The Albert N'Yanza, Great Basin of the Nile, Samuel White Baker [inspirational novels .TXT] 📗

arrived from Koorshid Aga, the

Circassian, to announce the departure of Mahommed’s party without me;

and my vakeel appeared with a message from the same people, that “if I

followed on their road (my proposed route), they would fire upon me and

my party, as they would allow no English spies in their country.”

 

My vakeel must have known of this preconcerted arrangement. I now went

to the Circassian, Koorshid, who had always been friendly personally. In

an interview with him, I made him understand that nothing should drive

me back to Khartoum, but that, as I was now helpless, I begged him to

give me ten elephant-hunters; that I would pay one-half of their wages,

and amuse myself in hunting and exploring in any direction until the

following year, he to take the ivory; by which time I could receive

thirty black soldiers from Khartoum, with whom I should commence my

journey to the lake. I begged him to procure me thirty good blacks at

Khartoum, and to bring them with him to Gondokoro next season, where I

arranged to meet him. This he agreed to, and I returned to my tent

delighted at a chance of escaping complete failure, although I thus

encountered a delay of twelve months before I could commence my

legitimate voyage. That accomplished, I was comparatively happy; the

disgrace of returning to Khartoum beaten would have been insupportable.

 

That night I slept well, and we sat under our shady tree by the

tent-door at sunrise on the following morning, drinking our coffee with

contentment. Presently, from a distance, I saw Koorshid, the Circassian,

approaching with his partner. Coffee and pipes were ready instanter:

both the boy Saat and Richarn looked upon him as a friend and ally, as

it was arranged that ten of his hunters were to accompany us. Before he

sipped his coffee he took me by the hand, and with great confusion of

manner he confessed that he was ashamed to come and visit me. “The

moment you left me yesterday,” said he, “I called my vakeel and headman,

and ordered them to select the ten best men of my party to accompany

you; but instead of obeying me as usual, they declared that nothing

would induce them to serve under you; that you were a spy who would

report their proceedings to the Government, and that they should all be

ruined; that you were not only a spy on the slave-trade, but that you

were a madman, who would lead them into distant and unknown countries,

where both you and your wife and they would all be murdered by the

natives; thus they would mutiny immediately, should you be forced upon

them.” My last hope was gone. Of course I thanked Koorshid for his

goodwill, and explained that I should not think of intruding myself

upon his party, but that at the same time they should not drive me out

of the country. I had abundance of stores and ammunition, and now that

my men had deserted me, I had sufficient corn to supply my small party

for twelve months; I had also a quantity of garden-seeds, that I had

brought with me in the event of becoming a prisoner in the country; I

should therefore make a zareeba or camp at Gondokoro, and remain there

until I should receive men and supplies in the following season. I now

felt independent, having preserved my depot of corn. I was at least

proof against famine for twelve months. Koorshid endeavoured to persuade

me that my party of only a man and a boy would be certainly insulted and

attacked by the insolent natives of the Bari tribe should I remain alone

at Gondokoro after the departure of the traders’ parties. I told him

that I preferred the natives to the traders’ people, and that I was

resolved; I merely begged him to lend me one of his little slave boys as

an interpreter, as I had no means of communicating with the natives.

This he promised to do.

 

After Koorshid’s departure, we sat silently for some minutes, both my

wife and I occupied by the same thoughts.

 

No expedition had ever been more carefully planned; everything had been

well arranged to insure success. My transport animals were in good

condition; their saddles and pads had been made under my own inspection;

my arms, ammunition, and supplies were abundant, and I was ready to

march at five minutes’ notice to any part of Africa; but the expedition,

so costly, and so carefully organized, was completely ruined by the very

people whom I had engaged to protect it. They had not only deserted, but

they had conspired to murder. There was no law in these wild regions but

brute force; human life was of no value; murder was a pastime, as the

murderer could escape all punishment. Mr. Petherick’s vakeel had just

been shot dead by one of his own men, and such events were too common to

create much attention. We were utterly helpless; the whole of the people

against us, and openly threatening. For myself personally I had no

anxiety, but the fact of Mrs. Baker being with me was my greatest care.

I dared not think of her position in the event of my death amongst such

savages as those around her. These thoughts were shared by her; but she,

knowing that I had resolved to succeed, never once hinted an advice for

retreat.

 

Richarn was as faithful as Saat, and I accordingly confided in him my

resolution to leave all my baggage in charge of a friendly chief of the

Bari’s at Gondokoro, and to take two fast dromedaries for him and Saat,

and two horses for Mrs. Baker and myself, and to make a push through the

hostile tribe for three days, to arrive among friendly people at “Moir,”

from which place I trusted to fortune. I arranged that the dromedaries

should carry a few beads, ammunition, and the astronomical instruments.

