Two African Trips

By Edward North Buxton

Two African Trips chronicles the author's experiences in Africa, and big game preservation.


A table of contents is included.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Charles River Editors
• Release date: Mar 22, 2018
• ISBN: 9781508012252

Book preview

TWO AFRICAN TRIPS

………………

Edward North Buxton

WAXKEEP PUBLISHING

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This book is a work of nonfiction and is intended to be factually accurate.

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Copyright © 2015 by Edward North Buxton

TABLE OF CONTENTS

I.BRITISH EAST AFRICA

II.THE WHITE NILE

III.BIG GAME PRESERVATION

Two African Trips

By Edward North Buxton

I.BRITISH EAST AFRICA

………………

EARLY IN 1899 a SMALL band of travelers and sportsmen, brought together by the kindness of a prominent official of the Foreign Office, met to consider the question of the preservation of the large game of Africa. The question was urgent, and many people hoped for some results from the International Conference of the great Powers having African possessions which assembled under Lord Salisbury’s auspices to confer upon the measures to be taken. Stimulated thereto by the first-named gathering, I paid a holiday visit with my daughter in the summer of 1899 to British East Africa, hunted for a few weeks in some of the best game-districts, and paid special attention to the protective measures which had been already taken. My field-notes may not be without their value as bearing on the subject, and especially as showing the extraordinary wealth of life which may yet be preserved, provided good rules are made and enforced the conditions under which the game lives and multiplies; the dangers which threaten some species with extinction, as well as the means of averting them. Some of my friends point the finger of scorn at my own modest bag, as if it were inconsistent with these views; but it is scarcely necessary to observe that no one proposes to interfere with legitimate sport,—indeed, it is the conservative sportsman who is generally found most anxious to preserve the animated scenes in which he delights.

Seven days’ battering from Cape Guardafui in the worst period of the south-west monsoon was the price which we paid for our first view of the low-lying African coast, with its coral strand, and fringe of palms, and huge baobab trees, as well as for the mysterious delights which lay behind. We cast anchor opposite the warehouses of Mombasa, and the whitewashed Portuguese fort and its rust-brown cannons.

Mombasa is an island, but within the land, being encircled by a double estuary formed by some small streams. Wild rovers from Vasco da Gama downwards have wrestled for this good harbor, but it was left for the authorities of the Uganda Railway to discover that the southern or Kilindini Channel was the better roadstead of the two. The old order and the new are visible

on every hand. The steamers which month by month bring the material for the new railway are jostled by native dug-out canoes and Arab dhows.

The latest invasion is from India, for the town is mainly peopled from Bombay. There has always been a trade between the eastern and western coasts of the Indian Ocean, and this has received an immense stimulus from the fact that the Uganda Railway is being constructed by coolies, who are followed by a number of traders of their own race.

A small tramway two miles long connects the town of Mombasa with the railway terminus, which was then at Kilindini on the opposite side of the island, and for a newly arrived tenderfoot it is very pleasant locomotion to be pushed in a covered trolly by a couple of nimble Swahili boys past the banana-shambas, the palm-groves, and the giant baobab- trees, and through stretches of long grass, among which bishop birds, like little balls of orange plush, and yellow weaver-birds, play and flutter and weave their bag-like nests.

Our preparations were so forward that we were able to take our places in the train the same night, and, sometime in the small hours, crossed the bridge to the mainland. When daylight grew we were traversing the Taru, or arid region of thorn-scrub, which has hitherto proved such a terrible ordeal to every caravan bound up-country. The interminable jungle of thorn carries scarcely any foliage in the dry season, and is almost bare of life. Africa’s sunny fountains are wider apart than the old hymn would lead one to suppose, and the first permanent running stream is the Tsavo, crossed at the 115th mile. This, being derived from the snows of Kilimanjaro, is perennial. There may be some good engineering reason why this precious gift has not been already utilized for the supply of the railway down to the coast, and even of Mombasa itself; but it seems to me, now that the pressure of the French on the Nile valley is relieved and the Soudanese revolt suppressed, that works of this character are of more immediate value than the advance of the railway at feverish speed. Although our train carried its own tank, and was thus independent, we passed several others hung up for want of water. They depended upon a tank supplied from a water-hole four miles off. The driver of one of these engines informed me that he had walked there and found the coolies, who should have been pumping, all sick or idle.

At Voi station, situated at the 100th mile, we left the train. From this point a new direct track has been cut through the jungle for about sixty miles to Taveta, close to the frontier of the German territory and near the lowest slope of Mount Kilimanjaro. It was around the base of that famous ex-volcano that I proposed to wander for two or three weeks.

At Voi we found our caravan, which had been sent up some days beforehand, assembled. They consisted of Rashid, the headman, one of Stanley’s faithful followers, and about seventy Swahili porters, shepherded by seven or eight askaris armed with old-fashioned rifles. The Swahilis are a mixed race, mainly the result of innumerable slave-raids by Arab traders along the coast and into the interior. With good treatment and fat feeding, combined with forced labor, they have developed a muscular physique which distinguishes them from the tribesmen of the interior, although they may be identical in blood and race. They are a jovial, light-hearted race, and sing and chatter as they swing along with the regulation load of 65 lbs., enhanced by their own belongings. They are troublesome owing to the childish impulses to which they are subject, especially aimless desertion. This tendency is fostered by a foolish custom of prepayment of wages, but it is dasturi, or custom, and what can a casual globe-trotter do? The deserting porter never steals his load, but throws it down in the jungle and decamps. This is a grave danger to caravans, as the mobility or even life of the caravan may depend on that load—as for instance, if it eontaius medicines or cartridges. Hence one of our first cares is to call the roll from the register of porters, which it is de rigueur to carry. The bwana, or master, is accountable for his men, and this measure is for their protection as well as his. Three had disappeared already, and we suffered some further depletion of numbers. Then followed the regulation gift of blankets and water bottles and the distribution of posho—the rice ration to which they are entitled. It was a piteous sight to watch poor starved Wateita picking up the grains of rice dropped by our men, and this was the first sign among many which greeted us of the starvation year due to long continued drought.

The allotment of loads followed, accompanied by much struggling to secure the lightest; and now we encountered a great difficulty. The porters assembled had to be shared with a friend proceeding in the same direction. A miscalculation had been made by somebody. Our carriers were obviously insufficient for the number of loads which comprised our tents and gear, trade goods, chop boxes, as boxes of assorted provisions are called, and rice for a month.

The Wateita who hung about the camp seemed too wasted to carry an ordinary load, and we were driven to leave a part of our rice behind, hoping to recruit sturdier beggars at the Bura Hills and send them back for the surplus. This we ultimately did, but they were long in overtaking us, and the want of these loads hampered our subsequent movements. I had bought five Zanzibar donkeys, which are admirable for riding, but in the difficulty in which we found ourselves for transport I made the mistake of loading them with some of our luggage, for which they are not suited. At Aden we had engaged four Somalis, two as tent-boys, and the other two—Ali Barali and Darota Nur—as shikaris. In both capacities Somalis may be found who are excellent, the latter being, of course, much the most important function, and the post proportionally difficult to fill satisfactorily.

By the middle of the next day we had completed our preparations, and our safari started, while we followed shortly after on our bicycles. We were by no means pioneers in the use of this kind of locomotion in East Africa, but it is only the broader roads on which they can be usefully ridden. The ordinary native track through the thorn-jungle is too narrow and tortuous, and the long grass hampers the wheels. Solid tires are essential, owing to the innumerable spines and thorny seeds which strew the ground. We believed that the Taveta road, being cut broad