CHAPTER IX
THREE WEEKS’ KOODOO STALKING ON GOLIS RANGE, 1893

Our hunting camp in the mountains—The “Rock of the Seven Robbers”—Exciting koodoo hunt; death of a splendid koodoo—My shooting costume—Triumphant return to camp—Unsuccessful koodoo hunt—March to Henweina—Unsuccessful hunt after four bull koodoos—Bag a fine bull—A charming spot—Dog-faced baboons—Alarm note of the koodoo cow—Picturesque bivouac—Cedar-trees in Mirso—A leopard caught with a piece of rope and speared by the Somális—March to Armáleh Garbadir—The great Massleh Wein bull—Exciting hunt; success of the Martini; a glorious koodoo—Return to the coast.

We descended the Jeráto Pass to Mandeira on 4th June. This pass has since been improved by an engineer officer from Aden, and there is now a good road. Once caravans had the greatest difficulty in getting up or down the pass. On this day I divided the men and animals into two caravans, one-half to remain with me in the mountains, the other half to go to Berbera, where the men would be paid off and the camels sold.

On the following day I took the half of the caravan which I had chosen for the koodoo-hunting trip, and marched three miles, from Mandeira wells to a small spring just under the crest of Gán Libah Mountain, which is six thousand feet above sea-level. The height of our camp here was four thousand five hundred feet. In the morning, while the men were moving camp to the new site, I took my two hunters Géli and Hassan, and an Esa Musa guide from some karias which we found at Mandeira, and searched the hills for koodoo, but only saw some female koodoo and young ones, so we made for camp, which we found pitched in a very pretty little glade on the hillside. I had no tent, but a small hut made of camel-mats, covered over with waterproof sheets, and fastened to some poles which we cut from the thorn bushes. To the east, just below camp, was a rocky torrent-bed, with stretches of flat sand in the bottom, and a small stream trickling through it, forming waterfalls of a foot or two in height, and flowing northwards into the Tug Mandeira. All the country for a mile or two round was very much broken and cut up by ravines from Gán Libah and other high mountains overlooking the camp; and in these ravines were long strips of the gudá jungle, with thick aloe undergrowth four feet high.

Three miles north-west, on the right bank of the Tug Mandeira sand-river, rises a very curious pinnacle or boss of hard rock, called Dagaha Todobálla, or the “Rock of the Seven Robbers” (from todoba, seven). The story goes that seven Jibril Abokr robbers came from the west on one of their periodical raids, to search for plunder among the Esa Musa flocks grazing at the foot of the Gólis Range; but the Esa Musa collected in force, and these men fled to the top of the almost inaccessible rock, where they were surrounded and finally cut to pieces by the enraged tribesmen. Rising as it does to a height of about a hundred feet above a sea of jungle of the large gudá thorn-trees, it forms a very beautiful addition to Mandeira scenery, which indeed is all very striking. There are several of these rocks and hillocks in the Mandeira Valley, and the large thorn jungles round their bases are the home of that lovely antelope, the lesser koodoo, which combines many of the beauties of both the large koodoo and the African striped bushbuck, and is midway between them in size. There are also wart-hog, Waller’s gazelles, the tiny Sakáro, as well as guinea-fowl and large koodoo in the mountains close by.

On the evening of 5th June I went out again with the same men, holding south-west along the lower slopes of a ridge called Gol Adéryu, or the “Hill of Koodoos”; and here I bagged a splendid specimen of a koodoo bull. When Géli first saw him we were moving along the base of the hills, crossing several torrent-beds, all more or less hidden under gudá trees, with bare gravelly ridges, or ridges covered with grass and aloe jungle, forming the watersheds. He was about three hundred yards away in front of us, standing nibbling the young shoots of the gudá where a thick mass of this kind of jungle crowned a ridge. The ground where the koodoo had taken up his position was higher than the low open ridge on which we had been standing when we saw him; but the wind was blowing in our faces, and was therefore in our favour. Two small torrent-beds intervened between us and the game. His body was quite concealed by the dark green foliage, only the head and shining horns being occasionally visible as he stretched himself out to reach down a branch, and it was long before I could make out what Géli was pointing at. But looking through my field-glass I saw that I had to deal with the bearer of a splendid pair of horns, the best I had seen, the whitish tips looking a yard apart, and the evening sun being reflected from the wide spirals.

We sank flat to the ground together where we had stood, and lay, without daring to move, fearing that some unlucky chance should cause him to come out of the bush and look towards us. We spoke in whispers, taking many more precautions than were really necessary at this distance because of the great size of this particular old bull, and the intense fear I had of losing him. We lay upon a flat, open piece of gravel about ten yards square; and so nervous did we become that we dared not creep along the ground from our respective positions far enough to tear down a branch to hold before the face, preferring to lie motionless in the open, in full view, to the chance of a movement catching his eye.

We lay for probably twenty minutes watching him, and we had perfected all the arrangements for a most difficult stalk, when, with an abrupt movement, he turned his head towards the north, only the tips of his horns appearing above the foliage. But they were motionless, and I knew that he had seen or heard something. I turned my head round slowly to look at my companions, to see whether they had moved, but they lay as they had dropped, and no sound above a whisper had been uttered by any of us.

Suddenly the pair of horns swung round to the south, and the bull’s shoulders appeared in full view as he gave a great bound forward, disappeared among the bushes, and emerged galloping his hardest up the ridge, where the jungle was thin, his tail held erect; next second he had plunged into a watercourse and disappeared, and a few minutes later we saw his whole body in the far distance as he made his way heavily up the steep Gol Adéryu ridge and went down on the other side. We looked blankly at each other! Of course it was of no use concealing ourselves now, so we got up and walked to the spot where the koodoo had been standing; and here, to our disgust, we met three men and two women of the Esa Musa, who had come from the Mandeira karias to pick gum. They had been walking along a torrent-bed and had come close up to the koodoo before they saw him; and one of the Esa Musa had thrown his small spear at him and missed, sending the koodoo off as we had seen.

