Narrative of Travels and Discoveries in Northern and Central Africa, in the years 1822, 1823, and 1824, by Major Denham, Captain Clapperton and the late Doctor Oudney ... With an appendix ... by Major D. Denham ... and Captain H. Clapperton [including 'Translations from the Arabic, of various...

Front matter

Dimm "by Ho.) or Ttanhco-i*; I»ffrs*ve3 "by E Tm3 en AJsjAKSHffiffiH ISMS. MT@IELAB!IEffllEJG> . K.T. J.I Tubh.,-h..t .!<:.) ••- " ■ ■■ London NARRATIVE OF TRAVELS AND DISCOVERIES IN- NORTHERN AND CENTRAL AFRICA, IN THE YEARS 1822, 1823, AND 1824, BY MAJOR DENHAM, F.R.S , CAPTAIN CLAPPERTON, AND THE LATE DOCTOR OUDNEY, EXTENDING ACROSS THE GREAT DESERT TO THE TENTH DEGREE OF NORTHERN LATITUDE AND FROM KOUKA IN BORNOU, TO SACKATOO, THE • CAPITAL OF THE FELATAH EMPIRE. THIRD EDITION. IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: JOHN MURRAY, ALBEMARLE-STREET. MDCCOXXVIII. LONDON : PRINTED BY THOMAS DAVISON, VVHiTEFRIARS. TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE THE EARL BATHURST, K. G. HIS MAJESTY'S PRINCIPAL SECRETARY OF STATE FOR THE COLONIES, THIS VOLUME, CONTAINING AN ACCOUNT OF THEIR DISCOVERIES MADE UNDER THE AUSPICES OF HIS LORDSHIP, IS INSCRIBED, WITH THE GREATEST RESPECT AND GRATITUDE, BY HIS OBLIGED AND FAITHFUL SERVANTS, THE AUTHORS.

Preface

. By the death of Dr. Oudney, it has fallen to the lot of Captain Clapperton and myself to render an account to the public of our expedition into the interior and central parts of Northern Africa. The sudden departure of my surviving companion, on a second mission, has necessarily thrown the greater part of the burden on myself. I believe, how ever — for I have not seen any of his papers — that Captain Clapperton, during the lifetime of Dr. Oudney, made but few remarks himself beyond the construction of the chart of our route, from daily observations of the latitude, and of lunars for the longitude, whenever favourable opportunities oc curred ; but, subsequently to the death of his travelling companion, which happened at an early stage of their journey into Soudan, a journal of his proceedings and remarks appears to have been

PREFACE.

. VI regularly kept ; and this, together with other docu ments connected with that journey, were left at his departure in the hands of Mr. Barrow, with a request that he would see them through the press. It may naturally enough be asked, Why some thing more than a short excursion to the westward of Mourzuk, and a few notes, do not appear from the pen of Dr. Oudney in the present work ? I can only answer the question by the fact, that the only papers placed in my hands consist of " An Itinerary from Mourzuk to Bornou ;" and " An Excursion to the Westward of Mourzuk ;" neither of which have been deemed fit for publica tion in extenso, from their imperfect state, and containing very little beyond what will be found in my own journals. I have, however, printed in foot notes such parts of them as have been pointed out to me.

Not a paper of his, to my knowledge, has been lost or destroyed ; and I can only account for the unsatisfactory state in which they have been found, from the circumstance of his ill health, which became extremely precarious from

PREFACE.

. VII the moment of our departure from Mourzuk, where he had caught a cold, which settled on his lungs, and never left him. On our arrival at Kouka, and frequently afterwards, he experienced so many attacks of fever, that there appeared little hope of his surviving to return to England, which was in deed his own opinion ; and when he set out on his last journey towards Soudan, he was so exhausted, and in a state so unfit for such an undertaking, that he fell a martyr to his zeal very soon after his de parture, though, had he remained at Kouka, the melancholy event would not, in all probability, have been prolonged many days. My own expeditions in various parts of Bornou, in Mandara, and Loggun, and the two fruitless attempts I made to complete the tour of the great lake Tchad, will be found to occupy a considerable portion of the work ; and being made in countries, and among a people unknown to Europeans, — many of them even by name or report, — it is hoped that observations, faithfully and circum stantially minuted down at the time and spot,

PREFACE.

