I returned with the two heads to camp, and sent half a dozen men to cut off the shields, of which we obtained thirty-five from the two skins. These men arrived in camp next morning, and said that while they had been cutting up the rhinos by the light of torches, several more had come round them, and a lion had roared to the westward.

On our second day at Túli we were unsuccessful with the rhinos, and when the water came from Dagahbúr we marched to Gumbur Wedel, a small hill four miles to the north-west across the Rhinoceros Valley. Here we found oryx, ostriches, and Sœmmering’s and Waller’s gazelles very plentiful, and rhino tracks numerous. My brother was very keen to get a rhino, but had so far had no luck.

At 5 A.M. on 6th August we left Wedel, and for three miles struggled through thick grass and jungle, and then struck a good path running north-west. After going a mile along this I saw fresh rhino tracks where a pair had crossed the path during the night, and so going on with the caravan, I left my brother to take up the pursuit. At our evening camp he arrived with the heads of both, a very fine bull and a cow, and we skinned them by firelight.

On the morning of the 7th August the caravan marched sixteen miles to a karia of the Rer Gedi, Abbasgúl, to us a new sub-tribe, at a place called Haddáma. Early in the day, while walking along the path, I came on the fresh tracks of a large bull rhino, so, as it was my turn, leaving the caravan and traversing work in charge of my brother, I left the path on these tracks, followed by Géli and Hassan. The rhinoceros had taken a straight line for a ridge of low hills to the south, which are a continuation of the Harar Highlands, and after following for several miles through thick jungle and over burnt clearings, the sun getting hotter and hotter, we at last put him up at about noon, making him rush off through the forest without our even getting a sight of him. I took up the tracking patiently for an hour more, and then we heard the trampling and snorting and smashing of thorn-trees again. Following at a run, we saw him standing broadside on, listening, in the centre of several acres of very transparent but dense and thorny wait-a-bit cover. We at once lay down. Not hearing our footsteps any more, the rhino trotted forward, head held high, for fifty yards, and then stood and listened again. He looked decidedly vicious. We crawled up to a small evergreen shrub, and I sat up behind it, and taking a steady rest upon my knees, fired for his ear at a range of seventy yards with my ten-bore rifle.

The bull dropped in his tracks, an inert mass. Going up, we found that the ten-bore had hit him exactly where I had aimed, the bullet entering under the left ear and stopping under the skin of the right temple.

I was twenty-five miles from camp, and as the camel was fully occupied in carrying the massive head and a few shields, I had to tramp the whole way. This, added to the hot tracking work of five hours before we got the rhino, and the fast run after putting him up, made a long day’s work, and I was right glad at sunset to meet some men whom my brother had considerately sent back with water and dates to bring us on to my half of the caravan, which he had halted for me at Haddáma. He had himself gone on to Waror, for we never allowed shooting to delay the rate of progress, and I came up with him there next morning; as usual, we reformed the double camp, with our “Cabul” tents side by side. The camp was pitched near the wells in a beautiful glade, covered with green grass, kept short by the Abbasgúl herds. We found an immense number of cows watering here, the chief wealth of the Abbasgúl being in cattle. The wells at Waror are narrow, circular funnels seventy feet deep, sunk through the red alluvial earth of the Jerer Valley. Steps were cut all the way down, and water was passed to the surface by a chain of nine naked men, standing one above the other, their feet resting on these steps, the full and empty leather buckets being passed up and down from hand to hand to an accompaniment of singing in chorus.[30] We showed the Abbasgúl how to do it with a large bucket and a long rope, whereat they were greatly pleased.

The Waror pasture, with its closely-cropped grass, under open thorn jungle, looked like an English orchard; and the wind blowing coldly with a leaden sky, heightened the resemblance. There was plenty of game about here. Round the base of a small rock called Dubbur, perched on the top of some high ground five miles from Waror, oryx and ostriches abound. At one place, near Waror, my brother found the ground pounded up, where some Midgáns’ dogs had brought an oryx to bay, and in the grass the blood of the animal and a broken arrow; close by were the pugs of a lion. A lion roared at night while we were at Waror. The people said one was in the habit of showing himself about once a day in broad daylight, and that he had killed twelve men, the last of whom fell a victim the day before we halted at the wells.

The Abbasgúl headmen came to us and gave us quantities of milk, calling us their protectors. They said that their tribe was once rich, but was now poor, because of the Abyssinians. They were unfortunate in being next to the east of the Bertiri, whom the Abyssinians had already absorbed.

The only Somáli tribes which may be said to be under Abyssinian influence are the Géri, Bertiri, Abbasgúl, a few of the Esa, and Malingúr. But they are all unwillingly so, and have at various times clamoured for help from the British. They all trade with Berbera.

The Rer Amáden and the riverine negro population of the Webbe are well disposed to the British, though not much connected with Berbera except to the east in the Shabéleh district, whence a large proportion of Berbera caravans are derived.

These headmen said that the Abyssinians every now and then came from Jig-Jiga with rifles, and did what pleased them best; that they killed Abbasgúl sheep and cattle for food, entered the karias and used the huts; that they forced even the old chiefs to hew wood and draw water, and interfered with the women; and that many Abbasgúl who had tried to defend their homes had been shot down.

This tribe seemed utterly cowed, and quite unlike the warlike and independent people whom we had met at Milmil. I noticed very few horses, and the tribesmen said that all their best had been taken by the Abyssinians.

The Abbasgúl told us that, three years before our trip, the Abyssinians came from Harar and overran all this country, even as far as the Sheikh Ash and Rer Ali tribes; and going into the Rer Harún country beyond Milmil, they came back by way of the Rer Amáden and Adan Khair to the far south, to Imé; here they were among the Gállas and the Adone, or riverine negro population of the Webbe Shabéleh. The Abyssinians are said to have got by threats or violence a tribute of camels, cattle, or sheep from every tribe passed through on this far-reaching raid. We were beginning to get very curious about these Abyssinians, whom neither of us had ever met in all our wanderings.

