. In the evening, when the cattle are brought in to be milked, they burn it. The smoke serves to keep the flies from the beasts during the milking. Then all the ash is collected and placed in the huts.
Following the river, we made good progress till a halt was called by the presence of a stupendous old bull elephant with magnificent tusks, who was dozing on the path. We shouted to him to get out of the way, and he slowly turned round, stalked towards us, and when within fifty yards curled up his trunk, spread his ears, rumbled and came. Crash went every load, and I found myself in a medley of tent and boxes, pots and pans, with a double.303 loaded with soft-nosed bullets, looking at him in amazement; but the shot fortunately turned him, and away he went, screaming and trumpeting, giving my blankets a parting kick as he swung round. This is the only time I have seen one aggressive without due cause. Owing to the absence of water and the quantity of plum-trees, of which they are very fond, there were enormous numbers of elephant along the river-bank, and except where they were on the path we scarcely noticed them, every day passing several herds. I was wild when I thought of the prodigious but futile efforts that Sharp and I made round the volcanoes to find them, when we had porters galore, while now, having no porters, I looked upon them as a nuisance, owing to the delay they caused. Here, and for some days afterwards, close to the line of bush, there was a well-defined river with a stream of one and a half to two miles an hour, which would be navigable for flat-bottomed punts. The numbers of hippo were incredible, literally thousands and thousands. At every two hundred yards there was a great purple bank of twenty, fifty, or a hundred lying with their bodies half exposed, while others were wandering about in every direction on the vegetation, islands, and mud-banks. They practically ignored our presence, though we often passed within ten yards of them. Other game was scarce; I only saw a few waterbuck, bushbuck, and once the track of a giraffe, though plenty of guinea-fowl, and a few ducks and geese; but these were of little use, as, on opening my last box of shot-cartridges, they fell to pieces, being eaten through and through with rust. At one village a native produced a recent number of Black and White, carefully wrapped up in a piece of goatskin, and pointed out with great glee a picture of Dreyfus; as I had no interpreter, and the natives no longer understood my ten words of pigeon Arabic, I have not the remotest conception how it came into this outlandish spot. It was very difficult to obtain supplies, owing to the general famine, so I shot another elephant, which came down to water near camp, and made my boys smoke a three-days’ supply of meat. The following day we saw two large herds of elephant, one mainly composed of good bulls. Some, showing splendid ivories, refused for a long time to leave the path. We were compelled to stone them. Then, making good progress, we camped opposite a ferry, which led to an island where I could see some natives. They quickly collected, and in a few minutes there was a crowd of several hundred, with a solid hedge of spears glinting in the sun. At first they were very doubtful; then, suddenly realizing that it was all right, they swarmed across, yelling and whooping, and in one minute my diminutive camp was one howling black mass. At first things looked rather anxious, but some slaps on the back and a long-winded repetition of arâm, which appears to be the local form of salaam, quickly spread a broad grin over the mass; they brought me a present of about thirty large fish, and there was soon a brisk trade in milk, of which they had an unlimited supply, so that all my men had a good wholesome feed. They proved very friendly, and I much regret that our conversation was strictly limited to arâm, which, however, appears to have considerable significance, being invariably responded to by much grunting and a peculiar clucking noise like the soliloquy of an old hen. Every one in Dinka-land carries a long-bladed spear, a pointed fish-spear, and a club made of a heavy purple wood, while the important gentlemen wear enormous ivory bracelets round their upper arm; strict nudity is the fashion, and a marabout feather in the hair is the essence of chic. They are all beautifully built, having broad shoulders, small waist, good hips, and well-shaped legs. The stature of some is colossal. It was most curious to see how these Dinkas, living as they do in the marshes, approximate to the type of the water-bird. They have much the same walk as a heron, picking their feet up very high, and thrusting them well forward. Their feet are enormous. Their colossal height is, of course, a great advantage in the reed-grown country in which they live. They are the complete antithesis of the pigmy, as the country in which they live is the complete antithesis of the dense forest that is the home of the dwarfs. Many of these strange African peoples form most interesting reading to a student of evolution. The adaptability of a race to its surroundings is wonderful. The favourite pose of a Dinka is in reality the favourite pose of a water-bird. It is most interesting to note that surroundings should produce a similar type in families as remote from one another as birds and men.
