Chapter VIII: Mistakes and False News (1)

We must now return to our arrival at Say. Although the days there were most of them monotonous enough, they brought their little ups and downs, and we received news now and then, of which, under the circumstances, we naturally sometimes exaggerated the importance. It would be wearisome for me as well as for the reader to give an account of what happened every day during our long winter at Fort Archinard. My notes were written under various difficulties and in very varying moods, reflecting alike my exaggerated low spirits when things went wrong, and my excess of delight when anything occurred to cheer me. Consecutive pages of my journal often contradicted each other, and any one reading them would imagine they were written by two different persons; but this is always the way with travellers, and even Barth himself was not exempt from such fluctuations of mood.

My journal _in extenso_ might serve as an illustration of the psychology of the lie as illustrated amongst the negroes and Mussulmans, but no other useful purpose, so I shall greatly condense it. The reader will still, I hope, get a very good idea of all we went through. If what I quote is rather incoherent, excuses must be made for me, for the news we got was often incoherent enough, and our life at the Fort was rather a puzzle too sometimes, with our alternations of hope and anxiety.

_Friday, April 10._—We are getting on with our fort; our abattis are finished and ready for any attack. (This was written the day after our arrival, whilst our work was still in full swing.)

We put the _Aube_ in dry dock to-day, and it took the united efforts of us all to haul her into position: non-commissioned officers, interpreters, servants, all had to work, and even we white men lent a hand. During the operation of turning her on to her side, the poor _Aube_ might have tumbled to pieces, for all her planks were loose. But she held together yet once more, and, as you will see, we did not have to abandon her until the very end of our voyage.

A new recruit joined us to-day, my journal goes on, so with Suleyman Futanké we have two extra hands now. This was how he came to join us. During the siesta hour we heard a man shouting from the other side of the river, “Agony! agony!” and looking out we saw some one waving a white cloth. We sent the _Dantec_ to fetch him, and when he arrived he kept shouting “Agony! agony!” in a joyful voice. He showed us his cap of European make, evidently expecting us to understand what he meant, but that did not explain the use of the word “agony” so often.

It was Tedian Diarra, a big Bambarra, who had acted as guide to General Dodds in the Dahomey campaign, who solved the mystery at last, and told us that the man had been a porter at Say to the Decœur expedition. He had been taken ill with an attack of some discharge from the joints, and had been left under the care of the chief of the village to be handed over to the first Frenchman who should happen to pass. The poor fellow, whose name was Atchino,—at least that is what we always called him,—was trying to explain to us that he came from the village of Agony on the Wemé. He had feared he should never see his native village again, with its bananas and oil palms; but as soon as he heard of our arrival at Say, he came to take refuge with us. Later I indemnified the man who had taken care of him for the expense he had been put to. We made this Atchino our gardener, and he turned out a very useful fellow, a decided acquisition to our small staff.

_Monday, April 13._—We finished the repairs of the _Aube_. She still let the water in like a strainer, but, as we always said, we were used to that. This expression, “used to it,” was perpetually employed by us all, and it enabled us to bear with philosophy all our troubles. It is, in fact, the expression which gilds the bitterest pills to be swallowed on an exploring expedition, and no one need dream of starting on such a trip as ours if they cannot adopt what we may call the philosophy of use and wont on every occasion. Have twenty-five of us got to pack into a boat about the size of my hand? What does it matter? go on board, you’ll get used to it. Have we got to find place for provisions and things to exchange with the natives when there is no more room? Never mind, ship them all, we shall get used to them when we settle down. Are you in a hostile district? Do rumours of war, of approaching columns of thousands and thousands of natives uniting to attack, trouble you? Never mind, they will turn out not to be so many after all; you are used to these rumours now. You have some dreadful rapids in front of you; you have got to pass them somehow. There are so many, you can’t count them. Shall we draw back? Shall we allow them to check our onward march? No, no, we shall get used to them. If you take them one by one, you will find that each fresh one is not worse than the last, and that the hundredth is just like the first. You get quite used to them, at least if you do not lose your boats and your life too. Which would be the final getting used to things, the last settling down!

A _diavandu_ and his sister one day presented themselves at the camp. These _diavandus_, who are the guides and confidants of the people, are everywhere met with amongst the Fulahs. I don’t know what trade the sister followed, but this _diavandu_ came to offer us his services. He offered to perform all the usual duties of his office on our behalf, and was ready either to sell us milk, or to act as a spy for us. He was a little fellow, of puny, sickly appearance. We made him drink some quinine dissolved in water, and our people told him that the bitter beverage contained all the talismans of the infernal regions. Certainly the witches in _Macbeth_ never made a philtre nastier than our mixture.

Our _diavandu_ swore by the Koran, without any mental reservations, that he would be faithful to us, and our spells and the _grisgris_ we had given him would, he knew, kill him if he were false to us, or betrayed us in any way. Then we sent him to see what was going on in Amadu’s camp. I do not know what eventually became of him, but perhaps if he was false to us the quinine killed him by auto-suggestion; perhaps he was simply suppressed by our enemies, or he may have died a natural death; anyhow we never saw either him or his sister again.