We enlisted these people in our service by a promise of meat if successful, and then we slowly took up the tracks. But we soon lost them again in the rocky ground, and extending into a line and moving over the ridge where he had disappeared, we resolved ourselves into couples and searched independently for further tracks.

We must have spent over an hour doing this, and traversed about a mile of very steep, stony hills covered with dense thorn bush, with occasional deep canons and gullies in the limestone, when one of the gum-pickers ran up and motioned to me to follow him; and scrambling over another half mile of steep ground we came upon the tracks of a koodoo, which by their size I concluded to be those of the bull we had lately lost. He had slowed down into a walk, the tracks leading up to a very high ridge, and we took them over the top with great caution, hoping that we might come upon him somewhere in the next valley.

We were soon scrambling along the sides of the valley when Hassan pointed downwards, and I saw the koodoo rounding a spur a hundred and fifty yards away, and about a hundred feet below us; and throwing up the rifle I fired just before he disappeared, the bullet telling loudly, and my men calling out that he was hit. We got down to where he had been in a few seconds, and rounding the corner we found him lying in a bush which had stopped his body as it had rolled down the hill. The .577 bullet, entering behind the withers, had driven nearly through him, breaking the spine and killing him almost instantaneously. All the Somális, of course, began shaking hands with me across the body to show their delight. This was a splendid old bull, his massive neck being covered with scars received in fights with his species, scratches from the thorn bushes through which he had forced his way, and abrasions from the rocks where he had fallen. The horns measured 34½ inches between tips, 37 inches in a straight line from base to tip, and 49 inches round the spiral.

It was getting late, and a heavy thunder-storm was coming up from the south,—always a disagreeable experience in these hills, and especially so in this instance, because I had nothing on but a thin vest, a pair of khaki drill breeches, and red rubber tennis shoes with long stockings, the day having been too hot for climbing steep hills in a coat.

It became intensely cold as the sun set and the rain poured down, so employing all our knives we soon whipped off the skin of the koodoo, and I threw it over my shivering shoulders like a shawl, hair inside. The Somalis had their tobes. We cut off the grand head, taking care to leave plenty of the skin of the neck and beard; and each of us being loaded with head, meat, or rifles, made our way over the hills back to camp, arriving an hour after dark; Hassan, who had pointed me out the koodoo, being privileged to sing the hunting-song as we approached the camp fire.

During the next six days I went after koodoo morning and evening without success, sometimes going up into the mountains before dawn and not returning till after nightfall, and shifting camp from one watering-place to another.

On the sixth day I had a long hunt after a koodoo with fine horns, which we had got news of in Harka-weina in the Henweina valley; we saw the koodoo across a gorge, and after making a long détour to get into a favourable position for a stalk, we found that he had mysteriously disappeared.

On the same evening we marched five miles across the Henweina valley, and made our bivouac at the karia of one Waiss Mahomed, of the Adan Esa, Esa Musa, Habr Awal. The people here were very kind and attentive to me, bringing me willingly goats, sheep, and milk to buy whenever I wanted supplies. The camp was pitched among large, flat-topped gudá thorn-trees hung with thick masses of armo creeper, which forms a deep and cool shade, and has a light green, heart-shaped leaf, thick and rubber-like and full of sap. At a distance of a mile on every side of the camp were the foothills of Gólis Range. The spot was pleasant, and I resolved to make a halt of several days here, looking for koodoo and making up the bundles of specimens ready to be enclosed in boxes when I arrived at Aden, and sent to Mr. Rowland Ward in London. This halt was a great rest for the men after the incessant marching of the last four months, and they thoroughly enjoyed it.

On 12th June I sent out two parties to look for koodoo, and waited in camp till 10 A.M. for news from these men, or from the Esa Musa cowboys who were herding cattle on the mountains. A herd-boy brought in news that he had seen four bull koodoos together on the top of a mountain, about three miles away, and fifteen hundred feet above camp. After a very toilsome climb, the day being exceptionally hot, the herd-boy led us to a saddle in the hills where he had last seen the four bulls; and as he took us with the wind by mistake, we only heard the rattle of stones as the game galloped away; we found their tracks, but never came up with them. Much disappointed, we descended by the most stony goat-track which I remember to have traversed at any time, and we arrived in camp very much done up.

I had just thrown myself on my camel-mats to rest when Géli and Hassan came in triumphantly with news of another bull in the opposite direction, about two miles away, and not more than five hundred feet above our camp. They had seen him quietly walking over the top of a hill, picking here and there at the bushes, and without waiting to find out where he had gone, they had rushed to camp to see whether I had returned from the other four bulls. I thought no more of rest, and trotted up the valley with my men, by sheep-paths winding through the thick undergrowth of aloes, and gained the base of the hill where the koodoo had been seen. There was not much time to be lost in searching for his tracks, as it was now half-past five, and the sun was nearly setting; so having lost them on stony ground near where he had last been seen, we all went in different directions to search, Géli and Hassan running about on top of the hill, and I waiting below under a screen of armo creeper which hung from a gudá thorn-tree. After a long wait Géli and Hassan could be seen coming cautiously towards me down a spur of the hill close to a deep, densely-wooded little ravine, which ran down parallel to the spur on my left. Gaining the level of the valley, and creeping from one thicket to another between the aloes, they at length reached me and pointed to a dense clump of bushes which grew half-way up the ravine, two hundred feet above me. We made a circuitous stalk by a long detour to the right, and so round the top of the hill on the farther side, and down over the head of the ravine; but this took so long that when we stalked in on the clump of bushes from above, the koodoo was no longer there, the tracks showing that he had grazed away down the hill; the bottom of this was now concealed from us by the curve of the steep ground and by the high grass, bushes, and rocks.

