Our porters were, on the whole, a cheery group of men, and our hearts often went out in deep sympathy with them, in the hardships and difficulties of the way, as they encountered dangers and risked their lives, in transporting our goods into the heart of the distant and unopened country. They carried heavy loads, of seventy to ninety pounds, from early dawn till the end of the day's march, and then were kept busy at the work of the camp till the shades of evening fell upon them. They only partook of food once a day, and that at night, after all their work was finished.
About five o'clock in the morning, we had a cup of tea or cocoa and some biscuits. The assembling whistle was then blown to awaken the prostrate forms of the sleepers, who lay scattered on the ground. Tents were taken down and loads packed by the light of the camp fires. At gray dawn, which comes at the equator shortly before six, the long file of porters marched out of camp.
On starting, the caravan might not cover more than four to five hundred yards of the track, but the more active and go-ahead men pressed forward, while the weak and sluggish lagged behind, and, unless special precautions were taken, the length of the caravan was soon drawn out to a couple of miles. The rear of the caravan, however, was always supported by one or two headmen, whose special duty it was to see that no stragglers fell out on the march.
In the early morning, even in the dry season, the long grass and bushes through which our course lay were dripping with dew, and our clothes and carrying chairs were always soaked with water, during the first few hours of the day's journey.
As the men passed along on their rough and rugged way through the bush, they warned one another of the difficulties and obstacles of the path. We became quite accustomed to such exclamations as, "Angalia! nyoka!" (Beware, snake); "Siafu!" (Biting ants); "Shimo!" (Hole); "Miiba tele!" (Thorns, plenty), etc. Thus, to the oncoming men of the rear, were announced the obstructions which awaited them, and, according to the old proverb, being warned, were half ready.
Petty stops were called now and again during the march, and about an hour before midday, when the sun was fiercely hot, a lengthy rest was given to the weary caravan. About three in the afternoon we usually halted for the night, but the time and place of camping was, in the dry season, decided totally by the water available and, in the season of rain, by the elevation of the district.
When our porters arrived at a place which we decided should be our camping ground for the night, the first work to be done was to pitch our tents. The loads of most valuable goods, with a special mark upon each box, were stored in a tent, in which three armed men slept at night. The other general goods, such as provisions, cases of gear and tools, were stacked in a pile on logs, to keep them from the white ants, and covered with a large cover. In time of rain, a trench was cut around each tent and stack of goods, to carry off the water.
If the place were thought to be very dangerous, due to the presence of treacherous natives or wild animals, a number of porters were sent out with axes, to cut down thorny trees in the surrounding forest, and a circular fence of considerable size was formed around the camp for protection.
If the position were not a dangerous one, the thorny enclosure was dispensed with, and the men proceeded to form little piles of grass and leafy branches of trees in a wide circle around our tents. Others gathered in huge piles of fuel for the night, and lit the necessary camp fires. These served the three-fold purpose of keeping off the lions and panthers, lighting the camp, and cooking the food. Large fires were kept burning near to the entrance of our tents and before each booth in the extended circle.
The entire caravan was divided up into small companies of five to six individuals, and each little group cooked and ate together, and slept in the same leafy recess.
When the covering of night falls on the camp, and all the fires are brightly burning, the scene is one of extreme weirdness and fascination. The plant life of the surrounding forest is lit up with the red glow of the camp fires. The animated figures of the porters are passing to and fro attending to their pots in which are being boiled large quantities of beans or some other kind of lentil or grain.
While the bean pots are sputtering, the babel of talk is something never to be forgotten. The porters speak to one another of the exciting incidents of the day. They talk of all that the white man has said or done. They discuss the probability of an attack by lions, or by the surrounding tribe during the night. They go over to one another their experiences of all the former caravans in which they have traveled, and tell of their hair-breadth escapes, and of the fate of many of their former companions in travel. They give to one another most graphic descriptions of the white men with whom they have journeyed in various parts of the continent, and, amidst giggling and often side-splitting laughter, they refer to their peculiarities and eccentricities, while they mimic their speech and action with great dramatic power.
