Maiden Voyages

by Mary Morris

  We reached Estes Park at noon of the following day. A more successful ascent of the Peak was never made, and I would not now exchange my memories of its perfect beauty and extraordinary sublimity for any other experience of mountaineering in any part of the world. Yesterday snow fell on the summit, and it will be inaccessible for eight months to come.

  * Let no practical mountaineer be allured by my description into the ascent of Long’s Peak. Truly terrible as it was to me, to a member of the Alpine Club it would not be a feat worth performing.

  ISABELLE EBERHARDT

  (1877–1904)

  When Isabelle Eberhardt traveled through North Africa, as a Muslim convert and dressed as a man, she moved within an Arab world that was shifting from its colonial attachments to national consciousness and independence. But Eberhardt (who called herself Si Mahmoud) took no interest in these events. Written at the turn of the century, Eberhardt’s diary is a journey into the self, a meditation that explores the psyche rather than the countryside. A daughter of an aristocratic family from Geneva, Eberhardt made two trips to North Africa. In the first she became enchanted with the exotic life-styles, the freedom from the strictures of home and family obligations. Home again in Geneva, she spurned her responsibilities, even left to return to North Africa without waiting a few weeks for a substantial inheritance. A nervous, conflicted woman, she spent her meager resources on drugs and became a homeless addict who begged food. The diary is written during her final months alive and reflects her life as an outcast from two very different worlds: the expatriate European society in the Arab states which would not accept her after her conversion to Islam and the Arab society where posing as a man barred her from formal contact with women. Eberhardt died at 28 in a flash flood at Ain Sefra.

  from THE PASSIONATE NOMAD

  Batna, 26 April 11 P.M.

  I am feeling depressed tonight in a way I cannot define. I feel lonely without Ouïha, and cannot stand the boredom. Yesterday’s storm has left Batna inundated, dark and freezing, and it is full of mud and filthy gutters. My poor Souf is very ill, so that I cannot even go for my strolls along the open road, or up to that desolate graveyard where damaged tombs, terrifying windows upon the spectacle of human dust, lie scattered among the fragrant tufts of grey chih near a green meadow full of purple flax, white anemones and scarlet poppies in full bloom.

  The other day I wandered around among a crowd of Muslims brandishing the flags of ancient religious ceremonial occasions; to the accompaniment of tambours and flutes they prayed for rain, for an extension of their fleeting Algerian spring which already, in its haste to move on, is blending summer flowers with those of spring.

  After six long days of only seeing Rouh for brief and furtive moments by the gate of the hated barracks where he is quartered, he came to see me yesterday.… I held him in my arms and after the first wild, almost savage embrace, tears ran down our cheeks, and each of us felt a very mysterious fear, even though neither of us had said a word or knew why.

  I realised yesterday once again how honest and beautiful is my Slimène’s soul, because of his joy that Augustin was making up with me and was doing justice to us both. In spite of my past, present and future misfortunes I bless God and my destiny for having brought me to this desert and given me to this man, who is my only solace, my only reason for happiness in this whole world.

  I have often been hard on him and unfair, I have been impatient for no good reason, so insane as to hit him, although secretly ashamed because he did not strike back but merely smiled at my blind rage. Afterwards I always feel truly miserable and disgusted with myself for the injustice I might have committed.

  This afternoon I went to see the police official who is without a doubt an enemy spy in charge of keeping an eye on me. He was the first to come out with the theory that P was the one who had wanted me killed, and that the murderer was bound to go scotfree. If so, that means I am doomed to die anywhere I go in the South, which is the only place where we can live.

  If the crime committed at Behima is only slightly punished or not at all, that will amount to a clear signal to the Tidjanyas: “Go ahead and kill Si Mahmoud, you have nothing to fear.”

  Yet God did stay the assassin’s hand once, and Abdallah’s sabre was deflected. If God wants me to die a martyr, God’s will is bound to find me wherever I am. If not, the plots of all those who conspire against me will be their undoing.

  I am not afraid of death, but would not want to die in some obscure or pointless way. Having seen death close up, and having felt the brush of its black and icy wings, I know that its proximity means instant renunciation of the things of this world. I also know that my nerves and willpower will hold out in times of great personal ordeals, and that I will never give my enemies the satisfaction of seeing me run in cowardice or fear.

