Chapter XXVIII: To the Albert Edward Nyanza (1)

Description of the road from Bundegunda--We get a good view of the
twin peaks in the Ruwenzori range--March to Utinda--The Pasha’s
officers abuse the officer in command: which compels a severe
order--Kaibuga urges hostilities against Uhobo--Brush with the
enemy: Casati’s servant, Akili, killed--Description of the
Ruwenzori range as seen from Nboga--Mr. Jephson still an
invalid--The little stowaway named Tukabi--Captain Nelson examines
the Semliki for a suitable ferry--We reach the Semliki river:
description of the same--Uledi and Saat Tato swim across the river
for a canoe--A band of Wara Sura attack us--All safely ferried
across the river--In the Awamba forest--Our progress to
Baki-kundi--We come across a few Baundwé, forest aborigines--The
Egyptians and their followers--Conversation with Emin
Pasha--Unexplored parts of Africa--Abundance of food--Ruwenzori
from the spur of Ugarama--Two native women give us local
information--We find an old man at Batuma--At Bukoko we encounter
some Manyuema raiders: their explanation--From Bakokoro we arrive
at Mtarega, the foot of the Ruwenzori range--Lieut. Stairs with
some men explore the Mountains of the Moon--Report of Lieut.
Stairs’ experiences--The Semliki valley--The Rami-lulu valley--The
perfection of a tropical forest--Villages in the clearing of
Ulegga--Submission of a Ukonju chief--Local knowledge from our
friends the Wakonju--Description of the Wakonju tribe--The Semliki
river--View of Ruwenzori from Mtsora--We enter Muhamba, and next
day camp at Karimi--Capture of some fat cattle of Rukara’s--The
Zeriba of Rusessé--Our first view of Lake Albert Edward Nyanza.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 9.

Bundegunda.]

The road to the south, which we now pursued on moving from Bundegunda on the 9th May, skirted the western base of that great bulk of mountain land inhabited by the Balegga, and the Bandussuma of Mazamboni. It crosses cultivated tracts devoted to beans and luxuriant sweet potatoes, yams, colocassia, and sugar-cane; it is hedged thickly with glorious plantains; it is flanked by humble villages, with cone roofs; it is buried under miniature wildernesses of reedy cane; it dips down to clear, limpid rillets, just escaped from the bosom of the tall mountains soaring above; it winds in snaky curves over rich flats of pasture; it runs close to the foot of steep slopes, and then starts off along smoothly-descending spurs. About five miles off to the westward, or on our right hand, the forest, black as night, keeps company with us. We are seldom out of sight of the advancing capes and receding bays of the dark, eternal mass. On our left, in intimate neighbourhood, rise the mighty slopes, steeply receding upward into the greyish blue of an uncertain sky, and far away, in solemn lines, like a colossal battalion of mountains, is ranged the series between each of which are deep ravines, narrow and far-reaching recessions, formed by ceaselessly-murmuring streams.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 10.

Utinda.]

On the morning of this day, Ruwenzori came out from its mantle of clouds and vapours, and showed its groups of peaks and spiny ridges resplendent with shining white snow; the blue beyond was as that of ocean--a purified and spotless translucence. Far to the west, like huge double epaulettes, rose the twin peaks which I had seen in December, 1887, and from the sunk ridge below the easternmost rose sharply the dominating and unsurpassed heights of Ruwenzori proper, a congregation of hoary heads, brilliant in white raiment; and away to the east extended a roughened ridge, like a great vertebra--peak and saddle, isolated mount and hollow, until it passed out of sight behind the distant extremities of the range we were then skirting. And while in constant view of it, as I sat up in the hide hammock suspended between two men, my plan of our future route was sketched. For to the west of the twin peaks, Ruwenzori range either dropped suddenly into a plain or sheered away S.S.W. What I saw was either an angle of a mass or the western extremity. We would aim for the base of the twin peaks, and pursue our course southerly to lands unknown, along the base-line. The guides--for we had many now--pointed with their spears vaguely, and cried out “Ukonju” and (giving a little dab into the air with their spear-points) “Usongora,” meaning that Ukonju was what we saw, and beyond it lay Usongora, invisible.

After halting at Ujungwa we rose next day to march to Utinda, seven miles off. The valley between the Balegga Mountains and the forest seemed to narrow, and the path threatened to take us into troublous depths of spear-grass brakes and fens nourishing reed-cane, when, after crossing the Chai and Aturo streams, and several gushing rivulets, it ran up a lengthy spur of the Balegga Mountains, and took us to a height of 500 feet above the valley.

From this altitude we observed that we had narrowly escaped being buried in the forest again, for it had advanced behind the spur right across the valley, and occupied every inch of lowland. Within its sombre depths the Chai and Aturo rivers and other streams united their currents to form a respectable tributary of the Ituri river.

A little to our left, as we looked south, was a deep basin parted into numerous small arable plots, appertaining to the district of Utinda. Every ravine and hollow seemed choked by long, straggling plantations of plantain and banana. The beans and Indian corn were late, for they were not more than five inches high, while at Bundegunda the crops were quite four feet high and in flower.

