Sketches of the East Africa Campaign Part 6

NIGHT IN MOROGORO

There's nothing quite so wideawake as a tropical night in Africa. At dawn the African dove commences with his long-drawn note like a boy blowing over the top of a bottle, one bird calling to another from the palms and mango trees. Then the early morning songsters wake.

There is no libel more grossly unfair than that which says the birds of Africa have no song. The yellow weaver birds sing most beautifully, as they fly from the feathery tops of the avenue of coconut palms that line the road to the clump of bamboos behind the hospital.

But they fly there no longer now, for our colonel, in a spasm of sanitation, cut down this graceful swaying clump of striped bamboos for the fear that they harboured mosquitoes. As if these few canes mattered, when our hospital was on the banks of the reed-fringed river. Morning songsters with voices of English thrushes and robins wake one to gaze upon the dawn through one's mosquito net. Small bird voices, like the chiff-chaff in May, carry on the chorus until the sun rises. Then the bird of delirium arrives and runs up the scale to a high monotonous note that would drive one mad, were it not that he and the dove, with his amphoric note, are Africa all over. A neat fawn-coloured bird this, with a long tail and dark markings on his wings.

Then as the sun rises and the early morning heat dries up the song birds' voices, the earth and the life of the palm trees drowse in the suns.h.i.+ne.

But at night, from late afternoon to three in the morning, when the life of trees and gra.s.ses and ponds ceases for a short while before it begins again at dawn, the air is full of the busy voices of the insect world.

Until we came south to Morogoro, to the land of mangoes, coconut, palms, bamboos, we had known the shrill voice of cicadas and the harsh metallic noises of crickets in gra.s.s and trees. But here we made two new acquaintances, and charming little voices they had too. One lived in the gra.s.s and rose leaves of our garden, for the German blacksmith who lately occupied our hospital building had planted his garden with "Caroline Testout" and crimson ramblers. His voice was like the tinkling of fairy hammers upon a silver anvil. And with this fine clear note was the elusive voice of another cricket that had such a marked ventriloquial character that we could never tell whether he lived in the rose bushes or in the trees. His note was the music of silver bells upon the naked feet of rickshaw boys, the tinkle that keeps time to the soft padding of native feet in the rickshaws of Nairobi at night. At first I woke to think there were rickshaw boys dragging rubber-tyred carriages along the avenues of the town, until I found that Morogoro boasted no rickshaws and no bells for native feet.

Punctuated in all the music of fairy bands and the whirr of fairy machinery were the incessant voices of frogs. Especially if it had rained or were going to rain, the little frogs in trees and ponds sang their love songs in chorus, silenced, at times, by the deep ba.s.so of a bull frog. And often, as our heads ached and throbbed with fever at night, we felt a very lively sympathy for the French n.o.blesse of the eighteenth century, who are said to have kept their peasants up at night beating the ponds with sticks to still the strident voices of these frogs.

With it all there is a rustling overhead in the feathery branches of the palms in the cobwebby s.p.a.ces among the leaves that give the bats of Africa a home. A twitter of angry bat voices, shrill squeaks and flutters in the darkness. Then stillness--of a sudden--and the ground trembles with a far-off throbbing as a convoy of motor lorries approaching thunders past us, rumbling over the bridge and out into the darkness, driving for supplies.

The road beside the hospital was the old caravan route that ran from the Congo through Central Africa and by the Great Lakes to Bagamoyo by the sea. For centuries the Arab slaver had brought his slave caravans along this path: it may have been fever or the phantasies of disordered subconscious minds half awake in sleep, or the empty night thrilling to the music of crickets, that filled our minds with fancies in the darkness. But this road seemed alive again. For this smooth surface that now trembles to the thunder of motor lorries seemed to echo to the soft padding of millions of slave feet limping to the coast to fill the harems or to work the clove plantations of his most Oriental Majesty the Sultan of Zanzibar.

