Stanley in Africa: The Wonderful Discoveries and Thrilling Adventures of the Great African Explorer, and Other Travelers, Pioneers and MissionariesBoyd, James P. (James Penny)
History
Stanley in Africa: The Wonderful Discoveries and Thrilling Adventures of the Great African Explorer, and Other Travelers, Pioneers and Missionaries
Boyd, James P. (James Penny)
Africa, Central -- Description and travel; Stanley, Henry M. (Henry Morton), 1841-1904
We now journey easily through the great Latooka, where game is so
abundant. In sight is a herd of antelope. The Colonel dismounts to stalk
them, but a swarm of baboons spy him and at once set up such a chattering
and screeching that the antelope take the alarm and make off. One of
the baboons was shot. It was as large as a mastiff and had a long brown
mane like a lion. This was taken by the natives for a body ornament.
That same evening the Colonel goes out in quest of other game. A herd of
giraffes appear, with their long necks stretched up toward the leaves of
the mimosa trees, on which they are feeding. He tries to stalk them, but
the wary beasts run away in alarm. He follows them for a long way in vain
chase. They were twice as fleet as his horse.
We are back again at Latooka. But how changed the scene. The small pox is
raging among both natives and Turks. We cannot encamp in the town. Mrs.
Baker falls sick with fever. Two horses, three camels and five donkeys
die for us. King Moy had induced the Turks to join him in an attack on
the Kayala tribe, and the combined forces had been beaten. Thus more
enemies had been made. It was no place to stay. So we must back to Obbo,
and the old chief Katchiba.
But here things are even worse. The small pox is there ahead of us,
carried by careless natives or dirty, unprincipled Moslem traders, and
the whole town is in misery. A party of roving traders had raided it and
carried off nearly the whole stock of cows and oxen. Our horses all die,
and most of our other animals, under the attacks of the dreadful tsetse
fly. Both the Colonel and Mrs. Baker fall sick with fever, and the old
chief comes in to cure them by enchantment. It rains nearly all the time,
and rats and even snakes seek the huts out of the wet. Our stay of two
months here is dreary enough, and the wonder is that any of us ever get
away.
As soon as the Colonel and Lady Baker can go out they pay a visit to
Katchiba, which he appreciates, and invites them into his private
quarters. It is only a brewery, where his wives are busy preparing his
favorite beer. The old chief invites them to a seat, takes up something
which passes for a harp, and asks if he may sing. Expecting something
ludicrous, they consent, but are surprised to hear a really well sung and
neatly accompanied air. The old fellow is evidently as expert in music as
in beer drinking.
Waiting is awful in any African village during the rainy or any other
season, and especially if the low fevers of the country are in your
system. We have really lost from May to October, on account of the
fullness of the streams south of us. Our stock of quinine is nearly gone;
our cattle are all dead. Shall we go on? If so, it must be afoot. And
afoot it shall be, for we have met an Unyoro slave woman who tells as
well as she can about a lake called Luta N’Zige, very nearly where we
expect to find the Albert Nyanza.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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