As we looked down the ravine we saw that to our right the valley fell from the level of my former watching-place into a V-shaped gorge, running off at right angles to the ravine. Creeping round the shoulder of the hill to the right, so as to be just above this gorge, we descended yard by yard, placing each foot carefully on the rocks and undergrowth so as to avoid making the slightest sound. The wind was in our faces as we advanced, and whenever I could get a piece of rock large enough to stand upon, and see over the high durr grass below, I slowly raised myself to an erect position, expecting to see the koodoo and get a shot. This manœuvre had been repeated three times, cautiously, so that no sound or brusque movement on our parts should attract the attention of the koodoo, if he should by any chance be in the gorge below.

As we gained the fourth group of rocks we heard the rattle of stones and crash of bushes, and saw, from behind, the horns of the koodoo rising and falling amongst the tufts of grass as he plunged down into the gorge. He paused before reaching the bottom, and we were having a whispered argument whether two objects showing motionless above the grass were the tips of his horns or spears of aloe, when they moved, and he went crashing on again.

Knowing he would have to ascend the opposite side of the V-shaped gorge, as the bushes and aloes were too thick for him to go fast along the bottom of the V to right or left, I jumped on to the rock and waited; springing across, he cantered clumsily up the other side, which was very steep. The distance was two hundred yards across the gorge, and taking a full sight I held the rifle for the withers and pulled the trigger. He fell back among the rocks and bushes, and though still breathing he was practically dead; but to prevent his moving and damaging his beautiful horns by rolling among the boulders, I gave him another shot. The horns measured 50 inches round the curve, 35½ inches in a straight line from base to tip, and 26½ inches between tips.

On 13th June I took a camel and a few necessaries for spending the night away from camp; and after looking for koodoo all day we arrived at a lovely little burn half buried in reeds, at the base of Banyéro Mountain, which is between six thousand and six thousand five hundred feet high. This was a charming spot, a clear stream flowing over boulders of many colours, there being occasionally narrow stretches of red sand, on which were imprinted the fresh tracks of koodoo and lion. Above, on the side of Banyéro Mountain, was a precipice two hundred feet or so in height, and on the smooth, perpendicular face of this were a number of holes and cracks leading into the rock, each tenanted by a group of gray-maned, dog-faced baboons, their long tails hanging down perpendicularly against the precipice. The crowded clusters of baboons, of a blue-gray colour, constantly moving their heads, tails, or legs, and chattering at us, formed a curious and lively picture against the brick-red face of the rock. There must have been three hundred altogether, including the little ones, which clung to the rocks or to their mothers’ backs; and with all heads looking at us, they kept up a tremendous barking as we crossed the stream, and it continued all night close to our bivouac, so that it was a long time before we were able to get any sleep. Some of the males seemed as large as retriever dogs, with gray manes as imposing as that of the lion.

Next morning we had to pass these baboons as we ascended a gorge to watch for koodoo, and they ran round to the head of the gully in a small army, like little men determined to block our passage. They hid in the rocks across our path, chattering at us as we came on, and when we were fifty yards away they still sat ferociously watching us. One gray old fellow had his head looking over a stone, and pointing my Martini-Henry at it, I was amused to see him duck behind a rock exactly as a man would have done. I again raised the rifle and down went his head again. This was curious, for he had certainly never seen a rifle before. My men stormed the pass, intent on catching a young one, but they were too quick for us, and retired slowly up the ravine, disputing with their short angry bark every inch of the ground. Of course I did not fire at the human-looking brutes; and the Somális, approving, said that they were little men, and it was unlucky to kill them.

In the forenoon we saw three cow koodoos and a young bull with half-grown horns, grazing up a patch of green meadow grass in a valley several hundred feet below us; but after watching them for an hour, and seeing that no old bull joined them, we gave it up for the day, and prepared for the long journey back to the main camp. As we descended to our bivouac to pack up our blankets and cooking-pots, we gave these koodoos a slant of our wind, and one of the females stood pawing the ground and looking up at us, both of the huge rounded ears held forward. We did not move, and every minute or so she emitted a loud bark which went echoing up the hillsides.

This alarm-note is given by an old cow when she scents or sees danger, but cannot quite make out its nature, and so she calls the attention of the herd. Sometimes three or four females on hearing the bark of one will throw up their heads, and joining her will stand motionless, all eyes turned to the direction of danger, as if in council, and then they canter away, followed by the ruck of the herd. By remaining motionless, even if on the bare hillside, you may keep up this performance for any length of time; but once you move, having made you out, off they go. More than once I have been first warned of the presence of koodoo in a valley below me by the loud echoing bark coming across to me from half a mile away, and arresting ourselves as if turned to stone, we have searched the opposite slopes, and have at last made out three or four brown bodies, standing under the shade of an overhanging precipice, in colour so like the background that we should never have seen them but for that warning bark. The old doe is usually a splendid sentry, but often she betrays the herd in this way.

On the 14th we came back to our former bivouac at the reed-margined spring, hoping to see the herd again in the morning, perhaps accompanied by an old bull. We arrived late, and found the baboons again in force. We lit fires and threw ourselves down under a fig-tree for the night. This was a very picturesque night camp. The stream was just below us, giving out a murmuring of running water which was refreshing after the hot march of the day. An hour after the sun had gone down a crescent moon rose in the east, and just disappearing in the west, following the sun, blazing in the clear mountain air, was the Hedig wa Galab, or evening star.

The two goats which I had brought to supply milk for my morning coffee were standing against each other, head to tail, between the two fires, trying to keep warm in spite of a current of air which blew down from the higher gorges of Banyéro, where the mist hung very white, shreds of it clinging to the side ravines and round the shoulders of the mountain. Between the fires, and around the goats, lay coiled the four natives. The camel sat alone, a little farther out, chewing the cud with regular cadence of sound and gazing into the darkness, its large eyes reflecting the firelight. The baboons kept up their barking all night as on the former occasion, and next morning were seen crossing the top of an adjacent cliff, inspecting our camp.

The next day we hunted for koodoo all the morning, but only once more saw the same family of cows with the half-grown bull; so we made for the Henweina camp, and arrived in the afternoon, very thirsty. Géli, while taking care of my water-bottle, smashed it against a projecting rock, losing the day’s supply.

