The Last Journals of David Livingstone, in Central Africa, from 1865 to His Death Volume I Part 26

they saw the reasonableness of this, but I could not get my cowardly attendants to come on, though one said to me, "Come, I shall show you the way: we must speak nice to them." This the wise boys think the perfection of virtue, speaking nice means adopting a childish treble tone of voice and words exactly similar to those of the little Scotch girl who, pa.s.sing through a meadow, was approached by a cow, probably from curiosity. To appease this enemy, she said, "Oh, coo, coo, if you no hurt me, I no hurt you." I told them to come on and leave them quietly, but they remained babbling with them. The guide said that there was no water in front: this I have been told too often ever to believe, so I went on through the forest, and in an hour and a half came to a sponge where, being joined by my attendants, we pa.s.sed the night.

_16th July, 1868._--Crossing this sponge, and pa.s.sing through flat forest, we came to another named Meshwe, when there, as a contrast, the young men volunteered to carry me across; but I had got off my shoes, and was in the water, and they came along with me, showing the shallower parts. We finished the day's march by crossing the Molongosi spongy ooze, with 150 paces of deep water, flowing N.E. The water in these oozes or sponges felt very cold, though only 60 in the mornings, and 65 at midday. The Molongosi people invited us into the village; but the forest, unless when infested with leopards and lions, is always preferable, for one is free from vermin, and free from curiosity gazers, who in the village think they have a right to stare, but in the forest feel that they are not on an equality with strangers.

[It was on the 18th of July, 1868, we see that Dr. Livingstone discovered one of the largest of the Central African Lakes. It is extraordinary to notice the total absence of all pride and enthusiasm, as--almost parenthetically--he records the fact.]

_17th and 18th July, 1868._--Reached the chief village of Mapuni, near the north bank of Bangweolo. On the 18th I walked a little way out and saw the sh.o.r.es of the Lake for the first time, thankful that I had come safely hither.

I told the chief that my goods were all expended, and gave him a fathom of calico as all I could spare: I told him that as soon as I had seen and measured the Lake I would return north; he replied, that seeing our goods were done he could say nothing, he would give me guides, and what else he should do was known to himself. He gave a public reception at once. I asked if he had ever seen anyone like me, and he said, "Never." A Babisa traveller asked me why I had come so far; I said I wished to make the country and people better known to the rest of the world, that we were all children of one Father, and I was anxious that we should know each other better, and that friendly visits should be made in safety. I told him what the Queen had done to encourage the growth of cotton on the Zambezi, and how we had been thwarted by slave-traders and their abettors: they were pleased with this. When asked I showed them my note-book, watch, compa.s.s, burning-gla.s.s, and was loudly drummed home.

I showed them the Bible, and told them a little of its contents. I shall require a few days more at Bangweolo than I at first intended.

The moon being in its last stage of waning I cannot observe till it is of some size.

_19th July, 1868._--Went down to Masantu's village, which is on the sh.o.r.e of the Lake, and by a spring called Chipoka, which comes out of a ma.s.s of disintegrated granite. It is seldom that we see a spring welling out beneath a rock: they are covered by oozing sponges, if indeed they exist. Here we had as a spectator a man walking on stilts tied to his ankles and knees. There are a great many Babisa among the people. The women have their hair ornamented with strings of cowries, and well oiled with the oil and fat from the seeds of the Mosikisi trees. I sent the chief a fathom of calico, and got an audience at once. Masantu is an oldish man; had never prayed to the Great Father of all, though he said the footsteps of "Mungu," or Mulungu, could be seen on a part of Lifunge Island: a large footstep may also be seen on the rock at the Chambeze, about fifteen inches long. He informed us that the Lake is much the largest at the part called Bangweolo.

The country around the Lake is all flat, and very much denuded of trees, except the Motsikiri or Mosikisi, which has fine dark, dense foliage, and is spared for its shade and the fatty oil yielded by its seeds: we saw the people boiling large pots full of the dark brown fat, which they use to lubricate their hair. The islands, four in number, are all flat, but well peopled. The men have many canoes, and are all expert fishermen; they are called Mboghwa, but are marked on the forehead and chin as Babisa, and file the teeth to points. They have many children, as fishermen usually have.