The Egyptians reached camp four hours after the advance guard, and the officer in charge of the rear complained bitterly of the abuse that he had received from the Pasha’s officers, some of them jeering at him, making mouths, and daring him to drive them along, which compelled me to issue the following order:--

“Whereas the Expedition must necessarily proceed slowly, and
shorten its marches, owing to the promise that we have given Selim
Bey, and to the fact that the Egyptians, the Soudanese and their
followers are as yet unaccustomed to hard travel and fatigue, and
to the fact that I, their guide, am physically too weak to endure
more than two or three hours’ exertion of any kind, the officers
will please exercise the greatest patience and forbearance, but
they must on no account forget the duties peculiar to the
rear-guard. They will permit no straggling by the wayside, no
looting of villages, no indiscriminate pillaging of plantations, no
marauding upon any excuse; and upon any insolence, whether from
Egyptian officer, private soldier, or follower, the officer in
charge will call his guard and bind the offender, and bring him to
me for punishment. If any violence is offered it must be met by
such violence as will instantly crush it.”

From the basin of Utinda we ascended past a few cones dominating a ridge which enclosed it on the south and south-east, and, after surmounting two other ridges separated by well-watered valleys, we arrived on the airy upland of grassy Uhobo, 4,900 feet above sea-level. A little later Kaibuga entered into our camp. This chief was of the Wahuma settled among the Balegga, whose grounds overlooked the plain of Kavalli and the south end of the Nyanza, and whose territory extended to the debouchure of the Semliki. He urged active hostilities, as Uhobo belonged to Kabba Rega. Naturally we smiled at this, as we had not seen the semblance of a single enemy, though it is true that the Uhobo natives had disappeared from view at our approach. At this instant a picquet signalled the advance of a column of Kabba Rega’s people armed with guns, and two companies of Zanzibaris were mustered by Lieutenant Stairs and Captain Nelson, the latter of whom had so improved by the diet of Kavalli and Mazamboni that he was fit for any work.

After proceeding about two miles they met the small party of the Pasha’s people carrying the dead body of Captain Casati’s faithful servant Okili, for whom Casati entertained deep affection. He had been shot through the forehead by a rifle-ball. It appears that while the Soudanese had been bathing in a stream south of Uhobo, the column of the Wara Sura happened to be observed marching in a pretty disciplined manner with two flags towards them, and a few minutes later would have surprised them, but the whole party hastily dressed, and, snatching their rifles, opened fire on them. Three of the enemy fell dead, and Okili was shot by the fire that was returned. On the approach of the Zanzibaris the Wara Sura fled, and were pursued for three miles, but no further casualties occurred.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 12.

Mboga.]

A severe rainstorm, lasting seven hours, fell during the night, and in the morning when marching to Mboga we were involved in cloud and mist. As the day advanced, however, Ruwenzori thrust its immense body into view far above the vapours rising from the low Semliki Valley, and every now and then the topmost cones gathered the cloudy fleeces and veiled their white heads from view. As we advanced nearer each day to the range we were surprised that we were not able to discover so much snow as we had seen at Kavalli, but on reflection it became evident that the line of snow became obscured from view by an advanced ridge, which the nearer we approached impeded the view the more. We observed also that the lofty mountain range assumed the form of a crescent; Ajif Mountain forming the northern end and the Twin Peak shoulder to the west the other end; and further, that beyond Ajif, which I estimated at about 6,000 feet above the sea, there was a steady and perceptible rise to the snow line, and then a sudden uplift to the proud height of from 2,000 to 5,000 feet higher, most of which was under snow.

This place of Mboga, were it in any other country than under the Equator in Mid Africa, would afford a splendid view of this unique range. From the Twin Peak angle and up to thirty miles N.N.E. of Ajif the whole of it ought to be in sight in any other clime, but the mist escapes in continuous series or strata from the valley beneath, and floats in fleeting evanescent masses, quite obscuring every other minute the entire outlines. Between this point and the Ruwenzori range lies the deep sunken valley of the Semliki, from twelve to twenty-five miles wide. From a point abreast of Mboga to the edge of the Lake the first glance of it suggests a lake. Indeed, the officers supposed it to be the Albert Lake, and the Soudanese women were immoderately joyous at the sight, and relieved their feelings by shrill lu-lu-lus; but a binocular revealed pale brown grass in its sere, with tiny bushes dotting the plain. To our right, as we looked down the depth of 2,500 feet, there was a dark tongue of acacia bushes deepening into blackness as the forest, which we had left near the Chai River, usurped the entire breadth of the valley.

Mr. Jephson was still an invalid, with a fever which varied from 102° to 105° temperature, ever since the 23rd of April, and at this time he was in rather an anxious state of mind. Like myself, he was much shrunk, and we both looked ill. We halted on the 13th to give rest to invalids and the little children.

To Kiryama, on the 14th, a village situated near the mouth of a deep and narrow valley, and which in old times, when Lake Albert covered the grassy plain and must have been a somewhat picturesque inlet, we made a continuous descent by declining spurs. The soil of the valley was extremely rich, and a copious stream coursed through it to the Semliki. We obtained, at brief intervals, glimpses of Ruwenzori; but had the mist not been so tantalising it would not have been deemed an unwelcome view that we should have had of the magnificent and imposing altitude of 15,500 feet above us.

