Chapter XVI: Heading for Home

Who of us who have lived in Out of the World places do not know the boundless pleasure that is ours in those memorable hours when trammels are cast aside and, task-free and care-free, we are at liberty to set out Homeward Bound! on that dream-journey that has ever been treasured as something finer than gold and oft our solace in the bitterest hours of solitude! And, at Agades, while packing up and preparing to go south, I confess to spending days of exultation, while honest John went about with a perpetual smile on his face: for he too was at last going home!

I left Agades, _en route_ to the south, on 10th August, with a caravan of camels bearing boxes and bales containing my complete collections.

We had no sooner departed than we experienced terrible weather: sandstorms succeeded by thunderstorms and rain, which for the next six days caused me considerable anxiety in my efforts to protect the precious cases of specimens from damage.

On the second day we camped below Tegguidi cliff in a regular land of flood, while thunderstorm raged and rain swept down upon us in torrents, and we spent a miserable night, standing ankle-deep in water, unable to lie down on the ground to sleep.

Next day we were in the centre of lakes of water, and it was impossible for the caravan-camels to travel; indeed, it was not until late morning on the following day that the water subsided sufficiently to permit of foothold for the camels and we were able to load up and, with difficulty, get out of the predicament.

The advent of Rains had set the game moving northward out of the bush-country, and, when travelling between Tegguidi and Abellama, great numbers were seen out on open plains which had been bleak and barren sand-wastes when I had passed northward, but which now contained patches of fresh grass-greenness. Dama Gazelles (_Gazella dama damergouensis_, subsp. nov.: Hausa: Mena) were most numerous, and many large herds of them were seen, and I counted herds of 37, 44, and 84. Dorcas Gazelles (_Gazella dorcas dorcas_: Hausa: Matakundi) were also plentiful, while I also saw a few handsome White Oryx (_Oryx algazel algazel_).

A day later Egyptian kites and marabou, and black and white storks were very common feeding on the abundance of locusts which now infested the green vegetation, the former catching locusts on the wing or swooping to pick them off grass-blades with their well-known dexterity. None of these birds had been present in this locality in the dry season.

On 16th August I reached the lonely post of Aderbissinat, and camped there for two weeks while collecting waterfowl and hunting again for ostrich. Much water had collected in ponds in Aderbissinat valley, and here, and henceforth, territory that had appeared bleak and barren when I passed northward was now green and fresh and well-watered, and completely changed in aspect. Waterfowl were unknown in the territory in the dry season, but now I found them plentiful: geese, ducks, waders; even gulls. But the advent of rain had brought one evil upon Aderbissinat—it was infested with mosquitoes, and much malaria was prevalent among the native soldiers of the Fort.

Aderbissinat, as I have already stated, is on the southern borders of Aïr, and in departing from it on 30th August I bid final farewell to the strange land I had come so far to explore.

In pursuit of my zoological research I calculate my camel-caravan travelled the following distances in Aïr:

Miles
Aderbissinat to Agades 93½
Agades to Tasessat, Baguezan Mountains 79
Tasessat to Timia 49
Timia to Iferouan 77
Iferouan to Aguellal 31
Aguellal to Assodé 40
Assodé to Timia 30
Timia to Tasessat via east side of Baguezan 73
Tasessat to Agades 79
Agades to Aouderas via Tilisdak river 62
Aouderas to Agades via east side of Tarrouaji 93
Agades to Aderbissinat 93½
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Total caravan travel in Aïr 800
Kano to Aderbissinat 303
Aderbissinat to Kano 303
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Total travel with camels 1,406

There is one point I would like to refer to before departing from the subject of Aïr. Aïr has been termed in the past on African maps and in textbooks a great “oasis,” a word which I take it means a “fertile place in a sandy desert”; a concise enough explanation, unless one endows it with a wider, less clearly defined latitude. But it appears to me that such a term applied to Aïr, inferring as it does that the country is fertile, is an imposition on the word that is apt to be misleading to anyone who endeavours to conceive, through the medium of description, the real composition of the country. And I hold this belief because during the dry season _I cannot imagine a more barren country than Aïr_ in all the world: mountain after mountain of bare rock and far-reaching lowlands of nothing but dark gravel-covered ground, bleak as a ploughed field in winter time, except for scant rifts of green along shallow sandy river-beds or close under mountain slopes. Without doubt Aïr is bleak almost as the veriest desert: the one a vast lifeless scene of rock and boulder and pebble, the other great wastes of sand. For my own part, therefore, I am happier and much more sure of my ground when, in speaking of the country, I refer to it nominally as “The mountain land of Aïr,” and am sure that at the present time it has no real claim to be termed an “oasis” unless in the height of a good season of rain.

From Aderbissinat I travelled south to Tanout, where I camped in the hope of securing an ostrich, as I had met with no success in hunting for those birds up till that time. Here, however, owing solely to the keenness of the French officer at the Fort, I managed to secure a very fine adult male ostrich, which proved on later examination to be the same species as is found elsewhere in Africa: _Struthio camelus camelus_. Those birds carry a large quantity of fat, and the task of skinning this specimen, and cleaning and drying the skin free of oily matter with due regard to keeping the rich plumes unsoiled, occupied no less than two days.

Tanout, like everywhere else now, was greatly changed since I had passed north, and I found all the inhabitants in the fields cultivating large areas of millet which had already sprung up almost to man-height. All natives declare it has been a bountiful and wonderful season of rain; which has fallen here earlier than farther north.

North of Tanout the country is uninhabited (except for a few roving Tuaregs) and uncultivated; but on resuming the journey south of this Fort, I thenceforth passed green fields of millet each day.

I need not dwell further on my return journey to Nigeria, via Zinder, for it was henceforth, until our destination was reached, simply routine of continual wearisome grinding travel, while I suffered from fitful attacks of malaria which I had contracted at Aderbissinat.

On 22nd September I re-entered Kano. All that I find recorded in my diary of this, to me, memorable day is: “The trail has ended—the camels have gone and faithful Dogo—and I miss the fretful roar of the beasts, and the soft speech of the Tuaregs, and the glow of the camp-fire. . . . Everyone is most kind in welcoming me safely back.” But it needs no diary to recall the day of my arrival in Kano—when the long trail finished, and riding saddles and pack saddles and a band of sorely tried camels were freed upon the sand from precious loads of specimens which they had carried for many months. That great last day when work was done—the burden and worry of it all thrown to the four winds—the warm handshake of friends awaiting to welcome me in—a day, indeed, rare in a lifetime.

Yes! I was back among my own people at last, had drifted in unannounced like the sandstorms that fitfully bore me company from the north, no one knowing of my coming until a ragged figure was in the streets of the European settlement, where civilisation and railway begin and the desolation of the Sudan ends.

Fourteen hundred miles lay behind me in my camels’ tracks, and all of the months of a year but one since the day I left home.

Assuredly, and perhaps I may be forgiven for thinking so, it was good to be back on British soil, good to hear my own tongue spoken, and good to look on the broad grin on John’s face. “Kano is sweet past Zinder,” he had said long ago, and boarding the steamer at Lagos a few days later, while honest John stood by with tears in his eyes and repeated injunctions that “master” was to hurry to return, I said to him: “Yes, John, what you mean is: ‘Home is sweet past anywhere else on earth—and you are right!’” And I stepped on board, followed by John’s parting cry ringing in my ears: “Sai wata rana” (Farewell till another day).