by Jules Verne
CHAPTER FOURTH.
African Explorations.--Barth, Richardson, Overweg, Werne, Brun-Rollet,Penney, Andrea, Debono, Miani, Guillaume Lejean, Bruce, Krapf andRebmann, Maizan, Roscher, Burton and Speke.
The aerial line which Dr. Ferguson counted upon following had not beenchosen at random; his point of departure had been carefully studied,and it was not without good cause that he had resolved to ascend atthe island of Zanzibar. This island, lying near to the eastern coast ofAfrica, is in the sixth degree of south latitude, that is to say, fourhundred and thirty geographical miles below the equator.
From this island the latest expedition, sent by way of the great lakesto explore the sources of the Nile, had just set out.
But it would be well to indicate what explorations Dr. Ferguson hoped tolink together. The two principal ones were those of Dr. Barth in 1849,and of Lieutenants Burton and Speke in 1858.
Dr. Barth is a Hamburger, who obtained permission for himself andfor his countryman Overweg to join the expedition of the EnglishmanRichardson. The latter was charged with a mission in the Soudan.
This vast region is situated between the fifteenth and tenth degreesof north latitude; that is to say, that, in order to approach it, theexplorer must penetrate fifteen hundred miles into the interior ofAfrica.
Until then, the country in question had been known only through thejourneys of Denham, of Clapperton, and of Oudney, made from 1822 to1824. Richardson, Barth, and Overweg, jealously anxious to push theirinvestigations farther, arrived at Tunis and Tripoli, like theirpredecessors, and got as far as Mourzouk, the capital of Fezzan.
They then abandoned the perpendicular line, and made a sharp turnwestward toward Ghat, guided, with difficulty, by the Touaregs. Aftera thousand scenes of pillage, of vexation, and attacks by armed forces,their caravan arrived, in October, at the vast oasis of Asben. Dr. Barthseparated from his companions, made an excursion to the town of Aghades,and rejoined the expedition, which resumed its march on the 12th ofDecember. At length it reached the province of Damerghou; there thethree travellers parted, and Barth took the road to Kano, where hearrived by dint of perseverance, and after paying considerable tribute.
In spite of an intense fever, he quitted that place on the 7th of March,accompanied by a single servant. The principal aim of his journey was toreconnoitre Lake Tchad, from which he was still three hundred and fiftymiles distant. He therefore advanced toward the east, and reached thetown of Zouricolo, in the Bornou country, which is the core of the greatcentral empire of Africa. There he heard of the death of Richardson, whohad succumbed to fatigue and privation. He next arrived at Kouka, thecapital of Bornou, on the borders of the lake. Finally, at the end ofthree weeks, on the 14th of April, twelve months after having quittedTripoli, he reached the town of Ngornou.
We find him again setting forth on the 29th of March, 1851, withOverweg, to visit the kingdom of Adamaoua, to the south of the lake, andfrom there he pushed on as far as the town of Yola, a little below ninedegrees north latitude. This was the extreme southern limit reached bythat daring traveller.
He returned in the month of August to Kouka; from there he successivelytraversed the Mandara, Barghimi, and Klanem countries, and reached hisextreme limit in the east, the town of Masena, situated at seventeendegrees twenty minutes west longitude.
On the 25th of November, 1852, after the death of Overweg, his lastcompanion, he plunged into the west, visited Sockoto, crossed the Niger,and finally reached Timbuctoo, where he had to languish, during eightlong months, under vexations inflicted upon him by the sheik, and allkinds of ill-treatment and wretchedness. But the presence of a Christianin the city could not long be tolerated, and the Foullans threatened tobesiege it. The doctor, therefore, left it on the 17th of March, 1854,and fled to the frontier, where he remained for thirty-three days inthe most abject destitution. He then managed to get back to Kano inNovember, thence to Kouka, where he resumed Denham's route after fourmonths' delay. He regained Tripoli toward the close of August, 1855,and arrived in London on the 6th of September, the only survivor of hisparty.
Such was the venturesome journey of Dr. Barth.
Dr. Ferguson carefully noted the fact, that he had stopped at fourdegrees north latitude and seventeen degrees west longitude.
Now let us see what Lieutenants Burton and Speke accomplished in EasternAfrica.