. will not be found tedious or uninteresting to the reader. It will, perhaps, be thought by some, that I have been more minute than necessary in the account of our journey across that tremendous de sert which lies between Mourzuk and Bornou, and which, generally speaking, is made up of dark frowning hills of naked rock, or interminable plains, strewed in some places with fragments of stone and pebbles, in others of one vast level sur face of sand, and, in others again, the same ma terial rising into immense mounds, altering their form and position according to the strength and direction of the winds. But, even in the midst of this dreary waste, towns, villages, wandering tribes, and kafilas, or caravans, sometimes occur to break the solitude of this dismal belt, which seems to stretch across Northern Africa, and, on many parts of which, not a living creature, even an insect, enlivens the scene. Still, however, the halting places at the wells, and the wadeys or valleys, afford an endless source of amusement to the

PREFACE.

. IX traveller, in witnessing the manners, and listening to the conversation, ofthe various tribes of natives, who, by their singing and dancing, their story telling, their quarrelling and fighting, make him forget, for a time, the ennui and fatigue of the day's journey. As for the rest, I have to trust to its novelty, for its recommendation to the public, rather than to any powers of writing, which I pretend not to possess ; and it is now a source of great satisfaction to me that, under all my difficulties, and they were not few, I was able to adhere to the resolution I set out with, of recording, at the end of each day, the occurrences, however trifling, that had taken place. Although we have not been able to solve that interesting problem, to which the discovery of the enterprising Mungo Park gave rise, I hope I may be allowed to say that we have very considerably enlarged the boundaries of our geographical know ledge of central Africa. The limit of Captain Lyon's travels to the southward was Tegerhy, in X

PREFACE.

. lat. 24° N. ; ours reached to Musfeia, in lat. 9° 15' N. ; being an addition of 14-| degrees, or nearly 900 geographical miles of latitude to our former knowledge. It is undoubtedly true that Hornemann crossed the great desert before us, and proceeded as far south as Nyffe, supposed to be about the lat. 10^°, but no record whatever has been preserved of his journey ; and the desert and all beyond it may therefore fairly be said to have been to us new ground. Then as to longitude : Park, proceeding westerly, about the parallel of 15° or lG°, reached Silla in long. 1° 34' west ; our discoveries, in a somewhat lower parallel, reached from Tangalia in long. 17° east, to Sackatoo in long. 5^° east, being 114- degrees, or nearly 700 geographical miles of longitude. The intermediate space, therefore, between Silla and Sackatoo, being about seven degrees of longitude, or 400 miles, is only wanting to complete our knowledge of the central part of Africa, or Soudan, from the shores ofthe Atlantic to the eastern shores of the lake Tchad.

PREFACE.

. XI We might have swelled the volumes which de scribe our labours by a great number of reports from Arabs and Moors, concerning the course and termination of the river Kowara, to which modern geographers have been pleased to give the name of Niger, and also of the continuation, or other wise, of the waters of the Tchad ; but many of these were so vague and contradictory, and others so obviously impossible, that it was deemed best to omit such at least as had not the appearance even of plausible probability. If the present mission, under my late travelling companion Clap perton, should happily succeed in reaching the dominions of the sultan Bello from the Bight of Benin, the problem of the Niger at least will no longer remain a speculation ; and as it appears that the sheikh of Bornou *, since our departure, has, for a time at least, completely subdued the Begharmis, there is a hope that the present travellers may find the means of penetrating, to a certain distance, the country to the eastward of the * See his Letter in the Appendix.

PREFACE.

. XII Tchad, and thus be enabled to determine the other point in dispute. To Sir Robert Ker Porter, my friend since the days of boyhood, I am indebted for having per fected several drawings, with his experienced pencil, from my hasty, but yet faithful sketches, of the people and scenery of Central Africa. His eye was nearly as familiar as my own with the picturesque objects they display ; and, indeed, all who are acquainted with the published narrative of his Researches amongst the Remains of Ancient Persia and Babylonia might readily recognise the same hand, in these his spirited delineations of African costume and character. DIXON DENHAM. Albany, London, Jan. 1st. 1826. CONTENTS OF VOL. I. Page Chap. I. — From Tripoli to Mourzuk . . . 1 Chap. II. — Excursion to the Westward of Mourzuk . 64 Chap. III. — From Mourzuk to Kouka in Bornou 112 Chap. IV.— Kouka ..:... 212 Chap. V. — Expedition to Mandara .... 264 Chap. VI. — Excursion to Munga and the Gambarou . 340 Chap. VII. — Rainy Season at Kouka . . .

