Chapter I: Preliminaries of Exploration (2)

The usual croaking followed the announcement of an intention to explore the mountain. The four or five fierce wild tribes holding the lower regions were represented as being able to turn out 5000 muskets—perhaps they may have 50. The forest swarmed with ‘tigers,’ hyænas, and other bugbears, the fevers were mortal in the lower regions, the cold would be intense, snow having just been seen in the upper heights,[37] and the Krumen—the only servants in these regions—would certainly die or desert, perhaps do both.

I cannot, however, but plead guilty to a modified fatalism. Purely retrospective, it has many advantages. ‘We could not have helped it,’ obviates all regret for the past however regretful, and bygones become doubly bygones; whilst the present so soon becoming the past is hardly more valuable, and the future, which must inevitably merge with present and past, is even less important:—

Il passato non è, ma se lo finge,

La viva rimembranza;

Il futuro non è, ma se lo pinge,

La credula speranza;

Il presento non è, ma in un baleno,

Passa del nube in seno;

Dunque la vita è appunto,

Una memoria, una speranza, un punto.

Prospective fatalism in practice appears absurd. When the Turk sits in an embrasure under a volley of musketry, and refuses to move—by-the-by, I emphatically never saw this often-heard-of incident—because Allah knows when he is to die, it ought to strike that benighted personage that Allah may also know he is to escape death by a little more activity. Fatalism, however, like all modifications of faith, is mainly the effect of climate. In the cold, bustling, and energetic north, amongst the elbowing Anglo-Saxons, where,—contrary to what the Italian says,—

Life is real, life is earnest,

fatalism is at best a sickly exotic. As you approach the Mediterranean it grows into a kind of creed: every one has known Southrons,—Italians and Spaniards,—who, fatalists by nature, yet broken by habit to the orthodox theological Catholic doctrine of Freewill, have subsided into a mixture of both, which they cannot define nor explain to themselves nor to others.

But although I had heard the cry of wolf too often to give it ready ear, solid difficulties presented themselves. A fortnight’s march up a pathless, densely wooded, and possibly waterless mountain, with bad tribes in rear and a desert in front, where all supplies must be carried by Krumen—poltroons who at the appearance of a fancied danger fling themselves into the bush, mutinous dogs whose one invariable tactic under difficulties is to make progress so hard and so dangerous, by bumping the master’s hammock against stub and stone, by inducing sore feet, or by diminishing the provisions, that the march must perforce be given up in disgust—may appear at home as feasible as a run through the Himalayas or the Andes: it wears, however, quite another aspect at Clarence Town.

During my brief delay on the island another volunteer presented himself for the exploration, which assumed the air of a little international expedition. M. Atilano Calvo Iturburu, assessor or assistant judge, was as weary as myself of ‘palavers’ and Fernando Po: he obtained a month’s leave of absence, and zealously prepared to outfit himself. The reader must not confound him with certain venerable beings in wigs and gowns, owning to that style and title in England, but rather think of him as a fast young pig-sticking Anglo-Indian magistrate. Although we had looked into the craters on the summit of Ilha Formosa, I almost feared—not knowing him to be a Vascongado on the mother’s side—lest, after many fevers, he might break down upon the frozen heights of the Camaroons, and explained to him the conditions of exploration, namely go ahead at all risks, even if one or more be left behind, and to send on the stores, ‘the tools to him who can handle them.’ He responded cheerfully, and, so far from ‘caving in,’ he devanced me on one occasion, and when the party was laid up he preserved his health. I found him throughout an amiable and not unphilosophic man, whose society round the camp-fire added greatly to the pleasures of an evening in the wild.

Betimes on Wednesday the 18th December, Judge Calvo and myself found ourselves off Ambas Bay in H.M.S. ‘Bloodhound,’ Lieut. Stokes commanding. As Morning, habited in her well-known russet mantle, walked over the beautiful Camaroons, we could distinguish the features of the scenery, which, viewed from the south-eastern entrance, are even more enchanting than when seen from the western approach. The immense height of the wooded curtain behind dwarfed the several islands that sentinel the bay to mere patches of a darker hue; presently they stood out with a beautiful distinctness, and relieved the sea of any appearance of monotony. Already the hand of Autumn—I should rather say the dry season—had besprinkled the many-hued foliage with red and yellow, whilst others, beautiful in their new coats, were decked with large masses of flowers, some white, others resembling the peony. Rising from the ruddy cliffs that wall in the harbour, the land sloped upwards to 5000 feet within about three miles; thin curls of blue smoke rose here and there, evidencing settlements, and the little canoes of the fishermen flitted over the milky blue waters. We steamed through the eastern channel, a clear entrance 880 yards wide with 5 to 6 fathoms of water, under Mananga Point, the high terminal bluff separating Ambas from Man-of- War’s Bay, and defending Victoria Harbour from the violence of the south-western winds.