THE WATERS OF TURIANI

Halfway between the Usambara and the Central Railway, the dusty road to Morogoro crosses the Turiani River. In the woods beside the river, the tired infantry are resting at the edge of a big rock pool. Wisps of blue smoke from dying fires tell of the tea that has washed beef and biscuit down dry and dusty throats. The last company of bathers are drying in the sun upon the rocks, necks, arms and knees burnt to a sepia brown, the rest of their bodies alabaster white in the suns.h.i.+ne. It is three o'clock, and the drowsy heat of afternoon has hushed the bird and insect world to sleep. Only in the tree-tops is the sleepy hum of bees, still busy with the flowers, and the last twitter of soft birds' voices. Soft river laughter comes up from the rocky stream-bed below, and, softened by the distance to a poignant sweetness, the sound of church bells from Mhonda Mission floats up to us upon the west wind.

Yesterday only saw the last of Lettow's army crossing the bridge and echoed to the noise of the explosion that blew up the concrete pillars and forced our pioneers to build a wooden subst.i.tute. Alas! for the best-laid schemes of our General. The bird had escaped from the closing net, and Lettow was free to make his retreat in safety to the Southern Railway. Here at Turiani for a moment it seemed that the campaign was over. Up from the big Mission at Mhonda, the mounted troops swept out to cut off the German retreat. All unsuspected, they had made then-big flank march to meet the eastern flanking column, and cut the road behind the German force in a pincer grip. But the blind bush robbed our troopers of their sense of direction, and the long trek through waterless bush, the tsetse fly and horse-sickness that took their daily toll of all our horses reduced the speed of cavalry to little more than a walk. A mistake in a bush-covered hill in a country that was all hill and bush, and the elusive Lettow slipped out to run and hide and fight again on many another day.

SCOUTING

Of the many aspects of this campaign none perhaps is more thrilling than life on the forward patrol. For the duty of these fellows is to go forward with armed native scouts far in advance of the columns, to find out what the Germans are up to, their strength, and the disposition of their troops. Their reports they send back by native runners, who not infrequently get captured. Like wolves in the forest they live, months often elapsing without their seeing a white face, and then it is the kind of white man that they do not want to see; every man's hand against them, native as well as German, unable to light fires at night for fear of discovery, sleeping on the ground, creeping up close, for in this bush one can only get information at close quarters; always out of food, forced to smoke pungent native tobacco. They have to live on the game they shoot, and it is a hundred chances to one that the shot that gives them dinner will bring a Hun patrol to disturb the feast. Theirs is without doubt the riskiest job in such a war as this.

Here is the story of a night surprise, as it was told me. The long trek had lasted all day, to be followed by the fireless supper (how one longs for the hot tea at night!), and the deep sleep that comes to exhausted man as soon as he gets into his blankets. Drowsy sentries failed to hear the rustling in the thicket until almost too late; the alarm is given, pickets run in to wake their sleeping "bwona," all mixed up with Germans. The intelligence party scattered to all points of the compa.s.s, leaving their camp kit behind them. There was no time to do aught but pick up their rifles (that is second nature) and fly for safety to the bush. Now this actual surprise party was led by one Laudr, an Oberleutnant who had lived for years in South Africa, and had married an English wife. Laudr had the reputation of being the best shot in German East, but he missed that night, and my friend escaped, unharmed, the five shots from his revolver. Next morning, cautiously approaching the scene of last night's encounter, he found a note pinned to a tree. In it Laudr thanked him for much good food and a pair of excellent blankets, and regretted that the light had been so bad for shooting. But he left a young goat tied up to the tree and my friend's own knife and fork and plate upon the ground.

Another story this resourceful fellow told me concerning an exploit which he and a fellow I.D. man, with twenty-five of their scouts, had brought off near Arusha. They had been sent out to get information as to the strength of an enemy post in a strongly fortified stone building--the kind of half fort, half castle that the Germans build in every district as an impregnable refuge in case of native risings. With watch towers and battlements, these forts are after the style of mediaeval buildings. Equipped with food supplies and a well, they can resist any attack short of artillery. Learning from the natives that the force consisted of two German officers and about sixty Askaris, my friend determined not to send back for the column that was waiting to march from Arusha to invest the place. Between them they resolved to take the place by strategy and guile. Lying hid in the bush, they arranged with friendly natives to supply the guard with "pombe" the potent native drink. Late that night, judging from the sounds that the Kaffir beer had done its work, they crept up and disarmed the guard.

