Ferdinand Werne

“ The high water seems here to have done mischief to the lower huts, as we see by the make-shift ones which have been erected in all haste. Inland, on the left shore, a village shews itself for a moment, through an aperture in the high reeds.
I looked upon the rising sun with the blissful heart and kindly humour that Nature, in her majesty, calls forth with irresistible power. Dark brown clouds covered the place where he was to disclose himself in all his glory. The all-powerful light of the world inflames this layer of clouds ”

“ Now it is no longer so, the vessel goes far lower: where the wood does not grow on the shore, there is only a melancholy low country, and the cheerful ambak-acacias lie dry on the ground bent and dismembered, throwing out in vain their long shoots with small leaves and solitary little flowers, on the soil where some moisture still remains. ”

“ I saw, indeed, trees shooting forth at this time in Taka, which boiling and cauldron-shaped valley may perhaps contain a tropical growth, or something like it; and plants springing up from the morass with incredible celerity and luxuriance, as if by magic. But trees that have true manly vigour, and strive to shoot out with sound strong muscles, whose pith is still clearly to be seen in the bark, with not a bough injured,—not a branch hanging down withered,—these are sought for in vain in the Tropics, so far as I have seen. ”

“ Beyond this village we perceive some trees, near which the smoke rises up in several places. The last little hamlet consists of fourteen tokuls, and the people are seen afar off amid the grass hastening to five other tokuls by the reeds. The inundation seems here altogether to cease, and the medium height of the water to have commenced for some time. A vigorous smoke, like a wide-spread steam of slaughtering, delights our crew. They hope to be able to regale their stomachs with the delicious roasted morsels, enveloped by these clouds of smoke, and protected against the insects. ”

“ The three islands of Genna, Siàl, and Schèbesha, stood out, with their thick forests, from the tranquil water; and on the other side the pointed peaks of the mountains grew dim in the deep blue, over the dusky woody foreground of the left border of the river, with the charms of an island in the Ægean Sea. Close to me, the shore is enlivened by the coloured and black forms of the crew; some play and wrestle, with songs to the sounds of the pot-drum, (Tarabuka) ; others lie and squat round the fire, stir and cook by it ”

“ We throw a sorrowful glance at the youth of these nations, and do not understand how it happens that a people could always remain young.
The other vessels pass us, whilst we are calling, “Eh lissa!” Most of the men are only seemingly exerting themselves in the water, to hoist the vessel, without answering the Abu Hashis passing by and mocking at us. The natives must love the shade, for they remain with their wives under the trees. The shaven heads, and mostly turned in noses of the latter seem to do homage to the principle of beauty being in man. ”

“ At twelve o’clock, a large herdsmen’s village on the right shore, with black giants, to whom the ant-hills serve as watch-towers, and where they look even taller, being contrasted with the horizon. This is the nation of the Bohrs. Here and there are seen men waiting on the shore, holding cattle by a rope, to sell them for beads.
The ox is said to be sacred amongst them. They may perhaps love and prize their cattle, to which they have but little else preferable, and may prefer the bull as the founder of the family, but that is all. ”

“ The very pretty straw-huts present nothing worth having to our rapacious eyes, and near them we remark the sleeping-places, and a large, glimmering heap of dung, serving at night for fire and a bed. The cow-dung is collected in little heaps in the enclosure, surrounded with palings, where the beast is tied, and is still quite fresh: notwithstanding this, it is very certain that we expect in vain the return this evening of these beautifully spotted cattle. Standing on an old trunk of a tree, I remarked a large village on the right shore at a quarter of an hour up the river. ”

“ Easterly deviations follow in the afternoon, and the mountain with two peaks seen from the mast before noon, shews itself in N. The river gains a majestic breadth for the short track it is free of islands; the anterior part of the shores is low and bordered with grass. Nile buffaloes which are in incredible numbers here, owing to the grass on the islands, greeted us twice to-day, and with such blows that Rassulla Effendi became quite pale. ”