One of our men stupidly told a crowd of people at the wells that we had come to attack Banagúsé, the commander of the Jig-Jiga outpost, and it was not till we heard shouts of delight from the men, women, and children collected, that we discovered this foolishness, and put a stop to it.

An Abbasgúl ákil,[31] to whom Sheikh Mattar had given us an Arabic letter, came to our camp. He said the Abyssinians were at Jig-Jiga, about thirty miles in our front, and that there were quite a hundred soldiers and a disorderly mob of Harar people there. So, as the object of our journey was the construction of a route map, without coming to blows with any one, we decided to defer our visit till a more fitting opportunity.

So far we had done three hundred miles of route in twenty-nine days, or ten and a half miles a day including halts, all of the road having been carefully traversed with prismatic compass, the main points being fixed by observations of the stars with a transit theodolite. We had travelled sixty-four miles without water between Dagahbúr and Waror, so that between Hargeisa and the latter place we had gone over two hundred miles of unexplored route with only two intermediate watering-places; yet all this country had been very fertile and subject to a considerable rainfall. With a proper system of tanks, involving, of course, a great initial outlay, combined with a steady, cultivating population, instead of the lazy, strife-loving Somáli nomads who now own the soil, much of this tract could, I believe, be made to rival some of the best parts of India. People who visit only the arid sandy Maritime Plain of the low coast country near Berbera, or see it from ships, can get little idea of the fine soil, good rainfall, and cool, healthy climate of these interior plateaux.

About the middle of August we broke up our Waror camp and marched to Abonsa, in the Harar Highlands, the elevation being six thousand feet, whence a fine view was obtained over the distant Marar Prairie to the north. On the way, at Koran, we passed six men carrying Remington rifles, three of whom were Abyssinians, the first we had seen. They were very civil and shook hands. Our guide said this was a party going to Gerlogubi, in Central Ogádén, to get “tribute.”

We had now gone as near to Jig-Jiga as we dared, and we proposed to return to Hargeisa to pick up some stores which we had left with Sheikh Mattar, and to make a fresh start for the Harar border on the Gildessa side, hoping to be able to include Jig-Jiga in the map if it should turn out to have been vacated by the Abyssinians.

The whole of the country south of Waror and Abonsa was much disturbed by a feud between the Ahmed Abdalla, Habr Awal, and the Rer Farah, Abbasgúl. We divided our camps at Dubbur in order to survey more ground, and my brother, in returning to Hargeisa across the Marar Prairie, passed through the fighting tribes, and saw many of their mounted scouts, who were uniformly civil to him. Meanwhile I struck across the Haud bush, forty miles to the east of my brother’s route.

While I was encamped on 16th August among the Ahmed Abdalla karias at Karígri, in open jungle, a surprise was attempted on them by the Rer Farah, Abbasgúl. A hue and cry was raised, and the plain was soon swarming with men, who came out of the karias with spears and shields to repulse the attack. The enemy upon seeing this retired. The affair was so sudden that the Gerád or Sultán of the Ahmed Abdalla was with his headmen drinking coffee in my camp at the time. On the first news their horses were brought up ready saddled from the karias, and they mounted without delay and rode to the south, disappearing in the clouds of red dust raised by the flocks and herds which were being driven in by the women.

We again met and formed the double camp over the wells at Hargeisa, and during the few days we were there we had pleasant company; for two sportsmen’s caravans—those of Col. R. Curteis of Poona, and of Captain Harrison, 8th King’s—passed through Hargeisa on their way to the Haud hunting-grounds.

The first fifty miles from Hargeisa being perfectly safe country, we made our fresh start on 24th August in two half caravans, and as the climate during this part of our wanderings was somewhat peculiar, showing that the Haud and Marar Prairie share in the great rainfall of the high Abyssinian plateau, I will give a short account of the first portion of the journey, the facts being taken from our Diary.

On 2nd September we marched over some rolling and open ban to the Jig-Jiga Valley, and camped at the water within three hundred yards of the ill-famed Abyssinian stockaded fort, which had been such a thorn in the side of the Jibril Abokr tribe. We found it untenanted; and as the Bertiri made no objection, we went over it and took some photographs.

The Jig-Jiga post is a work pushed out by the Abyssinians into the Bertiri part of the Marar Prairie, and it commands the route from Berbera to Harar. It is a strong redoubt surmounted by a rough stockade, the thin tops of the interlaced branches being about thirteen feet from the ground outside. The earthwork is a banquette four or five yards wide, rising in two steps to seven feet above the ground. The banquette and stockade are continuous round the enclosed space, which is a circle of about one hundred yards in diameter. It is strong enough against attacks by spearmen, but would give imperfect cover against musketry fire. On the outside the small branches of the stockade are bent outwards to form very flimsy chevaux de frise. There is one doorway, with a platform above on which a sentry can stand. Inside the enclosure were some very good circular huts, with perpendicular sides and conical thatched roofs.

A small watercourse, about eight feet deep, which would give cover for men running along the bottom, goes half-way round the stockade on the east side, at about fifty yards’ distance, so that men could collect there at night, and with the help of straw and kerosene oil the place might be burnt down and the inmates stabbed while trying to put out the fire. The work stands on the southern side of the Jig-Jiga Valley within three hundred yards of the usual wells, the Jig-Jiga Valley here being merely a depression in the open grass plains of the Marar Prairie.