Landing at the Missionary establishment, we found Mr. Saker up and ready: M. Mann had set out in advance, and we agreed to follow him next morning. On the same evening the ‘Bloodhound’ left us for Lagos, where she was to convey her ex-commander Lieutenant Dolben, and whence she was to proceed under Lieutenant Stokes to the much-desired South-Coast station. With regret I saw her leave. The Russian saying touching houses may be applied to ships in these regions: ‘Build the soundest imaginable, and the cockroaches will be in them before the owners.’ She was certainly very ‘roachy.’ But her comfortable dimensions made her a great contrast to the fast and narrow ‘screws’ which are now fashionable upon the West African Coast; she had been my home for well-nigh a month; and to one whose usual tenement is his hat, a good lodging and pleasant society are not to be lost sight of _sans serrement de cœur_.

[Footnote 5: Smaller volcanoes like Vesuvius ‘change almost imperceptibly from the steepest incline at which the outermost ashes and rocks will hang together, to a curve which ultimately sweeps away into a horizontal direction.’ But in those the cone bears a far greater proportion to the whole than in such features as the Camaroons and Fernando Po, consequently the angle of the culminating line appears excessive.]

[Footnote 6: Fernando Po Peak was ascended as early as 1843.]

[Footnote 7: As far as volcanic action is known, the different crater- vents communicate by ducts with the same central cause—very distinct from all idea of parasitism.]

[Footnote 8: ‘The river Camaroon with the Ambas Islands,’ by Capt. W. Allen, H.M.S. ‘Wilberforce,’ 1842, with additions by Mr. V. F. Johnson, H.M.S. ‘Philomel.’ The soundings and positions of the Hydrographical Chart are of course tolerably correct; the names of tribes and places are all more or less wrong.]

[Footnote 9: The Spanish colony that landed at Fernando Po in 1858 attributed the greater part of its losses to the inhumanity of the black people, who made a combination not to lodge them, and agreed to ‘cut their chop’—_anglicè_, to starve them.]

[Footnote 10: Writing from Fernando Po, May 31st, 1860, to Sir Wm. Hooker, M. Mann says:—‘I heard that you had inquired if it were possible to ascend the mountain of Bimbia or Camaroon. You will hear shortly that it is quite impossible, and only killing men to send them up there; this, however, was also told me before I went up Clarence Peak. It is, no doubt, _very_ difficult, but it is possible; only too much must not be expected from the first trip.’ (From the ‘Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnæan Society,’ vol. vi.)]

[Footnote 11: ‘A knowledge of the temperate flora of any spot on the West Coast of tropical Africa has long been one of the greatest desiderata in botanical geography, not only on account of the intrinsic interest that must attach to the plants of the extremely few isolated points so elevated as to possess a temperate climate in that vast humid and torrid area, but also from the light such lights might be exacted to throw on the floras of St. Helena, the Cape de Verd, and the Canaries, all of which (and especially the former) contain peculiar endemic genera, whose nearest allies might be expected to exist in the mountains of the neighbouring continent.’—‘Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnæan Society,’ vol. vi.]

[Footnote 12: Loc. sup. cit.]

[Footnote 13: Meaning a man of the Bakwiri tribe or bushmen, from kwiri, a bush. The word is Isubu. This small _échantillon_ will suffice to show that the dialects of East and West Africa are as closely connected as their flora. Here also there is a slight European importation; I particularly remarked ‘bwámo,’—good!—and suspected the Spanish bueno.

Despite the dicta of Dr. Beke (‘On the Mountains forming the Eastern Side of the Basin of the Nile’—a paper full of good and borrowed but unacknowledged information), who on this point follows Mr. E. Norris’s edition of ‘Prichard’s History of Man,’ I still deem it advisable to retain these ‘terse and concise African prefixes,’ which, if abandoned, would necessitate a weary redundancy of words. They can hardly, as Mr. Norris says, ‘occasion puzzlement to the readers of African intelligence,’ unless intelligence be sadly wanting in the readers. Mr. Norris and Dr. Beke omit the Kafir prefix ‘when it has not become part and parcel of the English appellation,’ deeming it ‘not only awkward, but positively incorrect.’ With due modesty I venture to opine that they have substituted for a fancied awkwardness a real blunder. To call ‘Unyamwezi’ and ‘Usumbara’ ‘Nyamwezi’ and ‘Sumbara,’ is about as correct as to term ‘Britain’ and ‘Britons’ ‘Brit’ or ‘Brits.’]