“ The Haba, with its videttes of old shores behind, draws nearer before us. The right shore is a vast semicircle, circumscribed by isolated trees, with many green grass-plats, pools, ambaks, and a kind of acacia, with yellow clusters of flowers, like the gold-rain of the laburnum. To judge from the many pools, the river does not appear yet to have receded entirely, although the nearest shore-land is already burnt away, right and left. We sail half an hour, but the northern wind is too faint, and we come to its assistance by towing. ”

“ He first, for a long time, squats, as he used to do in the land of Sudàn, with the people here; plays with the glass beads,—holds the larger ones by themselves against the light, as if they were jewels; and the good Ethiopians become so confident and longing, that they can hold out no longer; and then he is very slow in giving any, so that the value increases in their eyes. They are not only, as I have before said, very mistrustful in this barter, but also so undecided, like children, that beads and goods are often given away and returned. ”

“ In the neighbourhood, we saw far and wide, towards the left side of the village, the smoke assume a magnificent form. We see from the deck flames moving towards us, the wind being favourable, in long battle array, and steam and black ashes spread near us, apparently arising from the dry grass. Thousands of birds driven thence swarm in the air around the vessels. A number of turtle-doves remain quite innocently in our neighbourhood, perched on the ambak-bushes. ”

“ We go to the north. A poor little hamlet, surrounded and shaded by trees, on the left shore. Right and left the vessels squat, and accident alone makes us take the middle road. At the right, two small islands, distinguished, as usual here, by nothing except their succulent grass or reeds. Yet our vessel, proud at the start already gained, goes smack on the flat left shore, as if Nature did not shew shallows there to the most inexperienced mariner. One shock, and—we stick fast. Once more tokuls [96] peep through the trees of the left shore at some distance; negroes are collecting on the shore. ”

“ The life, buds, and bursting into development of the different plants appear to be arbitrary, for rain, water, and the height, depth, and quality of the soil have such effect, that the very same species often display entirely different stages of progression. From the tall dark mimosas, and other trees, down to the waving reeds, and the spikes of the high grass shooting out of the water, a vegetable life spreads with a freshness and fulness bordering on the marvellous. ”

“ Judging from the analogy of the stone hills I had seen in Kassela, and being fully persuaded that no violent rains from the mountains above, or flood from the Nile, could have so placed them, I took them to be ancient tombs, and searched for potsherds and other memorials of buildings that might have stood here, but in vain. Negro villages and cities disappear the moment they are not inhabited, like ignited bundles of straw, and the ashes do not remain on the ground. ”

“ Near the palms were four ant-hills, on the tops of which we found the wet blue clay worked up. Some miserable tokuls also stood around, but they were deserted by the inhabitants. To my sorrow, I see again a sürtuk destroyed, for the sake of some splinters of wood, merely to keep up a fire the whole night for amusement, on board the sandal,—not to drive away the gnats, for they let the fire burn in a clear flame. Wherever they have the opportunity of displaying their petulance, our blacks also are ever ready. ”

“ We can form a tolerable idea of the momentary life and vigour there by comparing in Europe, acacias, planes, and poplars, on suitable soil; it is the most cheerful awakening after a long repose: but part of the limbs always continues in a sleep-like death, whether it be under the bark of the stem, or a bough that the sun scorches, or a runner become dry, which disfigures the whole tree. ”

“ At half-past nine o’clock the left bank, close at hand, presented a real forest of tamarinds, which also traverses the lower covered pasture-land, or follows, in an irregular form, the newer line of the shore, caused by the descent of the stream. An incredible number of birds appear on all sides; these airy attendants of the marshes devour terrestrial animals, which perish through the overflow of water, and would otherwise entirely poison the air, as in Egypt. The trees, standing singly, are, for the most part, quite white, from the excrement of the birds, and naturally die away. ”