The Abyssinian garrison varies in strength; sometimes the work is left deserted, as on the occasion of our visit, when the garrison had gone to the Harrawa Valley for a few days, leaving the wells to the Bertiri and their cattle.[32]

We were glad to have hit off our visit to this post so fortunately, and without having come into collision with the Abyssinians. Our men were very disinclined to come here, but we had been cautiously feeling our way since leaving Milmil to avoid any chance of a hostile attack. The Bertiri were very civil to us, bringing us more milk than our men, with all their great capacity, could drink. Crowds of the people came to our camp and begged us not to go away, but to stay with them, as they said the Abyssinians would never return while we were camped here.

Having satisfied our curiosity, in the evening we marched to Eil Bhai wells, arriving there as night closed in during a rain-storm. Hartebeests abounded everywhere, and between Jig-Jiga and Eil Bhai I shot a beautiful wild goose, which I afterwards found common in Ogádén.

On the 3rd September, having halted for two hours to let things dry a little, we marched at 8.30 to Makanis Hill, arriving there at midday, the whole march being over the open grass plains. Vast squadrons of hartebeests and of Sœmmering’s gazelles, and some herds of oryx, were passed by us. We also saw thirteen ostriches. It rained as night fell, and on the 4th of September a high wind blew, with rain and sleet, keeping us in camp all day. On 5th September we descended into the Harrawa Valley in the Gadabursi country, and back on to the high ban again at Sarír, four days later. We then marched along the base of the Harar Highlands, reaching Sala Asseleh on 13th September. We had experienced heavy thunder-storms with deluges of rain daily, and had found the whole country deserted.

At Sala Asseleh we met a few Esa Somális who had just left the Abyssinian post of Gildessa, now only half a day’s march distant. They said that the Abyssinians were there in force. We could get no one to go forward to warn the garrison of our approach and peaceful intentions, the only native who knew the country being required as a survey guide.

The next morning we made our final march into Gildessa. We started early, and winding up a watercourse we entered low trap hills, and after going four miles we came in sight of an Abyssinian sentry-hut, perched on the top of a rocky hillock, at a place where the path emerges from the hills and makes an abrupt turn to the right into the Gildessa Gorge, down the side of which it runs towards Zeila. On the rocks around us was a large troop of dog-faced baboons, and there was no evidence, beyond the small hut, that we were approaching a town.

I was marching a little ahead of the caravan, with my brother and five or six camelmen; and turning to the right, round a shoulder of the hill, we suddenly found, only one hundred paces in front of us, the town of Gildessa—a group of some hundred mat huts, with a few thatched ones and stone houses. In the middle of the town is a stone zeríba sixty yards square, with walls ten feet high, having an opening five yards broad to allow of the ingress and egress of laden animals.

The hut we had noticed was the Abyssinian guard-house, on a mound overlooking the two converging roads from Harar and from Abósa to Gildessa, the latter being the road we had traversed. On the west of the guard-house was the bed of the Tug Gildessa, by the side of which wound the road to Zeila, and this channel now contained a stream of running water, which flowed to the east of the town.

The village through which we walked was very dusty, and a swarm of people of mixed Eastern races blocked the way, bartering cloth, tobacco, coffee, and other articles of trade; and among the Abyssinians, Gállas, Somális, and Hararis I observed several men of the black Soudánese type. We found the assembled crowd very entertaining, and although the people looked surprised at our sudden arrival they evinced no want of friendliness. We sat down under some large shady trees on the north side of the town, and were presently joined by the elders, who were followed by several villainous-looking retainers carrying Remington rifles and swords.

Taken up with this interesting crowd, we did not at first notice the non-arrival of our caravan, which had only been a few hundred yards behind us during the march; at length missing the caravan, and inquiring the reason of delay, we were told that the men and camels had been seized upon by the Abyssinian soldiers who garrison the place, and taken into the stone zeríba; they had been made to unload inside, and a sentry had been put over the entrance to stop them from coming out again.

This would not do! So running to the spot, we entered a small house on the right side of the entrance; and there we found, seated on carpets, writing, one Dágo, who was pointed out to us as the Abyssinian in authority over the town. We demanded an explanation, and Dágo said that he had seen our caravan coming, and had decided that this would be a suitable spot for our camp, and he had therefore ordered our men to unload the camels.

We now strolled in to look at the place. Outside the zeríba entrance, to the left, was a barrack; and on a wheezy bugle sounding, about twenty soldiers, in white Soudánese uniforms and armed with Remingtons, ran out and fell into line. Another bugle, and they presented arms in rather a fantastic fashion. They were then dismissed, and stood loafing about outside the entrance.

We looked into the stone square and found our camels sitting unloaded, our kit and boxes scattered about, lying where they had been thrown from the camels on to the ground. Our men were standing about, looking sullen and sheepish. The zeríba was quite bare, without tree or shelter, exposed to a powerful midday sun, and the ground was caked with camel’s dung. We were told that this camping ground had been chosen for our advantage, that we should be received with honour, and that water and camel’s milk would be brought for the use of the caravan. We thanked Dágo for his kind intentions, but said we preferred camping under the trees by the river.

Dágo and his friends made a thousand objections, and the native officer in charge crowded the soldiers in front of the stone enclosure. Our caravan had meanwhile been quietly loading up the kit by our orders, but upon the camelmen trying to lead out the camels, they were stopped by the soldiers, each of whom carried his rifle loaded, with a few more cartridges held between the fingers of the left hand, taken out of the belt ready for instant use. One big Soudánese soldier stood across the entrance with his rifle at the “port.”

We now saw the intention of the Abyssinian leader, and, as it would never do for our Somális to suppose that we could be detained against our will, we decided to take the next step; and going up to Dágo, who was still sitting on the carpet inside the little hut, I threatened to complain to Rás Makunan, the Governor of Harar, if this attempt at our arrest should be persisted in.