[Footnote 14: ‘Narrative of the Niger Expedition in 1841,’ by Capt. W. Allen, R.N., and T. R. N. Thompson, Esq., M.D., London, Bentley, 1848. It was written some time after the return of the authors from that disastrous attempt, and is a valuable work.]

[Footnote 15: The Bakwiri, who are erroneously called Bakwileh in the chart, use R for L, opposed to the tribes about Batanga, who use L for R; here, moreover, there are neither sibilants nor aspirates. Their speech, like the Kisawahili, abounds in K, a letter avoided in the Dualla or Camaroons dialect.]

[Footnote 16: MS. Geological Journal, Niger Expedition.]

[Footnote 17: Captain Allen (vol. ii. chap. vii.) distinctly asserts that this submarine ridge exists; on the other hand, there are shipmasters at Fernando Po who declare that the water rapidly deepens from the shore to 80 fathoms.]

[Footnote 18: Others say nine: the chart gives six feet of rise at full and change.]

[Footnote 19: ‘In the latter half of the day I was much refreshed by the constant sea-breeze, which in Fernando Po we seldom enjoy, and which renders Victoria such a pleasant and agreeable residence for Europeans.’—M. Mann, ‘Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnæan Society of London,’ Botany, vol. vii.]

[Footnote 20: From this old author I extract (Appendix I.) an accurate and truthful description of the region, which is not noticed by his contemporary Bosman, who yet alludes to the De El Rei and the Camaroons rivers. The reader will not fail to remark how greatly the islanders have changed since those days.]

[Footnote 21: ‘Camaroon’ in the Mauritius means crawfish.]

[Footnote 22: This gallant officer succeeded in 1830 to the government of the settlement formed at Fernando Po by Capt. Owen in 1827; he also has left his mark in Nicolls Island at the mouth of the Bimbia river.]

[Footnote 23: This assertion rests upon the direct authority of Capt. Allen (vol. ii. chap. vii.).]

[Footnote 24: In Appendix II. I have republished Mr. Merrick’s narrative from the Baptist Magazine of 1845.]

[Footnote 25: The faculty begins quietly and gingerly to confess this belief. ‘The evidence that intemperance in drinking exerts a particular influence in the production of hepatitis is by no means conclusive;’ and ‘the occurrence of hepatitis, on the other hand, in its severest form, is not an unusual event in persons of temperate habits—a statement which practitioners in India generally will, I am sure, amply confirm,’ says Dr. Morehead (‘Diseases of India’). He might have instanced the case of M. Jacquemont, who, deriding the English consumption of beef and beer, scientifically Hinduized himself with rice and water, and died at the end of the year of an invincible dysentery.]

[Footnote 26: I have reprinted Mr. Laird’s letter in Appendix V.]

[Footnote 27: It must, however, be owned that, beyond the expulsion order, the Spanish authorities have shown great toleration; in fact, if their rule has a fault, it is over lenity. A French commandant would certainly have billeted his men upon the negro townspeople when they refused to let lodgings and they ‘cut chop.’ The negro Baptists tried hard to enjoy a little persecution: during their private prayer meetings, or when ‘sitting under’ an occasional missionary from the mainland—churches are not permitted—they pretended great fear, closing doors and shutters whenever they inflicted injury upon the sweet songs of Zion. The Spanish wisely ignored all these little fooleries. The people are of some 30 to 40 nations, originally from Sierra Leone, with a few _emancipados_ from the Oil Rivers. They are justly described by Capt. Allen as ‘a lazy population of liberated Africans,’ who neglect the advantages of one of the richest soils in the world. They are now perfectly contented; many boast of being Spaniards, and they will probably all come over to the old Church, where, however, they will be no acquisition. There is probably not a soul amongst them that can distinguish a Protestant from a Catholic sermon. The a’mighty dollar is slowly but surely working its way. The salaries being defrayed by Cuba are liberal at Fernando Po, and considerable sums are spent in the island. The governor, who reports directly home to the President of Council (Minister of War and of Colonies), besides pay and allowances of 8000 dollars per annum, may dispose yearly of 25,000 dollars for local improvements. If we had sanctioned even this much in the Gold Coast and other outlying provinces, they would not now be in ruins. One million of reals was assigned for the immigration of colonists during the first year, and the Jesuit Mission has been allowed 6000 dollars per annum. Whilst the British consulship is worth 500_l._, the Spanish Secretary to the Civil Judge receives 3000 dollars, and the interpreter 2000 dollars. Besides which there is the expenditure of the naval and military establishments; two hulks, one steam gun-vessel, and a picked company of 150 infantry, each paid 10 dollars per mens., with two captains and a similar number of lieutenants, sub-lieutenants, and surgeons.

