From Pole to Pole

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It was one of the last days in December. A thick mist hung over the
river and the nearest palms were scarcely visible, but a breeze sprang
up and thinned the haze. Then the trumpets and drums sounded the signal
for starting, and Stanley gave the order to get into the boats. The
parting song of the sons of Unyamwezi was answered by Tippu Tib's
returning troop, and the flotilla of canoes glided down the dark river
towards unknown lands and destiny.

Stanley believed that this mighty river, which he named after
Livingstone, was none other than the Congo, the mouth of which had been
known for more than four hundred years; but he did not reject the
possibility that it might also unite with the Nile or be connected with
the Niger far away to the north-west. The journey which was now to solve
this problem will be famous for all time for its boldness and daring,
for the dangers overcome and adventures experienced, and is quite
comparable with the boat journeys of the Spaniards who discovered the
Amazons and Mississippi rivers in America.

Fourteen villages lie buried in the dense bush, and Stanley's flotilla
makes for the bank to encamp for the first time after parting from Tippu
Tib. Here the natives are friendly, but there is trouble a little
farther on, where the woods echo with the noise of war-drums and the
savages are drawn up with shield and spear. The drum signals are
repeated from village to village, from the one bank to the other. Canoes
are manned and put out from both banks and Stanley's flotilla is
surrounded. The interpreters call out "Peace! Peace!" but the savages
answer peremptorily, "Turn back or fight." Consultations and
negotiations are held, while the river sweeps down the whole assemblage
of friends and foes. More villages peep out from the trees where dwell
enemies of the attacking savages, so the latter dip their oars in the
water and row back without coming to blows.

But soon there was a different scene. Javelins were thrown from other
canoes and the dreadful poisoned arrows were discharged, so the
death-dealing European firearms had to be used in self-defence. On this
occasion Stanley's men succeeded in capturing a number of shields, of
which indeed they had need.

Again the war-drum is heard, just as the flotilla is passing a small
island. Stanley orders his boats to keep in the middle of the river
ready for action. Swarms of canoes shoot out from the bank like wild
ducks, and the black warriors beat their spears against their shields.
The interpreter gets up in the bow and shouts out "Peace! Take care or
we strike!" Then the savages hesitate, and retire quietly under
promontories and overhanging wooded banks. By the single word "Peace!"
the interpreter could often check parties of warriors, but others
answered the offer of peace with a scornful laugh, and their showers of
arrows and assegais had to be met with a volley of rifle bullets.

The New Year (1877) had already come, when a friendly tribe warned the
travellers of dangerous falls and rapids, the roar of which they would
shortly hear. The flotilla glided along the right bank, and all listened
for the expected thunder. Suddenly savages appeared on the bank and
hurled their assegais; then the war-drums were heard again, and a large
number of long canoes approached (Plate XXX.). The warriors had painted
one half of their bodies white and the other red, with broad black
stripes, and looked hideous. Their howls and horn blasts betokened a
serious attack. By this time Stanley's boats were out in the middle of
the stream in order of battle, with the shields placed along the
gunwales to protect the non-combatants. A canoe 80 feet long rowed
straight for Stanley's boat, but was received by a rattling volley. Then
it was Stanley's turn to attack, for the great canoe could not turn in
time. Warriors and oarsmen jumped overboard to save themselves by
swimming to land, and as the other boats vanished the expedition could
go on towards the falls.

Now was heard the roar of the water as it tumbled in wild commotion over
the barriers in its bed. The natives thought that this was just the
place to catch the strangers, and Stanley had to fight his way step by
step, sometimes on land and sometimes on the river. In quiet water
between the various falls the men could row, but in other places paths
had to be cut through the brushwood on the bank and the canoes hauled
over land. Often they had to fight from tree to tree. Once the savages
tried to surround Stanley's whole party in a large net, and lost eight
of their own men for their trouble. These captives were tattooed on the
forehead and had their front teeth filed to a point. Like all the other
people in the country, they were cannibals, and were eager for human
flesh.

One day at the end of January Stanley's boats crossed the equator, and
the great river turned more and more towards the west, so that it
evidently could not belong to the Nile. Here the party passed the
seventh and last fall, where the brown water hurled itself in mad fury
over the barrier. Thus the series of cascades afterwards known as the
Stanley Falls was discovered and passed.