About the same time Pullo Khalifa appeared at Fort Archinard, sent, he said, by Ibrahim Galadio, the friend of Monteil. He began by asking us what we wanted, but it really was he who wanted to get something out of us. We gave him a fine red _chechia_ to replace his own, which was very dirty and greasy. Later we gave him various other presents, but, strange to say, he always came to visit us in his shabbiest garments.

_Thursday, April 23._—In the evening a sudden noise and confusion arose on shore at Talibia, and in our camp we heard dogs barking and women shrieking, whilst the glare of torches lit up the surrounding darkness. Gradually the tumult died away in the distance. Had the Toucouleurs been on the way to surprise us, but finding us prepared given up the idea for the time being? We shouted to Mahmadu Charogne, but no answer came. Mamé then fired a fowling-piece into the air, but nothing came of it. All was silent again, but we passed the night in watching, for we knew that that very morning a man wearing a white _bubu_ had tried to tamper with our coolies, and to frighten away the native traders. He had shouted from the left bank that Amadu had let loose the Silibés upon us, giving them permission to make war on us, and promising them the blessing of Allah if they beat us. No wonder such a coincidence as this put us on our guard.

The next morning Mahmadu explained the uproar of the preceding evening. It had been a question not of an attack on us, but of a wedding amongst the Koyraberos. He told us a marriage is never consummated until the bridegroom has literally torn away his bride from her people, and the rite of abduction, for a regular rite it is, is a very exciting ceremony. When the suitor comes to pay the dowry it is customary for him to give his _fiancée_, it is considered good form for the parents to shrug their shoulders, and pretend that the sum offered is not enough; millet is very dear just now, they say, and they cannot afford wedding festivities worthy of their daughter. They must keep her at home until after the harvest, and so on.

The young man goes home then with bowed head and a general air of depression. When he gets back to his own village he calls his relations and friends together, chooses out the best runners and those who can shout the loudest, and with them returns to seize the object of his choice. He finally succeeds in taking her away in the midst of screams, yells, and the sham curses of her relations, who are really full of joy at the marriage. The so-called ravishers of the dusky bride are pursued to the last tents of the village, and the ceremony concludes, as do all weddings amongst the negroes, with a feast such as that of Gamache immortalized in _Don Quixote_.

Soon after this exciting night our relations with Galadio began, and throughout the winter all our hopes were centred on this man. We counted on him to the very last moment as our best friend, and he really was more reasonable than most of those with whom we had to do during that dreary time. It must not, however, be forgotten that amongst Mussulmans, especially those of the Fulah race, wisdom means profound duplicity. The Fulahs actually have no word to express giving advice, only one which means “give bad advice,” or “betray by counsel given.” The idea is simple enough, and is the first which comes into their heads. So that if by any chance they want for once to translate our expression, “advise you for your own good,” they have to go quite out of the way to make the meaning intelligible, and to use a borrowed word. This is really a reflection of the Fulah character.

Galadio was in this respect a thorough Fulah, although he had Bambarra blood in his veins. His mother was a Fulah, of the Culibaly tribe, and he deceived us perpetually with good words which meant nothing. Still I must do him the justice to add, that he was careful to save us from being involved in open war. Perhaps he saw how fatal that would be to his own influence, or he may have dreaded it as a calamity for the country he was now living in, or for the people over whom he had been set. Anyhow he managed to run with the hare and hunt with the hounds: in other words, to keep in with Amadu and us. He always gave us to understand, that if the worst came to the worst he would at least preserve a strict neutrality, and as a reward for this he got many very fine presents. He was treated almost as the equal of Madidu himself, and he too received from us a velvet saddle embroidered with gold. His messengers were provided with a pass by us, and were received with all due honour, for it was not until quite the end of our stay that the mystery was solved, and Galadio appeared in his true colours. Of his own free will he had concluded a regular treaty with me, a treaty drawn up quite formally in Arabic and French, and which he signed with his own name. He showed, moreover, a very eager wish to enter into relations with Bandiagara.

_April 30._—Khalifa is certainly an extraordinary man. To-night he is to bring to us in a canoe, when the moon is set and all is silence, darkness, and mystery, no less a person than the brother of the chief of Say. We watch all night for the signal agreed upon of the approach of our guests: the lighting of a candle on the bank of the river, but nothing is to be seen. Was the whole thing simply a manœuvre on the part of Pullo to get possession of a box of matches and a candle? Perhaps so, for one of his chief delights when he is in any of our tents,—and he is very often there,—is to strike matches one after the other. He is not the only one with this wasteful habit, Baudry is also afflicted with it, but fortunately we have a sufficient supply even for such vagaries as this, which really are very pardonable in the Sudan.

