Abbildungen der Seite
PDF
EPUB

Siam. Let us know how far the labourers of these countries may be regarded as free, how far as compulsory, and what is the produce and reward of their labour; in what manner they are fed, clothed, lodged, and generally what kind of treatment they experience from their masters or employers. When these facts are fully before us-when the public, by a solemn proceeding of this kind, is put in possession of the true state of the case in all its bearings-Then, and not till then, the question between England and her West India colonies may be brought to an issue worthy alike of the benevolence, the justice, and the wisdom of a great and Christian empire.

ART. XI.-Recent Discoveries in Africa, made in the Years 1823 and 1824, by Major Denham, Captain Clapperton, R. N. and the late Dr. Oudney, extending across the Great Desert to the Tenth Degree of Northern Latitude, and from Kouka in Bornou to Sackatoo, the Capital of the Soudan Empire. London. 1826. WE consider this work as, in every respect, the most inte

resting and important that has yet come under our observation (and we are not aware of having neglected any) on the subject of African researches. We will not even except the brilliant discovery of Mungo Park, which gave a new stimulus to enterprize in this the least known quarter of the globe. The importance of the information procured by our enterprizing travellers is not merely confined to geographical discovery, in which, however, a vast blank has been filled up, and a great jumble and dislocation of names on our maps rectified,-it is equally, perhaps more, important in the view which it gives us of the state of society and the moral condition of large masses of people, congregated in the central parts of Africa, and shut out, as it were, from the rest of the world, on one side by a frightful desert, and on the other by ranges of lofty mountains, inhabited by uncivilized beings, of whom little or nothing is yet known. If, from the extreme ill health and final dissolution of that member of the expedition, who undertook the department of natural history, less should appear to have been accomplished than might be wished in that branch of science, the reader will find an ample compensation for this deficiency in matters of a more entertaining description and more general interest. But we must hasten to take a summary view of the various matters contained in the volume; we have the narratives of an excursion from Mourzouk to Ghraat, or Ghaat, a town of the Tuaricks, by Dr. Oudney-of a journey across the desert to Bornou-of various expeditions to the southward and eastward by Major Denham-and of an excursion through Sou

dau

dan to the capital of the Fellatahs, by Captain Clapperton; we have also an appendix of several letters from the Sheikh of Bornou and the Sultan Bello; and from the latter a curious geographical memoir of the countries conquered by his father, accompanied by a chart of his own drawing; besides notices of natural history, vocabularies, registers of temperature, &c.: and by way of illustration, a great number of very valuable and well executed prints. On the death of Mr. Ritchie at Mourzouk, and the return of Captain Lyon, Earl Bathurst, relying on the strong assurances of his Majesty's consul at Tripoli, that the road from thence to Bornou was as open and safe as that between London and Edinburgh, resolved that a second mission should be set forth to explore the state of this unhappy quarter of the globe, which annually sends forth so many thousands of its population into hopeless slavery. The consul's information was found to be correct; for although a little army of Arabs accompanied our travellers, under pretence of affording them protection, it was intended, as afterwards appeared, for a very different purpose. Lieutenant Toole subsequently crossed the almost interminable desert with two or three attendants, and after him Mr. Tyrwhit, loaded with presents of great value; and neither of them met with any molestation from the Tuaricks or Tibboos, who inhabit this desolate region, but both arrived in safety at Bornou.

Dr. Oudney, a naval surgeon, was appointed, on strong recommendations from Edinburgh, to proceed, in the capacity of consul, to Bornou; being allowed to take with him, as a friend and companion, Lieutenant (now Captain) Clapperton, of the navy. Lieutenant (now Major) Denham had about this time volunteered his services on an attempt to pass from Tripoli to Timbuctoo, pretty nearly by the same route as that which Major Laing is now pursuing; and, it being intended that researches should be made from Bornou, as the fixed residence of the consul, to the east and to the west, Lord Bathurst added the name of Major Denham to the expedition.