After the pots are all emptied of their contents, and every appetite satisfied, the volume of sound dwindles and soon the weary porters have gone to sleep in their little temporary bowers. The guards, previously appointed, are now at their posts to keep up the camp fires and give warning of approaching danger. The howl of the hyena, the grunt of the leopard and the rolling sound of the lion stand out clearly on the still midnight air.
A few marches from the runaway camp brought us to a district where high, bare rocks stick out and large boulders were scattered about. Here we pitched our tents, late in the afternoon, at the conclusion of a long and tiresome journey.
Going up the vantage ground afforded us by one of these bare hills, we had a most glorious view of the great snow capped mountain, Kilimanjaro. In the evening, as we sat upon the summit of a big, sloping boulder, within two degrees of the equator, and gazed on that gigantic mass of earth, which rose over twenty thousand feet into mid-heaven, with its dazzling blanket of eternal snow, there came over us a feeling of dreamy awe that cannot be expressed. No wonder the natives call it the "Dwelling place of God." As our eyes were fixed in wonder and admiration on the lofty mountain, the disc of the sun was sinking fast below the horizon; and, as he disappeared, the huge dark cloud which, till then, had lingered high above the snow-clad dome of Kibo and the white towering cone of Kimawenzi, drew nearer to the glistening peaks, until cloud and mountain hold each other, and the charming scene gone from our view.
Retracing our steps to the camp, we were soon made aware of the nearness of the King of Beasts to our sleeping accommodations. On that particular night, lions seemed more abundant than usual as they answered one another from valley to gorge with full roar.
The presence of these beasts of prey was always betrayed by our transport donkeys, which were tied in the center of the camp. They served us as a sort of catlike indicator, indicating the degree of danger to which we were subjected by lions. Their timely warning, in the middle of the night or towards the early hours of morning, often roused our porters to pile more fuel on the campfires, which formed our great safeguard during the hours of darkness. When we were camping in the waterless jungle, where lions and leopards were entirely absent or rarely met with, our donkeys went off to sleep while standing in the camp; but when we entered districts which were infested by lions, these donkeys seemed quite sensitive to the feline odor around them, and seen in their fears and never-ending restlessness during the night.
The fresh spoor of lions and other carnivores were seen more frequently after crossing the Mekindu river, where the entire feature of the country suddenly changed, as if by the wand of the magician. Thick forest and scrubby jungle gave place to the most delightful landscape, covered with a carpet of green, juicy grass, where animal life roamed in superabundance, underneath the shadows of large clusters of leafy trees. As the caravan moves along on its winding path, snakes often dash through the bushes with incredible speed, and, at other times, are found lying dreamingly on the path, basking in the hot sun. Others are found wound up like a coil of variegated rope, and, at our approach, from the center of the coil they thrust out their poisonous head, as quickly as a dart leaves the bow, causing our men to make a fast retreat. At times one of these deadly reptiles of considerable length will glide sluggishly crossways the track, with open mouth and fangs erect, bringing alarm among the porters, who instinctively rise in the air, and, with the leap of a gymnast, jump out of the way.
As we proceed, our course opens into a park-like area, where a herd of zebra are lazily feeding, while the bright rays of sunlight show up the rare beauty of their shiny stripes. There a company of timid waterbuck, on becoming aware of our approach, rush through the acacia studded valley. Yonder a group of giraffe appear, with their heads gazing over the high mimosa trees, like visions of a former age.
Now we come upon an immense herd of the sportive and unpredictable gnu, whose lively and playful fun exceeds that of all the hoofed animals of the tropics. Big, burly bulls stand out from the herd at different points, as guards. Catching our smell, they bear down upon us with a lively leap, and suddenly come to a dead stop, as suddenly as if reined in by some unseen Hercules, and stare at us with almost rude curiosity. They then jump about around us at a respectful distance, with their bushy tails erect, and, lowering their heads to the grass until their shaggy beards sweep the dust, they fling their hind legs so high in the air, that one would think they were intent on turning a somersault.