Below the falls the river expands, sometimes to as much as two miles in
breadth. The opposite bank could hardly be seen, and the boats came into
a labyrinth of channels between islands. The rowers sang to the swing of
their oars, and a sharp look-out had always to be kept. Sometimes
canoes followed them, and occasionally ventured to attack. Wild warriors
were seen with loathsome features, and red and grey parrots' feathers on
their heads, and bangles of ivory round their arms.

[Illustration: PLATE XXX. THE FIGHT ON THE CONGO.

From Stanley's _Through the Dark Continent._]

In one village was found a temple with a round roof supported on
thirty-three elephants' tusks. In the middle was set up an idol carved
in wood and painted red, with black eyes, hair, and beard. Knives,
spears, and battle-axes were wrought with great skill, and were
ornamented with bands of copper, iron, and bone. Among the refuse heaps
were seen remains of horrible feasts, and human skulls were set up on
posts round the huts.

Interminable forests grew on the banks and islands, with the many-rooted
mangrove-tree, tall, snake-like canes with drooping tufts of leaves, the
dragon's-blood tree, the india-rubber, and many others.

Danger and treachery lurked behind every promontory, and the men had to
look out for currents, falls, rapids, and whirlpools. Hippopotami and
crocodiles were plentiful. But the savages were the worst danger.
Stanley and his men were worn out with running the gauntlet month after
month.

At the village of Rubunga, where the natives were friendly, Stanley
heard for the first time that the river actually was the Congo. Here the
traveller was able to replenish his stock of provisions, and when the
drums of Rubunga were sounded it was not for battle but to summon the
inhabitants to market, and from the surrounding villages the people came
to offer for sale fish, snails, oysters, dried dog-flesh, goats,
bananas, meal, and bread. As a rule, however, no trust could be placed
in the natives. In their hideous tattooing, with strings of human teeth
round their necks and their own teeth filed to a point like a wolf's,
with a small belt of grass round their loins and spears and bows in
their hands, they did not inspire confidence, and frequently the boats
had barely put out from the bank where the people seemed friendly before
the natives manned their canoes and pursued them. In this region they
were armed with muskets procured from the coast. Once Stanley's small
flotilla was surrounded by sixty-three canoes, and there was a hard
fight with firearms on both sides. In the foremost canoe stood a young
chief, handsome, calm, and dignified, directing the attack. He wore a
head-covering and a mantle of goatskin, and on his arms, legs, and neck
he had large rings of brass wire. A bullet struck him in the thigh. He
quietly wound a rag round the wound and signed to his oarsmen to make
for the bank. Then the others lost courage and followed their leader's
canoe.

They struggled southwards from one combat to another. The passage of the
great curve of the Congo had cost thirty-two fights. Now remained a
difficult stretch, where the mighty river breaks in foaming falls and
rapids through the escarpment which follows the line of the west coast
of Africa. These falls Stanley named after Livingstone; he was well
aware that the river could never be called by any other name than the
Congo, but the falls would preserve the great missionary's name.
Innumerable difficulties awaited him here. On one occasion half a dozen
men were drowned and several canoes were lost, and the party had to wait
while others were cut out in the forest. One day Pocock drifted towards
a fall, and was not aware of the danger until it was too late and he was
swept over the barrier. Thus perished the last of Stanley's white
companions.

At another fall the coxswain and the carpenter went adrift in a newly
excavated canoe. They had no oars. "Jump, man," called out the former,
but the other answered, "I cannot swim." "Well, then, good-bye, my
brother," said the quartermaster, and swam ashore. The other went over
the fall. The canoe disappeared in the seething whirlpool, came up again
with the man clinging fast to it, was sucked under once more, and rose
again still with the carpenter. But when it reappeared for the third
time in another whirlpool the man was gone.

At last all the boats were abandoned and the men travelled by land. The
party was entirely destitute, all were emaciated, miserable, and hungry.
A black chief demanded toll for their passage through his country, and
they had nothing to give. He would be satisfied with a bottle of rum he
said. Rum, indeed, when they had been three years in the depths of
Africa! Stanley was reasoning with the chief when the coxswain came and
asked what was the matter. "There's rum for him," he said, and gave the
chief a buffet which knocked him over and put his whole retinue to
flight.

Now it was only a couple of days' journey to Boma, near the mouth of the
Congo, where there were trade factories and Europeans. Stanley wrote a
letter to them, and was soon supplied with all necessaries; and after a
short rest at Boma the party made the voyage round the south of Africa
to Zanzibar, where Stanley dismissed his men.

