In Two Hours More We Reached A Settlement Called Madi, And Found
It Deserted.
Every man and woman had run off into the jungles
from fright, and would not come back again.
We wished ourselves
at the end of the journey; thought anything better than this kind
of existence - living entirely at the expense of others; even the
fleecings in Usui felt less dispiriting; but it could not be
helped, for it must always exist as long as these Turks are
allowed to ride rough-shod over the people. The Turks, however,
had their losses also; for on the way four Bari men and one Bari
slave-girl slipped off with a hundred of their plundered cattle,
and neither they nor the cattle could be found again. Mijalwa
was here convicted of having stolen the cloth of a Turk whilst
living in his hut when he was away at the Paira plundering and
got fifty lashes to teach him better behaviour for the future.
A party of fifty men came from Labure, a station on ahead of
this, to take service as porters, knowing that at this season the
Turks always come with a large herd of plundered cattle, which
they call government property, and give in payment to the men who
carry their tusks of ivory across the Bari country.
We now marched over a rolling ground, covered in some places with
bush-jungle, in others with villages, where there were fine
trees, resembling oaks in their outward appearance; and stopping
one night at the settlement of Barwudi, arrived at Labure, where
we had to halt a day for Mahamed to collect some ivory from a
depot he had formed near by. We heard there was another ivory
party collecting tusks at Obbo, a settlement in the country of
Panuquara, twenty miles east of this.
Next we crossed a nullah draining into the Nile, and, travelling
over more rolling ground, flanked on the right by a range of
small hills, put up at the Madi frontier station, Mugi, where we
had to halt two days to collect a full complement of porters to
traverse the Bari country, the people of which are denounced as
barbarians by the Turks, because they will not submit to be
bullied into carrying their tusks for them. Here we felt an
earthquake. The people would not take beads, preferring, they
said, to make necklaces and belts out of ostrich-eggs, which they
cut into the size of small shirt-buttons, and then drill a hole
through their centre to string them together. A passenger told
us that three white men had just arrived in vessels at Gondokoro;
and the Bari people, hearing of our advance, instead of trying to
kill us with spears, had determined to poison all the water in
their country. Mahamed now disposed of half of his herd of cows,
giving them to the chiefs of the villages in return for porters.
These, he said, were all that belonged to the government; for the
half of all captures of cows, as well as all slaves, all goats,
and sheep, were allowed to the men as part of their pay.
When all was settled we marched, one thousand strong, to Wurungi;
and next day, by a double march, arrived at Marson, in the Bari
country. I wished still to put up in the native villages, but
Mahamed so terrified all my men, by saying these Bari would kill
us in the night if we did not all sleep together in one large
camp, that we were obliged to submit. The country, still flanked
on the right by hills, was undulating and very prettily wooded.
Villages were numerous, but as we passed them the inhabitants all
fled from us, save a few men, who, bolder than the rest, would
stand and look on at us as we marched along. Both night and
morning the Turks beat their drums; and whenever they stopped to
eat they sacked the villages.
Pushing on by degrees, stopping at noon to eat, we came again in
sight of the Nile, and put up at a station called Doro, within a
short distance of the well-known hill Rijeb, where Nile voyagers
delight in cutting their names. The country continued the same,
but the grass was conspicuously becoming shorter and finer every
day - so much so, that my men all declared it was a sign of our
near approach to England. After we had settled down for the
night, and the Turks had finished plundering the nearest
villages, we heard two guns fired, and immediately afterwards the
whole place was alive with Bari people. Their drums were beaten
as a sign that they would attack us, and the war-drums of the
villages around responded by beating also. The Turks grew
somewhat alarmed at this, and as darkness began to set in, sent
out patrols in addition to their nightly watches. The savages
next tried to steal in on us, but were soon frightened off by the
patrols cocking their guns. Then, seeing themselves defeated in
that tactic, they collected in hundreds in front of us, set fire
to the grass, and marched up and down, brandishing ignited grass
in their hands, howling like demons, and swearing they would
annihilate us in the morning.
We slept the night out, nevertheless, and next morning walked in
to Gondokoro, N. Lat. 4§ 54' 5", and E. long. 31§ 46' 9", where
Mahamed, after firing a salute, took us in to see a Circassian
merchant, named Kurshid Agha. Our first inquiry was, of course,
for Petherick. A mysterious silence ensued; we were informed
that Mr Debono was THE man we had to thank for the assistance we
had received in coming from Madi; and then in hot haste, after
warm exchanges of greeting with Mahamed's friend, who was
Debono's agent here, we took leave, to hunt up Petherick.
Walking down the bank of the river - where a line of vessels was
moored, and on the right hand a few sheds, one-half broken down,
with a brick-built house representing the late Austrian Church
Mission establishment - we saw hurrying on towards us the form of
an Englishman, who, for one moment, we believed was the Simon
Pure; but the next moment my old friend Baker, famed for his
sports in Ceylon, seized me by the hand.
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