Very strange were the domestic and family relationships of Shol when considered in contrast with her public position, her present influence, and her excessive wealth. After the death of her first husband she had become the wife of his son by a previous marriage. She had thus raised this man, who was younger than herself, to the rank of prince consort. His name was Kurdyook. I had a visit from him on the following day. From his intercourse with the traders he could speak Arabic intelligibly. Like the rest, he was loud in his praises of Miss Tinné, and in her honour he had called the child of one of his concubines “the Sigñora.” Plainly there was a longing after the culture of European refinement, and let us hope that it will not stop at the name.
Of course, in comparison with his wife, he was quite destitute of lands; he was a mere cypher as far as any influence on the tribe was concerned, but yet he exercised a terror over Shol, which, under the circumstances, was quite incredible. He was accustomed to chastise this dame, who was at once his stepmother and his spouse, and to act towards her in the most brutal manner, although she was herself in the habit, perchance as a token of her dignity, of carrying in her hand several knotted thongs like a cat-o’-nine-tails.
With rambles in the neighbourhood and in receiving a succession of visitors, I found the days pass pleasantly away. On the mainland towards the north there were several more important villages, composed of permanent dwellings and fixed enclosures for oxen. To these I constantly resorted, and the concourse of so many men coming out of curiosity to look at me, entertained me very much. Failure alike both of water and food during the dry season had driven old Shol herself to one of the islands adjacent to the landing-place; here in some wretched huts not far from our boats she had taken up her residence in the midst of a quantity of her cattle. I occasionally paid her a visit, for the purpose of penetrating to the mysteries of her dairy.
On the 26th of February the old queen came to the tent which I occupied on the island, having been informed that the presents designed for her majesty there awaited her. On this occasion she had a costume somewhat different. She had made a fresh selection of her paraphernalia from her iron rings and chains, and so arrayed herself anew. I had prepared everything for a stately reception, as I was anxious to leave behind me an impression as favourable as Miss Tinné. There were beads as large as eggs, such as never before were seen in this country; there were marbles of green and blue from the Oriental plains: she was told they were for her. Next there were chains of steel; these, too, were hers: then that majestic chair of plaited straw; she could scarcely believe that she was to have it for her throne. But the crowning charm of all was an immense bronze medal, with a chain of plated gold, which she could hang about her neck; it was in fact, a commemoration of a German professor’s jubilee, with the Emperor’s likeness upon it; but no one can conceive the admiration it excited. She was really touched, and the sailors and soldiers seemed to like the medal as much as she did. The gifts which were made to me in return consisted of a calabash full of butter, a goat, a sheep, and a splendid bull of a peculiar breed, without horns.
The most remarkable plant amongst the islands of the Meshera is a climbing passion-flower—the Adenia venenata, the bright green leaves of which are applied by the natives of Central Africa for the purpose of drawing blisters. These leaves have, however, a poisonous property, which has proved fatal to camels. Camels have but a feeble faculty of smelling, and eat freely of whatever looks green, so that all attempts to acclimatise them here have been without success. It is the same plant which deprived Sir Samuel Baker of his pack-ass in Latuka. The most noticeable thing about the plant is the large development of its stem, which grows half under the soil, and projects with a strange protuberance some cubic feet in content. At the end of this the stem breaks out into a number of long climbing stalks, which mount upwards to a considerable height. One example of these stems I packed in linen and sent to Berlin, where, after a period of ten months, it was found to retain its vitality, and in a palm-house soon developed a number of young shoots.
The waters furnished a variety of fishes; amongst these few were more frequently seen than a sort of harness fish (Polypterus bichir), of which a representation will be given in a later chapter. But the creature which most particularly arrested my attention was the salamander-like fish of Gambia (Lepidosiren), which, with its four slim feet projecting from its fish-like form, had a mouth like that of a shark. I saw specimens between three and four feet long. Its flabby slimy flesh is disgusting to the Nubians, although Sir Samuel Baker, who found the same species in the Albert Nyanza, could not sufficiently praise its flavour. The whole family of the Siluridæ is here represented as much as in other sections of the Nile. Many of them share with the fish-salamander the practice of burying themselves in the bank, that they may await in the dry the rising of the stream; in the same way as an eel they can wriggle themselves through the soil, and even make a way over the dry ground.
Considering the circumscribed limits of land, the feathered race were found in great variety. I saw at least sixty kinds of birds upon the four or five islands which were nearest us. Conspicuous above all was the graceful rail (Parra africana), with its spreading claws and wiry legs stalking proudly, as if on land, upon a carpet of water-lily leaves. And not unheard were the familiar notes of our own home birds. Sparrows innumerable thronged about the papyrus plants, on which they settled for their evening roost. All this, however, is but the old story of ornithological travellers who have been before me, and hardly needs to be repeated here.
FOOTNOTES:
[11] Speke, p. 609: “We found only a small piece of water, resembling a duck-pond buried in a sea of rushes.”
[12] The words of the far-famed traveller are:—“It runs from Sennaar past many considerable villages, which are inhabited by white men of Arabia. Here it passes by Gerri [now Khartoom], in a north-easterly direction, so as to join the Tacazze.”—Bruce. b. vi. c. 14.
[13] In the accompanying plan it is attempted to give some general idea of this confusion.