Becoming at length assured, in their own minds, of our harmlessness or otherwise, they rush back to the herd, bearing news of the strange intruders, and soon the vast company, as if responding to a trumpet-call, start off at a swaying gallop, head and rump rising and falling alternately, as they move across the fertile plateau.
In the vicinity of the Mekindu river, we rested a couple of days to get some meat for the porters, and then moving forward, we crossed the Kiboko river, which presented considerable difficulties to our porters when fording, owing mainly to the long stretch of sud or bog, which lay on either side of the current. Once more we entered upon thick bush country, which was alive with rhinoceroses, and our caravan men had some exciting experiences.
The African rhinoceros, which, next to the elephant, is the largest animal existing, is a most fierce and dangerous beast, and more dreaded by the natives than even the lion. Unlike the Indian species, seen in the zoos of Europe, his skin does not lie in folds, but is drawn tight over his body; and he is armed with two heavy horns, of from eighteen to forty inches in length, placed one behind the other above the nose.
The smell and hearing of these pachyderms are remarkably sensitive, and, at four or five hundred yards, or even more if the breeze is in their favor, they will catch the smell of a human intruder upon their domain, and rush through brake and thicket straight for the spot, spurting and puffing like a steam engine. Their charge is overwhelmingly fast, as they rush windward on their cruel course, while the terror-smitten porters, throwing down their loads, flee here and there to escape the arrival, and become as swift in climbing the nearby trees as the chimpanzee of the forest.
My husband had rather an amusing experience, one day, while shooting some flesh for his men. Seeing a huge rhinoceros in a contracted opening in the forest, he cautiously approached it with the wind in his favor, until he got dangerously near to the ferocious brute. It instantly raised its head, and began sniffing up the air, in a manner which indicated a suspicion that there was some foe lurking in the vicinity. As the animal was wheeling round to charge, my husband, realizing that that moment was his only possible opportunity, covered it below the ear, and firing, dropped it apparently stone dead.
Going up to the rhinoceros, he caught hold of the long forward horn, and was, for a moment, startled to find the body moving, as if attempting to rise. The huge animal had fallen, with its four pillar-like legs doubled up together underneath it, and was resting on them, as on a pivot, with the head raised from the ground in a natural life-like position.
My husband whistled upon his men in the distance to come forward to flay the meat which had been secured, and, with eager expectation, they came running at a trot. While the men cautiously drew near to the head of the monster, my husband got behind the animal, and, placing the muzzle of his rifle against the rump, pressed it forward with a thrust. As the head moved towards the oncoming men, so frightened were they, thinking that the animal was about to rise to the charge, that they turned and scampered off, as fast as their heels could carry them: nor could they be convinced to return until they saw my husband sitting on the back of the monster.
Our camp at Ungarunga or Rock-pool, in the thick bush, was quite upset by these animals one night, as they came in numbers to wallow in the great, natural basin, from which we drew our water. They marched through the camp, stamping out the fires, while some of our men had narrow escapes. One of the porters rushed headfirst out of camp ahead of the angry beasts, and, on scrambling up an nearby boulder to save his life, he was terrified to find another of these brutes on the other side of the rock. So alarmed were the men by the night-time invasion of these malicious monsters, that they were unable to sleep during the rest of the night.
They were delighted when dawn broke, and, in the dim light of the early morn, we left the camp of unpleasant memories, and hastened on by a zigzag path through a jungle, where the tracks of the pachyderms were in continual evidence. In some places the ground had been plowed up by their horns, trees stripped of their bark, and thickets flattened down and destroyed.
As we journeyed on our way, through drenching sheets of rain, which covered the ground and turned it into spongy mud, in which our feet sank ankle deep, we entered among some rolling hills, overgrown with stunted acacias, and interspersed with deep valleys, which seemed to be the favorite home of companies of wild boars. There were some rocky elevations, rising at intervals over the landscape, on which a species of fig tree flourished, and the fallen fruit from these, together with roots and grass, formed the primary food of these large tusked swine.