  Yet, as I think of the future, there is one thing that does frighten me: misfortunes that might befall Slimène or Augustin. Faced with those, I would have no strength whatsoever. It would be hard to imagine worse poverty than the kind I am up against right now: yet the only reason it worries me is that our debts stand to spell disaster for Slimène.

  Fortunately, my enemies think I am rich. I was right to spend money the way I did two years ago, here and in Biskra, for a reputation of wealth is just as useful for our defence as actual wealth would have been. Oh, if those rascals were to know that I am utterly destitute and that the slightest humiliation could be my undoing, they would not hesitate for a moment!

  It is obvious that they are afraid. Otherwise they would arrest me as a spy, or expel me.

  I was right to account for the wretched way I live down here as mere eccentricity: that way, it is not too obvious that I am in fact destitute.

  I have begun to make a point of going to people’s houses to eat, for the sole purpose of keeping fit, something that would have been anathema in the old days, like the other thing I have been doing lately, namely going to see marabouts, just to beg them for money.

  I must have an iron constitution, for my health is holding up contrary to all expectation: those frightening last days in El Oued, the injury, the shock to the nervous system and the haemorrhage in Behima, the hospital, the journey, half of which I made on foot, my poverty here, the cold and the poor diet, which mostly consists of bread, none of that has got me down. How long will I be able to hold out?

  How can one explain the fact that at home, where I had warm clothes, an outstandingly healthy diet, and Mummy’s idolatrous care, the slightest chill I caught would degenerate into bronchitis; whereas here, having suffered freezing temperatures at El Oued, and at the hospital as well, having travelled in all kinds of weather, while literally always getting wet feet, going around in thin clothes and torn shoes, I don’t even catch a cold?

  The human body is nothing, the human soul is all.

  Why do I adore Rouh’s eyes so? Not for their shape or colour, but for the sweet and guileless radiance in their expression, which is what makes them beautiful.

  The way I see it, there is no greater spiritual beauty than fanaticism, of a sort so sincere it can only end in martyrdom.

  LADY MARY ANNE BARKER

  (1831–1911)

  “It really was like walking down the side of a house,” Mary Barker writes about descending a steep cliff in Station Life in New Zealand. In part thanks to her wry wit, Lady Mary Anne Barker managed to stake out territory few other women could claim: experiences toe-to-toe with men in distant colonial outposts. In 1865, when Barkers husband sailed to New Zealand to establish a sheep farm near Christchurch, she began writing about her activities—sheepshearing and bush trekking—and earned popularity among women readers at home in England. After leaving New Zealand in 1868, her husband was appointed colonial secretary in Natal and then Mauritius, governor of Western Australia and finally of Trinidad. Barker, a hardy, jolly example of the Spirit of the Empire, wrote three additional travel books and a memoir.

  from STATION LIFE IN NEW ZEALAND

 
We had finished breakfast by seven o’clock the following morning, and were ready to start. Of course the gentlemen were very fussy about their equipments, and hung themselves all over with cartridges and bags of bullets and powder-flasks; then they had to take care that their tobacco-pouches and match-boxes were filled; and lastly, each carried a little flask of brandy or sherry, in case of being lost and having to camp out. I felt quite unconcerned, having only my flask with cold tea in it to see about, and a good walking-stick was easily chosen. My costume may be described as uncompromising, for it had been explained to me that there were no paths but real rough bush walking; so I dispensed with all little feminine adornments even to the dearly-loved chignon, tucked my hair away as if I was going to put on a bathing-cap, and covered it with a Scotch bonnet. The rest of my toilette must have been equally shocking to the eyes of taste, and I have reason to believe the general effect most hideous; but one great comfort was, no one looked at me, they were all too much absorbed in preparations for a great slaughter, and I only came at all upon sufferance; the unexpressed but prevailing dread, I could plainly see, was that I should knock up and become a bore, necessitating an early return home; but I knew better!