Richarn said the idea was very mad; that the natives would do nothing

for beads; that he had had great experience on the White Nile when with

a former master, and that the natives would do nothing without receiving

cows as payment; that it was of no use being good to them, as they had

no respect for any virtue but “force;” that we should most likely be

murdered; but that if I ordered him to go, he was ready to obey.

 

“Master, go on, and I will follow thee, To the last gasp, with truth and

loyalty.”

 

I was delighted with Richarn’s rough and frank fidelity. Ordering the

horses to be brought, I carefully pared their feet—their hard flinty

hoofs, that had never felt a shoe, were in excellent order for a gallop,

if necessary. All being ready, I sent for the chief of Gondokoro.

Meanwhile a Bari boy arrived from Koorshid to act as my interpreter.

 

The Bari chief was, as usual, smeared all over with red ochre and fat,

and had the shell of a small land tortoise suspended to his elbow as an

ornament. He brought me a large jar of merissa (native beer), and said

“he had been anxious to see the white man who did not steal cattle,

neither kidnap slaves, but that I should do no good in that country, as

the traders did not wish me to remain.” He told me “that all people were

bad, both natives and traders, and that force was necessary in this

country.” I tried to discover whether he had any respect for good and

upright conduct. “Yes,” he said; “all people say that you are different

to the Turks and traders, but that character will not help you; it is

all very good and very right, but you see your men have all deserted,

thus you must go back to Khartoum; you can do nothing here without

plenty of men and guns.” I proposed to him my plan of riding quickly

through the Bari tribe to Moir; he replied, “Impossible! If I were to

beat the great nogaras (drums), and call my people together to explain

who you were, they would not hurt you; but there are many petty chiefs

who do not obey me, and their people would certainly attack you when

crossing some swollen torrent, and what could you do with only a man and

a boy?”

 

His reply to my question concerning the value of beads corroborated

Richarn’s statement; nothing could be purchased for anything but cattle;

the traders had commenced the system of stealing herds of cattle from

one tribe to barter with the next neighbour; thus the entire country was

in anarchy and confusion, and beads were of no value. My plan for a dash

through the country was impracticable.

 

I therefore called my vakeel, and threatened him with the gravest

punishment on my return to Khartoum. I wrote to Sir R. Colquhoun, H.M.

Consul-General for Egypt, which letter I sent by one of the return

boats; and I explained to my vakeel that the complaint to the British

authorities would end in his imprisonment, and that in case of my death

through violence he would assuredly be hanged. After frightening him

thoroughly, I suggested that he should induce some of the mutineers, who

were Dongolowas (his own tribe), many of whom were his relatives, to

accompany me, in which case I would forgive them their past misconduct.

 

In the course of the afternoon he returned with the news, that he had

arranged with seventeen of the men, but that they refused to march

towards the south, and would accompany me to the east if I wished to

explore that part of the country. Their plea for refusing a southern

route was the hostility of the Bari tribe. They also proposed a

condition, that I should “leave all my transport animals and baggage

behind me.”

 

To this insane request, which completely nullified their offer to start,

I only replied by vowing vengeance against the vakeel.

 

Their time was passed in vociferously quarrelling among themselves

during the day, and in close conference with the vakeel during the

night, the substance of which was reported on the following morning by

the faithful Saat. The boy recounted their plot. They agreed to march to

the east, with the intention of deserting me at the station of a trader

named Chenooda, seven days’ march from Gondokoro, in the Latooka

country, whose men were, like them selves, Dongolowas; they had

conspired to mutiny at that place, and to desert to the slave-hunting

party with my arms and ammunition, and to shoot me should I attempt to

disarm them. They also threatened to shoot my vakeel, who now, through

fear of punishment at Khartoum, exerted his influence to induce them to

start. Altogether, it was a pleasant state of things.

 

That night I was asleep in my tent, when I was suddenly awoke by loud

screams, and upon listening attentively I distinctly heard the heavy

breathing of something in the tent, and I could distinguish a dark

object crouching close to the head of my bed. A slight pull at my sleeve

showed me that my wife also noticed the object, as this was always the

signal that she made if anything occured at night that required

vigilance. Possessing a share of sangfroid admirably adapted for African

travel, Mrs. Baker was not a screamer, and never even whispered; in the

moment of suspected danger, a touch of my sleeve was considered a

sufficient warning. My hand had quietly drawn the revolver from under my

pillow and noiselessly pointed it within two feet of the dark crouching

object, before I asked, “Who is that?” No answer was given—until,

upon repeating the question, with my finger touching gently upon the

trigger ready to fire, a voice replied, “Fadeela.” Never had I been