My headman woke me in the morning with the pleasing information that my home-sick criminal had disappeared in the night, so the body of my tent had to go by the board, a severe loss, as afterwards transpired. During this day’s march and a part of the next, the population changed entirely, the well-bred Dinkas giving place to a miserable fishing-folk, who are presumably the Woatsch spoken of, as reported to live here, by Sir S. Baker. They are an extraordinary people, of a very low stage of civilization, and showed abject terror at the sight of beads and cloth. I imagine they took me for a god, as each village, man, woman, and child, persisted in escorting me for a mile or so, doing the honours with a deafening chant, and continually pointing to the sun; this, though very flattering, hardly acted as a sedative on my fever, and I was heartily thankful to leave them behind; at one spot there must have been fully five hundred men who formed a solid phalanx round me, and sang at the top of their voices for a distance of two miles. They appeared not to have the remotest conception of barter, and hid their faces when I produced any of my trade goods, so that it was impossible to buy any food. Even during the night small bands approached to a respectful distance and chanted, and at one watering-place about a hundred loathsome hags danced a wild fandango around me, uttering the shrillest cries conceivable, and accompanying them with a measured flap-flap of their long pendant dugs; then, as a grand finale, all threw themselves on their faces at my feet, and with one ear-piercing shriek dispersed into the bush, leaving me under the impression that I was in the Drury Lane pantomime, outside two bottles of champagne. Never in all Africa had I met such embarrassing and impossible people. In the intervals of these trying performances I noticed that the country was slightly more elevated, and that there was a profusion of large trees. This would be the best position for a Government station. But it soon settled down again into the dismal flat of sun-baked clay, thorn, and palm-scrub, which in places recedes, leaving large plains that are flooded in ordinary seasons; here there were numbers of small buck, and I saw a beautiful male Cobus maria. It was a most handsome little beast, and was running with a large herd of other waterbuck, and had the same action as the Uganda kob. I was much disappointed, from lack of porterage, to lose the opportunity of procuring such a rare specimen. The variety of aquatic birds was enormous; amongst others, a beautiful black-and-white ibis; but I looked in vain for Balæniceps rex. The kites, marabouts, and vultures were a great nuisance. On several occasions a kite actually took my dinner out of the frying-pan on the fire while the cook’s back was turned.
After the singing gentry, it was with no little relief that I met some respectable Dinkas again with large herds of cattle; they, too, appeared to be ignorant of the elements of barter, and it was only after an hour’s dumb-crambo business that they brought an antediluvian fish as a feeler; this I immediately bought at great price, and then they realized that there was something in the idea, and brought a good supply. They have absolutely none of the fear of, and respect for, the white man that one finds all over Africa except in the regions of Exeter Hall legislation, but merely regard one as a great joke, and, on the whole, not such a bad sort of fool. They are all the most inveterate, pertinacious, and annoying beggars, and evince the greatest astonishment when one refuses to distribute one’s belongings gratis amongst them. One in particular amused me, a 6 ft. 4 giant, who took a fancy to my last pair of trousers, and when, pleading modesty, I refused his request, he stamped and howled like a spoilt child. He then proceeded to make himself very objectionable, and forced his way into my tent, refused to quit, and brandished his club. This was too much, so I suddenly took him by the scruff of the neck and the seat of where he wished my trousers to be, and, trusting in the superiority of a beef and beer diet over one of fish and thin milk, to his intense amazement, ran him out of camp, and imparted a final impetus with a double-barrelled drop-kick, backed by a pair of iron-shod ammunition boots. I was surprised to find how weak he was, despite his colossal stature. The others took it as a huge joke, and an hour afterwards he returned and behaved himself very well, on the morrow guiding me for some miles.
From here the country changes completely, opening out into a limitless plain, dotted here and there with clumps of borassus palm, growing on small, flat-topped eminences which are the only possible camping-grounds. The channel (which I christened the Gertrude Nile, and which had never hitherto been more than half a mile from the bush) bends away to the west and spreads out into large marshes, though its course is still obvious, and the plain, which is a mass of matted, half-burnt reed, hippo and elephant holes, is scored with numerous channels of water and mud, and towards the bush, which is soon at least fifteen miles from the river, is covered with small ant-hills. There is an enormous population on these plains, with huge herds of cattle and goats, though it is impossible to say where they live, and they are wonderfully clever at hiding their cattle, and light smoke fires to prevent them from making a noise. I marched for hours without seeing a native, but when pitching camp I could see hundreds and hundreds advancing in Indian file from all directions, or if I took a line that led far from water, a group would appear like magic to put me right. There was something uncanny about knowing that one was watched by hundreds without ever seeing more than an occasional individual perched on one leg, the other foot resting on his knee, on the top of a far ant-hill, and looking like a long black stork. The first day that I camped in the plain I was visited by at least a thousand natives.