Dágo said that we ourselves might go where we liked, but that our Somális, camels, and property must remain inside the enclosure. We refused this separation, and told the officials simply that we were going out. Some of the soldiers became excited, and began shouting, but were silenced.

Again I walked over to Dágo, and he said the caravan could not go without the order of the Rás; that it would take till to-morrow at noon for a horseman to go to Harar and get this order, and our party must be detained in custody till then.

I stayed talking to him for a moment, while my brother quietly told off an advance and rear-guard, passing the word round for each of our followers to mark his man, and to put a bullet into him should an attack be made upon us. I then finally told Dágo that we were going, and walked to the entrance, where my hunter Géli silently put into my hands the double four-bore elephant rifle, loaded in each barrel with fourteen drams of powder and fifty SSG slugs. This rifle, so loaded, scatters a good deal, and would have been quite equal to the occasion.

We had not mistaken our friend Dágo. The forces were exactly equal, not counting the Gildessa crowd, some of whom would have been for, and some against us, and seeing we were capable of carrying our point, and afraid of the great responsibility he would incur by using force, he called me back and consented to our leaving, with our men, our camels, and our baggage, provided I would write a letter to Rás Makunan, to state why we had come to Gildessa. With my brother and half a dozen men, all having their rifles ready, I entered Dágo’s hut, and we sat down on the carpets in a circle, and he pushed me a reed pen, ink, and paper.

I wrote a short note to the Rás in English, stating that we had come to examine caravan routes for the Aden authorities, and meant no harm. That we had also had some shooting, and wished to go to Zeila; and I begged him to accept, as an accompaniment to my letter, a pair of rhinoceros horns, those of one of the two cows I had shot in the Dih Wiyileh.

The Abyssinian Dágo said he was sure Makunan would be pleased at the trophy, which would be a very suitable compliment, because only important Abyssinians are allowed to be in possession of rhino horns. They make sword handles and drinking-cups of them; the latter are supposed to neutralise the effect of any poison poured into them. He sent our letter to Makunan at once by a mounted messenger, at the same time begging that we would wait encamped here till noon the next day, when the answer might be expected.

We said we could leave Gildessa whenever we chose, but that, as we wished to be on friendly terms with the local authorities, and to respect their rules, we would camp under the trees outside till the afternoon of the next day. We now marched out and camped half a mile to the north of the town, on the right bank of the river, at a spot where it was overlooked by some low hills from a distance of a hundred yards.

In the afternoon the Abyssinian officials took us into their own huts, in the town, and gave us tea, sitting on rugs. The soldiers also were very friendly, and, now that business was over, they forgot the late awkwardness, and tried to show us that they bore no ill-will, but had only tried to do what they believed to be their duty to Rás Makunan. In the evening I received them in my hut, giving them tea, which they seemed to prefer to coffee.

When the Abyssinians were gone a large concourse of Gildessa people came to camp, amongst them many Esa and Arab merchants. They carried presents, among which were three large sugar-cane stems, with spreading leaves, Indian-corn cobs, potatoes, tomatoes, lettuce, and two sheep; all the vegetables having been grown at Gildessa by the Abyssinians. The Arab merchants were, some of them, Aden people; they came clad in their best yellow and green silks; and being versed in the tastes of the white man, heading the procession, they brought us gravely, as an acceptable gift, a bottle of absinthe carefully wrapped up in a wet cloth! Apparently this and breech-loading small-arms form the chief articles of commerce between the French port of Jibúti and Harar. Neither Abyssinians, Esa, nor Arabs would accept any return present, saying that we were their guests and not expected to give anything.

The Esa insisted, before the Abyssinians, that they were British “subjects.” One old man had been to London and Bombay as a ship’s fireman; he advised us to send down to Zeila and let the assistant Resident, Mr. Walsh, know of our whereabouts, as “something might happen” if we were to try to leave Gildessa.

Next morning a score or two of young warriors, with the large Esa spear and shield, gave us a dance in honour of the British Government, but it was cut short by a mounted Abyssinian, Dágo’s son, who rode up on a pony from the town and ordered them to desist. My own men all flew to arms and stood ready for a row, and Géli handed me my four-bore, suitably loaded as usual.

The Esa were silent for a moment; then, giving a derisive roar of laughter, they went on with their dance, which was the dibáltig, or acknowledgment of sovereignty, in our honour. The Abyssinian galloped back to Gildessa, and returned with the soldiers, marching two deep with loaded rifles; so the Esa suddenly stopped dancing. A young Esa, of splendid physique, came forward and asked whether we would like them to go on, for, as he courteously put it, “the Esa were the obedient slaves of the English.” Thanking him and his comrades, we said they were under Abyssinian control here, and they must do as they were bid.

They replied that they were sorry, for they felt great friendship for us. The situation was for a moment awkward. The Abyssinians and my own men stood drawn up opposite to each other near my tent, the young Esa warriors in a sullen group between the two, and a large crowd of Esa, Abyssinian, Arab, and Gálla townspeople, armed with long guns, swords, and spears, had collected on one side.

The Abyssinians were satisfied by my answer that I had no intention of insulting them, and without further word the commander marched them back to the town.

This was already the second hitch, and we were anxious to get from Makunan the answer to my letter. We could not foresee what trouble might arise with these sensitive Abyssinians if we stayed long in Gildessa. We also thought that instead of a letter reinforcements might be sent from Harar, and our camp was in a spot difficult to defend.

By noon on the day of the Esa dance no answer had as yet come from Harar; we had delayed over twenty-four hours to please the Abyssinians, but now, the stipulated time having expired, at 2 P.M. we began loading up.

Some Abyssinian scouts, who had been posted along the road between our camp and Gildessa, reported our preparations for departure to their commander, and a crowd of Arab merchants and Esa elders came in haste to our camp to prevent a quarrel; for they said that if we went without permission we would certainly be attacked by the Abyssinians. They put our staying so much in the light of a personal kindness to themselves, that we agreed not to stay, but to march a mile or two to a more defensible position, and camp for the night, going on in the morning towards Zeila. If a large force should by any chance come from Harar, our present camp was very unfavourably situated.

