How I Found Livingstone, Henry M. Stanley [best fantasy books to read txt] 📗

an awful serenity.

 

As I approached the tembe of Sayd bin Salim, Sheikh bin Nasib and

other great Arabs joined us. Before the great door of the tembe

the men had stacked the bales, and piled the boxes, and were using

their tongues at a furious rate, relating to the chiefs and

soldiers of the first, second, and fourth caravans the many events

which had befallen them, and which seemed to them the only things

worth relating. Outside of their own limited circles they

evidently cared for nothing. Then the several chiefs of the other

caravans had in turn to relate their experiences of the road; and

the noise of tongues was loud and furious. But as we approached,

all this loud-sounding gabble ceased, and my caravan chiefs and

guides rushed to me to hail me as “master,” and to salute me as

their friend. One fellow, faithful Baruti, threw himself at my

feet, the others fired their guns and acted like madmen suddenly

become frenzied, and a general cry of “welcome” was heard on all

sides.

 

“Walk in, master, this is your house, now; here are your men’s

quarters; here you will receive the great Arabs, here is the

cookhouse; here is the store-house; here is the prison for the

refractory; here are your white man’s apartments; and these are

your own: see, here is the bedroom, here is the gun-room,

bath-room, &c.;” so Sheikh Sayd talked, as he showed me the

several places.

 

On my honour, it was a most comfortable place, this, in Central

Africa. One could almost wax poetic, but we will keep such

ambitious ideas for a future day. Just now, however, we must

have the goods stored, and the little army of carriers paid

off and disbanded.

 

Bombay was ordered to unlock the strong storeroom, to pile the

bales in regular tiers, the beads in rows one above another, and

the wire in a separate place. The boats, canvas, &c., were to be

placed high above reach of white ants, and the boxes of ammunition

and powder kegs were to be stored in the gun-room, out of reach of

danger. Then a bale of cloth was opened, and each carrier was

rewarded according to his merits, that each of them might proceed

home to his friends and neighbours, and tell them how much better

the white man behaved than the Arabs.

 

The reports of the leaders of the first, second, and fourth

caravans were then received, their separate stores inspected, and

the details and events of their marches heard. The first caravan

had been engaged in a war at Kirurumo, and had come out of the

fight successful, and had reached Unyanyembe without loss of

anything. The second had shot a thief in the forest between

Pembera Pereh and Kididimo; the fourth had lost a bale in the

jungle of Marenga Mkali, and the porter who carried it had received

a “very sore head” from a knob stick wielded by one of the

thieves, who prowl about the jungle near the frontier of Ugogo.

I was delighted to find that their misfortunes were no more, and

each leader was then and there rewarded with one handsome cloth,

and five doti of Merikani.

 

Just as I began to feel hungry again, came several slaves in

succession, bearing trays full of good things from the Arabs;

first an enormous dish of rice, with a bowlful of curried chicken,

another with a dozen huge wheaten cakes, another with a plateful of

smoking hot crullers, another with papaws, another with pomegranates

and lemons; after these came men driving five fat hump backed oxen,

eight sheep, and ten goats, and another man with a dozen chickens,

and a dozen fresh eggs. This was real, practical, noble courtesy,

munificent hospitality, which quite took my gratitude by storm.

 

My people, now reduced to twenty-five, were as delighted at the

prodigal plenitude visible on my tables and in my yard, as I was

myself. And as I saw their eyes light up at the unctuous

anticipations presented to them by their riotous fancies,

I ordered a bullock to be slaughtered and distributed.

 

The second day of the arrival of the Expedition in the country

which I now looked upon as classic ground, since Capts. Burton,

Speke, and Grant years ago had visited it, and described it, came

the Arab magnates from Tabora to congratulate me.

 

Tabora* is the principal Arab settlement in Central Africa. It

contains over a thousand huts and tembes, and one may safely

estimate the population, Arabs, Wangwana, and natives, at five

thousand people. Between Tabora and the next settlement, Kwihara,

rise two rugged hill ridges, separated from each other by a low

saddle, over the top of which Tabora is always visible from

Kwihara.

________________

* There is no such recognised place as Kazeh.

________________

 

They were a fine, handsome body of men, these Arabs. They mostly

hailed from Oman: others were Wasawahili; and each of my visitors

had quite a retinue with him. At Tabora they live quite luxuriously.

The plain on which the settlement is situated is exceedingly fertile,

though naked of trees; the rich pasturage it furnishes permits them

to keep large herds of cattle and goats, from which they have an

ample supply of milk, cream, butter, and ghee. Rice is grown

everywhere; sweet potatoes, yams, muhogo, holcus sorghum, maize,

or Indian corn, sesame, millet, field-peas, or vetches, called

choroko, are cheap, and always procurable. Around their tembes

the Arabs cultivate a little wheat for their own purposes, and

have planted orange, lemon, papaw, and mangoes, which thrive

here fairly well. Onions and garlic, chilies, cucumbers, tomatoes,

and brinjalls, may be procured by the white visitor from the more

important Arabs, who are undoubted epicureans in their way. Their

slaves convey to them from the coast, once a year at least, their

stores of tea, coffee sugar, spices, jellies, curries, wine,

brandy, biscuits, sardines, salmon, and such fine cloths and

articles as they require for their own personal use. Almost every

Arab of any eminence is able to show a wealth of Persian carpets,

and most luxurious bedding, complete tea and coffee-services, and

magnificently carved dishes of tinned copper and brass lavers.