Prices of course became exorbitant; three shillings were paid for a lean chicken smaller than an English pigeon; the negroes, however, made merry and lived in a congenial idleness, which has more than compensated for the loss of their ‘morning (and evening) privilege.’]

[Footnote 28: A glance at Mr. Keith Johnstone’s latest map of Africa will show that the only purely white paper is bounded by the limits above assigned.]

[Footnote 29: As a rule, the lines of volcanic disturbance run in a diagonal to the direction of the earth’s rotation—suggesting some tidal action in the gas or fluid underlying the earth’s crust—from N.W. to S.E. along the western side of the great terrestrial areas of Europe, Asia, and America; they may be traced again along the eastern side almost as continuously, trending in transverse lines from S.W. to N.E., as from Mexico to Greenland, and from Sumatra to Behring’s Straits; hence a general parallelism of coast, inland mountain, and axis of volcanic action is inferred.]

[Footnote 30: Capt. Owen saw the Rumbi Mountains from a distance of 60 miles, and made them 44 miles N.E. of Camaroons Peak. The Kwa (Qua) Mountains, which are visible from the Cross or Old Calabar River, are placed both by Captains Owen and Boteler (chap. xiv. vol. ii. ‘Narrative of a Journey of Discovery,’ Bentley, 1835) 64 miles N., 16° 15′ W. of the Camaroons, and were seen from nearly 80 miles.]

[Footnote 31: In this range is Mount Alantika, to which the Hamburg traveller assigns an altitude of eight to ten thousand feet.]

[Footnote 32: Mr. Beecroft ascended the Bimbia, but I am unable to find an account of his trip.]

[Footnote 33: The northern limit is at present doubtful.]

[Footnote 34: The reader will consult upon this subject the able paper on Ethno-Climatology, or the Acclimatization of Man, by Dr. Jas. Hunt (‘Trans. Ethnological Soc.,’ vol. ii., New Series). I differ with the author only in suspecting that he has attached too much importance to the danger of dysentery, hill-diarrhœa, and other bowel complaints in the altitudes above the malarious tropical regions. Altitude must not be our sole guide in sanitaria and hill stations; they can be judged only by actual experience, and a height which here is healthy is there found to be distinctly the reverse.]

[Footnote 35: Somewhat similar was the opinion of the late Duke of Wellington, not to mention a cloud of competent observers and writers. Mr. Crawfurd (‘Trans. Ethnological Soc.,’ vol. i., New Series, p. 89) considers this ‘an hypothesis unsupported by facts,’ although every fact tends to prove it.]

[Footnote 36: I had determined upon that period by an inspection of the chart. From Ambas Bay the direct distance is 13 miles, which must be multiplied by two for détours, and in such places an average of a mile per diem is fair progress. The following is a list of necessaries for a party of seven men:—

£ _s._ _d._

7 blue shirts 2 5 6

7 serge trousers 3 10 0

7 pr. boots 3 10 0

12 red woollen caps 0 6 0

2 dozen matchets 1 0 0

2 hatchets 0 2 10

2 (water) breakers 0 8 8

452 lbs. rice 7 10 8

200 lbs. pork 7 10 0

14½ gallons rum 3 2 10

5 pieces blue baft 3 5 0

2 ditto satin stripe 0 17 4
------------------
£33 8 10

For private stores the best guide is any Alpine book, and even ‘Zouave leggings’ are not to be despised. Explorers in these regions must not forget that they are their own doctors, nor neglect caustic and diachylum; the reader will presently see how dear this little experience cost me.

All the belongings should be carefully watched. Krumen will steal anything and everything they can. If the water-breakers be provided with lock and key they will, unless stopped by the stick, try the trick of breaking them, and all cutlery will rapidly disappear, knives being most useful as offerings of gallantry to the native belles.

The prime difficulty here, as in other parts of Africa, is the _chaussure_. It is almost impossible to keep boots in order. The natural precautions are to procure the best and strongest articles that London makes—especially avoiding elastics—to use a little neats-foot oil instead of any vegetable unguents, and to keep them out of the reach of air and damp as much as possible. Even then two or three new pair will yield to the lava and other influences within the month.]

[Footnote 37: The usual snowy season is the tornado period, in our spring and autumn, with occasional falls during the rains. From May to July, and from September to October, the appearance is common, at other times rare. Yet in February, 1860, Messrs. Saker and Mann, after a heavy storm, saw from Victoria the topmost cone sheeted with white; on the next day a few stripes remained, and on the 3rd all had disappeared. On the 14th February, 1862, Capt. Perry, H.M.S. ‘Griffon,’ and all on board, when steaming up Camaroons River, saw the whole main peak covered with snow.]