With the exception of one or two slight fracas with my boys, they were well-behaved, and I bought a large supply of fish; but the second day about fifteen hundred turned up, and having nothing to sell, became very obstreperous. They tried to steal, so I ordered the vicinity of my tent to be cleared, and hustled several fairly roughly. One turned on me, and I knocked him down, cutting my hand badly on his teeth. They took my rough handling very well, but immediately resented any movement of my boys, and one silly young blood danced a dangerous war-dance, brandishing his spear round one of my Askaris, till I broke it for him, and gave him two or three reminders with a heavy hippo-whip. They then became very much excited, and I spent the rest of the afternoon with my hand on my revolver, momentarily expecting a general émeute, when, no doubt, we should have fared badly. Fortunately, there were two respectable old gentlemen who did their best to keep the younger blades quiet. One man bolted with a bit of cloth; a miss-fire from my.303 saved his life, and one of the old gentlemen, not knowing that I had pulled the trigger, signed to me to hold, and had the cloth fetched back; he then succeeded in clearing the camp of about half the turbulent rabble, for which I was very thankful. They then began to slowly file off, but about a hundred, including some of the most noisy ruffians, remained; these I quickly cleared with a heavy whip in one hand and my revolver in the other. They did not like the whip and smiled at the revolver, evidently thinking it a sort of club, till I shot a confiding marabout which was watching the proceedings, when there was a race for first place to less dangerous quarters.
On the march we came upon a belated hippo out on the plain, and there was a great hunt, about two hundred natives chasing him and plunging their spears into his body, till at last, covered with blood, he turned to bay, when I finished him off with a shot in the head.
A few miles further on I shot a Senegal hartebeeste, which gave us a supply of meat. On the third day we succeeded in shaking off our too attentive friends, and although we marched for six hours only made seven miles, owing to the necessity of feeling one’s way round the swamps and the difficult nature of the ground. In many places the burnt vegetation was of the consistency of coke, and severely cut my boys’ feet. The plain still widened, and the Gertrude Nile tended more decidedly towards the west. The bush was no longer visible, but to the west of the swamps there appeared to be a slight ridge with a dense covering of borassus.
We camped near a cattle village, and the people seemed friendly, though, as usual, somewhat turbulent. Two came into the camp after dark, evidently to see if we were on the alert, and were summarily ejected. In the morning about a hundred came and gave considerable trouble, and persisted in following us on the march. I noticed that two or three were closing round each of my boys, while at the same time about twenty were packing behind me. I turned round to drive them off, when my fools of Watonga were suddenly seized with a panic, and, throwing their loads down, ran towards me, shouting, “We are all lost!” Of course that started the game, and my best Congo soldier fell, stabbed to the heart, and two more went down with cracked skulls. I took the chief and his right-hand man with a double barrel, then turning round, found my boy had bolted with my revolver. At the same moment a Dinka hurled his spear at me; I dodged it, but he rushed in and dealt me a swinging blow with his club, which I fortunately warded with my arm, receiving no more damage than a wholesome bruise. I poked my empty gun at his stomach, and he turned, receiving a second afterwards a Dum-dum in the small of his back. Then they broke and ran, my army with eight guns having succeeded in firing two shots. I climbed up a high ant-hill that was close, and could see them watching at about three hundred yards for our next move, which was an unexpected one, for I planted a Dum-dum apparently in the stomach of one of the most obtrusive ruffians, whom I recognized by his great height. They then hurried off and bunched at about seven hundred yards, and another shot, whether effectual or not I could not see, sent them off in all directions, and the battle was finished. It was all over in a shorter time than it takes to tell the tale, but while it lasted it was fairly warm. I never expected to see my happy home again, nor did I feel much happier when I had time to look round. I was alone; at my feet lay my Congo Askari, in the last spasmodic shudder of death; a few yards away lay three more of my men, streams of blood slowly trickling from gaping wounds in their heads. The distorted figures of the three Dinkas, shot at close quarters, were the only other breaks in the dismal monotony of the marsh. I shouted, and slowly—one by one—my miserable curs emerged from patches of reed and bog-holes. Then the three wounded came-to from their swoon; one was very slightly hurt, but the other two were quite mad for days after. It was necessary, therefore, to throw away still more of our belongings. There was only one thing that could go, and that was Sharp’s 60g. Holland and Holland paradox, half of which is peacefully reposing under some scrub, while the other half is at the bottom of a mud-hole. After dressing the heads of the two soldiers, who, with the trifling exception of insanity, did not seem much the worse, one for a gash 2 in. long and down to the bone on his temple, and the other for two gaping holes on the top of his skull, we hurried on, fearing the Dinkas might return en masse. But they contented themselves with watching us, and when I dropped the topmost man of a bunch of five on an ant-hill at six hundred yards, they only made further observations at a distance of a mile.