The next day Khalifa and the brother of the chief of Say actually arrived, after a good deal more fuss and mystery. Even poor little Arabu, who wanted to sleep in the camp, was sent away, weeping bitter tears at the thought that his white brothers did not want him. Very useless were all these precautions, for the brother of the chief of Say, though perhaps rather more polite, was not a bit more sincere than he. Our visitor explained that he had come to see us quite independently, and that his great wish was to make friends with us. What he really wanted, however, was a _bubu_ and a copy of the Koran. As his friendship was of a very doubtful quality, we put off giving the present to another time, when he should have proved his sincerity by getting us a courier to go to Bandiagara. He went off promising to see about it.

We had “big brothers” and “little brothers” _ad infinitum_, but as there is no masculine or feminine in the Fulah language, the Sudanese when they try to speak French muddle up relationships in a most original manner, without any distinction of sex. Abdulaye said to us, with no idea that he was talking nonsense, “My grandfather, who was the wife of the king of Cayor;” and it is no rare thing for one of our men to bring a young girl to us in the hope of getting a present, who is really no relation to him at all, telling us, “Captain, here is my little brother; he has come to say good-morning to you.”

In my journal I find the following note _à propos_ of this confusion of relationships. The grandson of Galadio, who came to see us, told us he had come to pay his respects to his grandfather, and I was that grandfather, because I was the big brother of his other grandfather. The muddle is simply hopeless, but with it all the natives never lose their heads, but keep in view the possible present all the time.

_Sunday, May 3._—The day before yesterday some strange news was brought us by a boy of about fifteen. He had been sent secretly to us by the Kurteye marabout we had seen when we were on our way to Say. A horrible plot was being concocted, he said, for Amadu, remembering the spells of his father, who had been a great magician at Hamda-Allâhi, had made an infallible charm against us. On some copy-book paper, which had evidently been taken off our presents, he had written the most awful curses, imploring Allah seven times over to exterminate the Kaffirs, as he called us, and having washed the paper in water he made a goat drink the decoction thus produced. He then sent that goat to us, thinking we would buy it! But we were warned in time.

The awful _grisgris_ did, in fact, arrive in camp yesterday in the form of a black goat. The poor creature did not look as if she were charged with venom. She was plump not too old, and would make a first-rate stew.

All our men were, however, afraid to have anything to do with her, for in their eyes she was indeed a _grisgris_ endowed with unholy powers by Amadu. The negroes are all superstitious, and their imagination often quite runs away with them. On the other hand, faith is sometimes wanting amongst the Mussulmans. Putting on an air of very great wisdom, therefore, we generously offered two cubits of stuff, worth about threepence-halfpenny, for the goat filled with spells against us, and when the trader who had brought her looked confused, yet almost willing to let us have her at that ridiculous price, we explained to him emphatically that our own _grisgris_, the _tubabu grisgris_, had revealed to us the black designs of Amadu, and we intended to have him and his goat taken back to the other side of the river, _manu militari_, I very nearly said kicked back.

The Kurteye marabout who had warned us, was evidently a friend, unless the whole story was made up to get a present from us. Every evening now regular tornados broke near Say. Up-stream and down-stream, at Djerma and at Gurma, torrents of rain fell constantly, and the lightning flashed from every point of the compass; but, strange to relate, there was no rain at Say itself, and when there is no rain there is no harvest. The report was now spread that we had called down on the village the curse of Allah. The other day Amadu Saturu had publicly recited the _Fatiha_ in the Mosque in the hope of getting rain to fall, and we were told that in the meeting of the notables of the place, the Kurteye marabout had got up and asserted that Say was punished for having given a bad reception to a man sent from God, in other words, to the chief of our expedition, and because Amadu had broken his promise and all his solemn oaths.

Like my uncle Dr. Barth in Sarayamo, I now found myself looked upon as the bringer of storms. He had also been looked upon as a marabout saint, and the _Fatiha_ had been recited to him in the hope that he would open the floodgates of heaven. We, Kaffirs though we were, would soon in our turn be entreated to remove our interdict on the rain so much needed.

_May 7._—Tierno, after many a discussion, has at last succeeded in getting us a courier in the person of an ivory merchant from Hombori. He will take our letters for Bandiagara, an advanced French post of Massina. Aguibu, king of Massina, and under our protection, had sent an agent to Hombori, which is on the road there. Our man would go for 200 francs, 100 payable at Bandiagara and 100 on his return to us. All, therefore, was for some days excitement and bustle in our camp. Maps, reports, letters were being rapidly got ready, and nobody had a moment to spare. Our courier, who did not seem to feel quite sure of his safety, sent to ask whether during his absence his family could go to our friend Galadio, who would protect them. We said yes, of course.