_21st July, 1868._--Canoe-men are usually extortionate, because one cannot do without them. Mapuni claims authority over them, and sent to demand another fathom that he may give orders to them to go with us: I gave a hoe and a string of beads instead, but he insisted on the cloth, and kept the hoe too, as I could not afford the time to haggle.

Chipoka spring water at 9 A.M. 75 } Lake water at same time 71 } air 72.

Chipoka spring at 4 P.M. 74 5' } Lake water at same time 75 } air 71 5'; wet bulb 70.

No hot fountains or earthquakes are known in this region. The bottom of the Lake consists of fine white sand, and a broad belt of strong rushes, say 100 yards wide, shows shallow water. In the afternoons quite a crowd of canoes anchor at its outer edge to angle; the hooks are like ours, but without barbs. The fish are perch chiefly, but others similar to those that appear in the other Lakes are found, and two which attain the large size of 4 feet by 1-1/2 in. thickness: one is called Sampa.

_22nd July, 1868._--A very high wind came with the new moon, and prevented our going, and also the fishermen from following their calling. Mapuni thought that we meant to make, an escape from him to the Babisa on the south, because we were taking our goats, I therefore left them and two attendants at Masantu's village to a.s.sure him.

_23rd July, 1868._--Wind still too strong to go. Took lunars.

_24th July, 1868._--Wind still strong.

_25th July, 1868._--Strong S.E. wind still blowing, but having paid the canoe-men amply for four days with beads, and given Masantu a hoe and beads too, we embarked at 11.40 A.M. in a fine canoe, 45 feet long, 4 feet deep, and 4 feet broad. The waves were high, but the canoe was very dry and five stout men propelled her quickly towards an opening in Lifunge Island, on our S.E. Here we stopped to wood, and I went away to look at the island, which had the marks of hippopotami and a species of jackal on it: it had hard wiry gra.s.s, some flowers, and a species of Gapparidaceous tree. The trees showed well the direction of the prevailing wind to be south-east, for the branches on that side were stunted or killed, while those on the north-west ran out straight, and made the trees appear, as sailors say, lopsided: the trunks too were bent that way.

The canoe-men now said that they would start, then that they would sleep here, because we could not reach the Island Mpabala before dark, and would not get a hut. I said that it would be sleeping out of doors only in either case, so they went. We could see the island called Kisi on our east, apparently a double island, about 15 miles off, and the tops of the trees barely visible on Mpabala on our south-east. It was all sea horizon on our south and north, between Lifunge and Mpabala, and between Lifunge and Kisi. We could not go to Kisi, because, as the canoe-men told us, they had stolen their canoe thence. Though we decided to go, we remained awhile to let the sea go down. A hammerhead's nest on one of the trees was fully four feet high. Coa.r.s.e rushes show the shoals near the islands. Only one sh.e.l.l was seen on the sh.o.r.es. The canoe s.h.i.+ps much less water in this surf than our boat did in that of Nya.s.sa. The water is of a deep sea-green colour, probably from the reflection of the fine white sand of the bottom; we saw no part having the deep dark blue of Nya.s.sa, and conjecture that the depth is not great; but I had to leave our line when Amoda absconded. On Kisi we observed a dark square ma.s.s, which at first I took to be a low hill: it turned out to be a ma.s.s of trees (probably the place of sepulture, for the graveyards are always untouched), and shows what a dense forest this land would become were it not for the influence of men.

We reached Mpabala after dark. It was bitterly cold, from the amount of moisture in the air. I asked a man who came to see what the arrival was, for a hut; he said, "Do strangers require huts, or ask for them at night?" he then led us to the public place of meeting, called Nsaka, which is a large shed, with planks around and open s.p.a.ces between, instead of walls; here we cooked a little porridge, and ate it, then I lay down on one side, with the canoe-men and my attendants at the fire in the middle, and was soon asleep, and dreamed that I had apartments in Mivart's Hotel. This made me feel much amused next day, for I never dream unless I am ill, or going to be ill; and of all places in the world, I never thought of Mivart's Hotel in my waking moments; a freak of the fancy surely, for I was not at all discontented with my fare, or apartment, I was only afraid of getting a stock of vermin from my a.s.sociates.