The Esa elders said they were sorry, as if they were ordered to seize our camels, and we used force, a fight would ensue; and a fight with the English was the last thing they wanted.

We answered that we would also deplore this, but would not allow our free right to go to Zeila to be questioned. So we marched off, with most of the men formed into a rear-guard thrown across the camel track and extended at about two paces.

We followed the path which goes to the north between the low hills and the forest which fringes the right bank of the Gildessa stream. My brother afterwards crowned the hills with part of the rear-guard, while I kept with the remainder in the fringe of the woods covering the retreat till the caravan should be clear of Gildessa.

A number of the Abyssinian and Soudánese soldiers ran out with their rifles to stop us, but when they had come a quarter of a mile they were recalled by a bugle from the barrack.

We camped after two miles, as we had promised our friends the Esa and Arab merchants. It rained as we halted, but we spent the first two hours of the night in fortifying our camp with piled boxes of stores and rough timber from the thorn-trees, so as to make them bullet-proof. We sent back word notifying to the Abyssinians that we had camped, but that we should make a very early morning march for Zeila; and we asked that the Harar letter might be sent after us.

The messenger, on his return, reported that there had been high talk among the Abyssinians of punishing our Esa guides Boh and Hadji Adan, who had shown us the way to Gildessa, but the other Esa in the town had said that if a hair of their heads were touched the Abyssinians would have to deal with themselves also. The Esa had then been driven out of the town by the soldiers, who had formed line and charged them.

The Esa are accounted the bravest of any of the Somáli tribes; they seldom or never use light throwing-spears, but run up and stab at close quarters with the large, heavy, broad-bladed spear. On a certain punitive expedition which occurred in 1890,[33] it is well known that they managed to get into a zeríba full of regular troops, and, although beaten off, to leave their mark inside; and as fighting men they are by no means to be despised. But having no guns they are obliged in Gildessa to give in to the well-armed and numerous Abyssinians.

My brother and I watched by turns at this camp during the whole night, and with the transit theodolite we took several pairs of stars for latitude.

Sending three men half a mile back along the road to Gildessa, to keep a look-out, we loaded by moonlight and marched at 4 A.M., and by dawn we had gone five miles along a good track through thick jungle. At daylight we came to Arrto, where Count Porro’s scientific expedition, including nine Italian travellers, was destroyed in 1886. We crossed a wide nala to the foot of a small hill, which was the last camping-place of Porro’s party. Half a mile farther we came to the Garasleh stream. The banks were beautifully wooded on both sides by large thorn-trees covered with creepers, with an undergrowth of aloes.

At dawn next day, at our camp at Warrji, where we had put twenty-five miles between our caravan and Gildessa, a number of Abyssinians came riding after us on mules, bringing letters from Rás Makunan of Harar. The letters were written in Amháric, and were couched in the most polite terms. The Rás expressed himself glad to hear of the nearness to Harar of British officers, and invited us to come to see him. The bearer of the letter, who was the commander of the guard at Gildessa, further said that one Gobau Desta had been sent to Gildessa to arrange for the journey, and that by Gobau Desta the Rás had courteously sent his own riding mule, with embroidered state saddlery, for my use on the way. The Rás thanked me also for the rhino horns. Alluding to our affair with the Gildessa soldiers, the Rás significantly wrote, “If they have been discourteous to you they shall reap their reward.”

I sent an answer to this, saying our time was not our own, but that I hoped at some future opportunity, when on leave, to pay him a visit. I said that the soldiers had naturally rather lost their heads at our sudden arrival, but that they had treated us with great hospitality.

On 20th September we arrived at Biyo-Kabóba fort, the small post pushed out by the Abyssinians into the Esa country. And as we approached the guard of fifteen men fired a salute in our honour. Strict orders had come from Harar that we were to be given sheep, milk, and vegetables, that we were not to be molested in any way, and above all, that the Odahgub White Esa might dance to us if they liked. This they did, and I took a photograph of them. I have never seen finer men in any Somáli tribe than some of these Esa.

At So Madu, on 22nd September, a mail bag arrived from Mr. Walsh, from Zeila, now about a hundred miles distant. News contained in these letters necessitated my leaving my brother to finish the traverse. I started for Zeila with two attendants and my three Arab trotting camels. We slept on the side of the track for two nights, arriving in Zeila on the evening of the second day.

My brother marched down to Loyi-Ada, between Jibúti and Zeila, to have a look at a palm-tree which is supposed to mark the boundary between the French and British spheres of influence. Here he had an amusing conversation in the pitch darkness with a French officer, who thought he was trying to break the cholera quarantine, the two parties of twenty men or so standing opposite each other under arms; this awkwardness was followed by explanations, my brother expressing regret that, through long absence in the interior, he had no knowledge of the quarantine, and the Frenchman apologising for having received him en troupier under a misapprehension; and there followed a pleasant breakfast with this official, who said he lived at Jibúti.

A few days before reaching Zeila my brother’s caravan was struck down with sickness, caused by bad water, several men having to be left at Ambós police-hut, and many more coming into Zeila strapped on camels. I rode fifty miles on a very hot day, with a native Indian hospital assistant and medicines, in pursuit of my brother, but found he had come to Zeila by another route.[34] Arriving at Zeila, we paid off the caravan and returned to Aden. This was the last trip made in company with my brother.