In the camp of the immense caravan a little boy about eleven years old, named Tukabi, was found. He was what is termed “a stowaway.” While we were at Mazamboni, his father, a subject of Kavalli, had come to appeal for help to recover him. He had attached himself to some Zanzibaris. The boy was delivered up, and his father was charged to observe the young truant carefully. He had disguised himself with some cloth to cover his face, but as he passed my tent I recognised him. He was asked why he deserted his father to join strangers who might be unkind to him. “Because,” he answered, “I prefer my friend to my father.” “Does your father beat you?” “No, but I wish to see the place where these guns come from, and where the thunder medicine (gunpowder) is made.” It was the first time in my experience that an African boy of such a tender age was known to voluntarily abandon his parents. He was a singularly bright little fellow, with very intelligent eyes, and belonged to the Wahuma race.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 14.

Kiryama.]

Captain Nelson was despatched to proceed to the Semliki River with 80 rifles, to examine what opportunities there might be for crossing the river. He returned after a brilliant march, and reported that the Semliki at the ferry was about eighty or ninety yards wide, swift and deep, with steep banks of from ten to twenty feet high, much subject to undermining by the river; that the canoes had all been removed by Ravidongo, the General of Kabba Rega, who was said to have gathered a large force to oppose our crossing, and also that all the natives of Uhobo, Mboga, and Kiryama districts, were collected across the Semliki River with him, and that it was clear a stout resistance would be made, as the opposite banks were carefully watched; that while they were examining the river a volley had been fired at them, which was fortunately harmless.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 17.

Awamba.]

After a two days’ rest at Kiryama we marched south across the grassy plain to another ferry led by Kaibuga. That which some of us had assumed to be a lake was very firm alluvium and lacustrine deposit, growing a thin crop of innutritious grass, about 18 inches high. As we advanced up the river it sensibly improved; and at the third hour from Kiryama an acacia tree was seen; a little later there were five, then a dozen, wide apart and stunted. At the fourth hour it was quite a thin forest on the left side of the Semliki, while to the right it was a thick impervious and umbrageous tropic forest, and suddenly we were on the bank of the Semliki. At the point we touched the river it was sixty yards wide, with between a four and five-knot current. A little below it widened into 100 yards, a fine, deep, and promising river. Up and down, and opposite, there were broad signs of recent land falls. Its banks consisted of sediment and gravelly débris which could offer no resistance to the strong current when it surged against the base. It washed away great masses from underneath. There was a continual falling of dissolving lumps, as though it was so much snow; then a sudden fall of a two-ton fragment of the superincumbent bank. It was a loopy, and twisting, crooked stream, forming a wide-stretching S in every mile of its course, and its water was of a whitey-brown colour, and weighted with sediment. Out of a tumblerful of the liquid, a fourth of an inch of fine earth would be deposited.

By a good aneroid the altitude of the bank, which was about twenty feet above the river, was 2,388 feet above the sea. Lake Albert by the same aneroid was 2,350 feet. There was a difference indicated of 38 feet. I estimated that we were about thirty English miles from the lake.

As we arrived at the river a canoe was observed floating down rapidly. The alarm had been given, probably, by some natives who had heard our voices, and in their hurry to escape had either purposely cast off their canoe, or had feared to be detained through the necessity of securing it. The village of the Awamba, whence it had floated adrift, was in sight. Men were sent up and down the banks to discover a canoe, and Uledi--always Uledi--sent up soon the good news that he had found one. The caravan proceeded in his direction, and camped in a large but abandoned banana plantation. The canoe was across the river in a small creek, opposite the camping place. By some method it was necessary to obtain it, as one canoe at this time was priceless. The men with the bill-hooks were ordered up to clear twenty yards of bush, and to leave a thin screen between the sharpshooters and the river. Then three or four volleys scoured the position around the canoe, and in the meantime the bold Uledi and Saat Tato, the hunter, swam across, and when near the vessel the firing ceased. In a few seconds they had cut the canoe loose, and were in it, paddling across to our side with all energy. They had gained the centre of the river when the archers rose up and shot the hunter, and at the same time the rifles blazed across. But the canoe was obtained, and Saat Tato, streaming with blood, was attended by Dr. Parke. Fortunately, the broad-bladed arrow had struck the shoulder blade, which saved the vitals. Both the brave fellows were rewarded with $20 worth of cloth on the spot.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 18.

Awamba.]

At 5 P.M. Mr. Bonny performed signal service. He accepted the mission of leading five Soudanese across the Semliki as the vanguard of the Expedition. By sunset there were fifty rifles across the river.

On the 18th the ferriage was resumed at dawn. By noon two more canoes had been discovered by scouts. Staits and Jephson were both very ill of fever, and I was a prematurely old man of ninety in strength and appearance and just able to walk at this time about one hundred yards. Captain Nelson and Surgeon Parke therefore superintended the work of transporting the Expedition across the Semliki. At two o’clock in the afternoon, while the ferrying was briskly proceeding, a body of fifty of the Wara Sura stole up to within 250 yards of the ferry, and fired a volley at the canoes while in mid-river. Iron slugs and lead bullets screamed over the heads of the passengers, and flew along the face of the water, but fortunately there was no harm done. Notwithstanding our admiration at their impudent audacity, a second volley might be more effective, but Captain Nelson sprang from the river-side, and a hundred rifles gathered around him and a chase began. We heard a good deal of volleying, but the chase and retreat were so hot that not a bullet found its purposed billet. However, the Wara Sura discovered that, whatever our intentions might be, we were in strong force, and we understood that they were capable of contriving mischief. In their hurried flight they dropped several as well-made cartridges as could be prepared at Woolwich; and here was a proof also what a nest of traitors there was in the Equatorial Province, for all these articles were of course furnished by the scores of deserters.