He returned a month later, and said he had not been able to get to Bandiagara. The Habés, who had risen in revolt, had robbed him near the village of Dé. He had only escaped with the greatest difficulty under cover of a tornado, leaving his packet of letters in the hands of our enemies. We think he romanced a good deal on the subject, and I fancy that a good search in Amadu Saturu’s camp would probably result in the discovery of our packet intact, except for being perhaps gnawed by termites.

I had some little doubt on the subject, however, and it is thanks to that doubt that the courier still has his head on his shoulders. I never saw him again.

_May 13._—Great news! We are told by Osman that there are some white men on the Dori side of the river, but no one knows exactly how many. Barges full of white men are floating down-stream; they are now off Ansongo. There is talk of three iron boats like ours; those in them are all for peace, nothing but peace.

_May 16._—Who is our friend Pullo bringing us this morning? Who is that man with him who looks like a Tuareg, dressed in blue Guinea cloth, with a _grisgris_ on his head and a spear and javelin in his hand?

He is a Fulah, the foster-brother of Madidu, with his pockets full of news. Twenty days ago he said he had left his “big brother” to come to Say and sell four oxen for some of the cloth of the district. One of these oxen had died, another had been stolen. What a good opportunity to ask us to give him a _bubu_ to make up for his losses.

Madidu had not known that we were still at Say. Had he done so he would certainly have sent messengers, perhaps even have come himself. He or Djamarata would have visited us, for they had gone down the river as far as Ayoru to chastise Yoba for some want of respect to us, but I am sure I don’t know what.

Our Fulah had heard a rumour of four white men having come to trade on the Niger. Madidu had sent two of his blacksmiths to prepare the way before them, and he had also by this time sent envoys to Timbuktu to confirm the treaty we had made with him. He did not know what had become of that treaty, but anyhow he had returned with his pocket (Heaven only knows the capacity of that pocket) full of knick-knacks and more than one present for Madidu.

The news of the approach of the barges was confirmed during the following days, and in my notes I find the following reference to them:—

_May 17._—A man from Auru who had come to Say told us that at Ansongo there were three hundred armed men and seven or eight whites who had come in peace, nothing but peace, and were coming down the river soon, at least as soon as there should be water enough; at present they were arrested by the shallows. The white men, according to our informer, were French like ourselves.

The armed men have now increased to five hundred, and the white officers to eight, who are waiting for the rising of the river. Really these rumours were beginning to make us anxious. The barges began to assume in our imaginations the appearance of properly manned vessels, and we wondered if there really was anything of importance in the wind. Perhaps a party had been sent out from Timbuktu for Say to make sure that we had plenty of provisions, perhaps even to found a permanent post at the latter place. It would be good policy, but bearing in mind the temper of the natives, the probability was that we should not know anything for certain till we actually saw the French flag at the bend of the river, unless of course Madidu should inform us officially beforehand.

Suppose, however, that a French party had followed us, would they be able to pass? It would indeed be a bold thing to attempt to pass the rapids as we had done, aided as we were by the natives, and with such a skilful captain as Digui, who was used to coolies and knew how to manage them.

_May 17._—The river is still falling, and above our island a little sand-bank is now laid bare, where we were able to leave the _Davoust_ for the repairs the damage done to her at Labezanga rendered necessary. Aided by Abdulaye, I undertook the task of patching her up, and found it a simple affair enough. Fortunately we had a sheet of aluminium in reserve, one only, it is true, but it was all we needed. We bent that sheet to the shape required, we bolted and riveted it all in a few days, and until the water rose again the _Davoust_ remained high and dry in her dock on the sand.

The sand-bank was very useful to our coolies for bathing from, and was also turned to account by the women who came to our market for doing their washing. The deck of the _Davoust_ became the rendezvous of everybody, and no doubt some strange episodes took place on and in the stranded vessel. The flesh is weak, and it was perhaps as well that the chaplain of the mission and his aide-de-camp, Baudry, who had charge of the police department, did not inquire too closely into what went on in the siesta hour.

_May 18._—No storm at Fort Archinard, though it is pouring with rain all round. One would really suppose that we had a _grisgris_ or a fetich which enabled us to control the elements.

Three men came from Galadio to ask us to send him the treaty already alluded to. We gave them two copies of it, one of which was to be returned to us after being signed by Ibrahim if he approved of it. This treaty was a league of friendship between the French and him, agreeing to give mutual aid and protection throughout the whole of the districts subject to him or to the French to all who came in peace, whether as travellers or traders, whether actually the subjects, or only aliens under the protection of either of the contracting parties. Under all circumstances, in fact, and by every means in their power, Galadio and the French agreed to assist each other. Both would do their very utmost to make the road between Uro Galadio and Massina safe. Lastly, Ibrahim promised to make no agreement with any other European without having first consulted the French resident at Bandiagara.

Later the duplicate of this convention came back to us signed in beautifully clear and firm Arabic writing, after having been read and discussed at a general meeting of native notables. This valuable treaty had not been obtained by lavish presents, for we had already begun to practise economy, in view of the probable heavy expenses of the return journey, and we had warned Ibrahim that he must not expect costly gifts.