This march home was twice as long as it need have been; for, anxious to visit the higher parts of Banyéro, I had ascended a thousand feet to the Mirso ledge, and walking for several miles between splendid specimens of the mountain cedar, I had again descended into the Henweina Valley near the main camp, by a sheep track which we hit upon, hitherto unknown to the guides. I continued unsuccessful during the next few days, going many a “wild-goose chase” after some bull which some one had seen, and when away after this, a splendid chance in another direction would be lost through my being out of camp. What sometimes occurred was that three shepherds would see a koodoo while out in the early morning tending sheep, and leaving one of their number to mind the sheep and to watch the koodoo at the same time, the other two would run down to camp, over four miles of mountain and valley, to bring me the news. By the time I had arrived at the spot, perhaps some hours afterwards, the man who had been left to watch would either be asleep or would have moved with his sheep to another pasture; and while we looked for the koodoo in the absence of a guide, it would catch sight of us and steal away. I think I never worked harder than at this period in the search for koodoo, but was continually disappointed, often going three expeditions during the day, and climbing many thousands of feet.

One day we heard a fine leopard coughing, as leopards do, among the hills, and I spent the day looking for his cave. Arriving home after dark, the first object which I saw on approaching the camp fire was the spotted body, with a framing of natives, who had just brought him over from the Esa Musa karia quite close to us. The elders, having lost a goat the night before, had on this evening tied one up as a bait, and had prepared a running noose of camel-rope in the brushwood of the zeríba through which he must pass to get to the goat. Having sauntered boldly down from the hills in the evening for another goat, as had been his custom, he charged recklessly and got himself noosed, when the Somális, who had been waiting in ambush, closed round and speared him. The body was scarcely cold when I bought it of old Waiss Mahomed, the patriarch of the karia, for twelve rupees.

The koodoos seemed to have left this neighbourhood. I had heard a good deal in Henweina about a mysterious bull koodoo living in the high Massleh Wein gully, overlooking Garbadir, fifteen miles to the east along the foot of Gólis, if one went round by the camel path, or nine miles up and down, if one took a short cut over the mountains. He was known to have remained in Massleh Wein, drinking nightly at the spring below, for three years. He was reported to be very old and cunning, to carry enormous horns, and to be lame in one foot. He had been seen by a great many shepherds in the same place, but had always at once disappeared in the mists which filled these gorges in the early morning; and the clump of cedar-trees, amongst which he was always found, being on the spur between the bifurcation of two branches of the Massleh gully, he had from his lair a view in every direction.

Having resolved to try conclusions with this bull, I sent my caravan round the base of a peaked mountain called Hambeileh Weina, by a good camel track, with orders to the men in charge to make two marches to Garbadir, and camp at Armáleh water. Armáleh to the east and Massleh to the west were two of several valleys which joined to form the district called Garbadir. The grazing grounds of Garbadir, filling a semicircle of about six miles’ radius, formed a bay in Gólis Range, under Daar Ass Bluff, which is about six thousand five hundred feet above the sea. Garbadir was beautifully wooded with very large gudá thorn forest, plenty of grass growing in the glades, and the ground was covered with fresh tracks of the Esa Musa flocks. It was at Armáleh Garbadir that I had formed my first shooting camp in 1885.

From my Henweina camp into Garbadir there was a short cut over the mountains which was impassable for camels, and this path I took with my two gunbearers and an Esa Musa guide, ascending and descending about a thousand feet over the neck between the Hambeileh Weina pointed peak and the top of Daar Ass. At a height of about five thousand feet above the sea we found several Esa Musa cattle karias, perched on the mountains, with splendid flat stretches of open green pasture. The Esa Musa herds showed me the tracks of a very large koodoo, which I knew to be those of a well-known bull which I had hunted once or twice during the last few days, and which we had called the Darei-Hosei koodoo, after the name of the gully in which he was generally seen by the shepherds in the early mornings; but as he had passed by at dawn, several hours before, I held on for the Armáleh camp, leaving Massleh Valley two miles behind us on my right.

I resolved not to disturb Massleh gorge till we should hear news of the well-known Massleh koodoo. Arriving at Armáleh a little after noon, I sent some Esa Musa shepherds up to Massleh with orders to sit on points of vantage and watch the gorge for the appearance of the koodoo when he should get up from his sleep in the afternoon; and if they should see him, to run and let me know; meanwhile I sat down and waited for the caravan to come round by the long road.

At about four o’clock, acting on the information of an old woman who was collecting firewood, I went after pig, and came to the Massleh water; we here found several women and girls filling their bark water-vessels preparatory to carrying them on their backs to their huts; and they told us they had just seen a large wart-hog boar come to drink, and then run away again without drinking. Following on the tracks, we came suddenly on him twenty yards away on the top of a rise in a goat path, and I raised my rifle and covered his shoulder; but finding I could not see his tusks, and as I never shoot a boar unless they are abnormally large, I let him off. He walked round the bend of the path and I followed, but coming to the corner we found he had managed to go quietly away without leaving a track to show his whereabouts.

My gunbearer said he must be a shaitan, or devil, and we were just preparing to drink and go home when two Esa Musa ran up to say they had seen the lame koodoo of Massleh Wein, and they could show him to me at once! This was great luck! We started off at a trot up the Lower Massleh Valley, and came to where there was a stretch of about half a mile, before it branched out in the form of a Y into two gorges running up steeply into Daar Ass Mountain. The natives had just seen him coming out of the mass of jungle which filled the point of junction of the two gorges where they joined to form the main valley, or stalk of the Y, lower down.

Géli and I, keeping to the right, ascended the side of the valley and sat down under the shade of a black poison-bush on a pile of rocks, commanding the nearest of the two small gorges above the junction, that is, the western one; while I stopped the eastern gorge by sending an Esa Musa across to its head, to drive back the koodoo should he attempt to retreat up it. We knew he was somewhere in the jungle below the junction of the gorges, and I had ordered Hassan and the other Esa Musa to sit under cover down in the lower valley long enough to give us all time to take up our appointed positions; and then, when they saw us posted, to walk slowly up through the jungle, looking for the fresh tracks.