  An American waggon and some ponies were waiting to take the whole party to the entrance of the bush, about four miles off, and, in spite of having to cross a rough river-bed, which is always a slow process, it did not take us very long to reach our first point. Here we dismounted, just at the edge of the great dense forest, and, with as little delay as possible in fine arrangements, struck into a path or bullock-track, made for about three miles into the bush for the convenience of dragging out the felled trees by ropes or chains attached to bullocks; they are not placed upon a waggon, so you may easily imagine the state the track was in, ploughed up by huge logs of timber dragged on the ground, and by the bullocks’ hoofs besides. It was a mere slough with deep holes of mud in it, and we scrambled along its extreme edge, chiefly trusting to the trees on each side, which still lay as they had been felled, the men not considering them good enough to remove. At last we came to a clearing, and I quite despair of making you understand how romantic and lovely this open space in the midst of the tall trees looked that beautiful spring morning. I involuntarily thought of the descriptions in “Paul and Virginia,” for the luxuriance of the growth was quite tropical. For about two acres the trees had been nearly all felled, only one or two giants remaining; their stumps were already hidden by clematis and wild creepers of other kinds, or by a sort of fern very like the hart’s-tongue, which will only grow on the bark of trees, and its glossy leaves made an exquisite contrast to the rough old root. The “bushmen”—as the men who have bought twenty-acre sections and settled in the bush are called—had scattered English grass-seed all over the rich leafy mould, and the ground was covered with bright green grass, kept short and thick by a few tame goats browsing about. Before us was the steep bank of the river Waimakiriri, and a few yards from its edge stood a picturesque gable-ended little cottage surrounded by a rustic fence, which enclosed a strip of garden gay with common English spring flowers, besides more useful things, potatoes, &c. The river was about two hundred yards broad just here, and though it foamed below us, we could also see it stretching away in the distance almost like a lake, till a great bluff hid it from our eyes. Overhead the trees were alive with flocks of wild pigeons, ka-kas, parroquets, and other birds, chattering and twittering incessantly; and as we stood on the steep bank and looked down, I don’t think a minute passed without a brace of wild ducks flying past—grey, blue, and Paradise. These latter are the most beautiful plumaged birds I ever saw belonging to the duck tribe, and, when young, are very good eating, quite as delicate as the famous canvas-back. This sight so excited our younger sportsmen that they scrambled down the high precipice, followed by a water-spaniel, and in five minutes had bagged as many brace. We could not give them any more time, for it was past nine o’clock, and we were all eager to start on the serious business of the day; but before we left, the mistress of this charming “bush-hut” insisted on our having some hot coffee and scones and wild honey, a most delicious second breakfast. There was a pretty little girl growing up, and a younger child, both the picture of health; the only drawback seemed to be the mosquitoes; it was not very lonely, for one or two other huts stood in clearings adjoining, and furnished us with three bushmen as guides and assistants. I must say, they were the most picturesque of the party, being all handsome men, dressed in red flannel shirts and leathern knickerbockers and gaiters; they had fine beards, and wore “diggers’ hats,” a head-dress of American origin—a sort of wideawake made of plush, capable of being crushed into any shape, and very becoming. All were armed with either rifle or gun, and one carried an axe and a coil of rope; another had a gun such as is seldom seen out of an arsenal; it was an old flint lock, but had been altered to a percussion; its owner was very proud of it, not so much for its intrinsic beauty, though it once had been a costly and splendid weapon and was elaborately inlaid with mother-of-pearl, but because it had belonged to a former Duke of Devonshire. In spite of its claims to consideration on this head as well as its own beauty, we all eyed it with extreme disfavour on account of a peculiarity it possessed of not going off when it was intended to do so, but about five minutes afterwards.

  It was suggested to me very politely that I might possibly prefer to remain behind and spend the day in this picturesque spot, but this offer I declined steadily; I think the bushmen objected to my presence more than any one else, as they really meant work, and dreaded having to turn back for a tired “female” (they never spoke of me by any other term). At last all the information was collected about the probable whereabouts of the wild cattle—it was so contradictory, that it must have been difficult to arrange any plan by it—and we started. A few hundred yards took us past the clearings and into the very heart of the forest. We had left the sun shining brightly overhead; here it was all a “great green gloom.” I must describe to you the order in which we marched. First came two of the most experienced “bush-hands,” who carried a tomahawk or light axe with which to clear the most cruel of the brambles away, and to notch the trees as a guide to us on our return; and also a compass, for we had to steer for a certain point, the bearings of which we knew—of course the procession was in Indian file: next to these pioneers walked, very cautiously, almost on tiptoe, four of our sportsmen; then I came; and four or five others, less keen or less well armed, brought up the rear. I may here confess that I endured in silence agonies of apprehension for my personal safety all day. It was so dreadful to see a bramble or wild creeper catch in the lock of the rifle before me, and to reflect that, unless its owner was very careful, it might “go off of its own accord,” and to know that I was exposed to a similar danger from those behind.