LIST OF PLATES. VOL. I. Page Portrait of Alameen Ben Mohammed . to face the title A Woman of Sockno . . . .32 View of the Bahir Mandia . . .94 Body Guard of the Sheikh of Bornou . . . 21 1 Reception of the Mission by the Sultan of Bornou *. 231 Shouaa Women, Kingdom of Bornou . . . 257 Arrival at Mora, the Capital of Mandara . . . 283 Attack at Musfeia . . . . 31st A Favourite of the Seraglio accompanying a military Expedition . . . . .361 Kanemboo Spearman, Munga Bowman, in the Service of the Sheikh of Bornou . . . .364 Map of Travels and Discoveries . at the end ofthe volume VOL. II. Lancer of the Sultan of Begharmi . to face the title Manner of Fishing in the River Yeo . . . 100 Sketch of the Lake Tchad . . . . .155 A Reduction of Bello's Map of Central Africa . . RECENT DISCOVERIES IN AFRICA.

Chapter I

(introductory), BY MAJOR DENHAM. TRIPOLI TO MOURZUK. Previous to any knowledge I had received of the intentions of His Majesty's government to follow up the mission of Mr. Ritchie and Captain Lyon, I had volunteered my services to Lord Bathurst to proceed to Timbuctoo, by nearly the same route which Major Laing is now pursuing. I learnt in reply, that an expedition had been planned, and that Doctor Oudney and Lieutenant Clapperton, both of the navy, were appointed ; and with these gentlemen, by the kindness of Lord Bathurst, I was, at my request, associated. My companions left London before me ; but, as soon as ready, I lost no time in proceeding in the packet to Malta, where I found that they had left VOL. I. B TRIPOLI TO MOURZUK. f_CHAP. I. the island for Tripoli nearly a month before. By the kindness of Admiral Sir Graham Moore, Sir Manley Power, Sir Richard Plasket, and Captain Woolley, commissioner ofthe dock-yard, all my wants were amply supplied ; and judging that the assistance of a shipwright or carpenter might prove of essential use, and being allowed by my instruc tions to engage any one, at a reasonable salary, who might choose to volunteer to accompany the mission, William Hillman, shipwright, a man of excellent character, immediately offered his ser vices, on an agreement that he should receive 120/. a year so long as he should continue to be employed.

I embarked in the Express schooner, which the admiral lent me for the purpose, and, on the 18th November, after three days' sail, arrived at Tri poli, and found my two companions at the house of Mr. Consul Warrington, anxiously expecting my arrival. Of this gentleman it is not too much to say, that by his cheerful and good humoured disposition, his zeal, perseverance, and extraor dinary good management, we owe, in a great de gree, that influence which England possesses with this government far beyond that of any other of the Barbary powers. The English name, in fact, is of such importance in Tripoli, that there is scarcely a point to carry, or a dispute to settle, in which the bashaw does not request the interference of the CHAP. I.j TRIPOLI TO MOURZUK. British consul ; and to him, indeed, is, in a great degree, owing the origin and success of the late mission.

He stated broadly to the government at home, that the road from Tripoli to Bornou was as open as that from London to Edinburgh ; which, with a small allowance for Oriental hyperbole, was found to be true — witness the journey of my lamented friend Toole, and also of Mr. Tyrwhitt, the latter laden with valuable presents. But this is not all : the British flag has a peculiar power of protection, and the roof of the English con sul always affords a sanctuary to the perpetrator of any crime, not even excepting murder ; and scarcely a day passes that some persecuted Jew or unhappy slave, to escape the bastinado, does not rush into the court-yard of the British consulate for protection. A circumstance occurred in returning from one of our excursions, which shows in what high estimation the English character is held in Tripoli.