Several of them sport gold watches and chains, mostly all a watch

and chain of some kind. And, as in Persia, Afghanistan, and

Turkey, the harems form an essential feature of every Arab’s

household; the sensualism of the Mohammedans is as prominent here

as in the Orient.

 

The Arabs who now stood before the front door of my tembe were the

donors of the good things received the day before. As in duty

bound, of course, I greeted Sheikh Sayd first, then Sheikh bin

Nasib, his Highness of Zanzibar’s consul at Karagwa, then I greeted

the noblest Trojan amongst the Arab population, noblest in bearing,

noblest in courage and manly worth—Sheikh Khamis bin Abdullah;

then young Amram bin Mussoud, who is now making war on the king of

Urori and his fractious people; then handsome, courageous Soud,

the son of Sayd bin Majid; then dandified Thani bin Abdullah; then

Mussoud bin Abdullah and his cousin Abdullah bin Mussoud, who own

the houses where formerly lived Burton and Speke; then old

Suliman Dowa, Sayd bin Sayf, and the old Hetman of Tabora—Sheikh

Sultan bin Ali.

 

As the visit of these magnates, under whose loving protection white

travellers must needs submit themselves, was only a formal one,

such as Arab etiquette, ever of the stateliest and truest, impelled

them to, it is unnecessary to relate the discourse on my health,

and their wealth, my thanks, and their professions of loyalty, and

attachment to me. After having expended our mutual stock of

congratulations and nonsense, they departed, having stated their

wish that I should visit them at Tabora and partake of a feast

which they were about to prepare for me.

 

Three days afterwards I sallied out of my tembe, escorted by

eighteen bravely dressed men of my escort, to pay Tabora a

visit. On surmounting the saddle over which the road from the

valley of Kwihara leads to Tabora, the plain on which the Arab

settlement is situated lay before us, one expanse of dun pasture

land, stretching from the base bf the hill on our left as far as

the banks of the northern Gombe, which a few miles beyond Tabora

heave into purple-coloured hills and blue cones.

 

Within three-quarters of an hour we were seated on the mud veranda

of the tembe of Sultan bin Ali, who, because of his age, his

wealth, and position—being a colonel in Seyd Burghash’s unlovely

army—is looked upon by his countrymen, high and low, as referee

and counsellor. His boma or enclosure contains quite a village of

hive-shaped huts and square tembes. From here, after being

presented with a cup of Mocha coffee, and some sherbet, we

directed our steps towards Khamis bin Abdullah’s house, who had,

in anticipation of my coming, prepared a feast to which he had

invited his friends and neighbours. The group of stately Arabs

in their long white dresses, and jaunty caps, also of a snowy

white, who stood ready to welcome me to Tabora, produced

quite an effect on my mind. I was in time for a council of war

they were holding—and I was,requested to attend.

 

Khamis bin Abdullah, a bold and brave man, ever ready to stand up

for the privileges of the Arabs, and their rights to pass through

any countries for legitimate trade, is the man who, in Speke’s

`Journal of the Discovery of the Source of the Nile,’ is reported

to have shot Maula, an old chief who sided with Manwa Sera during

the wars of 1860; and who subsequently, after chasing his

relentless enemy for five years through Ugogo and Unyamwezi as far

as Ukonongo, had the satisfaction of beheading him, was now urging

the Arabs to assert their rights against a chief called Mirambo of

Uyoweh, in a crisis which was advancing.

 

This Mirambo of Uyoweh, it seems, had for the last few years been

in a state of chronic discontent with the policies of the

neighbouring chiefs. Formerly a pagazi for an Arab, he had now

assumed regal power, with the usual knack of unconscionable rascals

who care not by what means they step into power. When the

chief of Uyoweh died, Mirambo, who was head of a gang of robbers

infesting the forests of Wilyankuru, suddenly entered Uyoweh, and

constituted himself lord paramount by force. Some feats of

enterprise, which he performed to the enrichment of all those who

recognised his authority, established him firmly in his position.

This was but a beginning; he carried war through Ugara to Ukonongo,

through Usagozi to the borders of Uvinza, and after destroying

the populations over three degrees of latitude, he conceived a

grievance against Mkasiwa, and against the Arabs, because they

would not sustain him in his ambitious projects against their

ally and friend, with whom they were living in peace.

 

The first outrage which this audacious man committed against the

Arabs was the halting of an Ujiji-bound caravan, and the demand for

five kegs of gunpowder, five guns, and five bales of cloth. This

extraordinary demand, after expending more than a day in fierce

controversy, was paid; but the Arabs, if they were surprised at

the exorbitant blackmail demanded of them, were more than ever

surprised when they were told to return the way they came; and

that no Arab caravan should pass through his country to Ujiji

except over his dead body.

 

On the return of the unfortunate Arabs to Unyanyembe, they

reported the facts to Sheikh Sayd bin Salim, the governor of the

Arab colony. This old man, being averse to war, of course tried

every means to induce Mirambo as of old to be satisfied with

presents; but Mirambo this time