He then travelled home, and was, of course, feted everywhere. For a
thousand years the Arabs had travelled into the interior of Africa, but
they did not know the course of the Congo. European explorers had for
centuries striven to penetrate the darkness. The natives themselves did
not know whither the Lualaba ran. All at once Stanley had filled up the
blank and knit together the scattered meshes of the net; and now a
railway runs beside the falls, and busy steamboats fly up and down the
Congo. Well did Stanley deserve his native name of Bula Matadi, or "the
breaker of stones," for no difficulty was too great for him to overcome.

After a life of restless activity--including another great African
journey to find Emin Pasha, the Governor of the Equatorial Province
after Gordon's death--Stanley was gathered to his fathers in 1904. He
was buried in a village churchyard outside London, and a block of rough
granite was placed above the grave. Here may be read beneath a cross,
"Henry Morton Stanley--Bula Matadi--1841-1904," and lastly the word that
sums up all the work of his life, "Africa."

TIMBUKTU AND THE SAHARA

In the middle of north-western Africa, where the continent shoots a
gigantic tongue out into the Atlantic, lies one of the world's most
famous towns, Timbuktu.

Compared with Cairo or Algiers, Timbuktu is a small town. Its three poor
mosques cannot vie with the grand temples which under French, Turkish,
or English dominion raise their graceful minarets on the Mediterranean
shores of Africa. Not a building attracts the eye of the stranger amidst
a confusion of greyish-yellow mud houses with flat roofs and without
windows, and neglect and decay stare out from heaps of ruins. There is
hardly a tottering caravanserai to invite the desert wanderer to rest.
Some streets are abandoned, while in others the foot sinks over the
ankle in blown sand from the Sahara.

Timbuktu is not so famous as the sparkling jewels in the diadem of
Asia--Jerusalem and Mecca, Benares and Lhasa. The very name of each of
these is, as it were, a vital portion of a great religion, and indeed
almost stands for the religion itself. Timbuktu has scarcely any
religion, or, more correctly, too many. And yet this town has borne a
proud name during its eight hundred years of existence--the great, the
learned, the mysterious city. No pilgrims flock thither to fall down in
prayer before a redeemer's grave or be blessed by a high priest. No
pyramids, no marble temples, make Timbuktu one of the world's wonders.
No wealth, no luxuriant vegetation exist to make it an outer court to
Paradise.

[Illustration: NORTH-WEST AFRICA.]

And yet Timbuktu is an object of desire. Millions long to go there, and
when they have been, long to get away again. Caravan men who have
wandered for months through the desert long for the tones of the flute
and the cithern, and the light swayings of the troops of dancers. Palms
and mimosa grow sparsely round Timbuktu, but after the dangers of the
desert the monotonous, dilapidated town with its dusty, dreary streets
seems really like an entrance to Paradise. Travelling merchants who have
risked their wealth in the Sahara among savage robbers, and have been
fortunate to escape all dangers, are glad at the sight of Timbuktu, and
think its grey walls more lovely than anything they can imagine.

The remarkable features of Timbuktu are, then, its situation and its
trade. We have only to take a look at the map to perceive that this town
stands like a spider in its web. The web is composed of all the routes
which start from the coast and converge on Timbuktu. They come from
Tripoli and Tunis, from Algeria and Morocco, from Senegal and Sierra
Leone, from the Pepper Coast, the Ivory Coast, and Slave Coast, the Gold
Coast, and from the countries round the Gulf of Guinea, which have been
annexed by France, England, and Germany. They come also from the heart
of the Sahara, where savage and warlike nomad tribes still to this day
maintain their freedom against foreign interference.

In Timbuktu meet Arabs and negroes, Mohammedans and heathens from the
deserts and fruitful lands of the Sahara and Sudan. Timbuktu stands on
the threshold of the great wastes, and at the same time on the third in
rank of the rivers of Africa. At the town the Niger is two and a half
miles broad, and from its mouth it discharges more water than the Nile,
but much less than the Congo. Like the Congo, the Niger makes a curve to
the north, bidding defiance to the Sahara; but the desert wins in the
end, and the river turns off towards the south.