A poor wretch, who, for some trifling offence, was sentenced to five hundred bastinadoes, having, while on his way to receive the sentence ofthe law, contrived to slip from the custody of his guards, fortunately met with the child and servant of Doctor Dickson, a most respectable and intelligent English physician practising in Tripoli : the con demned wretch, with wonderful presence of mind, snatched up the child in his arms, and halted boldly before his pursuers. The talisman was sufficiently b QCHAP. I. TRIPOLI TO MOURZUK. powerful : the emblem of innocence befriended the guilty, and the culprit walked on uninterrupted, triumphantly claiming the protection of the Bri tish flag. But the following proves still more strongly to what extent the influence of the British flag might be carried. — Since the reduction of the refractory Arabs to submission, no chief had re ceived such repeated marks of kindness and atten tion from the bashaw as sheikh Belgassam ben Khalifa, head of the powerful tribe of El Gibel.

At the particular request of the former, sheikh Khalifa had quitted his tents and flocks, resided in the city, and was high in his prince's con fidence — fatal pre-eminence in Barbary states ! — and had been presented, but a few months before, with one of the most beautiful gardens in the Minshea. Returning from the castle after an even ing of music and dancing in the bashaw's private apartments, Belgassam kissed the hand that had signed his death-warrant, and took his leave. At his own door a pistol-shot wounded him in the arm, and on entering the skiffa, or passage, a second entered his body. The old sheikh, after his slave had fastened the door, staggered to his carpet, and then, in the arms of his wife, pro claimed his assassin to be his own nephew, sheikh Mahmoud Belgassam Wild6 Sowdoweah.

The work being, however, but half done, others rushed in, and seven stabs put an end to his sufferings, not withstanding the screams of his wife, who received two wounds herself, in endeavouring to save her husband. The poor old man was almost instantly buried, and the three persons who had undertaken the murder fled to the British consulate for pro tection. Early the next morning, however, the consul despatched his dragoman to give the bashaw notice, "that the murderers of Khalifa would find no protection under the flag of England." The bashaw said, " he was shocked at the murder, and regretted the assassins having taken refuge in the consulate, as it was a sanctuary he could not vio late, particularly as he understood they meant to resist, and were well armed." Our consul re plied, " that the bashaw was at liberty to send any force he pleased, and use any means he thought best, to drag them from beneath a banner that never was disgraced by giving protection to assas sins."

The minister also came and expressed the bashaw's delicacy ; and it was evident he did not expect such would be the conduct of the consul : he was, however, peremptory, and the bashaw dared not seem to favour such an act of villany. It was sunset before he decided on taking them away, when about sixteen of the chosen people of the castle entered the consulate, and the wretches, al though provided with arms, which they had loaded, TRIPOLI TO MOURZUK. f_CHAP. I. tremblingly resigned themselves, and were, in less than an hour, hanging over the walls of the castle. On a day appointed we waited on the bashaw. After passing the court-yard, crowded with guards, and several groups of Arabs in the passages and ante-rooms playing at cards or dice, we were in troduced to the audience chamber, where the bashaw, sitting cross-legged on a carpet, supported by his two sons, and attended by armed negroes, received us kindly, ordered us to be served with sherbet and coffee, and expressed himself in the most favourable manner on the subject of our mis sion, which he promised to forward in safety into the interior of Africa.

He invited us to join him in a hawking party. The cavalcade, consisting of about three hundred, altogether presented so novel an appearance, that I shall endeavour to give some description of our morning's amusement. The bashaw was mounted on a milk-white Arabian, superbly caparisoned, with saddle of crimson velvet richly studded with gold nails, heavy stirrups of the same, and trappings of embroidered cloth hanging down on each side nearly to the horse's fetlock joint ; he was preceded by six chaoushes, or officers, also mounted and richly caparisoned, armed with long guns, swords, and pistols, and a white silk barracan thrown loosely and gracefully round their bodies. His highness was supported on each side by a favourite black slave, whose glittering vest, light bornouse, and white turban, formed a pleasing contrast to the costume of the Arabs.