The convention was simple, direct, and easy to be understood by all. It was in my opinion the most complete treaty which could possibly be drawn up in these parts, and after its signature we had a right to rely upon the absolute good faith of the other party to the contract, and to consider him our friend and our ally. You will see presently how much it was worth, and judge from that of the value of all treaties with negro chiefs, especially of those left with them, the contents of which have never been explained.

Another great piece of news! A Messiah has risen up, by name Bokar Ahmidu Collado, who is winning converts on the Liptako to the west of our encampment, between Say and Bandiagara. He has already had considerable success, and has received investiture from Sokoto with a banner, giving him the right to make war on the French. He went to Amadu Cheiku to ask for reinforcements, but that chief only gave him his blessing in a very frigid manner, saying, “Believe me, the time will come, but it is not yet come, for driving the white men from the Sudan, the land of our fathers. There is a country in the East bounded by a big creek (the Tchad?), and they must spread there first. As for me, I know the French too well to care to rub shoulders with them.”

Bokar Ahmidu Collado then went to Niugui, chief of the Cheibatan Tuaregs, and asked him to give him some men, but Niugui said to him, “Madidu will make war on me if I help against his friends the French.” “You have no faith,” answered the Messiah; “I will make you believe,” and he gave him a consecrated drink. Then they say Niugui saw, in the air above him, crowds of combatants armed with rifles and swords, with many mounted men, all following the Messiah and the triumphant Crescent. He still hesitates, however, on account of his salutary fear of Madidu.

Bokar Ahmidu Collado comes from a village of Farimaké, near Tioko. One of Galadio’s people from Wagniaka (Massina) knew him when he was quite young. “A poor fool that Collado,” he said to us, “who has not even been to Mecca, yet sets up for being a Messiah!” Moral: No man is a prophet in his own country.

Something special seemed to be going on all through the latter part of May; all manner of news pouring in, some of it really seeming very likely to be true. The barges at Ansongo constantly increased in number. The Toucouleur chief Koly Mody was about to abandon the cause of Amadu. Diafara, a man from Kunari, which had remained true to Agibu, was on the west of our camp to levy tribute in Hombari, to found a post at Dori, or to lead a very strong force of French and their allies into the district of Mossi. The people of Bussuma had been defeated and driven away, they had taken refuge at Wagadugu, which last-named rumour seemed to us most likely to be true, for it behoved the French Sudan to avenge the injury inflicted on French troops the previous year by the so-called _Naba_ of the _Nabas_. What, however, were we to think of all the contradictory rumours which sprung up like mushrooms and grew like snowballs, to melt away almost as quickly as they took shape?

_May 20._—A new visitor to-day, original if nothing more. Like every one else, he has his budget of news, and told us about the French column which is to operate in Mossi. We are beginning to attach very little importance to all this gossip. Our guest is a heathen, or, as Suleyman translates it, a Christian, explaining that he must be a co-religionist of ours, in that he has customs peculiar to the Christians—drinks _dolo_ and gets drunk on it, of which he is very proud. He therefore belongs to our family, and that is why he has come to see his big brother, the commandant!

He calls himself a sorcerer, and seems a little off his head. Anyhow he talks great nonsense. Whilst we were questioning him he kept fingering a little goat-skin bag, out of which, when we were quite weary of his stupid replies, he drew a small phial full of oil of pimento, and a number of tiny little pots—the whole paraphernalia of magic, in fact. Having set out all these odds and ends on the ground, he proceeded to make some _grisgris_ to protect the hut in which he was from bullets.

He began by smoothing the sand of the floor with his hand, to bring good-fortune, he said, and he then skilfully drew with his finger in the sand four parallel lines forming parallelograms. These he combined two by two, three by three, four by four, and so on, reciting invocations all the time. He then rubbed all the first designs out and began again with fresh invocations, making the lines sometimes vertical, sometimes of other shapes.

With a very solemn face, as if he were celebrating mass, he now drew forth a little satchel of ancient paper, written all over in Arabic by some marabout, and muttered some words, evidently learnt by heart, for he certainly could not read. At last, with an expression as serious as that of the Sphinx of the desert, he announced: “Hitherto you have had none but enemies in the land, no one in the whole country is your friend. Beware of the marabouts! Beware, above all, of one particular marabout! There is a young man ill here (this was Bluzet, who was just then lying down with an attack of fever), but it will not be much. You must sacrifice a white chicken for his recovery; have it broiled, and give it to the poor: this will conciliate the favour of the great prophet Nabi Mussa, or Moses. It will be best to give your charity to children. Then all the _grisgris_ of the negroes and the marabouts will avail nothing against you. But beware, above all, on account of your men. If you cut away all the roots of a tree it falls. In the same way, if they take away your negroes, all will be over with you. Now I have come to give you a _grisgris_ for them, which will protect them from all spells, and even from _cortés_ and other evils. I can even give you a _corté_ myself, which will kill a man if you only throw the tiniest bit of it in his face.”