It is a struggle between life and death. The life-giving water washes
the choking sand, and just where the strife is fiercest lies Timbuktu.
From the north goods come on dromedaries to be transported farther in
canoes or long, narrow boats with arched awnings of matting, or, where
the river is not navigable, on oxen and asses or the backs of men.
Dromedaries cannot endure the damp climate near the Niger, which
especially in winter overflows its banks for a long distance. Therefore
they are led back through the Sahara. They thrive on the dry deserts.
The constantly blowing north-east trade-wind dries up the Sahara, and in
certain regions years may pass without a drop of rain.

The name Timbuktu has a singular sound. It stands for all the mystery
and fascination connected with the Sahara It leads the thoughts to the
greatest expanse of desert in the world, to long and lonely roads, to
bloody feuds and treacherous ambushes, to the ring of caravan bells and
the clank of the stirrups of the Beduins (Plate XXXI.). There seems to
be a ring in the name itself, and we seem to hear the splash of the
turbid waters of the Niger in its vowels. We seem to hear the plaintive
howl of the jackal, the moan of the desert wind, the squealing of
dromedaries outside the northern gateway, and the boatmen splashing with
oars and poles in the creeks of the river.

Caravans from the northern coast bring cloth, arms, powder, paper,
tools, hardware, sugar, tea, coffee, tobacco, and a quantity of other
articles to Timbuktu. But when they begin their journey through the
Sahara, only half the camels are laden. The other half are loaded with
blocks of salt on the way, for salt is in great demand at Timbuktu.
Caravans may be glad if they come safely through the country of the
Tuaregs, and at best they can only obtain an unmolested passage by the
payment of a heavy toll. On the return journey northwards the
dromedaries are laden with wares from the Sudan, rice, manioc, honey,
nuts, monkey breadfruit, dried fish, ivory, ostrich feathers,
india-rubber, leather, and many other things. A small number of black
slaves also accompany them. The largest caravans contain five hundred or
a thousand dromedaries and five hundred men at most. The goods they can
transport may be worth twenty-eight thousand pounds or more. Five great
caravan roads cross the Sahara from north to south.

Let us set out on a journey from Timbuktu, and let us go first eastwards
to the singular Lake Chad, which is half filled with islands, is shallow
and swampy, choked with reeds, rises and falls with the discharge of the
great rivers which flow into it, and has a certain similarity to Lop-nor
in Central Asia. Nearly 17 cubic miles of water are estimated to enter
Lake Chad in the year, and when we know that the lake on the whole
remains much about the same size, we can conceive how great the
evaporation must be.

We have our own dromedaries and our own Arab guide on whom we can rely.
We can therefore go where we like, and we steer our course from Lake
Chad towards the eastern Sudan, where we have already been in the
company of General Gordon. But before we come to the Nile we turn off
northwards to cross the Libyan desert, the most inaccessible and
desolate, and therefore the least known, part of the Sahara. On our way
northwards we notice that animal and vegetation life becomes more
scanty. Even in the Sudan the grasslands are more thinly clothed and
the steppes more desert-like the farther we travel, and at last blown
sand predominates. We must follow a well-known road which has been used
for thousands of years by Arabs and Egyptians.

[Illustration: PLATE XXXI.

A GROUP OF BEDUINS.]

We are in the midst of the sea of sand. Here lie at certain places dunes
of reddish-yellow drift sand as high as the tower of St. Paul's
Cathedral. We see no path, for it has been swept away by the last storm;
but the guide has his landmarks and does not lose his way. The sand
becomes lower and the country more open. Then the guide points to a bare
and barren ridge which rises out of the sand like a rock out of the sea,
and says that he can find his way by this landmark, which remains in
sight for several days, and is then replaced by another elevation.

We encamp at a deep well, drink and water our camels. Next day we are
out in the sandy sea again. The sky has assumed an unusual hue. It is
yellow, and soon changes into bluish grey. The sun is a red disc. It is
calm and sultry. The guide looks serious, and says in a low tone
"samum." The hot, devastating desert storm which is the scourge of
Arabia and Egypt is approaching.