We proceeded in a westerly direction ; and on arriving at the desert, parties of six and eight dashed forward, with the rapidity of lightning, several hundred paces, fired, immediately halted in a most surprising manner, and with loud cries rushed back again to the main body, when instantly the same ceremony was repeated by an other party. Their superior skill in the management of their horses is really beautiful ; and the way they manœuvre their long musket, by repeat edly spinning it over their heads at full speed, has a most picturesque effect. Near the bashaw's per son rode Sidi Ali, his third son, although second in succession, in consequence of the banishment of the eldest ; he also was attended by his par ticular guard of Arabs, distinguished not only by their superior and determined appearance, but by their figured muslin bornouses.

Sidi Ali is the bashaw's favourite son, and is particularly hand some, although what we should call too fat, and is said to resemble very much what the bashaw was at his age : he is allowed great privilege and liberty, which is indeed proved by his saying, the other day, to his father, " I shall succeed you as bashaw." " How do you mean ?" " How ? why, TRIPOLI TO MOURZUK. [chat. Iby taking the same steps you did yourself," said the youth *. I was invited, with my colleagues, to pass a day about five miles from Tripoli, at the garden of Ma homed D'Ghies, to whom I brought letters from his son, who was residing in London, much noticed and respected. This old gentleman had been mi nister for foreign affairs to the bashaw, but had retired from office some time, on account of a com plaint in his eyes.

He is a most respectable man, and particularly kind to all European travellers who visit Tripoli ; and so well known throughout Northern Africa, that letters of credit from him are sure to be duly honoured. Nothing could ex ceed the hospitality and attention with which we were received : having; regaled ourselves with sher bet, coffee, and tobacco, several times in the course of the day, and partaken of an excellent dinner, a la Turque, in a grove of lemon and orange trees, we returned in the evening to Tripoli, well pleased with our day's excursion. Tripoli has been so often described, that I shall pass it over in silence. Its Jews, its Arabs, its Moors, and Maraboots ; the slave population, and the bashaw's family ; are all so well painted to the life in " Tully's Letters," as to require no further notice from me as a casual visitor.

Neither is it my in- * Vide Tully's Letters on Tripoli. tention to enter into a minute description of the country between Tripoli and Mourzuk ; the surface of which is not essentially different from that be tween Mourzuk and Bornou, and has already been noticed by Captain Lyon, and in the communi cations to the African Association. On the 5th March, 1822, I left Tripoli for Benioleed*, to join my two companions, who had * Benioleed, a rich valley, bounded on all sides by whitish brown hills, capped in many places with green stone and amygdaloid, or vesicular lava, rugged villages, and ruinous castles, on every point, some overtopping the columnar green stone, and scarcely distinguishable from it. The hills possess a very interesting structure. The height does not exceed 400 feet, and limestone is the prevailing rock.

On the north side the whole of the range, till within a mile of the western extremity, is limestone : at that point above the limestone is a thick bed of columnar green stone, with thick layers of vesicular lava. On the southern side, most of the hills have their tops covered with lava and columnar green stone, and have a structure similar to that of the one I have delineated. A little difference is here and there observable, but not so much as to be worthy of notice. The tops of the hills on this side form an extensive, black, dreary-looking plain, strewed over with loose stones, extending eastwardly as far as the eye can discern. The upper, or, as I would call it, the lavaceous crust, appears as if a layer left by a flowing fluid, and therefore of more recent formation than the rock on which it rests.

This is seldom more than a few feet in thickness, and spread over the subjacent rock. proceeded thither with our servants, horses, camels, and baggage. They had gone on to Memoon, a The rocks dip in various directions, but generally at an angle of 18°. The Jibel Gulat is one of the highest hills we have yet come to. It is about six hundred feet high : its top is tabular, and its sides exceedingly rugged, from an amazing number of detached pieces. The lowest exposed stratum is a calcareous tufa, containing, or indeed almost formed of sea-shells ; the most abundant are a species of oyster and limpet, in a very entire state. Above, beds of soft carbonate of lime, like whiting, and falling into dust on the slightest touch, and in which is embedded a large quantity of lamellar calcareous spar. Above, and apparently extending to the summit, to lerably fine marble.