It is marvelous how quickly they trot along, on scenting danger, and, if pursued, they will often stop, raise their head, and look over their shoulder to see how far the enemy is behind; and, if pressed hard, will make for the nearest cave. If the male is brought to bay, he is a most dangerous animal and, so formidable is he, that he will try to defend himself against the King of the Forest. When the lion springs upon the boar, the latter receives him on his powerful tusks. Natives have seen, at times, the lion and the wild boar lying dead together, both having succumbed while engaged in mutually destructive combat.
Dropping gradually down from these undulating hills, we approached the well-wooded valley, through which flowed the river N'dange. As we marched over low lying, swampy ground and drew near to the river, the roar of water was truly terrific, and spoke to our porters a difficult crossing. On we pressed through the interlacing growth of large trees and creepers, which lined the wide -spreading banks.
Never can we forget the thrilling scene which confronted us, as we emerged from the undergrowth. The thundering waters leaped over jutting rocks and giant boulders, madly careering on their way to the ocean, through a sylvan avenue of large-foliaged trees, whose overhanging branches were kissed by the foaming stream.
The available fording place was situated at a rapid, over the top of some irregular, slippery and indented rocks, whose elevated ridges lay two to three feet underneath the surface of the boiling river. The carriers' burdens were stacked together, while many attempts at crossing were made by the boldest and bravest of our men, some of whom narrowly escaped sliding into the holes which lay on the low side of the rocks. With the aid of stout poles, they were eventually able to find safe footing, and, after some hours of patient labor, the loads were transported to the further bank of the river, where we camped and gave our porters a couple of days' well earned rest.
After plowing through rough jungle and muddy swamps for several hundred miles, at times pitching our tents in slushy camps, our clothing and bedding, which were handled by unwashed porters, had got into a disgraceful condition. Some of the most capable of our men were therefore started to the work of washing and repair, and, when everything was done, they were allowed to amuse themselves fishing on the shady banks of the gurgling river.
With a piece of cord and a crooked pin, and a grasshopper or fly for bait, some of them were successful in bringing into camp a fairly large haul of tender, well flavored fish, which did much to break the monotony of the dull food of the jungle.
After journeying for one month from the Coast, we entered the thickly populated, southwestern tract of the Ukamba country, and our porters were rejoiced at the prospect of being able to exchange the barter goods for food, as our supply was absolutely empty. According to the winding track which we had followed through the forest, we had then covered a distance of three to four hundred miles.
Our tents stood in the middle of a crowded population, and we were amazed at the large numbers of natives who surrounded our camp. The people were of very fine body type, the women stout, plump and erect, while the men were tall, muscular, agile and athletic, and of graceful manner. There was nothing unpleasant about the features of this tribe, whose territory bordered on the equator. We found them very much superior in intelligence to many of the tribes we had met in the country five to six degrees south latitude, but infinitely more wild and dangerous. The men were quite naked, and the women almost entirely so, as their only covering consisted of a small apron four or five inches square.
The bold and brave Wakamba warriors were armed with large bows, and quivers full of poisoned arrows were slung over their shoulders. These darts were capped with a spatulate head of native iron, as sharp as a razor, and smeared with a deadly mixture, which is fatal to the largest quadruped if only it enters a surface vein.
The warriors surged round our tent to see the newly arrived white man and his children. Never before had they or their forefathers witnessed such a sight, for no white woman or child had ever entered the borders of their country, and they stood in blank amazement, critically scanning the white-skinned mother and her young children, while ejaculations, I am afraid far from flattering, followed one another in rapid succession.
We were camped in the midst of the beautiful rolling hills of Kilungu, and we realized the wonderful opportunities existing there for the preaching of the Gospel. The country in which we had purposed opening work lay over one hundred and fifty miles further inland, but we could not help contemplating the favorable conditions presented in that crowded district for establishing a Mission.