The guide stops and turns round. He is uncertain. But he goes on again
when he sees that we cannot get back to the well before the storm is
upon us. It is useless to look for shelter, for the dunes are too flat
to protect us from the wind. And now the storm sweeps down, and it
becomes suffocatingly close and hot. The dromedaries seem uneasy, halt,
and turn away from the wind. We dismount. The dromedaries lie down and
bury their muzzles in the sand. We wrap up our heads in cloths and lie
on our faces beside our animals to get some shelter between them and the
ground. And so we may lie by the hour panting for breath, and we may be
glad if we get off with our lives from a _samum_ when we are out in the
desert. Even in the oases it causes a feeling of anxiety and trouble,
for the burning heat is most harmful to palms and crops. The temperature
may rise to 120 deg. in this dangerous storm, which justifies its name of
"poison wind."

The storm passes off, the air becomes clear and is quiet and calm, and
the sun has again its golden yellow brilliance. It is warm, but not
suffocating as it was. The heated air vibrates above the sand. Beside
our road appears a row of palms and before them a silver streak of
water. The guide, however, goes on in quite a different direction, and
when we ask him why, he answers that what we see is a mirage, and that
there is no oasis for many days' journey in the direction in which we
see the palms.

In the evening we come to a real oasis, and there we are glad to rest a
couple of days. Here are a hundred wells, here the ground is cultivated
in the shade of the palms, here we can enjoy to the full the moist
coolness above the swards of juicy grass. The oasis is like an island in
the desert sea, and between the palm trunks is seen the yellow level
horizon, the dry, heated desert with its boundless sun-bathed wastes.

If we now turn off towards the north-west, Fezzan is the next country
which our route touches. It is a paradise of date palms. They occur in
such profusion that even dromedaries, horses, and dogs are fed with the
fruits. The surface of the ground also has undergone a great change, and
is not so sterile and choked with sand as in the Libyan desert. Here and
farther to the west the country becomes more hilly. Ridges and bosses of
granite and sandstone, weathered and scorched by the sun, stand up here
and there. Extensive plateaus covered with gravel are called _hammada_;
they are ruins of former mountains which have burst asunder. In the
Sahara the differences of temperature between day and night are very
great. The dark, bare hill-slopes may be heated up to 140 deg. or more when
the sun bathes them, while during the night the radiation out to space
is so intense that the temperature sinks to freezing-point. Through
these continual alternations the rocks expand and contract repeatedly,
fissures are formed and fragments are detached and fall down. The
hardest rocks resist longest, and therefore they stand up like strange
walls and towers amidst the great desolation.

If we go another step westwards we come to the land of the Tuaregs.
There, too, we find hilly tracts and _hammadas_, sandy deserts and
oases, and in favourable spots excellent pastures. We have already
noticed in Timbuktu this small, sturdy desert people, easily recognised
by the veil which hides the lower part of the face. All Tuaregs wear
such a veil, and call those who do not "fly-mouths." They are powerfully
built, and of dark complexion, being of mixed negro blood from all the
slaves they have kidnapped in the Sudan. They are as dry and lean as the
ground on which they live, and nature in their country obliges them to
lead a nomad life. Wide, simple, and dreary is the desert, and simple
and free is the nomad's life. The hard struggle for existence has
sharpened their senses. They are acute observers, clever, crafty, and
artful. Distance is of no account to them, for they do not know what it
is to be tired. They fly on their swift dromedaries over half the
Sahara, and are a terror to their settled neighbours and to caravans. On
their raids they cover immense distances in a short time. To ride from
the heart of their country to the Sudan after booty is child's play to
them. They have made existence in many oases quite unendurable. What use
is it to till fields and rear palms when the Tuaregs always reap the
harvest? The French have had many fights with the Tuaregs, and the
railway which was to pass through their country and connect Algiers with
Timbuktu is still only a cherished project. Yet this tribe which has so
bravely defended its freedom against the stranger does not number more
than half a million people. The Tuaregs are not born to be slaves, and
we cannot but admire their thirst for freedom, their pride, and their
courage.

The desert here exhibits the difficult art of living. Even animals and
plants which are assigned to the desert are provided with special
faculties. Some of the animals, snakes and lizards for instance, can
live without water. Dromedaries can go for many days without drinking.
Ostriches cover great distances to reach water before it is too late.
Plants are provided with huge roots that they may suck up as much
moisture as possible, and many of them bear thorns and spikes instead of
leaves so that the evaporation may be insignificant. Many of them are
called to life by a single fall of rain, develop in a few weeks, and die
when long drought sets in again. Then the seeds are left, waiting
patiently for the next rain. Some desert plants seem quite dead, grey,
dried-up, and buried in dust, but when rain comes they send out green
shoots again.

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