I had been sitting some twenty minutes at my post, when Hassan and the Esa Musa shouted across from the jungle to the men at the head of the eastern gorge to look out, and we saw the koodoo, the finest I have ever set eyes on, go cantering heavily upwards along the bank of the torrent-bed which occupied the centre of the eastern gorge. The men whom I had posted there shouted back, and the koodoo, as I expected, made for the western gorge which was commanded by my rifle.

On the opposite side of this gully, on a level with the bush under which I was sitting, was a very large gudá tree, and the range to this tree I judged to be about two hundred yards across the gorge. If I allowed him to pass this tree I knew that my chances of bagging him would become very slender, as the gorge widened, and there was a way by which he could get out of it, over a shoulder of the mountain, without again coming within range.

It became very exciting listening to the shouts from the jungle below and the answering shouts from the other gorge, and more so as, warned by the rattle of displaced stones and the crashing of bushes, I turned my eyes and saw the koodoo at the point of intersection of the two gorges, and heading straight for the one which I commanded. I had in my hands a long military Martini-Henry, and pushing forward the sliding-leaf to two hundred yards I marked the gudá tree opposite and watched. There was suspense for a moment or two, and then with another crash he emerged from the jungle and galloped along the opposite hillside, straight for the gudá tree. I held for the front of his shoulder, just clear of his body, and as he neared the tree I fired. Looking under the smoke I observed him still galloping on, and felt in my pocket for another cartridge; but after passing the tree he suddenly plunged forward and went rolling over and over down the hill, till his body was arrested about thirty feet below by a bush, and then he lay motionless. We made very short time across the rocky gorge, and coming up I found him dead, the Martini picket having passed through his heart—a wonderfully lucky shot at the distance.

He was a splendid sight as he lay extended on the remains of the bush into which he had crashed, his horns measuring 52 inches and 53 inches respectively round the curve, and 3 feet 1 inch in a straight line from base to tip, and 37 inches between tips; and his massive neck was adorned with a fine white and brown beard. There was a slight malformation in the hoof of his right foreleg which accounted for his lameness, but did not much interfere with his speed when galloping.

We carried his head back to camp in the dusk, leaving three men to skin him; and we sent back all the Esa Musa, whom we could collect in the valley below on our way to camp, telling them to go up and scramble for the meat.

Having now bagged three good bull koodoos in three weeks, which is about the usual rate of successful and lucky koodoo stalking in these mountains, and my leave being up, I went in three short marches to Berbera, and a week later caught a steamer to Aden.

CHAPTER X
SECOND JOURNEY TO THE WEBBE SHABÉLEH RIVER, 1893

The new caravan—Pass Lord Delamere’s party—Captain Abud in camp at Hargeisa—Sheikh Mattar—Cross the Haud, and arrive at Seyyid Mahomed’s town in Ogádén—Holy reputation—Why the Somális have no Mahdi—Scene at the Seyyid’s town—Native impression of some European travellers—Every European a doctor—Malingúr mission to Harar—Ruspoli’s men seized—Jáma Deria’s Englishman—Reach the Webbe and bag a waterbuck—Friendly Gilimiss Somális—First news of the Webbe bushbuck—Shooting a crocodile—Great beauty of our camp on the Webbe banks—Gálla raids on the Gilimiss—The crossing of the Webbe at Karanleh—Unexpected Gálla news—Entertain Gálla chiefs in camp; a defiant speech—A Gálla trip planned—Fresh hippo tracks in the reeds—A waterbuck swims the Webbe; a noble buck—Sad death of a horse—The Aulihán—A row in camp—Unsuccessful buffalo hunting—Wounded waterbuck struck down by a lion—Starving negroes eat the carrion—Disturbed country; the Gálla trip impracticable—Recross the Webbe—Driving for bushbuck—A fine wart-hog bagged—A man seized by a lion; extraordinary story—A leopard bagged—A buck killed by leopards before our eyes—A row at Garbo—Success of the Lee-Metford—The Awáré pan; beautiful hunting ground—Lions roaring at night—Unsuccessful lion hunts—Magnificent lion shot; a surprising leap—Abundance of lions—Return to Berbera; and go to England.

During the first trip to the Webbe we had been four and a half months in the interior, travelling over more than eleven hundred miles of camel track. I found at Aden that an extension of leave had been granted, and at once prepared a second caravan, intending to go back to Imé, and taking Gabba Oboho at his word, to explore Gállaland and the Juba under his guidance.

On 30th July ’93 we landed again at Berbera with thirty-four men armed with Snider carbines and forty-five fresh camels. The coast men were very much afraid of Gállaland, and insisted that we ought to have at least a hundred rifles; but fighting not being my object, I considered our party strong enough, and after explaining that I would only cross the Gálla border if the Gállas should prove peaceful, the men took a more cheerful view of the prospects of my journey.

We marched from Berbera on 31st July, and on the second day we passed Lord Delamere and his shooting party on their way to the coast. Captain Abud was at that time encamped at Hargeisa, carrying on political business with Eidegalla chiefs. Sheikh Mattar of Hargeisa, whom I met here, advised me not to go to Imé, but to try Karanleh, three marches farther down the Webbe; and he gave me an Arabic letter to Seyyid Mahomed, a mullah whose permanent town lay in our front. By visiting the Seyyid I should cross Ogádén by a route several days to the west of my former one through Dagaha-Madóba.

I crossed the Haud by the Warda Gumaréd, the route we had taken on our first crossing, when I had gone to Milmil with my brother the year before; this time I carried water for five and a half days only. About three marches out from Hargeisa I crossed the fresh tracks of seventy-five horsemen of the Abdalla Saad, Habr Awal, who had gone to loot the Eidegalla a few hours before my caravan passed over the ground.