By night of the 18th, 669 people had been ferried across. At 3 o’clock of the 19th, 1,168 men, women and children, 610 loads of baggage, 3 canoe loads of sheep and goats, and 235 head of cattle had been taken across. The only loss sustained was a calf, which was drowned. It may he imagined how pleased I was at the brilliant services, activity and care shown by Captain Nelson and Dr. Parke.

A few hours later one of the Pasha’s followers was taken to the surgeon with a fatal arrow-wound. It reminded me of the anxious times I suffered, during the first eighteen months’ experiences with the equally thoughtless Zanzibaris.

On the 20th the Expedition moved through the thick forest, along an extremely sloughy path to a little village removed one and a half hours from the river. We arrived just as the intolerable pests of gnats were at their liveliest. They swarmed into the eyes, nostrils, and ears, in myriads. We thought the uninhabited forest was preferable, but at 9 o’clock the minute tribes retired to rest, and ceased to vex us. There was an odour of stale banana wine and ripe banana refuse, and these probably had attracted the gnats. Two large troughs--equal in size to small canoes--were stationed in the village, in which the natives pressed the ripe fruit and manufactured their wine.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 20.

Awamba.]

For the first time we discovered that the Awamba, whose territory we were now in, understood the art of drying bananas over wooden gratings, for the purpose of making flour. We had often wondered, during our life in the forest region, that natives did not appear to have discovered what invaluable, nourishing, and easily digestible food they possessed in the plantain and banana. All banana lands--Cuba, Brazil, West Indies--seem to me to have been specially remiss on this point. If only the virtues of the flour were publicly known, it is not to be doubted but it would be largely consumed in Europe. For infants, persons of delicate digestion, dyspeptics, and those suffering from temporary derangements of the stomach, the flour, properly prepared, would be of universal demand. During my two attacks of gastritis, a light gruel of this, mixed with milk, was the only matter that could be digested.

On the 22nd we were obliged to march for six hours through quagmire and reeking mud before we were enabled to find a resting-place. The dense forest, while as purely tropical in its luxuriance as any we had travelled, was more discomforting owing to its greater heat and over-abundant moisture. The excessive humidity revealed itself in a thin, opaque, damp haze just above us. In the tree-tops it had already gathered into a mist; above them it was a cloud; so that between us and sunshine we had clouds several miles in thickness, the thick, dark, matted foliage of the forest, then thickening layers of mist, and finally a haze of warm vapour. We therefore picked our way through shallow pool and gluey black mud, under a perpetual dropping of condensed vapour, and by a leaden light that would encourage thoughts of suicide, while bodily distress was evinced by trickling rillets of perspiration.

Emerging into a ruined village, the result of some late raid of the Wara Sura, we threw looks towards Ruwenzori, but the old mountain had disappeared under blue-black clouds that reminded one of brooding tempests. The heights of Mboga were dimly visible, though they were further from us than the stupendous mass behind which the thunder muttered, and whence rain seemed imminent. We began to realize that we were in the centre of a great fermenting vat, and that the exhalations growing out of it concentrated themselves into clouds, and that the latter hung in ever-thickening folds until they floated against the face of Ruwenzori; that they languidly ascended the slants and clung to the summits, until a draught of wind over the snow-crests blew them away and cleared the view.

We passed through an extremely populous district the next day, and travelled only two and a quarter hours to reach Baki Kundi. Flanking the path were familiar features, such as several camps of pigmies, who were here called Watwa.

The distance from the Semliki to these villages wherein we were now encamped is 15½ English miles, which we had taken three days to travel, and two days’ halt in consequence. But slow as this was, and supplied as was the caravan with running streams of good water and unlimited quantities of meat and grain, potatoes, plantains, and ripe fruit, the misery of African travel had been realised to its depths. Mothers had left their little children on the road, and one Egyptian soldier, named Hamdan, had laid down by the wayside and stubbornly refused to move, unwilling to pursue the journey of life further. He had no load to carry, he was not sick, but he--what can be said? He belonged to the donkey breed of humanity; he could not travel, but he could die, and the rear-guard were obliged to leave him. This started a rumour through the camp that the commander of the rear-guard had quietly despatched him.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 24.

Baki-Kundi.]

The 24th of May was a halt, and we availed ourselves of it to despatch two companies to trace the paths, that I might obtain a general idea which would best suit our purposes. One company took a road leading slightly east of south, and suddenly came across a few Baundwe, whom we knew for real forest aborigines. This was in itself a discovery, for we had supposed we were still in Utuku, as the east side of the Semliki is called, and which is under Kabba Rega’s rule. The language of the Baundwe was new, but they understood a little Kinyoro, and by this means we learned that Ruwenzori was known to them as Bugombowa, and that the Watwa pigmies and the Wara Sura were their worst enemies, and that the former were scattered through the woods to the W.S.W.

The other company travelled in a S. by W. direction, reached the thin line of open country that divided the immediate base-line of Ruwenzori from the forest. They spoke in raptures of the abundance of food, but stated that the people were hostile and warlike. The arms of the men were similar to those of other forest people, but the women were distinguished for iron collars, to which were suspended small phial-shaped pendants of hollow iron, besides those ending in fine spiral coils at the extremities.