  We soon got on the fresh tracks of some cows, and proceeded most cautiously and silently; but it could hardly be called walking, it was alternately pushing through dense undergrowth, crawling beneath, or climbing over, high barricades made by fallen trees. These latter obstacles I found the most difficult, for the bark was so slippery; and once, when with much difficulty I had scrambled up a pile of débris at least ten feet high, I incautiously stepped on some rotten wood at the top, and went through it into a sort of deep pit, out of which it was very hard to climb. On comparing notes afterwards, we found, that although we had walked without a moment’s cessation for eleven hours during the day, a pedometer only gave twenty-two miles as the distance accomplished. Before we had been in the bush half an hour our faces were terribly scratched and bleeding, and so were the gentlemen’s hands; my wrists also suffered, as my gauntlets would not do their duty and lie flat. There were myriads of birds around us, all perfectly tame; many flew from twig to twig, accompanying us with their little pert heads on one side full of curiosity; the only animals we saw were some wild sheep looking very disreputable with their long tails and torn, trailing fleeces of six or seven years’ growth. There are supposed to be some hundre
ds of these in the bush who have strayed into it years ago, when they were lambs, from neighbouring runs. The last man in the silent procession put a match into a dead tree every here and there, to serve as a torch to guide us back in the dark; but this required great judgment for fear of setting the whole forest on fire: the tree required to be full of damp decay, which would only smoulder and not blaze. We intended to steer for a station on the other side of a narrow neck of the Great Bush, ten miles off, as nearly as we could guess, but we made many détours after fresh tracks. Once these hoof-marks led us to the brink of such a pretty creek, exactly like a Scotch burn, wide and noisy, tumbling down from rock to rock, but not very deep. After a whispered consultation, it was determined to follow up this creek to a well-known favourite drinking-place of the cattle, but it was easier walking in the water than on the densely-grown banks, so all the gentlemen stepped in one after another. I hesitated a moment with one’s usual cat-like antipathy to wet feet, when a stalwart bushman approached, with rather a victimised air and the remark: “Ye’re heavy, nae doot, to carry.” I was partly affronted at this prejudgment of the case, and partly determined to show that I was equal to the emergency, for I immediately jumped into the water, frightening myself a good deal by the tremendous splash I made, and meeting reproving glances; and nine heads were shaken violently at me.

  Nothing could be more beautiful than the winding banks of this creek, fringed with large ferns in endless variety; it was delightful to see the sun and sky once more overhead, but I cannot say that it was the easiest possible walking, and I soon found out that the cleverest thing to do was to wade a little way behind the shortest gentleman of the party, for when he disappeared in a hole I knew it in time to avoid a similar fate; whereas, as long as I persisted in stalking solemnly after my own tall natural protector, I found that I was always getting into difficulties in unexpectedly deep places. I saw the bushmen whispering together, and examining the rocks in some places, but I found on inquiry that their thoughts were occupied at the moment by other ideas than sport; one of them had been a digger, and was pronouncing an opinion that this creek was very likely to prove a “home of the gold” some day. There is a strong feeling prevalent that gold will be found in great quantities all over the island. At this time of the year the water is very shallow, but the stream evidently comes down with tremendous force in the winter; and they talk of having “found the colour” (of gold) in some places. We proceeded in this way for about three miles, till we reached a beautiful, clear, deep pool, into which the water fell from a height in a little cascade; the banks here were well trodden, and the hoof-prints quite recent; great excitement was caused by hearing a distant lowing, but after much listening, in true Indian fashion, with the ear to the ground, everybody was of a different opinion as to the side from whence the sound proceeded, so we determined to keep on our original course; the compass was once more produced, and we struck into a dense wood of black birch.