The delay that the travellers were doomed to experience at Tripoli was, as usual, most vexatious. The old bashaw, anxious, as he always has been, to meet the wishes of the British government, and led, as he appears to be, most completely by Mr. Consul Warrington, could not prevail on the Arab escort to stir one step out of their ordinary slow process of preparation for so long a journey. So profound is the respect of the bashaw for the British flag, and such is its influence on the minds of his subjects, that Major Denham tells us the roof of the English consul always affords a sanctuary to the perpetrator of any crime, not even excepting murder'; and that scarcely a day passes on which

some

some persecuted Jew or unhappy slave does not rush into the court-yard of the consulate to escape the bastinado.' One day our traveller met with a poor wretch whom they were dragging along to the place of punishment, when a child and servant of Dr. Dickson were passing; the criminal, slipping from his guards, snatched up the child in his arms, and halted boldly before his pursuers. The talisman was sufficiently powerful; the emblem of innocence befriended the guilty, and the culprit walked on uninterrupted, triumphing in the protection of the British flag.

[ocr errors]

Another delay took place at Mourzouk, during which Dr. Oudney and Mr. Clapperton made an excursion to the westward as far as Ghaat, the frontier town of the Tuaricks, who, Hornemann says, are the most interesting nation of Africa'; he calls thema mighty people'-not mighty in numbers, we presume, though they are most extensively spread over Northern Africa, and indeed divide with the Tibboos the whole of the Sahara, or Great Desert; the latter occupying the wells and the wadeys of the eastern, and the Tuaricks those of the western portion of this dry, dreary, naked and sterile belt, which is drawn across Northern Africa from the Nile to the Atlantic, and extends in width from Tripoli to Soudan, (for Fezzan is nothing more than an assemblage of wadeys,) not less than twelve hundred geometrical miles. The poor peaceable Tibboos, who are nomades of a mixed Ethiopian race, are constantly exposed to the predatory excursions of the fierce and warlike Tuaricks, who carry on their marauding expeditions to the very frontiers of Bornou and Soudan.

These Tuaricks vary in colour, in different parts of the desert, from almost black to nearly white, and they seem to take pains to preserve their complexion, not only by being clothed from head to foot, but also by covering the face, up to the eyes, with a black or coloured handkerchief. They have not embraced Moslemism, although they observe some few of its external ceremonies; neither is their language Arabic, but appears to have a near affinity with that of the Berbers-a language which Mr. Marsden and some others have traced to the oasis of Siwah, and also to the foot of Mount Atlas, that is, from the extreme east to the extreme west of Northern Africa. Mr. Marsden conjectures it may have been the general language of northern Africa before the period of the Mahomedan conquests, and that, so marked is its affinity to certain forms of the oriental languages, it may not be unreasonable to consider it as connected with the ancient Punic-an opinion in which M. Langlés is disposed to concur.

The wide diffusion of a language of which so little is known, and which has been a subject of so much discussion, is thus accounted for in the geographical memoir of Bello, the sultan of the Fellatals.

tahs, an extract from which Mr. Clapperton procured at Sacka

too:

[ocr errors]

While Africus reigned over Yemen, and the Barbars in Syria, the inhabitants of the latter country, being oppressed by the iniquities and impiety of their rulers, applied to Africus to deliver them from their hands, and, at the same time, they proclaimed and acknowledged him as their legal sovereign. He marched against the Barbars, fought and destroyed them, except the children, whom he kept in Yemen as slaves and soldiers. After his death, and the lapse of a long period, they rebelled against Hemeera, who then ruled Yemen. He fought and turned them out of that country; whence they emigrated to a spot near Abyssinia, where they took refuge. They then went to Kanoom, and settled there as strangers, under the government of the Tawarék, who were a tribe related to them, and called Amakeetan.'--Appendix, p. 159.