Holding the outer gate they sent in word to the commandant, a Major Schneider, the administrator of the district, to surrender. He duly came from his quarters into the courtyard accompanied by his Lieutenant.

"Before I consider surrender," he said, "tell me what force you've got?"

"This fort is surrounded by my troops, that is enough for you," said our man. "In any case you see my men behind me, and, if you don't 'hands up,' they'll fire." And the "troops"--half-clad natives--stepped forward with levelled rifles.

The next morning the Major, still doubting, asked to see the rest of the English troops, and on being informed that these were all, would have rushed back to spring the mines that would have blown the place to pieces. But the Intelligence Officer had not wasted his time the previous night, and had very carefully cut the wires that led apparently so innocently from the central office of the fort. My friend brought this Major, a man of great importance in his district, to Dar-es-Salaam; and during the whole journey the German never ceased to complain that bluffing was a dishonourable means of warfare to employ.

On yet another occasion he had an experience that taxed his tact and strength to the utmost. In the course of his work he seized the meat-canning factory near Arusha that a certain Frau ----, in the absence of her husband, was carrying on. The enemy used to shoot wildebeest and preserve it by canning or by drying it in the sun as "biltong" for the use of the German troops. My friend was forced to burn the factory, and then it became his duty to escort this very practical lady back to our lines. This did not suit her book at all. With tears she implored him to send her to her own people. She would promise anything. Cunningly she suggested great stores of information she might impart. But he cared not for her weeping, and ordered her to pack for the long journey to Arusha. Then tears failing her she sulked, and refused to eat or leave her tent. But this found him adamant. Finally she tried the woman's wiles which should surely be irresistible to this man. But he was unmoved by all her blandishments. So surprised and indignant was he that he threatened to tell her husband of her behaviour, when he should catch him. But here it appears he made a false estimate of the value of honour and dishonour among the Huns. "A loyal German woman," she exclaimed, laughing, "is allowed to use any means to further the interests of her Fatherland. My husband will only think more highly of me when he knows." So this modern Galahad of ours turned away and ordered the lady's tent to be struck and marched her off, taking care that he himself was far removed from her presence in the caravan.

"What fools you English are," she flung back at him, as he handed her into the custody that would safely hold this dangerous apostle of _Kultur_ till the end of the war.

"HUNNISHNESS"

Wearily along the road from Korogwe to Handeni toiled a little company of details lately discharged from hospital and on their way forward to Division. Behind them straggled out, for half a mile or more, their line of black porters carrying blankets and waterproof sheets. Arms and necks and knees burnt black by many weeks of tropic sun, carrying rifle and cartridge belts and with their helmets reversed to shade their eyes from the westering sun, this little body of Rhodesians, Royal Fusiliers and South Africans covered the road in the very loose formation these details of many regiments affect. Far ahead was the advance guard of four Rhodesians and Fusiliers. Nothing further from their thoughts than war--for they were thirty miles behind Division--they were suddenly galvanised into action by the sight of the advance guard slipping into the roadside ditches and opening rapid rifle fire at some object ahead.

For at a turn of the road the advance guard perceived a large number of Askaris and several white men collected about one of our telegraph posts, while, up the post, upon the cross trees, was a white man, busily engaged with the wires. One glance was sufficient to tell these wary soldiers that the white men were wearing khaki uniforms of an unfamiliar cut and the mushroom helmet that the Hun affects. So they took cover in the ditches and opened fire, especially upon the German officer who was busily tapping our telegraph wire. Down with a great b.u.mp on the ground dropped the startled Hun, and the Askaris fled to the jungle leaving their chop boxes lying on the road. From the safe shelter of the bush the enemy reconnoitred their a.s.sailants, and taking courage from their small numbers, proceeded to envelop them by a flank movement. But the British officer in charge of the details behind, knew his job and threw out two flanking parties when he got the message from the advance guard.