_26th July, 1868._--I have to stand the stare of a crowd of people at every new place for hours: all usually talk as quickly as their glib tongues can; these certainly do not belong to the tribes who are supposed to eke out their language by signs! A few indulge their curiosity in sight-seeing, but go on steadily weaving nets, or by beating bark-cloth, or in spinning cotton, others smoke their big tobacco pipes, or nurse a baby, or enjoy the heat of the bright morning sun. I walked across the north end of the island, and found it to be about one mile broad, I also took bearings of Chirubi Island from the eastern point of Mpabala, and found from the south-east point of Chirubi that there are 183 of sea horizon from it to the point of departure of the Luapula. Chirubi is the largest of the islands, and contains a large population, possessing many sheep and goats. At the highest part of Mpabala we could see the tops of the trees on Kasango, a small uninhabited islet, about thirty miles distant: the tops of the trees were evidently lifted up by the mirage, for near the sh.o.r.e and at other parts they were invisible, even with a good gla.s.s. This uninhabited islet would have been our second stage had we been allowed to cross the Lake, as it is of the people themselves; it is as far beyond it to the mainland, called Manda, as from Masantu's to Mpabala.

_27th July, 1868._--Took lunars and stars for lat.i.tude.

The canoe-men now got into a flurry, because they were told here that the Kisi men had got an inkling that their canoe was here, and were coming to take it; they said to me that they would come back for me, but I could not trust thieves to be so honest. I thought of seizing their paddles, and appealing to the headmen of the island; but aware from past experience how easy it is for acknowledged thieves like them to get up a tale to secure the cheap sympathy of the soft-headed, or tender-hearted, I resolved to bear with meekness, though groaning inwardly, the loss of two of the four days for which I had paid them.

I had only my coverlet to hire another canoe, and it was now very cold; the few beads left would all be required to buy food in the way back, I might have got food by shooting buffaloes, but that on foot and through gra.s.s, with stalks as thick as a goose quill, is dreadfully hard work; I had thus to return to Masantu's, and trust to the distances as deduced from the time taken by the natives in their canoes for the size of the Lake.

We had come to Mpabala at the rate of six knots an hour, and returned in the same time with six stout paddlers. The lat.i.tude was 12' in a south-east course, which may give 24' as the actual distance. To the sleeping-place, the Islet Kasango, there was at least 28' more, and from thence to the mainland "Manda," other 28'. This 24 + 28 + 28 = 80' as the breadth from Masantu village, looking south-east. It lies in 11 0' S. If we add on the half distance to this we have 11 40' as the lat.i.tude of Manda. The mainland to the south of Mpabala is called Kabende. The land's end running south of Masantu's village is the entrance to the Luapula: the clearest eye cannot see across it there.

I saw clouds as if of gra.s.s burning, but they were probably "Kungu,"

an edible insect, whose ma.s.ses have exactly the same appearance as they float above and on the water. From the time the canoes take to go to Kabende I believe the southern sh.o.r.e to be a little into 12 of south lat.i.tude: the length, as inferred from canoes taking ten days to go from Mpabala to the Chambeze, I take to be 150 miles, probably more. No one gave a shorter time than that. The Luapula is an arm of the Lake for some twenty miles, and beyond that is never narrower than from 180 to 200 yards, generally much broader, and may be compared with the Thames at London Bridge: I think that I am considerably within the mark in setting down Bangweolo as 150 miles long by 80 broad.

When told that it contained four large islands, I imagined that these would considerably diminish the watery acreage of the whole, as is said to be the case with five islands in Ukerewe; but even the largest island, Chirubi, does not in the least dwarf the enormous ma.s.s of the water of Bangweolo. A range of mountains, named Lokinga, extends from the south-east to the south-west: some small burns come down from them, but no river; this range joins the Kone, or Mokone range, west of Katanga, from which on one side rises the Lufira, and on the other the Liambai, or Zambesi. The river of Manda, called Matanga, is only a departing and re-entering branch of the Lake, also the Luma and Loela rivers--some thirty yards broad--have each to be examined as springs on the south of the Lake.

_July 29th, 1868._--Not a single case of Derbys.h.i.+re neck, or of Elephantiasis, was observed anywhere near the Lake, consequently the report we had of its extreme unhealthiness was erroneous: no muddy banks did we see, but in the way to it we had to cross so many sponges, or oozes, that the word _matope_, mud, was quite applicable; and I suspect, if we had come earlier, that we should have experienced great difficulty in getting to the Lake at all.

