They Are, I Believe, Entirely Distinct From The
Song Tunes.
And these peaceful tunes my men were now singing were,
in their florid elaboration very different from the one they fought
the rapids to, of - So Sir - So Sur - So Sir - So Sur - Ush!
So Sir,
etc.
On we go singing elaborately, thinking no evil of nature, when a
current, a quiet devil of a thing, comes round from behind a point
of the bank and catches the nose of our canoe; wringing it well, it
sends us scuttling right across the river in spite of our ferocious
swoops at the water, upsetting us among a lot of rocks with the
water boiling over them; this lot of rocks being however of the
table-top kind, and not those precious, close-set pinnacles rising
up sheer out of profound depths, between which you are so likely to
get your canoe wedged in and split. We, up to our knees in water
that nearly tears our legs off, push and shove the canoe free, and
re-embarking return singing "So Sir" across the river, to have it
out with that current. We do; and at its head find a rapid, and
notice on the mountain-side a village clearing, the first sign of
human habitation we have seen to-day.
Above this rapid we get a treat of still water, the main current of
the Ogowe flying along by the south bank. On our side there are
sandbanks with their graceful sloping backs and sudden ends, and
there is a very strange and beautiful effect produced by the flakes
and balls of foam thrown off the rushing main current into the quiet
water. These whirl among the eddies and rush backwards and forwards
as though they were still mad with wild haste, until, finding no
current to take them down, they drift away into the landlocked bays,
where they come to a standstill as if they were bewildered and lost
and were trying to remember where they were going to and whence they
had come; the foam of which they are composed is yellowish-white,
with a spongy sort of solidity about it. In a little bay we pass we
see eight native women, Fans clearly, by their bright brown faces,
and their loads of brass bracelets and armlets; likely enough they
had anklets too, but we could not see them, as the good ladies were
pottering about waist-deep in the foam-flecked water, intent on
breaking up a stockaded fish-trap. We pause and chat, and watch
them collecting the fish in baskets, and I acquire some specimens;
and then, shouting farewells when we are well away, in the proper
civil way, resume our course.
The middle of the Ogowe here is simply forested with high rocks,
looking, as they stand with their grim forms above the foam, like a
regiment of strange strong creatures breasting it, with their
straight faces up river, and their more flowing curves down, as
though they had on black mantles which were swept backwards. Across
on the other bank rose the black-forested spurs of Lomba-njaku. Our
channel was free until we had to fight round the upper end of our
bay into a long rush of strong current with bad whirlpools curving
its face; then the river widens out and quiets down and then
suddenly contracts - a rocky forested promontory running out from
each bank. There is a little village on the north bank's
promontory, and, at the end of each, huge monoliths rise from the
water, making what looks like a gateway which had once been barred
and through which the Ogowe had burst.
For the first time on this trip I felt discouraged; it seemed so
impossible that we, with our small canoe and scanty crew, could
force our way up through that gateway, when the whole Ogowe was
rushing down through it. But we clung to the bank and rocks with
hands, poles, and paddle, and did it; really the worst part was not
in the gateway but just before it, for here there is a great
whirlpool, its centre hollowed some one or two feet below its rim.
It is caused, my Kembe islander says, by a great cave opening
beneath the water. Above the gate the river broadens out again and
we see the arched opening to a large cave in the south bank; the
mountain-side is one mass of rock covered with the unbroken forest;
and the entrance to this cave is just on the upper wall of the south
bank's promontory; so, being sheltered from the current here, we
rest and examine it leisurely. The river runs into it, and you can
easily pass in at this season, but in the height of the wet season,
when the river level would be some twenty feet or more above its
present one, I doubt if you could. They told me this place is
called Boko Boko, and that the cave is a very long one, extending on
a level some way into the hill, and then ascending and coming out
near a mass of white rock that showed as a speck high up on the
mountain.
If you paddle into it you go "far far," and then "no more water
live," and you get out and go up the tunnel, which is sometimes
broad, sometimes narrow, sometimes high, sometimes so low that you
have to crawl, and so get out at the other end.
One French gentleman has gone through this performance, and I am
told found "plenty plenty" bats, and hedgehogs, and snakes. They
could not tell me his name, which I much regretted. As we had no
store of bush lights we went no further than the portals; indeed,
strictly between ourselves, if I had had every bush light in Congo
Francais I personally should not have relished going further. I am
terrified of caves; it sends a creaming down my back to think of
them.
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