Our men outflanked the outflanking enemy, and soon as pretty a little engagement as one could hope to see had developed. Finding themselves partly surrounded by unsuspected strength the Germans scattered in all directions, leaving a few wounded and dead behind upon the field. There on his back, wounded in the leg and spitting fire from his revolver, was lying the German officer determined to sell his life dearly. His last shot took effect in the head of one of the Fusiliers who were charging the bush with the bayonet; up went his hands, "Kamerad, mercy!" and our officer stepped forward to disarm this chivalrous prisoner. Then they wired forward to our hospital, at that time ten miles ahead, for an ambulance, and proceeded to bury their only casualty and the dead Askaris.

Happening to be on duty, I hurried to the scene of this action in one of our ambulances, along the worst road in Africa. There I found the German officer, an Oberleutnant of the name of Zahn, lying by the roadside gazing with frightened eyes out of huge yellow spectacles. We dressed his wound and gave him an injection of morphia, a cigarette, and a good drink of brandy, and left him in the shade of a baobab tree to recover from his fears. Then I turned toward the dividing of the contents of captured chop boxes that was being carried out under the direction of the officer in charge. On occasions such as these, the men were rewarded with the only really square meal they had often had for days; for the Hun is a past master in the art of doing himself well, and his chopboxes are always full of new bread, chocolate, sardines and many little delicacies. I stepped forward to claim the two Red Cross boxes that had obviously been the property of the German doctor, and with some difficulty--for no soldier likes to be robbed of his spoil--I managed to establish the right of the hospital to them. In the boxes were not only a fine selection of drugs and surgical dressings and a bottle of brandy, but also the doctor's ammunition. And such ammunition too. Huge black-powder cartridges with large leaden bullets; they would only fit an elephant gun; and yet this was the kind of weapon this doctor found necessary to bring to protect himself against British soldiers. Had that doctor been caught with his rifle he would have deserved to be shot on the spot. Nor were our men in the best of moods; for they had seen the dead Fusilier, and were furious at the wounds these huge lead slugs create.

The orderlies then lifted the German officer tenderly into the ambulance; and the prisoner, now feeling full of the courage that morphia and brandy give, beckoned to me. "Meine Uhr in meiner Tasche,"

he said, pointing to his torn trouser. "Well, what about it?" I asked.

Again he mentioned his watch in his pocket, and looked at his torn trouser. "Do you suggest," I said sternly, "that a British soldier has taken your beastly watch." "No, no, not for worlds," he exclaimed; "I merely wish to mention the fact that when I went into action I had had a large gold watch and a large gold chain, and much gold coin in my pocket. And now," he said, "behold! I have no watch or chain." "What," I said again, "do you suggest that these soldiers are thieves?" "No! Not at all; but when I was wounded the soldiers, running up in their anxiety to help me and dress my wound" (as a matter of fact they had run up to bayonet him, had not the officer intervened, for this swine had forfeited his right to mercy by emptying his revolver first and then surrendering) "inadvertently cut away my pocket in slitting up my trouser leg." "Then your watch," I continued coldly, "is still lying on the field, or, if a soldier should discover it, he will deliver it to General Headquarters, from whence it will be sent to you." Sure enough that evening the sergeant-major in charge of the rearguard came in with the missing watch and chain.

Later, we learned, from diaries captured on German prisoners, what manner of brute this Zahn was.

FROM MINDEN TO MOROG.o.dO

Judge of my surprise when, one morning in hospital at Morogoro, a fellow walked in to see me whose face reminded me of times, two years back, when I was in the Prisoners of War Camp at Minden in Westphalia. He showed a fatter and more wholesome face certainly, he was clean and well dressed, but still, unmistakably it was the man to whom I used to take an occasional book or chocolate when he lay behind the wire of the inner prison there. "It can't be you?" I said illogically. But it was.