“ Priests or sorcerers do not appear to be assembled at these public sittings in judgment, which remind us of the ancient German institutions, because not a trace has been found, so far as I know, of any such men among these people. The great king, therefore, does not crack the criminal’s skull with the club-sceptre he usually carries, as I imagined on his first visit; but the very same views of a death without dishonour seem to prevail here as among the Shilluks, who do not slay the Arabs taken prisoners by them with the honourable spear, but beat them to death like a dog with the hassaie. ”

“ About twelve o’clock we see, on the right side of the river, six ostriches walking about. This sight Suliman Kashef cannot withstand. We go ashore therefore, but the ostriches do not seem to trust us strangers: they stride up the country, and run away, directly the first shot sounds in their ears. The shore here gently rises from ten to twelve feet; and the hill, which might once have counted many huts where now only a few cabins are seen, rose some six feet higher. ”

“ Perhaps the white faces of another world, our vessels larger than their palaces, in which we go up the river without oars, when the wind is favourable, and especially the thunder and explosion of our cannons and guns, might have been the principal motive that induced the wise council to come to the reasonable opinion that it would be a ticklish affair to spit us like bats, or to kill us like dogs with clubs. ”

“ I write—I try once more to embrace the mightiest picture of ethereal life, but the ship has, in the mean time, turned, and the sails cover the sun, so as not to weaken the first impression. There are moments, truly, when one is, as it were, a god; but this god-like feeling lasts, in its entire strength, only as long as the external impression, which the inmost persuasion rather weakens than strengthens. Cheerfully, and with a fresh heart, I settled myself there in a vernùs, on my little bamber, before the cabin, to a soothing sleep, where dreamy pictures of my home delighted me. ”

“ When I view the steep and high slope of the shores of the Sobàt, and the proportionate thin layer of earth on the immovable strata of clay or original soil, which here is twenty to twenty-five feet higher than on the shore or in the bed of the Nile, I return to my former conviction, that the immeasurable particles of stone and plants stream by means of the breach, and flowing away of the lakes of the Ethiopian highlands, to the lake of the basin-shaped valley of the White Stream which flows off with the Nile, as the deepest point ”

“ With a faint north wind we advance for some minutes N.E. by S. A light mist, thrown over the horizon, rises high to the heavens, and melts away. Neither land or tree is to be seen, for the village is an island in the verdant sea, extending boldly in all shades of green, and to an immeasurable distance. About seven o’clock N.E. by E., and in a bend to W. Wild geese fly here and there, but they scream, and are therefore not roasted. Even I feel inclined for meat.
At 8 o’clock, three villages appear in the south. From N.N.W. we turn a sharp angle to the south. ”

“ Our blacks are generally very much afraid of the report of guns, and do exactly as the Greeks did at the commencement of their war for freedom; they lay the butt-end on the thigh, and fire at random. On the White River, also, the report of these unknown weapons was more feared than the real danger itself. They listened to me; but then came the vessel of Captain Mohammed Agà, a fool-hardy Arnaut, who is always trying to distinguish himself in some way or another. He shouted to the sandal to cut away the rope, although the men were still on land. ”

“ His physiognomy becomes still more disfigured by his outbursts of wrath, which are not rare, when his true character is more rapidly developed in the working of his features than by all the chiselling and carving of the Gorgon’s head. His blue eyes stare and sparkle in his deadly pale countenance, and his inmost soul reflects itself in its real light, at this moment, as if in a mirror—it is the face of a tiger. Every one, seeing him for the first time, finds him a handsome man, but with something inexpressibly gloomy in his look, and in the melancholy features shaded by a dark beard. ”

“ The royal gentlemen, however, with whom we stood on an old river bed of six feet high, were restless, and in a great hurry to take home their presents of a red coat and glass beads. The city is like all other villages, but large: the king’s palace consists of several straw tokuls lying together, encompassed as usual with a seriba; this also Nalewadtshòn had told us. The Ethiopian palaces, therefore, have not much to boast of; it is sufficient if the men in them be pleased and happy, and not oppressed by the cares of government and want of sustenance. ”