Crossing the Rer Ali and Rer Harún tribes, always friendly, on the 16th I arrived at Seyyid Mahomed’s town. It is a permanent village of three or four hundred huts, about the size of Hargeisa, its site being near the Tug Fáfan, in the Malingúr tribe. The banks of the stream, which we found dry, were dotted with thriving and very extensive patches of jowári cultivation. The inhabitants are mainly widads and mullahs from different Somáli tribes.

Pitching camp under some shady trees near the river, on the Fáfan banks, I went with the elders, through a dense crowd, to the Seyyid’s hut. He was too old and feeble to walk over to camp, and had sent his son to ask me if I would mind coming to him, to make his acquaintance and give him medicine. The Seyyid is known far and wide as a holy man, even my Dolbahanta headman, Adan Yusuf, having heard of him. Adan was glad to meet such a holy man, who was said to be invulnerable. He added that the Abyssinians lately tied the Seyyid up and fired at him point blank with Remingtons, but the bullets melted; they then bound him to a gudá thorn-tree, and collecting all the dry branches about, they lit a roaring fire at his feet, but he obstinately refused to burn; so then they gave up interfering with him!

If he were a fighting man the Seyyid would probably have developed into a first-class Mahdi, and long ere this he could have made a combined movement against Abyssinia; but his influence, like that of other Somáli sheikhs and mullahs, is almost entirely social and religious. He lives a quiet life, cultivating jowári, reading the Koran, and educating youths. Among the nomad tribes the fighting elders abound, but they have not the wide influence of these cosmopolitan Mahomedan priests, and, moreover, there is no element of cohesion among them, each working for the good of his own clan and ignoring the general interests of the community. The Seyyid was cordial, and I gave him medicine at the door of his hut in the presence of his wives and children, who squatted on their heels in a semicircle around us, whilst the townspeople collected in a dense mass to gaze at us through the palisades of the courtyard which separated the hut from the main street of the village. He had only seen one English party, that of Colonel Paget and Lord Wolverton, two months before, and they had left a very good impression; not so the caravan under Prince Ruspoli, for he, less fortunate, had had a good deal of trouble with the natives in Gállaland, on the Webbe, and even in Somáliland. I mention this because the troubles of this Italian caravan had an adverse influence over the success of my trip.

Before we left the hut of the sick man he had written for me an Arabic letter to Hussein-bin-Khalaf and Núr Róbleh, the two Mahomedan chiefs of Karanleh. While we were halted at the Fáfan, crowds of sick people and cripples from the village constantly loitered in and about camp, begging for medical treatment from ninki frinji wein (the great foreigner).[47] Every European being believed to be a doctor, they rushed to me for treatment, presenting the most complicated diseases, such as cataract in the eye and cancer. My medicine bag containing only chlorodyne, pills, vaseline, quinine, and the simplest medicines, I treated what cases I could, and sent the worst away with a small present of meat or calico and a few comforting words, which were listened to in dead silence by the crowd of relations.

At the Seyyid’s village I heard that Ugáz Umr, the Malingúr chief, had returned from Harar, after laying complaints against frontier Abyssinians before Rás Makunan. Eight men, who had either deserted from Prince Ruspoli or had been dismissed by him, said that some of their comrades and all the guns had been seized by Ugáz Umr, and were to be sent to Harar. They asked me to interfere; but for political reasons I declined.

On 22nd August, at sunset, we reached Bokhaiyer, another permanent village, occupied by the Rer Amáden tribe. Here I met many old friends, among them Jáma Deria and his sons, who had escorted me to Imé a few months before, and were in this country on a short visit. I was standing about, the centre of a mob of the villagers, when Jáma Deria and six horsemen rode up, covering us with dust, and Jáma shouted that “his Englishman had come.” He took jealous care of me, whipping away the crowd, and never ceased begging till I left next morning.

After several days’ hard marching we reached the Webbe at Sen Morettu, a permanent village of the Gilimiss Somális, standing on the north bank, about six marches south-east of Imé, Karanleh lying half-way between the two villages.

In this journey, owing to the great difficulty in getting reliable guides, we had made a détour to the east, doing fifty-two marches between Berbera and the Webbe, the direct distance being forty short marches. We actually struck the Webbe at Dagah-Yeleh on 25th August, and in the evening I went out and shot my first adult balanka, or waterbuck. Both the bucks I had shot at Imé, under the impression that they belonged to a new species, I now found to be only young ones.

Next day we made one long march westward, by the river banks, to Sen Morettu. The Gilimiss Somális were strong here, and came in numbers to my camp to present their salaams. Late at night they brought for sale the skin of a dól, or Webbe bushbuck. This was the first time I had heard of such a thing as a dól, and I resolved not to leave the Webbe till I had shot one. I got a very large crocodile by moonlight; it was floating with the eyes above the water, only thirty yards from the tent, no doubt waiting for one of the milch goats to come and drink.

This night camp on the banks of the Webbe at Sen Morettu was striking in its scenery, and will ever live in my memory. The Gilimiss who had brought the dól skin had left, and the camp had settled down into slumber, except for one watchful sentry. The moonlight was so bright that everything had a distinctive colour, the sky being of a deep blue, studded with stars in the regions farthest from the moon. I went to the river bank and looked out on the water gliding by, in streaks of silver and dark brown, across the shadows of the tall casuarina-trees,[48] which rose one hundred and twenty yards away on the opposite bank. Several of the trunks had fallen, and lay aslant upon the steep bank of the river. Now and then a gust of wind swept with a peculiar roaring sound through the feathery tree-tops, and ruffled the surface of the water with broad patches of silver as it blew across to our camp. Sometimes monkeys chattered, or squirrels shrieked, disturbed by prowling animals in the dense evergreen bush, bordering the river. Each movement I made was the signal for the splash of one or two crocodiles as they regained the water.