CHAPTER VI
A VISIT TO RÁS MAKUNAN OF HARAR, 1893

Project to explore Gállaland—News of Colonel Carrington’s party—A Bulhár feud—Start from Bulhár—Gadabursi dance to the English—Esa raid—A rival sportsman—Awálé Yasin breaks his leg—Native surgery—Adventures with leopards—Following a wounded leopard by moonlight—A plucky home charge—Exciting encounter—An oryx hunt—On the Marar Prairie again—Quantities of game—Arrival at Jig-Jiga, and visit from Abyssinians—Attempted arrest of the caravan by an Abyssinian general—Exciting adventure—Arrival of Gabratagli—Character of Banagúsé—A letter to the Rás—Interviews with Banagúsé—Bertiri complaints against Abyssinians—An answer from the Rás—Picturesque journey to Harar—Hospitality of Basha-Basha, an Abyssinian general—Enter Harar—Meet Signor Felter—First interview with the Rás in the audience-room—Entertained by Allaka Gobau Desta—My servant wounded—Meet Count Salimbeni, M. Guigniony, and the Archbishop of Gállaland—Interviews with the Rás and exchange of presents—Farewells in Harar—Leave Harar for the Webbe.

In the winter of 1892 I found myself able to undertake a project which I had long formed,—that of spending my long leave in Somáliland, and penetrating through the country to explore Gállaland and the sources of the Juba, five hundred miles inland. Having thought for several years of undertaking this journey, when I was at last in possession of the opportunity I had all the arrangements in my head. It occurred to me that Rás Makunan’s invitation, received by me at Gildessa, might be very useful, because such a visit would ensure respectful treatment from any marauding Abyssinian soldiers whose path I might cross on my route to the Webbe. On the other hand, there was a chance that Rás Makunan might put obstacles in my way; but as he would get news of my journey in any case, whether I went to Harar or not, I considered it best to visit him, and laying before him my project, to trust in his intelligent co-operation. I, moreover, thought Harar would be an interesting place to visit, and I knew that Rás Makunan would be glad of such a chance of exchanging ideas with a British officer. I mentioned my project to the political authorities, who, though not in a position to use my services, kindly allowed me to go in from British ports. Eventually I started for Harar, armed with eighteen Snider carbines, which were my own property, a letter of recommendation to “all tribes whose countries I might pass through” drawn up at the Residency, Aden; a note to Rás Makunan from Signor Cecchi, the Italian Consul-General; and a “round robin” in Arabic, from Sheikh Mattar of Hargeisa, to all the mullahs, widads, and chiefs of the Malingúr and Rer Amáden Somális, and of the Geriré Gállas beyond Imé.

The caravan, which I got together at Berbera on this occasion, was the best equipped and manned that I have ever done work with. The men were twenty-four picked Somális, all of whom I had had under my command on many expeditions, and they were chosen from among some two hundred applicants for this particular trip.

In Aden I bought three Arab trotting camels and at Berbera thirty-three Somáli baggage camels. I engaged Adan Yusuf as caravan leader and interpreter, Géli and Hassan as hunters, Dowra Warsama as guide, a cook, butler, and eighteen camelmen—in all twenty-four men.

To Adan Yusuf I lent a Martini-Henry carbine, my hunters carried my own spare big-game rifles, and the rest of the men carried two Martini and eighteen Snider carbines. I took one hundred and fifty rounds of ball ammunition per man, a box of buckshot cartridges, and a box of blank ones for firing salutes and signals, and for skirmishing drill. Fifty rounds per man of the ball ammunition I expended in Bulhár and during the journey in field-firing at targets.

Organising the caravan at Berbera, I marched to Bulhár, and there remained a week to drill the men and put them through their target practice, during which time I was the guest of Mr. Malcolm Jones, the political officer. While I was at Bulhár Mr. Seton Karr arrived on a shooting trip, and left for the south-west on the same day; I also heard that Colonel Carrington of Poona was starting from Zeila into the Gadabursi country to look for elephants.

My own private weapons were a double four-bore elephant rifle carrying fourteen drs. of powder and a spherical ball, and weighing twenty-one pounds; a double eight-bore Paradox, a double .577 Express, all by Holland and Holland; and a long Lee-Metford magazine rifle, a Martini-Henry, and a double twelve-bore pistol.

There was a row going on among the coast people while we were at Bulhár. Near Eil Sheikh, on the shore, fourteen miles west of Bulhár, two men had fought in the jungle, a man of the Ayyal Gadíd being killed by a man of the Rer Gédi section of the Ba-Gadabursi Shirdone clan; after the duel the Shirdone man had run away to his karia.

The whole of the Ayyal Gadíd sub-tribe who were in Bulhár at once assembled to drive the Shirdone out of the town, and Mr. Jones promptly shut up five of the slayer’s relatives in the lock-up to prevent their being lynched. Next day he sent half a dozen police, mounted on fast camels, to catch the murderer, and in the evening I walked out with my host to a crowd of Gadíd, who were burying the dead man wrapped up in a white tobe, and we found that he had already been partly eaten by hyænas before being brought in, as one fleshless arm-bone was standing out from under the tobe.

We left Bulhár on 16th February, marched about twelve miles, and camped at Eil Sheikh, between Elmas Mountain and the sea. We took up eighty gallons of water at Eil Sheikh for the waterless march of fifty miles to Kabri Bahr. On the following day I got an aoul buck with the Martini-Henry while on the march, the meat being very welcome. I saw a good many oryx and followed a pair of ostriches, but both without success, the flat-topped khansa bushes being very thick and thorny, and difficult to get through. We reached Kabri Bahr on the 19th, and Digan on the evening of the same day.