The _corté_ is, in fact, the most terrible of all spells amongst the negroes. It is said to consist of a powder which slays from a distance. The natives say that if thrown from some miles off the man it touches dies, and the truth seems to be, that the sorcerers have the secret of a very subtle poison, which produces terrible disorders in those touched by it.

As a matter of course, we did not accept the offers of a _corté_ or counter _corté_ from Djula, but to give him an idea of the mischief we could do if we chose, I gave him a five-franc piece in a bowl of galvanized water, as I had the son of the chief of the Kel Temulai. I then told him to go to Mossi and have a look round there to see what would happen. He is a crazy old fellow enough, but I have been told that sorcerers have more influence over the Mossi and their _nabas_, as they call their chiefs, than those who are in the full possession of their senses. He was willing to go, and when the Tabaski was over he would come back _inch Allah_, with envoys from Bilinga or Wagadugu.

Now Bilinga is eleven days’ march from Say, and eight days after he left us the old fellow came back pretending he had gone all the way. He had really never gone beyond Say, and brought us all sorts of silly news only, so Digui took him by the shoulders and quite gently turned him out of the camp.

_May 20._—As the so-called Tabaski fête approached, our visitors and the news they brought were greatly on the increase. Pullo, Osman, and the minor ambassadors vied with each other in the ingenuity of their inventions. The fact was, they all wanted to have new _bubus_ for the festive occasion, some money, some coppers to buy kola nuts, etc., not to speak of new bright-coloured undergarments for their wives. “What would the village people say, commandant,” they would urge, “if I, who every one knows to be a friend of the French, should cut anything but a good figure?”

Some few, however, were actuated by something more than a wish for presents on their visits to us. They were rather afraid of the column which was said to be operating in Mossi. Osman brought the chief trader of the market to us, a Wagobé, belonging therefore to the Sarracolais tribe, an intelligent man with a frank, open expression. His pretext for coming to see us was that he had a slave to sell, but he knew well enough that we never bought slaves. She had been brought from Samory’s camp, where prices for such merchandise were very low, there being a perfect glut of slaves in the market, and at the same time a scarcity of grain. The young girl, who was in good health, with all her teeth intact, had been bought for the modest sum of 10,000 cowries, about 10 francs, or the value of two sheep, or of a sack of millet. According to her owner, prices were much higher at Say, where a first-class female slave, that is to say, a young virgin, would fetch 200,000 cowries, whilst a strong young man was worth 150,000. Less valuable captives were cheaper, and some of the fifth-class went for as little as 100,000 cowries. These are of course commercial quotations, but as a matter of fact now and then a few are sold for as low a sum as 25,000 cowries.

The chief of the market brought us kola nuts, honey, rice, and milk. He mourned over the evil days which had fallen on Say. “All our roads,” he said, “are blocked on the north by the Tuaregs, on the west by the heathen Mossi, on the south by the Dendi, and on the east by the Kebbi and the Mauri. It is only rarely that a few caravans with a strong escort can get as far as Sansan Haussa, by way of Sergoe. A whole fleet of canoes, which went down to Yauri last year, had remained there for fear of the Dendikobés. The boatmen had founded a village there, and were now lost to Say. Then, besides that, things were not going as could be wished by those of the true faith. The Empire of Sokoto and its Emir were between two fires, with Rabba on one side and the Serki Kebbi on the other.”

When Osman, returning to the charge, spoke to us again about the column supposed to have gone to Mossi, I said to him—“You see, the Naba of Wagadugu gave the same kind of reception to the Frenchmen who went to visit him last year as Amadu Saturu has given to us at Say. So the chief of the whites has given orders that his village should be destroyed, and it will be your turn next year, I hope.”

They then went away plunged in reflection.

Visitors are all the fashion just now. On Thursday, May 21, a young man came to our market wearing a blue _bubu_ trimmed with blue and red printed calico, such as is made at Rouen. We had long known the owner of this costume, and when we recognized him we were ready to fling ourselves into his arms.

He at least was a genuine person, the son of the chief of Fafa, who had been such a good guide to us when we were amongst the rapids, the son of that old Fulah who wished to interpose his own body between me and Djamarata to protect me from harm. He came from Djamarata now, and we had no reason to doubt his good faith at least. He came, he said, to inquire after the health of the commandant, and to ask what state our boats were in after passing over the terrible rocks, etc. Djamarata assured us of his friendship. True, when we first arrived in his country the Tuaregs had been on their guard, but now that they were convinced of our pacific intentions, and saw that we molested no one, the Awellimiden were quite on our side, and had full confidence in us.

When our friend left us his goat-skin bag was full of presents. Here at least was one native who deserved well of us, for he had made a twenty days’ march to come and give us his master’s compliments.