We heard from our Kilangozi that the natives of that part of the country were famed for being deceptive and treacherous, and often attacked men of their own tribe in other districts. This latter trait of character was so unusual, among all the tribes we had ever seen, that we could not at first believe it. The truth of the assertion was afterward sufficiently verified, however, when an Mkamba from another part was laid hold of by these warriors, and a strip of skin, an inch wide and twelve feet long, was taken from his body, running from the ankle on the one leg, right over the crown of the head, and down to the ankle of the other. He was then released and told to go home, and make known to his people the sort of men they were. The poor fellow died on his return journey in unbearable pain.
Although there has existed, for ages, a deadly hatred between the different tribes, and they have been forever engaged in intertribal warfare, and inflicting unthinkable tortures and mutilations upon one another, yet, as a rule, the people of any single tribe are quite friendly with those of the same clan, throughout their entire boundary. There is among them a strong spirit of unity and agreement, which enables them to present an undivided front against the surrounding tribes, which are their chronic foes.
After we were some time in our camp among the Wakamba, there was quite an uproar among our men, and there seemed a great danger of a general fight between them and the natives. My husband rushed out among them, and asked about the cause of the fight, and brought our own porters and the natives concerned before our tent. After due investigation, it was discovered that some of the meal, which had been received by our men in exchange for beads, consisted of a mixture of meal and wood ashes. This we considered a very serious matter, as our carriers would thus be deprived of proper nourishment, while there was a great probability of the wood ashes inducing among them an outbreak of dysentery or sickness.
Although the natives took up a very threatening attitude, my husband decided that the beads given for this contaminated food must be returned immediately. After considerable clamoring and hesitation, these were produced, and the stuff was handed over to the natives, with the remark that meal made from wood ashes might be very good for themselves, but the Mzungu (white man), who had come to their country, must have flour made from millet, just as it was pounded in the mortar without any additional flavoring! The lesson thus taught these natives, on our first introduction to them, served a practical purpose, and there were no more wood ashes brought to our camp.
From the heart of the Kilungu country, we rather unwillingly took our departure, as we had become quite attached to these wild and wily barbarians. After one or two hours' marching, we experienced very considerable difficulty in discovering any track which led in the direction to which we wished to proceed. Eventually we reached some steep, pathless hills, and, finding no beaten passage, we were obliged to enter the course of a wide but shallow river, about one and a half to two feet deep, and march for seven hours against the stream as it wound its way through these pathless heights.
The waters rolled along over an alternate sandy and rocky bed, and swiftly rushed underneath the overhanging bushes and creepers, which covered the banks on either side.
Our children were carried in their chairs, but I was too heavy for my men to carry me along under such poor and trying circumstances. My husband took my arm, and we walked up the stream together. My short walking skirt I tucked up under my belt. Never, I think, in all my experience have I had such a wearing march, although, on several occasions, I had walked through miles of swamp in the Useguha country. Now and again we plunged into holes, three to four feet deep, in which we floundered in our attempts to reach a more shallow part of the muddy current. At times, some of the children were thrown out of their chairs into the water, when one of their carriers had stumbled and fallen.
Our limbs ached terribly with the never-ending battling against the stream, and our heads became dizzy, due to the continual movement and rippling of the waters. Frequently we rested on some of the large elevated rocks which protruded their heads in mid-current, while the water was streaming from our clothing. It seemed that day as if the whole caravan, black and white alike, had suddenly turned amphibious. Fortunately the sun overhead was splitting the rocks, and the water was of a fairly high temperature.
As we ascended the stream, the current became more cramped and rapid, and depressions in the bed of the stream more numerous. A few of the porters got some ugly bruises through tumbling into these, and several of the loads got soaked.
Our hearts were gladdened, when, in the afternoon, we found that the trackless hills had been skirted, and we emerged from the river bed unto an rolling, grassy plain. There we pitched our tents, and large fires were soon made, and our clothing changed and dried. In one or two hours after leaving the river, we felt our limbs so hurt that we could barely move about the camp to attend to the preparation of our evening meal.
After the necessary fires had been made, and the porters had cooked and partaken of their first and last meal that day, they stretched themselves at full length on the green grass, and soon were wrapped in sleep, and unmindful of all the impediments and difficulties they had encountered in the rough and winding stream.