Here one of Colonel Carrington’s men came into camp from the west, he having been sent to look for elephants. I sent a note to the Colonel, whom I had met in India, giving him notice that I was on a trip to the far interior, and would not therefore interfere with his hunting ground; and I marched to Ali Maan, where I found the country very much dried up, and water scarce, owing to a very dry Jilál season and the failure of the Dair or winter rains. The Rer Nur, Gadabursi, gave a dance of fifty men, on foot, with spear and shield, in my honour; and, as a return courtesy, I took a photograph of them. There were two large karias here. The men professed themselves, as usual all over Somáliland, to be English ryots (subjects),[35] and they made complaints against their neighbours, which they wished me to settle. While I was at Ali Maan the Esa attacked some Gadabursi and killed one of them, and in leaving I passed a party of young men going out to try and find an Esa to kill, and so square off the score.

In the Dibiri-Wein country, by a beautiful reed-margined river-bed, in the wet sand I found the footmarks of a herd of elephants which had passed about twenty-four hours before. Following these for a mile I discovered, to my horror, imprinted over them the uncompromising outline of an European boot! The herd had been followed, not by Colonel Carrington, but by another traveller. I left these footprints in deep disgust, without even inquiring the name of their owner, and marching on in haste I reached Gebili a few days later.

I was riding at noon ahead of the caravan, and had just stopped to look at some old stone ruins half-buried in rocks and grass, when my guide Daura ran up and reported, “Awálé is killed,” and when the caravan came up it was headed by Awálé Yasín strapped on a camel, in great pain, with his leg broken below the knee, the tibia sticking out of the flesh for two or three inches. He had been fixing a loose load when the camel had fallen on him, crushing his leg. I gave him chlorodyne to try and alleviate the pain. Then as we neared the camp we lifted him off the camel, and four men bore him down the steep descent of fifty feet to the Gebili watercourse, to the south of which I pitched my tent. Following a sheep track, we soon found a few shepherds of the Jibril Abokr, who were returning from watering their flocks. They sent a mounted messenger to their karias, lying ten miles to the south, and next morning a native expert at bone-setting arrived on the scene. I explained I was not a doctor, and that the sick man might choose between us; and he chose the Somáli, while I stood by to help and to see fair-play. I am not responsible for the following method:—

First they washed the leg with warm water. There was a gash some two inches wide, where the bone had come through. The limb was pulled violently to get it straight, and the knee was then bent till the calf pushed against the back of the thigh; more pulling was done to get the broken bones in a straight line, and then the bandaging began.

Cutting a tobe into strips we wound it round and round the bent leg, a neat hole being made with the point of a spear wherever the bandage came over the gash in the flesh, so as to keep the wound exposed and thus allow of future inspection. The whole of the bandage was covered with subug, or clarified butter, as the work progressed.

Over the tobe bandage was wound a final wrapping of soft keirán leather. The whole of this dressing was to remain on for seven days, and then to be opened; if the bones had not joined at the end of that time they were to be reset by the aid of a wooden splint. If they had joined, a light bandage would be again put on, and in a month he should be able to walk.

Awálé bore the pain without a sound, under circumstances which would probably have caused an Asiatic or European to yell, and next day I sent him off to the Jibril Abokr karias strapped on a camel, with about two months’ rations of rice and dates, and plenty of cloth to buy more; but it afterwards transpired that the hákim, native-like, had bolted with the whole of this and left Awálé to shift for himself. However, he managed to get attended to by a good Samaritan from a passing caravan, in the shape of a distant relation, who took him to Berbera, where I found him four months afterwards; he was then able to walk, but rather lame. A broken leg may not seem a great matter, but happening away from any transport except a baggage camel, and perhaps miles away from water in an uninhabited wilderness, it becomes a terrible misfortune.

I went out for a stroll on the evening of 1st March from Camp Gebili, quite alone, and walked along the sandy river-bed, which is surrounded by rocky and bush-covered country; and here I saw a hyæna rolling about in the sand, one hundred and fifty yards away; and pitching up my rifle I hit him, breaking his back, and walking up I finished his violent struggles with a ball from my pistol. As I reached my tent a large panther was heard coughing in the jungle to the east, no doubt prowling round camp looking for one of my goats; so we tied up a kid a hundred yards from my tent on the slope of the river bank, and raising a small screen of thorn branches, I sat up with my hunter Géli, five yards from the goat, to watch for the panther by the light of the rising moon. After an hour, just as we had begun to get tired of watching, and were nodding off to sleep, the panther charged the goat and carried it away. The loop-hole which we had prepared in our brushwood screen had been too small, allowing no room laterally for a moving shot.

The panther carried away the kid at a gallop, and we rushed after him in the moonlight over the rocky ground and scrub, and made him drop it when he had gone some two hundred yards from camp; we then dragged the carcase back and secured it in the same place, tying its leg with a stout rope to a stake hammered into the ground, the rope being smeared with muddy water to make it less conspicuously white. We also fastened a live goat by the side of the dead one.

After another wait of half an hour Hassan the Midgán, who sat on my left, touched me gently and pointed. Looking up I saw a panther’s head five yards from the goat, gray and ghostlike, and next second in a flash he had sprung on the live goat’s neck, but finding it fastened to the stake he let go and bounded on, giving no time for a shot. I searched all next day in the thick ergín jungle round camp, but failed to put him up, but we found a cave which had evidently been his lair.

On the next night I again went for a walk along the river-bed alone, and saw the mate of the hyæna I had killed the night before; but I held my fire for fear of driving away any panthers or leopards from the neighbourhood.

I sat up again, and at eight o’clock, while it was still nearly dark, a large leopard charged the goat at full gallop, and I fired without looking along the sights, the light being too dim for me to see the platinum bead. I fired a snap-shot with my eyes thrown upon the bait as the grey silhouette of the leopard pounced on to it, and pulled the trigger at random as it for a moment obscured the white form of the goat; the leopard left the goat struggling and bounded away across the river. The smoke hung heavily, and even when it had cleared away I could only make out the white outline of the goat in front, lying in its death throes; beyond that the black silhouette of the bush-covered hill, and the white light in the sky which would soon be replaced by the disc of the rising moon. I distinctly heard the leopard spring up the hill on the other side of the river; and then she stopped, growling at intervals, and evidently badly wounded, for I could hear the cracking branches of the thorn bushes and the sound of displaced stones as she rolled about.