_May 24, Whitsunday._—It appears that the Mossi column is making good progress, at least we gather that it is, from the improved bearing towards us of the natives, but lies and all manner of false reports are still the order of the day.

Yesterday the fête of the Tabaski, or the Feast of the Sheep, was celebrated, which is not, it appears, of Mahommedan origin. The village of Talibia sent envoys to make friends in our camp, and some wretched-looking natives danced a _tam-tam_. Others came to beg, and to all the poor creatures we gave something—a little salt, a mechanical toy, a cubit of cloth, or some other trifles. I also distributed a little money amongst our own men.

A regular descent was made on the camp by sellers of kola nuts, _grisgris_, etc. A number of women also came, amongst whom was a Toucouleur girl named Fanta. She said she had come to see if her brother was with us, but I suspect her motives were not quite so innocent as that. In the end, this girl became a dangerous enemy to us. After warning her off again and again, we at last had literally to drive her out of the camp. If we had not done so I expect she would have persuaded some of our men to desert, so great was her influence over them.

Fanta was really a very reckless person, and is supposed to have poisoned a man whom she had persuaded to treason, but who had failed to achieve the result she had hoped by that treason. The native chiefs know only too well how easy it is to seduce men from their allegiance to travellers with the aid of some pretty fellow-countrywoman of theirs, and it is necessary to be always on guard against this sort of thing.

In the present case the Tabaski fête passed over quietly enough. We regaled our visitors with a little apparently impromptu fusillade, which we had really agreed upon beforehand amongst ourselves, giving the Koyraberos from Talibia a demonstration of the penetrating force of our bullets on the branches of some trees. “_Bissimilaye! Bissimilaye!_” cried old Suleyman Foutanké, hardly able to believe his own eyes.

_June._—No rain at Say yet! It really looks as if we had cast a spell upon the place, the more so that the want of rain was accompanied by a plague of locusts. We had invoked the aid of Moses against our enemies, and now, like him, I had brought upon the natives of the land of our exile clouds of locusts to devour all green things. The people were in despair. A drought and locusts together meant perhaps the complete destruction of the harvest. But there is always some good in everything, and the Koyraberos flung themselves, armed with sticks, into the thickest part of the swarms, beating down the insects, which were picked up by the children, and stowed away in their _bubus_. Fried and seasoned, the locusts made a very appetizing change of diet.

Our men from Senegal, however, made great fun of those who ate them; they were themselves much too civilized for such food as that. “The Koyraberos,” Digui said to me, “are regular savages!” and it was worth something to hear the tone of contempt in which he gave utterance to this insulting remark.

The chief of Kibtachi, a big Haussa village down-stream, sent us various presents and made many promises to us. He also begged us most politely to visit him when we passed later. “Why,” he said, “did you not come to Kibtachi to begin with, instead of stopping with Saturu, who wishes you no good?” Talking of presents, Galadio, when he returned the signed treaty, sent a wonderful collection of gifts, including kola nuts, symbolic of friendship, with calabashes full of honey, and bags of baobab flour, the medicinal effect of the two being totally different, the honey acting as an emollient, the flour as an irritant.

The chiefs of the Sidibés, Kurteyes, Sillabés, etc., all vied with each other now in sending messengers to us to assure us of their friendship, and yet another notable, chief of the Torodi Fulahs, asked us to make just such a treaty with him as we had with his friend Galadio. “Galadio and I,” he wrote to us, “are together like two teeth of the same comb!” A happy metaphor indeed, a regular literary gem!

Yes, indeed, they all belonged to the same comb, these native friends of ours, and as yet we did not suspect how very dirty that comb was.

Presently we heard of a split amongst the Toucouleurs, and that the Gaberos had had enough of Amadu. They sent, in fact, to beg me to intercede for them with my friend Madidu, and to get him to let them return to his country. There were more fresh quarrels too between the Toucouleurs and the Sidibés. Amadu had put a Hadji marabout of the Sidibé tribe in irons, and by way of reprisal the Sidibés had seized three Toucouleurs at Yuli, opposite Dunga. The hostile tribes were, in fact, snarling at each other from the two banks of the river, and showing their teeth rather like porcelain dogs, only in this case the dogs were jet black.

The Sidibés, according to Pullo Khalifa and the son of their chief, who came to us with him, were disposed to throw themselves upon our protection. If, they said, Amadu had not set their Hadji free in three days, the Sidibé women with their flocks and herds would be placed under the protection of our guns!

Would this be the spark which would set fire to the gun-powder? Hurrah! If it were, our protectorate would become an effective one; we should have a fine _rôle_ to play; that of intervening in favour of a native coalition against the parasitical Toucouleurs, the hereditary enemies of French influence in Africa.

All, then, was tending in the direction of our hopes. A good job too, for the river was falling, falling, falling. Our island was completely transformed, for a big isthmus of sand and flints now united it to the right bank. Hundreds of determined men, or of men driven in from behind, might pour into the camp any night now, as into some popular fair.