_30th July, 1868._--We commenced our march back, being eager to get to Chik.u.mbi's in case Mohamad should go thence to Katanga. We touched at Mapuni's, and then went on to the Molongosi. Clouds now began to cover the sky to the Mpanda, which has fifteen yards of flood, though the stream itself is only five yards wide, then on to the Mato and Moiegge's stockade, where we heard of Chik.u.mbi's attack on Kombokombo's. Moiegge had taken the hint, and was finis.h.i.+ng a second line of defence around his village: we reached him on the 1st August, 1868, and stopped for Sunday the 2nd: on the 3rd back to the Rofubu, where I was fortunate enough to hire a canoe to take me over.

In examining a tsetse fly very carefully I see that it has a receptacle at the root of the piercer, which is of a black or dark-red colour; and when it is squeezed, a clear fluid is pressed out at its point: the other two parts of the proboscis are its s.h.i.+eld, and have no bulb at the base. The bulb was p.r.o.nounced at the Royal Society to be only muscle, but it is curious that muscle should be furnished where none is needed, and withheld in the movable parts of the s.h.i.+eld where it is decidedly needed.

_5th August, 1868._--Reach Kombokombo, who is very liberal, and pressed us to stay a day with him as well as with others; we complied, and found that Mohamad had gone nowhere.

_7th August, 1868._--We found a party starting from Kizinga for the coast, having our letters with them; it will take five months to reach the sea. The disturbed state of the country prevented parties of traders proceeding in various directions, and one that set off on the same day with us was obliged to return. Mohamad has resolved to go to Manyuema as soon as parties of his men now out return: this is all in my favour; it is in the way I want to go to see the Lualaba and Lufira to Chowambe. The way seems opening out before me, and I am thankful. I resolved to go north by way of Casembe, and guides were ready to start, so was I; but rumours of war where we were going induced me to halt to find out the truth: the guides (Banyamwezi) were going to divine, by means of a c.o.c.k, to see if it would be lucky to go with me at present. The rumours of danger became so circ.u.mstantial that our fence was needed: a well was dug inside, and the Banyamwezi were employed to smelt copper as for the market of Manyuema, and b.a.l.l.s for war. Syde bin Omar soon came over the Luapula from Iramba, and the state of confusion induced the traders to agree to unite their forces and make a safe retreat out of the country. They objected very strongly to my going away down the right bank of the Luapula with my small party, though it was in sight, so I resolved to remain till all went.

_13th August, 1868._--The Banyamwezi use a hammer shaped like a cone, without a handle. They have both kinds of bellows, one of goatskin the other of wood, with a skin over the mouth of a drum, and a handle tied to the middle of it; with these they smelt pieces of the large bars of copper into a pot, filled nearly full of wood ashes. The fire is surrounded by ma.s.ses of anthills, and in these there are hollows made to receive the melted metal: the metal is poured while the pot is held with the hands, protected by wet rags.

_15th August, 1868._--Bin Omar, a Suaheli, came from Muaboso on Chambeze in six days, crossing in that s.p.a.ce twenty-two burns or oozes, from knee to waist deep.

Very high and cold winds prevail at present. It was proposed to punish Chik.u.mbi when Syde bin Omar came, as he is in debt and refuses payment; but I go off to Casembe.

I learn that there is another hot fountain in the Baloba country, called Fungwe; this, with Kapira and Vana, makes three hot fountains in this region.

Some people were killed in my path to Casembe, so this was an additional argument against my going that way.

Some Banyamwezi report a tribe--the Bonyolo--that extract the upper front teeth, like Batoka; they are near Loanda, and Lake Chipokola is there, probably the same as Kinkonza. Feeling my way. All the trees are now pus.h.i.+ng out fresh young leaves of different colours: winds S.E. Clouds of upper stratum N.W.

_29th August, 1868._--Kaskas began to-day hot and sultry. This will continue till rains fall. Rumours of wars perpetual and near; and one circ.u.mstantial account of an attack made by the Bause. That again contradicted. _(31st August, 1868.)_ Rain began here this evening, quite remarkable and exceptional, as it precedes the rains generally off the watershed by two months at least: it was a thunder shower, and it and another on the evening of the second were quite partial.