Another short march of two and a quarter hours brought us to a village of thirty-nine round, conical huts, which possessed elaborate doorways, here and there ornamented with triangles painted red and black. The _Elais gunieensis_ palm was very numerous near the village.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 25.

Ugarama.]

On the next day we emerged out of the forest, and camped in the strip of grass-land in the village of Ugarama, in N. lat. 0° 45′ 49″ and E. long. 30° 14′ 45″. The path had led along the crests of a narrow, wooded spur, with ravines 200 feet deep on either hand, buried by giant trees. The grass-land here did not produce that short nutritive quality which made Kavalli so pleasant, but was of gigantic spear-grasses, from 6 to 15 feet high.

The Egyptian Hamdan made his reappearance at this camp. Left to himself he had probably discovered it hard to die alone in the lonely woods, and had repented of his folly. By this time we had become fully sensible of the difficulty we should meet each day while these people were under our charge. Low as was my estimation of them before, it had descended far below zero now. Words availed nothing, reason could not penetrate their dense heads. Their custom was to rush at early dawn along the path, and after an hour’s spurt sit down, dawdle, light a fire, and cook, and smoke, and gossip; then, when the rear-guard came up to urge them along, assume sour and discontented looks, and mutter to themselves of the cruelty of the infidels. Almost every day complaints reached me from them respecting Captain Nelson and Lieutenant Stairs. Either one or the other was reported for being exacting and too peremptory. It was tedious work to get them to comprehend that they were obeying orders; that their sole anxiety was to save them from being killed by the natives, or from losing their way; that the earlier they reached camp the better for everybody; that marches of two or three hours would not kill a child even; that while it was our duty to be careful of their lives, it was also our duty to have some regard for the Zanzibaris, who, instead of being two or three hours on the road were obliged to be ten hours, with boxes on their heads; that it was my duty also to see that the white officers were not worn out by being exposed to the rain, and mud, and shivering damp, waiting on people who would not see the benefit of walking four or five miles quickly to camp to enjoy twenty to twenty-one hours’ rest out of the twenty-four. These whining people, who were unable to walk empty-handed two and a half or three hours per day, were yellow Egyptians; a man with a little black pigment in his skin seldom complained, the extreme black and the extreme white never.

The Egyptians and their followers had such a number of infants and young children that when the camp space was at all limited, as on a narrow spur, sleep was scarcely possible. These wee creatures must have possessed irascible natures, for such obstinate and persistent caterwauling never tormented me before. The tiny blacks and sallow yellows rivalled one another with force of lung until long past midnight, then about 3 or 4 A.M. started afresh, woke everyone from slumber, while grunts of discontent at the meeawing chorus would be heard from every quarter.

Our Zanzibaris concluded that though the people of Equatoria might be excellent breeders, they were very poor soldiers. The Egyptians had been so long accustomed to overawe the natives of the Province by their numbers and superior arms, that now their number was somewhat reduced and overmatched by natives, they appeared to be doubtful of reaching peaceful countries; but they were so undisciplined, and yet so imperious, they would speedily convert the most peaceful natives to rancorous foes.

With the Pasha I had a conversation on this date, and I became fully aware that, though polite, he yet smarted under resentment for the explosion of April 5th. But the truth is that the explosion was necessary and unavoidable. Our natures were diametrically opposed. So long as there was no imperative action in prospect we should have been both capable of fully enjoying one another’s society. He was learned and industrious and a gentleman, and I could admire and appreciate his merits. But the conditions of our existence prohibited a too prolonged indulgence in these pleasures. We had not been commissioned to pass our days in Equatoria in scientific talk, nor to hold a protracted conversazione on Lake Albert. The time had come, as appointed, to begin a forward movement. It was not effected without that episode in the square at Kavalli. Now that we were on the journey I discovered to my regret that there were other causes for friction. The Pasha was devoured with a desire to augment his bird collections, and thought that, having come so far to help him, we might “take it easy.” “But we are taking it easy for manifold reasons. The little children, the large number of women burdened with infants, the incapable Egyptians, the hope that Selim Bey will overtake us, the feeble condition of Jephson and myself, and Stairs is far from strong.” “Well, then, take it more easy.” “We have done so; a mile and a half per day is surely easy going.” “Then be easier still.” “Heavens, Pasha, do you wish us to stay here altogether? Then let us make our wills, and resign ourselves to die with our work undone.” The thunder was muttering again, as behind the dark clouds on Ruwenzori, and another explosion was imminent.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 26.

Ugarama.]

I knew he was an ardent collector of birds and reptiles and insects, but I did not know that it was a mania with him. He would slay every bird in Africa; he would collect ugly reptiles, and every hideous insect; he would gather every skull until we should become a travelling museum and cemetery, if only carriers could be obtained. But then his people were already developing those rabid ulcers, syphilis had weakened their constitutions, a puncture of a thorn in the face grew into a horrid and sloughy sore; they had pastured on vice and were reaping the consequences. The camps soon became so filthy that they would breed a pestilence, and we should soon become a moving sight to gods and men. Carriers were dying--they were not well treated--and then, why then, we could not move at all by-and-by. He was in Heaven when his secretary, Rajab Effendi, brought him new species; he looked grateful when there was to be a two days’ rest, sad when he heard we should march; and when we should reach a nice place near Ruwenzori, we should stay a week, oh, splendid!