Glancing into the camp, I could see, in the bright moonlight, men and animals lying in different positions, as if they had been suddenly struck down by sleep. Adan’s horse lay by the cook’s fire fast asleep, with his head against a camel-saddle, and on the other side of the glowing embers were Suleiman the cook and three white milch goats, lying close together. The forty-five camels were sitting on their hard nether humps packed close, with tails to the wind, steadily chewing the cud, their eyes flashing with quiet enjoyment; for this is the only time when they are not pestered by flies, and they evidently deem it far too valuable to be thrown away entirely in sleep; though occasionally, for a short spell, the head and neck will be laid stretched out flat along the ground and the eyes closed. All around were lying camel-trunks, water-casks, bags of rice, and mountains of camel-mats, piled in the form of a rough circular wall, enclosing the camels; and taking shelter from the wind between these and the camels were the sleeping men, scattered in twos and threes, with their rifles by their sides. The bright light threw deep black shadows on the short grass; we were in a glade a quarter of a mile wide, bordered by a fringe of tall casuarina-trees. At the edge of the glade, up stream and near the river bank, a deserted village of large beehive huts of brown straw stood out against the gray, indistinct background of the trees. Large logs of driftwood and snags, with half their length out of the water and looking very black, gave one the impression of crocodiles; and certain pairs of gray dots, sometimes disappearing and again reappearing a few yards away, resembling pieces of driftwood, were really the projecting lumps on the heads of crocodiles, which were floating with the eyes just above the water, looking out for prey.

The climate at Sen Morettu was perfect for sleeping out, and I found myself regretting that before two months were over I should have to leave this interesting river, and almost certainly never get a chance of seeing it again.

We marched to Maaruf, a landing-stage exactly opposite to Karanleh, which was on the south side of the river. We passed through numbers of the Gilimiss people, who said they had come to the north bank for fear of the Gállas, who were out raiding. The camels had been late in getting off from Sen Morettu, so I walked on with the two shikáris. We found several of the Gilimiss elders at the landing-stage, and had a long talk about the means of getting across, while sitting under some very large trees which gave a welcome shelter from the midday sun. The Webbe was rather low, the width being only ninety yards. The people occupying the banks were Gilimiss Somális and Adone, or Webbe negroes.

The Gilimiss cultivate on both sides of the river when not in fear of the Arussi (Geríré) Gállas, who live in the hills ten miles away to the south, and often raid along the south bank. The Gálla name for the Webbe is Webbe Sidáma; no one calls it Webbe Shabéleh here. Shabéleh (“the place of leopards”) is merely the name of the district farther down to the south-east, where Mr. F. L. James and his companions first struck the river in 1884. Since that journey no Englishman had visited the Webbe till the previous spring, when my own caravan and that of Colonel Paget reached it simultaneously, as I found on my return to Berbera in June.

I sent one of the Gilimiss into Karanleh to call Hussein-bin-Khalaf and Núr Róbleh, and to present my Arabic letter. The first chief was sick, but Núr Róbleh sent word to say he would come over to see me in the evening. Meanwhile I went to look for bushbuck in the thick belt of forest along the margin of the river.

On first arriving at the landing-stage I had been met by a rival of Núr Róbleh, who undertook to take my caravan across on rafts made of dried tree-trunks. But Núr Róbleh, arriving on the scene while I was away hunting, arrested the other chief and his partisans, and tied them all up at the foot of a tree, placing one of my escort on guard over them with a loaded rifle. However, when I walked into camp, much to Núr Róbleh’s disgust, I set them free.

The Amáden and Gilimiss told me it would take seven days to cross; but before leaving Aden I had bought sixty fathoms of three-inch rope. This we made fast to bollards driven deep into the mud on both sides of the river, and pulling the rope taut we attached two of the native rafts to it by running loops, so that they could be easily hauled backwards and forwards; this was a great improvement on the primitive way of punting and paddling the rafts across the swift current and landing four hundred yards below the shoving-off point By this method, instead of seven days, it took us only one day for the baggage and one day for the animals, all the latter swimming over; the more timid of the camels were bound and towed over by a crowd of swimming men, shouting and splashing to keep off the crocodiles, while I fired a blank cartridge now and then from the bank. I also shot two crocodiles, one a very large one. It lay dead on an island, and four small boys jumped into the river, and swimming to the island, towed the carcase to the bank. The natives are in the habit of swimming their horses and cattle across when moving to better pasture. We saw one negro family, including women, children, mats, cooking pots, and all their effects, moving across on a raft so overloaded that half of them were sitting in six inches of water. Where cows drink, the natives construct brushwood semicircular fences to enclose the shallows and so deter the crocodiles from attacking the animals; yet, despite all precautions, the loss caused by crocodiles is very great.

By the evening of 29th August our camp was properly established on the southern bank, and we were on the Gálla side of the border. At night Núr Róbleh returned to me. I had sent him out to look for Dubbi Harré and Gudan Abatteri, two Arussi Gálla chiefs of great influence, to whom Seyyid Mahomed had written a letter on my behalf. He now came with news of one of these. He had given the letter to Dubbi Harré, who was now staying in a village five miles to the south-east, owned by a rich Somáli named Yahia; and Dubbi Harré had unexpectedly said that his own tribe and all the Gállas had had serious difficulties with the Prince’s caravan which was in front of me, these being the first Europeans they had ever seen, and they wished no more white men to enter their country, adding, if I still wished to see him, I might send soldiers to take him, but he would have gone to Gállaland. He feared to come to camp lest I should have him flogged, for he believed all Europeans were bad, and only invited people to visit them in order to make them prisoners. The first party of Europeans whose acquaintance he had made had said they meant peace, and had made war. Of course I took his statements regarding this caravan to be very one-sided and, because advanced by a native, probably untrue.

Knowing that Prince Ruspoli had pushed through to the far interior of Gállaland with about one hundred and twenty rifles, and that they had lost a great many men in one way and another, I did not hope that my party, consisting of a single white man, with only thirty followers and with limited time, would be able to force its way through the tribes which my predecessors had already passed, should they be hostile to us. Fighting, except in self-defence, was not part of my programme, as I had promised the men at Berbera; I meant, if possible, to enter the country by the invitation of the natives or not at all.