But what a change these two years had wrought! Now an officer in the Royal Flying Corps, the ribbon of the Military Cross bearing witness to many a risky reconnaissance over the Rufigi Valley; but then a dirty mechanic in the French Aviation Corps and a prisoner. But in December, 1914, there were no fat or clean English soldiers in German prisons.

And, as I looked, my mind went back to a wet morning when, the German sentry's back being turned, a French soldier, working on the camp road, dug his way near to the door of my hut and, still digging, told me that there was an Englishman in the French camp, who wanted particularly to see me. So that afternoon I walked boldly into the French camp as if I had important business there, and found my way to the further hut. There lying on a straw mattress, incredibly lousy and sandwiched between a Turco from Morocco and a Senegalese negro soldier, I found a white man, who jumped up to see me and was extraordinarily glad to find that his message had borne fruit. Clad in the tattered but still unmistakable uniform of a French artilleryman, three months' beard upon his face, with white wax-like cheeks, blue nose and a dreadfully hunted expression, stood this six emaciated feet of England. Drawing me aside to a sheltered corner he told me his story; how, despairing of a job in our Flying Corps at the commencement of the war, he had joined the French Aviation Corps as a mechanic, and how he had been taken prisoner early in September, 1914, when the engine of his aeroplane failed and he descended to earth in the middle of a marching column of the enemy. Of the early months of captivity from September to December in Minden he told me many things. He and all the others lived in an open field exposed to all the Westphalian winter weather, with no blankets, nothing but what he now wore. They lived in holes in a wet clay field like rats and--like rats they fought for the offal and pigwash on which the German jailors fed them twice a day. Now he had been moved into a long hut, open on the inner side that looked to the enclosed central square of the lager, but well enclosed outside by a triple barbed wire fence.

"Why do they put you in with coloured men?" I asked, as I looked at his bedfellows.

"Oh, that's because I'm an Englishman, you know," he said. "When I came here the commandant, finding who I was, was pleased to be facetious.

'Brothers in arms, glorious,' he chuckled, as he ordered my particular abode here. 'You, of course, don't object to sleep with a comrade,' he said, with heavy German humour. And I wanted to tell him, had I only dared, that I'd rather sleep with a n.i.g.g.e.r from Senegal than with him."

"How about the lice?" I said, for it was not possible to avoid seeing them on the thin piece of flannelette that was his blanket.

"Oh, I'm used to them now. Time was when I hunted my clothes all day long, but now--nothing matters; in fact, I rather think they keep me warm."

So I was quick and glad to help in the little way I could. Not that there was much that I could do. But I at least had one good meal a day and two of German prison food, but he had only three bowls of prisoner's stew and soup. Lest you might think that I exaggerate, I will tell you exactly what he had, and you may judge what manner of diet it was for a big Englishman. Five ounces of black bread a day, part of barley and part of potato, the rest of rye and wheat; for breakfast, a pint of lukewarm artificial coffee made of acorns burnt with maize, no sugar; sauerkraut and cabbage in hot water twice a day, occasionally some boiled barley or rice or oatmeal, and now and then--almost by a miracle, so rare were the occasions--a small bit of horseflesh in the soup. Could one wonder at the wolfish look upon his face, the dreary hopelessness of his expression? And on this diet he had fatigues to do; but on those days of hard toil there was also a little extra bread and an inch of German sausage.

But I could get some things from the canteen by bribing the German orderly who brought our midday food, and I had some books. So the sun shone, for a time, on Minden.

Nor was this fellow alone in these unhappy surroundings. There with him were English civilian prisoners, clerks and school-teachers, technical and engineering instructors, who once taught in German schools and worked at Essen or in the s.h.i.+pyards. These wretched civilians, until they were removed to Ruhleben, were not in much better case; but they might, at least, sleep together on indescribable straw pallia.s.ses. Then they were together; there was comfort in that at least.

By a strange turn of Fortune's wheel this very camp was placed upon the site of the battlefield of Minden, when, as our guards would tell us, an undegenerate England fought with the great Frederick against the French.

Moved to another camp this fellow had escaped by crawling under the barbed wire on a dirty wet night in winter when the sentry had turned his well-clothed back against the northern gale.