Now, all this made me feel as if we were engaged in a most ungrateful task. As long as life lasts, he will hold me in aversion, and his friends, the Felkins, the Junkers, and Schweinfurths will listen to querulous complaints, but they will never reflect that work in this world must not consist entirely of the storage in museums of skulls, and birds, and insects; that the continent of Africa was never meant by the all-bounteous Creator to be merely a botanical reserve, or an entomological museum.

Every man I saw, giant or dwarf, only deepened the belief that Africa had other claims on man, and every feature of the glorious land only impressed me the more that there was a crying need for immediate relief and assistance from civilisation; that first of all, roads of iron must be built, and that fire and water were essential agencies for transport, more especially on this long-troubled continent than on any other.

Alas! alas! With this grand mountain range within a stone’s throw of our camp--not yet outlined on my map--that other lake we heard so much about from Kaibuga, our Mhuma chief, not yet discovered, the Semliki Valley, with its treasures of woods and vegetable productions, not yet explored, and the Semliki River, which was said to connect the upper with the lower lake, not yet traced. To hear about wonderful salt lakes that might supply the world with salt; of large-bodied Wazongora, and numbers of amiable tribes; of the mysterious Wanyavingi, who were said to be descended from white men; to be in the neighbourhood of colossal mountains topped with snow, which I believed to be the lost Mountains of the Moon; to be in a land which could boast of possessing the fabulous fountains de la lune, a veritable land of marvel and mystery, a land of pigmies and tall men reported from of old, and not feel a glad desire to search into the truth of these sayings. He--the Maker who raised those eternal mountains and tapestried their slopes with the mosses, and lichens, and tender herbs, and divided them by myriads of watercourses for the melted snow to run into the fruitful valley, and caused that mighty, limitless forest to clothe it, and its foliage to shine with unfading lustre--surely intended that it should be reserved until the fulness of time for something higher than a nursery for birds and a store-place for reptiles.

The abundance of food in this region was one of the most remarkable features in it. Ten battalions would have needed no commissary to provide their provisions. We had but to pluck and eat. Our scouts reported that on every hand lay plantations abounding in the heaviest clusters of fruit. The native granaries were full of red millet, the huts were stored with Indian corn; in the neighbouring garden plots were yams, sweet potatoes, colocassia, tobacco.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 27.

Ugarama.]

From the spur of Ugarama, where we halted on the 27th, we could see that up to 8,000 feet of the slopes they were dotted with several scores of cultivated plots, and that the crooked lines of ravines were green with lengthy banana groves, and that upland and lowland teemed with population and food, and other products. Through a glass we were able to note that a thick forest covered the upper slopes and ridges, with an elevation of 9,000 up to 12,000 feet; and that where there was no cultivation the woods continued down to the base. The wild banana was seen flourishing up to a lofty limit, and graced the slopes denuded of trees, and towered over the tallest grass. The Ruwenzori peaks appeared shrouded by leaden clouds, and the lower mountain ranges played at hide-and-seek under the drifting and shifting masses of white vapour. By aneroid, Ugarama is 2,994 feet; and by boiling point, 2,942 feet above the sea. The immediate range, under whose lee the spur ran out to Ugarama village, was, by triangulation, discovered to be of an altitude of 9,147 feet.

Two women--light-complexioned and very pleasing--who were found in the woods near the village, were able to speak the Kinyoro language. It was from them we learned that we were in Ugarama, in the country of Awamba; that Utuku was a name given to the open country up to the Mississi River and the Lake; that the next district we should reach southerly was Bukoko, where the principal Chief, Sibaliki, of the Awamba, lived; and beyond Bukoko was Butama. That from Ugarama to the north extremity of Bukonju or Ukonju, was one day’s march; that two days thence would take us to Toro, but we should have to cross the mountains; that the king of N. Ukonju was called Ruhandika; that the Wakonju formerly owned vast herds of cattle, but the Wara Sura had swept the herds away. We were also told that if we followed the base line of the big mountains, three days’ march would enable us to reach a country of short grass, wherein goats and sheep were plentiful, and wherein there were a few herds of cattle; but the Wara Sura had raided so many times there that cattle could not be kept. The enemies of the Awamba, who cut down the woods and tilled the ground, were the vicious Watwa pigmies, who made their lives miserable by robbing their plantations, and destroying small parties while at work, or proceeding to market in adjoining districts, while the Wara Sura devastated far and near, and they were in the service of Kabba Rega.

When asked if they ever enjoyed days of sunshine and the snow mountains could be seen clear and bright for three or four days, or a week, or a month, they replied that they had never witnessed so much rain as at this time; and they believed that we had purposely caused this in order the more easily to detect people by the tracks along the paths. They also said that at first they had taken us for Wara Sura; but the large herd of cattle with us disproved that we had taken them from the Awamba, for they possessed none. When we informed them that we had seized them from people who acknowledged Kabba Rega as their chief, they said: “Oh, if our people but knew that, they would bring you everything.” “Well, then, you shall go and tell them that we are friends to everyone who will not close the road. We are going to a far country, and, as we cannot fly, we must use the path; but we never hurt those who do not raise the spear and draw the bow.”