The news spread like wildfire, for, several miles further on, when passing within half a mile of a village, a band of ten old men came towards me, waving their arms in the air to show that they were unarmed. I went to meet them, and when quite close they started the old singing business, so I hurried off, after treating them to several arâms with an attempted pacific intonation. They then sent milk after me, but I waved them off, thinking it advisable to try by forced marches to break the line of communication.
Shortly afterwards, crossing a swamp on a dangerous bridge of weed burnt to the water level, I saw a specimen of Balæniceps rex standing quite close to me. I was on the point of firing, when a hippo put his head through the bridge at about ten yards, and regretfully I had to shoot him instead for his beef. Half a dozen Dinkas appeared, and, after making a great pacific demonstration, approached and helped to finish him off. He took several shots, and each time I fired they ran to a distance of at least two hundred yards, so they had evidently heard of the morning’s proceedings. After cutting off some meat we continued our march, and it was not till 4 p.m. that I found another place where it was possible to camp, having buried most of my beads on the road to further lighten the loads. For the same purpose, in the evening I made a distribution of cloth and burnt a quantity, together with all my boys’ rags.
The night passed peacefully, though I thought it advisable to put on a double sentry, and on the morrow, weary of swamps, I struck east towards the great burnt plain, and then marched due north, trusting to luck for water. I found numerous holes where the water had not quite dried up, and met many isolated groups of desponding natives spearing a loathsome four-legged reptile or fish, some of which, for lack of more delicate fare, I had to eat; and after marching for about fifteen miles, I again came on extensive swamps which stretched far to the east, and seemed likely to give me much trouble, if not to effectually prevent me going further. Being totally ignorant of the country, and without means of asking the simplest question of the natives, I had been fearing all along that I should arrive at some impassable obstacle. I was very anxious on this point, as it would have been impossible to return. Arriving unexpectedly on the edge of the first pool, I found it one mass of small duck, with a spur-winged goose standing up in the middle. I fired at him with my.303, and he dropped, the bullet striking him with most unusual noise. My boy, wading in, returned not only with the goose, but also two duck. The bullet had struck the goose’s back, removing his intestines and half his breast, then cut off the head and broken the wing of No. 1 duck, and neatly cleaned No. 2. It was a Dum-dum, and must have exploded like a shell. I have often noticed that the bullets with the most penetration, such as the solid, nickel-coated, and the Dum-dum, shatter small animals and birds more effectually than the more expansive bullets, such as the Jeffrey and the lead-nose. This stroke of luck provided a very welcome change to my mournful diet of doubtful fish, occasional milk flavoured with cow’s urine, which is used for washing the dairy utensils, and a strange cheese of my own manufacture.
We camped on the top of a layer of burnt vegetation overlying a morass, and my tent nearly disappeared in the night, while I was seized with furious bouts of vomiting, caused by the quantity of salt in the water. To make matters more cheerful, I discovered that my last two tins of tobacco were mouldy, and I only wished that I could enjoy it as much as the mosquitoes appeared to do, who settled in clouds on the rim of my pipe waiting their turn for a space on my epidermis. Several either climbed inside or bit me through a pair of ammunition boots. I had a severe cold and a stiff arm; my cook boy had dysentery; one of the Congo soldiers had a dreadful foot, which rendered walking a terrible torture; and the two gentlemen with cracked skulls were semi-delirious, so that, on the whole, we were a jovial party, our joviality being materially increased by the impossibility of making a fire, owing to lack of fuel.
In the morning we repeated the same tactics, and after finding plenty of water early in the march, only reached a camping-place at sunset. The country became slightly more cheerful, several trees about the dimensions of a healthy cabbage appearing on the horizon, and I saw the spoor of several giraffe, though where the giraffe themselves contrived to hide was more than I could guess. Our camp was near a large village where there were at least one thousand five hundred head of cattle, besides sheep and goats, and the chief brought me a fine fat bull-calf, which settled the nervous question of food for two days. These people, too, had evidently heard of the fracas, and only approached my camp in small bands, for which I was very grateful.
There were numbers of Dinkas fishing here. Their method is as follows: About a dozen men, each taking a large basket open at the bottom and with a hole at the top, advance in line through the shallow portions of the lagoon. Grasping the basket by the hole at the top, they dash it down on to the mud in front of them. I suppose if they catch a fish inside they pull it out of the hole at the top. I never saw them catch one, although they appeared to be quite hopeful.
The styles of coiffure affected by the Southern Dinkas had now changed, the prevailing fashion being to wear the hair long and frizzed out like a mop, while some of the young exquisites caked it with a white clay brought out to a peak behind. The rambling village, with its groups of figures and long lines of home-coming cattle dimly seen in the smoke of a hundred fires as I approached at sunset, was very picturesque.
Notes
18 They turned up seven years later, the natives having kept them for me till a Government station was established.