[As we shall see, he takes advantage of his late experience to work out an elaborate treatise on the climate of this region, which is exceedingly important, bearing, as it does, upon the question of the periodical floods on the rivers which drain the enormous cistern-lakes of Central Africa.]

The notion of a rainy zone, in which the clouds deposit their treasures in perpetual showers, has received no confirmation from my observations. In 1866-7, the rainfall was 42 inches. In 1867-8, it amounted to 53 inches: this is nearly the same as falls in the same lat.i.tudes on the West Coast. In both years the rains ceased entirely in May, and with the exception of two partial thunder showers on the middle of the watershed, no rain fell till the middle and end of October, and then, even in November, it was partial, and limited to small patches of country; but scarcely a day pa.s.sed between October and May without a good deal of thunder. When the thunder began to roll or rumble, that was taken by the natives as an indication of the near cessation of the rains. The middle of the watershed is the most humid part: one sees the great humidity of its climate at once in the trees, old and young, being thickly covered with lichens; some flat, on the trunks and branches; others long and thready, like the beards of old men waving in the wind. Large orchids on the trees in company with the profusion of lichens are seen nowhere else, except in the mangrove swamps of the sea-coast.

I cannot account for the great humidity of the watershed as compared with the rest of the country, but by the prevailing winds and the rains being from the south-east, and thus from the Indian Ocean: with this wind generally on the surface one can observe an upper strong wind from the north-west, that is, from the low humid West Coast and Atlantic Ocean. The double strata of winds can easily be observed when there are two sheets of clouds, or when burning gra.s.s over scores of square miles sends up smoke sufficiently high to be caught by the upper or north-west wind. These winds probably meet during the heavy rains: now in August they overlap each other. The probability arises from all continued rains within the tropics coming in the opposite direction from the prevailing wind of the year. Partial rains are usually from the south-east.

The direction of the prevailing wind of this region is well marked on the islands in Lake Bangweolo: the trunks are bent away from the south-east, and the branches on that side are stunted or killed; while those on the north-west run out straight and make the trees appear lopsided. The same bend away from the south-east is seen on all exposed situations, as in the trees covering the brow of a hill. At Kizinga, which is higher than the Lake, the trees are covered with lichens, chiefly on the south-east sides, and on the upper surfaces of branches, running away horizontally to or from the north-west. Plants and trees, which elsewhere in Africa grow only on the banks of streams and other damp localities, are seen flouris.h.i.+ng all over the country: the very rocks are covered with lichens, and their crevices with ferns.

But that which demonstrates the humidity of the climate most strikingly is the number of earthen sponges or oozes met with. In going to Bangweolo from Kizinga, I crossed twenty-nine of these reservoirs in thirty miles of lat.i.tude, on a south-east course: this may give about one sponge for every two miles. The word "Bog" conveys much of the idea of these earthen sponges; but it is inseparably connected in our minds with peat, and these contain not a particle of peat, they consist of black porous earth, covered with a hard wiry gra.s.s, and a few other damp-loving plants. In many places the sponges hold large quant.i.ties of the oxide of iron, from the big patches of brown haemat.i.te that crop out everywhere, and streams of this oxide, as thick as treacle, are seen moving slowly along in the sponge-like small red glaciers. When one treads on the black earth of the sponge, though little or no water appears on the surface, it is frequently squirted up the limbs, and gives the idea of a sponge. In the paths that cross them, the earth readily becomes soft mud, but sinks rapidly to the bottom again, as if of great specific gravity: the water in them is always circulating and oozing. The places where the sponges are met with are slightly depressed valleys without trees or bushes, in a forest country where the gra.s.s being only a foot or fifteen inches high, and thickly planted, often looks like a beautiful glade in a gentleman's park in England. They are from a quarter of a mile to a mile broad, and from two to ten or more miles long. The water of the heavy rains soaks into the level forest lands: one never sees runnels leading it off, unless occasionally a footpath is turned to that use.

The water, descending about eight feet, comes to a stratum of yellow sand, beneath which there is another stratum of fine white sand, which at its bottom cakes, so as to hold the water from sinking further.