In another place the sultan says, the Tawaréks are of the remnants of the Barbar, who spread themselves over Africa at the time of its conquest;' adding that some consider them sprung from Abraham, but others from Gog and Magog, whom the two-horned Alexander immured.'*

Dr. Oudney has given what he calls an alphabet of this language, some of the characters of which approach nearly to the more ancient forms of the Greek letters; these they may have acquired in Syria. Not a single word of the language, however, has he furnished; and as Captain Lyon did not fulfil the promise he made, of printing a vocabulary, we remain in almost total ignorance as to its elements and structure. We hope that Mr. Laing will not omit availing himself of the opportunities which a long journey through the Tuarick country will afford him. It would be a curious circumstance, indeed, if it should be discovered, from their language, and any writings they may possess, that these people are the descendants of the ancient colony of Dido.

At length, after many provoking delays, the whole cavalcade left Mourzuk on the 29th of November. They had before them a wide waste of eight hundred English miles, hitherto untrod by any European foot except that of Hornemanu. It occupied them sixty-eight days in crossing, being about the rate of twelve miles a day, including halts, which were frequent.

This dreary journey was somewhat enlivened by the noisy quarrels, the equally noisy and boisterous mirth, the songs, and the stories of the Arab escort. Arabic songs,' says Denham, go to the heart, and excite greatly the passions. I have seen a circle of Arabs straining their eyes with a fixed attention at one moment,

Salamé, the translator, observes, that Africus, as appears from Mass-oodé's History of Yemen,' reigned soon after the death of Alexander the Great.

VOL. XXXII. NO. LXVI.

LL

and

and bursting with loud laughter at the next, melting into tears, and clasping their hands in all the ecstasy of grief and sympathy.' Part of one of their extemporary songs is thus rendered by Major Denham:

[ocr errors]

My hopes are but as the fantastic dreams of night; yet with this hopelessness my love does but increase, even as a star shines the brightest in the blackest night. O! Mabrooka! thy head sinks too with sorrow at losing him whose thoughts are still of thee; but as the desert bird* drops and smooths its wing but to display the richness of its plumage, so will thy silent grief but cause thee to appear with increased charms!' Another, of a very different character, is thus given by Clapperton:

'Give flesh to the hyenas at day-break :

Oh! the broad spears.

The spear of the sultan is the broadest:
Oh! the broad spears.

God is great!-I wax fierce as a beast of prey:
Oh! the broad spears.'†

The country very gradually approached to the semblance of vegetation, and at length, at Lari, they got sight of the great lake Tsad: My heart bounded within me,' says Denham, at this prospect, for I believed this lake to be the key to the great object of our search.' The Kanem people, or Kanemboo, inhabit Lari: the women, we are told, are good-looking, laughing negresses, and all but naked. It was impossible not to feel an anxiety to pay an immediate visit to the Tsad. Accordingly, says Denham:

'By sun-rise I was on the borders of the lake, armed for the destruction of the multitude of birds, who, all unconscious of my purpose, seemed as it were to welcome our arrival. Flocks of geese and wild ducks, of a most beautiful plumage, were quietly feeding at within half pistol shot of where I stood; and not being a very keen or inhuman sportsman, for the terms appear to me to be synonymous, my purpose of deadly warfare was almost shaken. As I moved towards them they only changed their places a little to the right or left, and appeared to have no idea of the hostility of my intentions. All this was really so new, that I hesitated to abuse the confidence with which they regarded me, and very quietly sat down to contemplate the scene before me. Pelicans, cranes, four and five feet in height, grey, variegated, and white, were scarcely so many yards from my side, and a bird, between a snipe and a woodcock, resembling both, and larger than either; immense spoonbills of a snowy whiteness, widgeon, teal, yellow-legged plover, and a hundred species of (to me at least) unknown water fowl, were sporting before me; and it was long before I could disturb the tranquillity of the dwellers on these waters by firing a gun.'-p. 46.

'Ostrich.'

+ This may remind the reader of the begianing of the song of Lodbrok.

From

« ZurückWeiter »