On the 28th we advanced five miles over a series of spurs, and across deep ravines, continuous descents of 200 feet to ravines a few yards across, and opposite ascensions, to a similar height. They were so steep that we were either sliding, or climbing by means of the trees and creepers depending from them; and all this under an unceasing, drizzly rain. The rotting banana stalks and refuse of the fruit created a sickening stench.

The next day’s march of four miles enabled us to reach Butama, after an experience as opposite to the sloughs, mud, rock, descents and ascents of the day before, as a fine path, broad enough for an European’s wide-stepping feet, could well be in Africa. The sandy loam quickly absorbed the rain; the rank reed-grass, except at rare intervals, afforded a sufficient space between, and troops of elephants had tramped the ground hard.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 29.

Butama.]

An old man, with white hair, and too feeble to flee, had awaited his fate at Butama. On being questioned, he replied that the name of the snow mountains that now were immediately above us at an appalling height, was “Avirika, Aviruka, Avrika, Avruka, Avirika, and Avuruka!” so he rang the changes by pressure of eager questions which he had excited by its relation to Afrika. Upon the Watwa pigmies he was most severe. He charged them with being exceedingly treacherous; that they were in the habit of making friends with chiefs of rich districts by fraudful arts and false professions, and, despite blood-brotherhood, and plighted faith, of suddenly turning upon them and destroying them.

On the 30th we reached Bukoko in four hours’ easy travel, for we marched over a smooth graduated terrace formed by the debris rolled down the slopes of the snow mountain, and scoured by repeated falls of rain to a gentle slope, luxuriant with reed-grass, and wonderfully prolific in edibles, where cultivated. Here and there cropped out a monster boulder, half imbedded in the loam and gravelly soil, which had rolled and thundered wildly down when displaced by some landslip, or detached from its resting-place by a torrential shower.

Bukoko was a large and powerful settlement and an important cluster of villages; but it struck us as we entered it that it had been for several days abandoned, probably as long ago as a month. Its groves seemed endless and most thriving, and weighted with fruit, and tomatoes grew in prodigious plenty.

The scouts, as usual, soon after stacking goods and arranging camp, set out to explore, and in a short time met some people in cotton dresses who were armed with guns, and who fired upon them. We heard the loud boom of percussion muskets, and the sharper crack of rifles, and then there was quiet. Presently the scouts returned to report, and they brought me an Enfield rifle which had been thrown away by the defeated band, two of the men were supposed to be fatally wounded, one was said to be dead. They also brought with them a woman and a boy, who were evidently natives of the country, and could say nothing intelligible.

[Sidenote: 1889.

May 30.

Bukoko.]

A company of seventy rifles was immediately despatched to reconnoitre further, and in ten minutes there was quite a sustained fusillade, deep booming of muskets against sharp volleys of Remingtons and Winchesters. Soon after two of our men were carried to camp wounded, who reported that the enemy were Wara Sura. The rifles appeared to have pressed the strangers hard; the firing was getting more distant, but in an hour’s time we had two more wounded, and a Zanzibari youth, and a Manyuema youth killed, and almost immediately, as I thought of preparing a strong reinforcement, Uledi and the rifles walked into camp accompanied by the chiefs of the enemy, who turned out to be Manyuema raiders, the followers of Kilonga-Longa!

Their story was that a band of fifty gunmen, accompanied by about 100 spearmen, had crossed the Ituri River, and pushing east had arrived about twenty days ago near the edge of the forest, having crossed the Semliki River, and had, with their usual tactics, commenced raiding when they caught sight of some men with guns whom they guessed to be Wara Sura, and had fired upon them. The strangers had fired in return and killed one of them, wounded another mortally, and four others severely. The rest had fled to their settlement, crying out, “We are finished,” whereupon they had then sent men to be in ambush along the route, while the community at the settlement was repairing its defences. On seeing the head of the party coming along the road, they had fired, killing two and wounding four slightly, but when their friends began to rain bullets on them, they cried out “Who are you?” and were answered that they were Stanley’s men, and firing at once ceased, and an acquaintance ever disastrous to us was then renewed. Though we should have wished to have had a legitimate excuse for annihilating one band of the unconscionable raiders, we could not but accept their apologies for what had clearly been an accident, and gifts were exchanged.

We were told that they had met gangs of the Wara Sura, but had met “bad luck,” and only one small tusk of ivory rewarded their efforts. Ipoto, according to them, was twenty days’ march through the forest from Bukoko.

Ruwenzori was now known as Virika by the Awamba of this district.

Since emerging from the Awamba forest near Ugarama, we had journeyed along a narrow strip, covered with prodigious growth of cane-grass reaching as high as fifteen feet. From eminences it appears to be from three to eight miles wide, separating the deep, dark forest. From the immediate vicinity of the mountain, notwithstanding that the grass was of the height and thickness of bamboo, the path was infinitely better, and we had but to cross one or two ravines and watercourses during a march. A feature of it was the parachute-shaped acacia, which in the neighbourhood of the Nyanza was the only tree visible. Near the forest line this tree disappears, and the vegetation, riotously luxuriant and purely tropical, occupied the rest of the valley.

The streams we had lately crossed were cold mountain torrents with fairly wide beds, showing gravel, sand, cobble stones, specimens of the rocks above, gneiss, porphyry, hornblende, sandstone, steatite, hematite, and granite, with several pumice lumps. Three of the principal rivers, called the Rami, Rubutu, and Singiri, were respectively of the temperatures 68°, 62°, and 65° Fahrenheit.

