Chapter VII (3)

Nor is it uninteresting to notice the various equivalents which are found of one and the same word. “Mahee” means “lance” and “meat” in general, and is a collective expression for antelopes of every kind; “attamatta” is employed equally for what is “bitter” and what is “annoying;” “dill” implies either a “shadow” or a “cloud;” “gimah” is used indifferently for either “a son” or “a boy,” and “goah” for either “a pit” or “deep.” “Helleleh” simply means “wind” or “air,” but by reduplication “helleleh-helleleh,” implies whatever is “light.” Either “rain” or “the sky” may be indicated by the word “hetorro,” and “ndan” not merely signifies “night,” but is used for “to-day.” This last mode of expression has been transferred from the African to the Arabic of the Eastern Soudan, where “fee lehle” means either “by night” or “this very day.”

The disposition which is ever manifested amongst the untutored children of nature to represent certain animals by imitating the sounds they utter, is extended amongst the Bongo to describe a variety of inanimate object. As examples of this kind of nomenclature I may mention “golongolo” as their name for a “bell,” “gohi” as their name for a “cough,” “kulluluh” for a “ball,” and “marongonn” for “snoring.” The name they give a “cat” is “mbriow” differing little in its pronunciation from “mew.”

There is a kind of poetry which underlies many of their expressions, and which invests some objects with a certain charm of indefiniteness; thus for example they call a leaf “mbillee-kaggah,” “an ear of the tree,” and a man’s chest they name “doah kiddi,” or “the capital of the veins.”

The speech of a people is very often indicative of the predominating character of their pursuits. By the name of “mony,” which originally meant the common sorghum, which is the staple of their produce, the Bongo, being an agricultural people, have come to denote not so much the particular corn, as eatables of any description. They have, moreover, adopted this word as the root of a verb which is conjugated. In a way corresponding to this the Niam-niam, who are mainly addicted to hunting, give a very comprehensive meaning to their word “push-yo,” which signifies “meat.” Of almost infinite variety are the names of the different individuals among the Bongo. I had opportunities of making inquiries whilst I was measuring nearly a hundred of the people, and I do not think that I found more than five names that occurred more than once. As a regular rule parents name their children after trees or animals, or some object in nature, and it is quite exceptional for any personal peculiarity to be associated with the appellation.

[Sidenote: INTERMINGLING OF RACES.]

In the labyrinth of African culture it is very difficult to disentangle the hundred threads which lead up to the centre from which they have been all unwound. Not a custom, not a superstition is found in one part which is not more or less accurately repeated in another; not one contrivance of design, not one weapon of war exists of which it can be declared that it is exclusive property of any one race. From north to south, and from sea to sea, in some form or other every invention is sure to be repeated; it is “the thing that has been.” The creative hand of Nature alone produces what is new. If we could at once grasp and set before our minds facts that are known (whether as regards language, race, culture, history, or development) of that vast region of the world which is comprehended in the name of Africa, we should have before us the witness of an intermingling of races which is beyond all precedent. And yet, bewildering as the prospect would appear, it remains a fact not to be gainsaid, that it is impossible for any one to survey the country as a whole without perceiving that high above the multitude of individual differences there is throned a principle of unity which embraces well nigh all the population.

Such a conclusion has been amply borne out by the preceding delineation of the Bongo, who form an element in that unity. We cannot take a retrospect of the particulars which have been now detailed about them, without the question arising as to which of the other races of Central Africa most nearly resemble the Bongo. Any answer to this question that could not be invalidated would afford hints invaluable for the investigation of the latest movements among African nations; but I must confess that I am only hazarding an opinion which I cannot establish, when I name the countries about Lake Tsad as being those in which the most marked similarity in habit to the Bongo might be expected, and the tribes to which I would more particularly allude are the Musgoo, the Massa, the Wandala, and the Loggon.

I conclude by repeating the comparison which I made at the beginning between the existence of a people and a drop of water evaporating in the sea. Ere long, the Bongo as a people will be quite forgotten, superseded by a rising race. The time cannot be far off when this race, so gifted and so impressionable, shall be known no more. The domination over the people which is contemplated in Egypt cannot fail to effect this result, and it is a destiny that probably awaits all the rest of the African races. However much the Nubian may tyrannize, he still leaves the poor natives a portion of their happiness. But there is still a more distant future: after the Nubian comes the Turk, and he takes all. Truly it is not without reason that the proverb circulates in every district, “Where the Turk has been no grass will grow.”

FOOTNOTES:

[28] Vide ‘Linguistische Ergebnisse einer Reise nach
Central Afrika,’ by Dr. G. Schweinfurth. Berlin: Wiegandt
and Hempsel, 1873.

[29] An illustration of this contrivance appears in
Petherick’s ‘Travels in Central Africa,’ vol. i. p. 255.

[30] For a pictorial representation of this scene, vide
vol. ii.

[31] Vide Petherick, ‘Egypt, the Soudan,’ &c., p. 395.

[32] Vide Chap. V. p. 206, _seq._

[33] The woodcut represents a vertical section of one of
these smelting-ovens.

[34] Petherick in his ‘Travels,’ vol. i. p. 164, refers to
this shrub, and designates one of its branches by the name
of “ebony.”

[35] Tremaux: ‘Voyage Pittoresque au Soudan.’ Tab. XIV.