Reassured though we were by what we heard of the political condition of the country, and by all these protestations of friendship, we yet awaited the 14th July with impatience, and we celebrated its passing as joyfully as possible when it came at last. No sooner was it over, however, when slowly and quietly, and at first very doubtfully, certain bad news filtered through, which gradually gained certainty.

For once, indeed, there was no doubt about the evil tidings, which were diametrically opposed to all that the politeness of the natives would have had us believe. The whole country, Toucouleurs, people of Say, of Kibtachi, and of Torodi, with the Sidibés, the Gaberos and others, had combined against us and were marching to attack us.

Naturally no one had thought fit to warn us. It was Osman, poor fellow, who, in spite of himself, put us on the scent, and gave us the alarm. He meant to play the part of an angel of light, but, as is often the case, his _rôle_ was really quite the reverse.

One fine day he said to us point-blank, “There is no cause for anxiety now, you can sleep with both ears shut, for Amadu Saturu and Amadu Cheiku are both most favourably disposed towards you.”

“Why do you tell us that, Osman?” I asked. “I feel sure you have some very good reason, but take care what you say. You are lying, I know. Amadu is really trying to pick a quarrel with us.”

“_Bissimilaye!_ not a bit of it,” was the reply. “He is only getting his column together to move against Djermakoy.”

I had never been told a word about that expedition, and the fact seemed strange, so I said—

“Osman! you are telling a lie. What column is going against Djermakoy?”

Then with much hesitation, and turning as pale as a negro can when he has got himself into a hobble, he began to tell us how all the people of Say, and the Toucouleurs, in fact, all the natives, had united to march on Dentchendu, a big village of Djerma, the very centre of the Futanké agitation, but that before actually starting they were all coming to Say to receive the benediction of Saturu, who would recite the Fatiha to the glory of the Prophet on the tomb of his ancestor, Mohammed Djebbo, who had founded the town.

I understood at once, and really the plan to surprise us had not been at all badly thought out. “Well, Osman,” I said, “you will warn Modido that if the Toucouleur column camps in or near his village, in which he declined to receive us, it will mean war with us.” “Oh!” cried Osman in his dismay, “the whole column will not come, only the chiefs, with Ahmidu Ahmadu, the leader of the troops.”

Then he tried to undo what he had done, and told quite a different story, saying he had been mistaken; Saturu would go and give the benediction to the column on the bank near Djerma.

We were warned now; a big column really was assembled. We made discreet inquiries on every side, and all the news we heard confirmed the fact. Pullo himself now ventured to be explicit, and told us to be on our guard.

The palm of deception and treason must be given in this case to a Fulah from Massina, called Ahmadu Mumi, but we were the ones to reap the benefit of his evil-doing. Born in the village of Mumi, near Mopti, on the Niger, all his people had been killed by the Toucouleurs when El Hadj Omar won his great victory. He himself had been taken prisoner, and dragged behind the horses of his captors to Say, where, bruised, bleeding, and in rags, he was sold. Of course, as a natural consequence, he hated the Toucouleurs with an intense and bitter hatred, but he was later bought by the chief of Say, who set him free. He became the confidant and friend of his liberator, so that, as he explained to us, he knew better than any one else what was going on, and was therefore better able to betray Saturu.

He did betray him too, for a high price, revealing to us all the preparations our enemies were making against us. Amadu, it appeared, aided by the chief of Say, had rallied every one all round to his standard, and to win over the lukewarm, vague hints were thrown out of going to get slaves amongst the Djermas on the left and the Gurmas on the right bank of the river. All would meet at Say for the benediction, and then at the critical moment, Madidu, pretending to be suddenly supernaturally inspired, would exclaim—“Listen! what says the prophet? Leave the Gurmas and the Djermas alone. It is against the infidels, the Kaffirs of Talibia, that you must march. It is their destruction which will please God!” Then every one would be carried away by enthusiasm, and urging each other on, would rush in their fanatical zeal to the attack of our little island.

None but the chiefs knew of the plot, Ahmadu Mumi told us, but he had been so placed that he could tell what they were all thinking of. Double traitor that he was, he used to go backwards and forwards from Say to Dunga, and from Dunga to Fort Archinard, spying and taking bribes now from one side, now from the other. When with us he would say all he wanted was revenge on the Toucouleurs.

Well, we merely said “All right!” and set to work with feverish activity to double our abattis, which the tornados had somewhat damaged, and to build new loopholed redoubts round the camp. On July 14 we were all eagerly engaged in preparing for the defence of our fort, and I don’t suppose any one gave a thought to the review at Longchamps, or to the public balls going on in Paris at this festive time. As in all crises and times of difficulties, our coolies rose to the occasion, and showed themselves more full of zeal, better disciplined, more thoroughly in hand under their French officers than they had ever done before, so that when we saw the smoke from the camp of the allies rising up above Say, we were all perfectly ready for the attack.