The various expeditions that had ascended the Nile could never manage toreach the mysterious source of that river. According to the narrativeof the German doctor, Ferdinand Werne, the expedition attempted in 1840,under the auspices of Mehemet Ali, stopped at Gondokoro, between thefourth and fifth parallels of north latitude.
In 1855, Brun-Rollet, a native of Savoy, appointed consul for Sardiniain Eastern Soudan, to take the place of Vaudey, who had just died, setout from Karthoum, and, under the name of Yacoub the merchant, tradingin gums and ivory, got as far as Belenia, beyond the fourth degree, buthad to return in ill-health to Karthoum, where he died in 1857.
Neither Dr. Penney--the head of the Egyptian medical service, who, ina small steamer, penetrated one degree beyond Gondokoro, and then cameback to die of exhaustion at Karthoum--nor Miani, the Venetian, who,turning the cataracts below Gondokoro, reached the second parallel--northe Maltese trader, Andrea Debono, who pushed his journey up the Nilestill farther--could work their way beyond the apparently impassablelimit.
In 1859, M. Guillaume Lejean, intrusted with a mission by the FrenchGovernment, reached Karthoum by way of the Red Sea, and embarked uponthe Nile with a retinue of twenty-one hired men and twenty soldiers, buthe could not get past Gondokoro, and ran extreme risk of his life amongthe negro tribes, who were in full revolt. The expedition directed by M.d'Escayrac de Lauture made an equally unsuccessful attempt to reach thefamous sources of the Nile.
This fatal limit invariably brought every traveller to a halt. Inancient times, the ambassadors of Nero reached the ninth degree oflatitude, but in eighteen centuries only from five to six degrees, orfrom three hundred to three hundred and sixty geographical miles, weregained.
Many travellers endeavored to reach the sources of the Nile by takingtheir point of departure on the eastern coast of Africa.
Between 1768 and 1772 the Scotch traveller, Bruce, set out fromMassowah, a port of Abyssinia, traversed the Tigre, visited the ruins ofAxum, saw the sources of the Nile where they did not exist, and obtainedno serious result.
In 1844, Dr. Krapf, an Anglican missionary, founded an establishmentat Monbaz, on the coast of Zanguebar, and, in company with the Rev. Dr.Rebmann, discovered two mountain-ranges three hundred miles from thecoast. These were the mountains of Kilimandjaro and Kenia, which Messrs.de Heuglin and Thornton have partly scaled so recently.
In 1845, Maizan, the French explorer, disembarked, alone, at Bagamayo,directly opposite to Zanzibar, and got as far as Deje-la-Mhora, wherethe chief caused him to be put to death in the most cruel torment.
In 1859, in the month of August, the young traveller, Roscher, fromHamburg, set out with a caravan of Arab merchants, reached Lake Nyassa,and was there assassinated while he slept.
Finally, in 1857, Lieutenants Burton and Speke, both officers in theBengal army, were sent by the London Geographical Society to explore thegreat African lakes, and on the 17th of June they quitted Zanzibar, andplunged directly into the west.
After four months of incredible suffering, their baggage having beenpillaged, and their attendants beaten and slain, they arrived at Kazeh,a sort of central rendezvous for traders and caravans. They were in themidst of the country of the Moon, and there they collected some preciousdocuments concerning the manners, government, religion, fauna, and floraof the region. They next made for the first of the great lakes, theone named Tanganayika, situated between the third and eighth degreesof south latitude. They reached it on the 14th of February, 1858, andvisited the various tribes residing on its banks, the most of whom arecannibals.
They departed again on the 26th of May, and reentered Kazeh on the 20thof June. T
here Burton, who was completely worn out, lay ill for severalmonths, during which time Speke made a push to the northward of morethan three hundred miles, going as far as Lake Okeracua, which he camein sight of on the 3d of August; but he could descry only the opening ofit at latitude two degrees thirty minutes.
He reached Kazeh, on his return, on the 25th of August, and, in companywith Burton, again took up the route to Zanzibar, where they arrivedin the month of March in the following year. These two daring explorersthen reembarked for England; and the Geographical Society of Parisdecreed them its annual prize medal.
Dr. Ferguson carefully remarked that they had not gone beyond the seconddegree of south latitude, nor the twenty-ninth of east longitude.
The problem, therefore, was how to link the explorations of Burtonand Speke with those of Dr. Barth, since to do so was to undertake totraverse an extent of more than twelve degrees of territory.