The quantity of debris, and the size and appearance of the masses, might make one believe that an earthquake had been the cause of that rent state ; but it appears to me more probable that the undermining, by the mouldering of the soft stratum underneath, accounts well for the state and appearance of the side of the hill. The hill is about three miles long, and runs from east to west. It is in habited by a solitary family ; a man, his wife, and several children. We were told that he had resided in this dreary and barren place for eleven years, and it is said lives chiefly by plunder. Near Niffud, the hills are of lime, and in structure and form not unlike those of the Tarhona range. In the vicinity of the long range there are a number of small conical hills, of a soft whiting-like substance, appearing as if recently thrown up, although, from every thing around, that is not at all probable.

The range runs parallel to that near tlie coast ; but we had no opportunity of determining very pretty valley, which, at this season of the year, was green with herbage, and adorned by how far it extends to the eastward and westward. There are several passes, into one of which we entered. It is rugged, from the number of masses that have fallen from the sides of the hills. Several tumuli of stones are observable, marking the burial-places of unfortunate travellers, who have been murdered here, it was said, by large rocks rolled from the overhanging heights. When I was examining the rocks, in the dry bed of a river, these monuments were pointed out, to make me aware my presence there was not free from danger. This led to a valley, with some thick groves of acacias, and a plant like a mespilus, with pleasant small astringent berries : it is called by the natives butomo.

From this we passed over a low hill, into the valley Niffud. This valley has been the seat of much fighting, as our conductors informed us, among the Arabs of different tribes. We left the valley, by a pass to the southward, and entered an extensive plain, named Ambulum : in this we travelled the whole day. The surface, in some places, a firm sand, with here and there rocky eminences, and patches of gravel : the latter was fine, and mixed with fragments of shells. Often, for a considerable extent, not the least vestige of vegetation ; and in no place was the ground completely covered, except in a few small oases, where there was a species of grass, of the genus festuca. The feniculum duter, and a beautiful genista, which extends all the way from the coast, were common. The butum occurred in abundance, and its shade was a defence to us at times.

We found some beautiful fragments of striped jasper, and some small pieces of cornelian. Bonjem. — We had no opportunity of examining any of these ; but from the strewed masses they appear to be lime- TRIPOLI TO MOURZUK. [chap, rflowers of various hues and colours, richly scat tered in beautiful disorder ; — but it was the last of stone. The wadey of Bonjem has characters different from any of the other valleys we have passed through. The valley is strewed over wth gypsum in different states, with numerous shells, of the genus pecten, and several terebrellæ. There are here and there sand, and many incrustations of the carbonate, mixed with crystals of the sulphate, of lime, that gives to the surface a shining white appearance, which, in place of being pleasing, is disagreeable, by the power of the reflected light.

There are small ranges of low hills, composed of soft white chalk (whiting), covered with a crust of gypsum. In this structure we found one large pit, about forty feet deep, and nearly as much in diameter. These low hills are bounded by much higher, and of a dark brown colour ; the low hills are numerous, some are separate, but in general they are in short ridges, and have, at a distance, very much the appearance of fortifications. A small senecio, a geranium, and a statice, were the principal beings of the vegetable creation. Barometer 30.020. temperature 72. Near the wells, the arundo phragmites grows in abundance ; it has long creeping roots, the first true roots of that kind I have ever seen in North Africa. Plants of this kind would soon make considerable encroachments on the desert, and render habitable where it is difficult even to travel over.

This quarter is poor in the grasses, for I think I have not seen above eight different kinds. Our course was among sand hills, and over a gravelly road, strewed with masses of com mon opal, with small portions of botroidal iron ore, and thick layers of gypsum, with their edges appearing above ground. Tlie low hills presented the same features as those near which we remained in the wadey : one, detached on the road, had a the kind we were fortunate enough to meet with between this place and Bornou ; and here the consul and his son, who had accompanied us from Tripoli, took their leave, with many hearty good wishes for our success and prosperity. On the day previous to our approach to Sockna, a town about halfway between Tripoli and Mour zuk, which we reached in fourteen days, the uni formity ofthe journey was somewhat enlivened, by meeting with a kafila of slaves, from Fezzan, in which were about seventy negresses, much better looking, and more healthy, than any we had seen near the sea-coast.