It is exactly the same as we found in the Kalahari Desert, in digging sucking places for water for our oxen. The water, both here and there, is guided by the fine sand stratum into the nearest valley, and here it oozes forth on all sides through the thick mantle of black porous earth, which forms the sponge. There, in the desert, it appears to damp the surface sands in certain valleys, and the Bushmen, by a peculiar process, suck out a supply. When we had dug down to the caked sand there years ago, the people begged us not to dig further, as the water would all run away; and we desisted, because we saw that the fluid poured in from the fine sand all round the well, but none came from the bottom or cake. Two stupid Englishmen afterwards broke through the cake in spite of the entreaties of the natives, and the well and the whole valley dried up hopelessly. Here the water, oozing forth from the surface of the sponge mantle, collects in the centre of the slightly depressed valley which it occupies, and near the head of the depression forms a sluggish stream; but further down, as it meets with more slope, it works out for itself a deeper channel, with perpendicular banks, with, say, a hundred or more yards of sponge on each side, constantly oozing forth fresh supplies to augment its size.

When it reaches rocky ground it is a perennial burn, with many aquatic plants growing in its bottom. One peculiarity would strike anyone: the water never becomes discoloured or muddy. I have seen only one stream muddied in flood, the Choma, flowing through an alluvial plain in Lopere. Another peculiarity is very remarkable; it is, that after the rains have entirely ceased, these burns have their largest flow, and cause inundations. It looks as if towards the end of the rainy season the sponges were lifted up by the water off their beds, and the pores and holes, being enlarged, are all employed to give off fluid. The waters of inundation run away. When the sponges are lifted up by superabundance of water, all the pores therein are opened: as the earthen mantle subsides again, the pores act like natural valves, and are partially closed, and by the weight of earth above them, the water is thus prevented from running away altogether; time also being required to wet all the sand through which the rains soak, the great supply may only find its way to the sponge a month or so after the great rains have fallen.

I travelled in Lunda, when the sponges were all supersaturated. The gra.s.sy sward was so lifted up that it was separated into patches or tufts, and if the foot missed the row of tufts of this wiry gra.s.s which formed the native path, down one plumped up to the thigh in slush. At that time we could cross the sponge only by the native paths, and the central burn only where they had placed bridges: elsewhere they were impa.s.sable, as they poured off the waters of inundation: our oxen were generally bogged--all four legs went down up to the body at once. When they saw the clear sandy bottom of the central burn they readily went in, but usually plunged right over head, leaving their tail up in the air to show the nervous shock they had sustained.

These sponges are a serious matter in travelling. I crossed the twenty-nine already mentioned at the end of the fourth month of the dry season, and the central burns seemed then to have suffered no diminution: they were then from calf to waist deep, and required from fifteen to forty minutes in crossing; they had many deep holes in the paths, and when one plumps therein every muscle in the frame receives a painful jerk. When past the stream, and apparently on partially dry ground, one may jog in a foot or more, and receive a squirt of black mud up the thighs: it is only when you reach the trees and are off the sour land that you feel secure from mud and leeches. As one has to strip the lower part of the person in order to ford them, I found that often four were as many as we could cross in a day. Looking up these sponges a bird's-eye view would closely resemble the lichen-like vegetation of frost on window panes; or that vegetation in Canada-balsam which mad philosophical instrument makers _will_ put between the lenses of the object-gla.s.ses of our telescopes. The flat, or nearly flat, tops of the subtending and transverse ridges of this central country give rise to a great many: I crossed twenty-nine, a few of the feeders of Bangweolo, in thirty miles of lat.i.tude in one direction. Burns are literally innumerable: rising on the ridges, or as I formerly termed them mounds, they are undoubtedly the primary or ultimate sources of the Zambezi, Congo, and Nile: by their union are formed streams of from thirty to eighty or 100 yards broad, and always deep enough to require either canoes or bridges. These I propose to call the secondary sources, and as in the case of the Nile they are drawn off by three lines of drainage, they become the head waters (the _caput_ Nili) of the river of Egypt.

Thanks to that all-embracing Providence, which has watched over and enabled me to discover what I have done. There is still much to do, and if health and protection be granted I shall make a complete thing of it.

[Then he adds in a note a little further on:--]