I went to camp and fetched a lantern and several men; and taking up the tracks, holding the lantern close to the ground, we found a great deal of blood and shreds of her stomach which had been dropped as she had galloped across the river-bed. We held a whispered conference, and decided that if we waited till the morning to follow her up, with this fearful wound she might die in the night and hyænas would spoil the skin. Several men then began throwing small stones up on to the hillside amongst the bushes where we thought she must be lying, but she refused to show her hiding-place.

The Somális offered to form line and drive her out by the light of the moon. I tried to show them the foolhardiness of this; but as they were bent on it, and further hesitation on my part would have been misinterpreted, I arranged a line of twelve men with Snider carbines, and placing myself at its head, we cautiously worked up the hillside. The leopard was very quiet now, and gave no sign. The moon was getting brighter, as it had risen well above the horizon clear of the hill and bushes, shining down into our faces as we ascended.

The men were straggling and would not keep proper line, in spite of my constant directions. We had made three unsuccessful casts up and down the hill, when the leopard charged down from the top, with a coughing roar, right in our faces. The men bunched up round me and I could not fire,—indeed no one had time to fire. She came down the hill in three or four tremendous bounds, and the next second her shadowy form had sprung on Esmán Abdi, who was next to me on the left, and leopard and man, locked together, rolled down the hill, brushing past my leg. Libán Gúri, the man on the farther side of Esmán Abdi, placed the muzzle of his carbine against the leopard’s shoulder, actually singeing the skin, the bullet passing through the leopard and ricochetting within a few inches of my foot, scattering the gravel over me; the brute let go Esmán Abdi, or rather Esmán let go her, for he had had her safe by the throat from the first; and she rolled over in her last agony, fixing her claws into everything within reach, until I fired with the muzzle against her ribs and settled her.

Esmán ran down the hill, and we all followed him, calling out to know how much he was wounded; and when we overtook him he said he wasn’t running from the shabél, but was very much afraid of our bullets! He was badly clawed about the arms, but having caught the leopard by the throat in the first rush, and never let go his hold, he had got off without feeling her teeth, although he had several abrasions from falling among the rocks.

We took the leopard to my tent and skinned it by firelight, while by the same fire I dressed Esmán Abdi’s wounds with carbolic oil. The first shot fired at the leopard as she charged the goat had taken her in the centre of the belly, and torn quite half of the intestines away, and with this wound she had waited quietly for us, and had died game!

On the 3rd of March we left Gebili, and at the end of an afternoon march of three and a half hours halted at noon on the northern edge of the great Marar Prairie, at Ujawáji, near the spot where I had been mauled by a lion a few months before. A glorious view lay before us, the row of conical hills called Subbul rising out of the plain some twenty-five miles away; and another twenty-five miles beyond could be seen the long blue line of the Harar Highlands, at the edge of which lay Jig-Jiga the Abyssinian post by which I must pass before marching to the city of Harar. By the evening of the 4th of March we had reached Júk, a grassy bottom in the undulating bush-covered country leading up to Subbul Odli, which is a dome-shaped hill, the top being two or three hundred feet above the surrounding ground and some six thousand feet above the level of the sea. Between Bulhár and Júk the whole country passed over had been under the influence of a very severe Jilál, or dry season, but at Júk we found that recent rain had fallen, and young grass was just shooting up all over the plain, the thorn bushes being already a mass of green.

On the evening of our arrival at Júk I left the three trotting camels in camp and strolled out on foot; I found oryx abundant here, and after a careful crawl through old high grass, hit two mortally with a right and left, but, to my sorrow, night closed in while I was following them, and I had to leave them to die in the bush.

At dawn the next morning the caravan marched on for Subbul Odli, while I went back on foot with Géli and Hassan to look for the oryx wounded the night before. I found one, a large cow, still standing, and gave her a finishing shot; and two or three hundred yards farther I found the other, a bull, already killed and eaten by hyænas; but the skull, carrying a very fine pair of horns, I took away, and as much of the meat of the cow as we could carry.

Soon after overtaking the caravan I started a large herd, followed by what is perhaps the greatest meat delicacy, a young calf oryx; and as the meat of the cow was scarcely enough for my followers, I shot him. At noon we reached Subbul Odli and camped half a mile from the hill, in open park-like country. There was at the foot of Subbul Odli a beautiful forest of the wádi, a thorn-tree with an upright light gray or lemon-yellow stem, bare to about ten feet from the ground, and then spreading out flat at the top into small stems in the form of an inverted cone. It is a tree of great beauty, and is covered with thorns two or three inches long. This tree gives out a gum which the Somális eat. It was now the Kalíl, or great heat before the monsoon, and we experienced the first thunder-storms while at this camp.

Continuing our journey towards Jig-Jiga, I saw immense quantities of hartebeests on the open plains, one herd containing quite a thousand individuals, and three herds of about five hundred each; and plenty of smaller herds and solitary bulls were scattered about near the horizon. All the game was rather wild, but I shot two buck Sœmmering’s gazelles by a right and left, as a long line of these animals galloped past me extended at full speed, the setting sun glancing on their sleek hides; and we camped where they had fallen, on the short grass of the open plains, my tent being within half a mile of Gumbur Dug, a small rounded hillock which takes its name from the Dúg, or large gadfly. Four Ayyal Yunis traders came to me here, to lay before me, as a representative of the English, complaints against the Abyssinians; and some of the Jibril Abokr tribe joined us, with their flocks, for protection while passing the frontier.