I gave Núr Róbleh some calico and a Koran, telling him to ride quickly to Dubbi Harré and give him the presents, and to assure him that if he would come to my camp he would have safe conduct, and be hospitably entertained, and free to go when he liked. After an interval of twenty-four hours, during which I hunted unsuccessfully for dól, Núr Róbleh returned with better news. He had found Dubbi Harré on the point of leaving for the mountains; but, the presents softening him, the Gálla chief had promised to come to me, though he protested that it would be of no use; he had declared he would never be able to persuade his countrymen that there could be any good in me.

On the morning of 30th August six horsemen came in. There were three Somális, Yahia and two friends, and three Gállas, Dubbi Harré being one of them. Dubbi Harré was a remarkably handsome and pleasant-looking old man, clean shaven, with thin, well-cut features. Taking Dubbi Harré by the hand I led them into the tent, in which had been arranged on the right and left rows of boxes covered with folded blankets; there was also a box for myself against the tent pole, and a mat on the ground for Adan Yusuf, the interpreter. As usual, we began the conference with coffee.

Dubbi Harré said that his country had been peaceable and happy till Europeans had come a few months ago; but that they and the Abyssinians had brought in rifles, and had fought; and now the people were firmly resolved to allow no one into the land who carried firearms or were escorted by men so armed.

I contended that I had come as a friend. He answered, “Yes, the other white men said that too.” Without going into the rights and wrongs of the case, it seemed to me that the caravan which had gone before me had been singularly unfortunate in the impression left behind, and I thought, that being the case, in the limited period of my leave it would be at least very uphill work ingratiating myself. I did my best, however, and Dubbi Harré and I became good friends over our coffee. He said he had seen my men as he came into camp; he liked the look of them; they were well behaved and orderly; they were clean and respectable Mahomedans and few in number, and altogether different from the rabble of Abyssinians, Arabs, and Soudanese whom the other Europeans had brought; and now, having seen us, he believed we wished him no harm. He and his two companions were no longer afraid to be with us—though he had been afraid, very much afraid, at first. I told him that if I had come for war I should have brought more men, and that he, a chief skilled in fighting, had seen there were only thirty, and could judge for himself whether we looked like invaders.

Dubbi Harré spoke quietly, with a pleasant smile on his face. He looked what he was, a fighting chief, of great intelligence. I said, “What will happen if we go to Wéb, in your country?” He said his people would fight; I declared we would hurt no one. He said, “No, but they will hurt you, and I wish to prevent you going. They are looking for a white man to kill, because they are angry with your countrymen the white men, who came first and fought with them. If your countrymen had not come first we should have received you well, but now it is different. I believe you, but the tribes won’t; so take my advice and don’t go. You will find game in the empty country between the Aulihán Somális and the Geríré Gállas; there are elephants and giraffes; you can get Yahia here to arrange your trip. If, however, you persist in wishing to go to the Webbe Wéb, I will go on and tell my people, and will come back, and if I think it safe I will take you there myself.”

Attracted by the prospect of shooting buffaloes and hippopotami, which were to be found at the Wéb, and not in the Aulihán country, I stuck to my idea of going into Gállaland, declaring that I had not come all this way to see Somális. So it was arranged we should go to the Aulihán for eleven days; and then, returning to Karanleh, meet Dubbi Harré, and be taken by him to the Webbe Wéb. This matter having been settled, Dubbi Harré and his friends remained my guests till the cool of the evening, and then rode away with Yahia.

At sunrise, on 31st August, I broke up the Karanleh camp and marched through some five miles of jowári plantations, near the south bank of the river, to Yahia’s village, where I shot a noted man-eating crocodile. These hideous pests swarm here; once I shot a wild goose, which, falling into the stream, was at once seized by a crocodile and drawn under while still struggling. In the evening we made another march to a spot near the river where we had been told to expect a school of hippopotami, and I shot two good waterbuck bulls on the way there. We saw fresh tracks of the hippos in the reeds, and I sat up by moonlight in the jungle overlooking them, hoping to bag one as it came to feed on shore. But at 4 A.M., finding nothing stirring in the reeds, we gave it up and returned to camp by moonlight. The Gilimiss, our guide, said that the hippopotami were scarce and wary, as the Adone negroes, during a recent famine, when nearly all their cattle had died of disease, had killed hippopotami for food, and had greatly reduced their numbers.

The great epidemic of cattle disease which three or four years ago raged in Masailand, and other parts of East Africa was also felt in Ogádén, the cattle and the koodoo antelopes dying of it in large numbers. It was felt as far north as the Marar Prairie.

We made a morning march on 1st September, and another in the evening. While passing over ground blackened by fire, and covered with young grass, I shot a buck Sœmmering’s gazelle and a waterbuck. At dusk, coming to dense forest by the river, I ordered the men to pitch camp at the edge, and entering the jungle unattended, I saw a red object standing motionless near the stem of a large tree twenty yards away. I felt certain it was an antelope, but was unable to make it out in the half light. I put up the rifle and fired, when the animal rushed past me and fell in a ravine close by, rolling over on its side; and on going up to it, I found, to my delight, it was a young buck of the dól, or striped and spotted Webbe bushbuck, which I had been so anxious to get. Going into camp to call up the men, I shot a buck lesser koodoo. As the forest appeared to have plenty of game in it I resolved to halt for a day’s shooting. The camp was in a very pleasant place, at the corner of a patch of forest looking down on the river from the edge of a steep bank.

Next day at dawn I went out and soon came upon a waterbuck. We had been making for a wide glade of fresh grass, and on emerging from the forest we caught sight of him going up a bank two hundred yards away. I fired, and we ran to the spot, but his tracks leading away without any sign of blood, I knew I had missed. He took us through several very thick patches of bush, the game paths sometimes forming tunnels four feet high in the vegetation; and at last, the light appearing ahead, we forced our way through a thicket and found ourselves unexpectedly on the very verge of the Webbe, a few yards from the water’s edge.