[Sidenote: 1889.

June 2.

Banzombé.]

After a halt of two days at Bukoko we marched a distance of eight miles to the village of Banzombé, situate on a narrow, level-topped spur between two deep ravines, on the edge of the forest, which here had crept up to the base-line of the snow mountains. As usual, Ruwenzori was invisible, and I feared we should have little chance of photographing it, or employ any of its lofty peaks to take bearings.

The vapours issuing from the Semliki Valley appeared to be weighed down by pressure from above, judging by the long time required for a mass of ascending vapour to each the summit. The smoke of the camp hung over us like a fog until we were nearly blinded and suffocated.

Our cattle showed signs of fagging out. We now possessed 104 head, and 30 sheep and goats.

On the 3rd of June we reached the little village of Bakokoro, in N. Lat. 0° 37′, and here a Copt, one of four brothers, breathed his last. Three considerable streams had been traversed during the short march of three miles. The temperature of one was 62° Fahrenheit.

Unable to trace a path beyond Bakokoro, trending in the direction we required, we halted on the 4th. Jephson was in a high fever; temperature 105°. Mr. Bonny was also suffering; Stairs had recovered. Captain Nelson was robust and strong, and during these days was doing double duty to endeavour to make up for the long months he had been invalided, from October, 1887, to October, 1888.

Some plantains measured here were seventeen and a half inches in length, and as thick as the fore-arm.

After a short march of two and a half hours, we arrived at Mtarega, situated near the deep gorge of the Rami-Lulu river, as it issued from a deep chasm in the mountains.

[Sidenote: 1889.

June 3.

Bakokoro.]

We had all we desired to possess at this camp. We were within 200 yards from the foot of the Ruwenzori range. Paths were seen leading up the steep slopes; a fine cool river was 200 feet below, rushing through the gorge fresh from the snow tops, 61° Fahrenheit temperature. Bananas, plantains, and yams, and corn and sugar-cane were in the plantations and fields, 200 yards away. Now was the period of exploration, and to make botanical collections. Accordingly I sounded the note to prepare to win immortal renown by scaling the heights of the famous Mountains of the Moon. My strength was so far recovered that I could walk 200 yards. Mr. Jephson regretted to say that the fever had conquered and subdued his sanguine spirit; Captain Nelson was sorry, but really, if there was any practical use in climbing such ruthlessly tall mountains--and he took a solemn look at them, and said, “No, thanks!” Surgeon Parke’s line was amid suffering humanity; Mr. Bonny was in bad luck--an obstinate fever had gripped him, and reduced his limbs to mere sticks. Captain Casati smiled mournfully, and seemed to say, “Look at me, and imagine how far I could go.” But the Pasha’s honour was at stake; he had at all times expressed rapture at the very thought, and this was the critical period in the march of the Expedition, and Stairs took a sly glance at the grim, unconquered heights, and said, “I’ll go, like a shot.” It only remained for me to advise him, to furnish him with instruments, to compare his aneroids with a standard one in camp, and supply the men with many anxious counsels to avoid the cold, and to beware of chills after an ascent.

The night was an agreeable one. The altitude of the camp above the sea was 3,860 feet, and a gentle, cool wind blew all night from the gap of the Rumi-Lulu river. In the morning Stairs departed, and the Pasha accompanied him. But, alas! the Pasha had to yield after a thousand feet, and returned to camp, while Stairs held on his way. The following is the report of his experiences:--

Expedition Camp, _June 8th, 1889_.

SIR,--

Early on the morning of the 6th June, accompanied by some forty
Zanzibaris, we made a start from the Expedition Camp at the
foot-hills of the range, crossed the stream close to a camp, and
commenced the ascent of the mountain.

With me I had two aneroids, which together we had previously noted
and compared with a standard aneroid remaining in camp under your
immediate observation; also a Fahrenheit thermometer.

For the first 900 feet above camp the climbing was fairly good, and
our progress was greatly aided by a native track which led up to
some huts in the hills. These huts we found to be of the ordinary
circular type so common on the plain, but with the difference that
bamboo was largely used in their interior construction. Here we
found the food of the natives to be maize, bananas, and colocassia
roots. On moving away from these huts, we soon left behind us the
long rank grass, and entered a patch of low scrubby bush,
intermixed with bracken and thorns, making the journey more
difficult.

At 8.30 A.M. we came upon some more huts of the same type, and
found that the natives had decamped from them some days previously.
Here the barometer read 23·58 and 22·85; the thermometer 75° F. On
all sides of us we could see Dracænas, and here and there an
occasional tree-fern and palm: and, tangled in all shapes on either
side of the track, were masses of long bracken. The natives now
appeared at different hill-tops and points near by, and did their
best to frighten us back down the mountain, by shouting and blowing
horns. We, however, kept on our way up the slope, and in a short
time they disappeared and gave us very little further trouble.

Of the forest plains, stretching far away below us, we could see
nothing, owing to the thick haze; we were thus prevented from
seeing the hills to the west and north-west.

At 10 30 A.M., after some sharp climbing, we reached the last
settlement of the natives, the cultivation consisting of beans and
colocassias, but no bananas. Here the barometer read 22·36;
thermometer 84° F. Beyond this settlement was a rough track leading
up the spur to the forest; this we followed, but in many places, to
get along at all, we had to crawl on our hands and knees, so steep
were the slopes.