Five Weeks in a Balloon

CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHTH.

A Rapid Pas­sage.–Pru­dent Re­solves.–Car­avans in Sight.–In­ces­sant Rains.– Goa.–The Niger.–Gol­ber­ry, Ge­of­froy, and Gray.–Mun­go Park.–Laing.– Rene Cail­lie.–Clap­per­ton.–John and Richard Lan­der.

The 17th of May passed tran­quil­ly, with­out any re­mark­able in­ci­dent; the desert gained up­on them once more; a mod­er­ate wind bore the Vic­to­ria to­ward the south­west, and she nev­er swerved to the right or to the left, but her shad­ow traced a per­fect­ly straight line on the sand.

Be­fore start­ing, the doc­tor had pru­dent­ly re­newed his stock of wa­ter, hav­ing feared that he should not be able to touch ground in these re­gions, in­fest­ed as they are by the Aoue­lim-​Mini­an Touaregs. The plateau, at an el­eva­tion of eigh­teen hun­dred feet above the lev­el of the sea, sloped down to­ward the south. Our trav­ellers, hav­ing crossed the Aghades route at Mur­zouk–a route of­ten pressed by the feet of camels–ar­rived that evening, in the six­teenth de­gree of north lat­itude, and four de­grees fifty-​five min­utes east lon­gi­tude, af­ter hav­ing passed over one hun­dred and eighty miles of a long and monotonous day’s jour­ney.

Dur­ing the day Joe dressed the last pieces of game, which had been on­ly hasti­ly pre­pared, and he served up for sup­per a mess of snipe, that were great­ly rel­ished. The wind con­tin­uing good, the doc­tor re­solved to keep on dur­ing the night, the moon, still near­ly at the full, il­lu­min­ing it with her ra­di­ance. The Vic­to­ria as­cend­ed to a height of five hun­dred feet, and, dur­ing her noc­tur­nal trip of about six­ty miles, the gen­tle slum­bers of an in­fant would not have been dis­turbed by her mo­tion.

On Sun­day morn­ing, the di­rec­tion of the wind again changed, and it bore to the north­west­ward. A few crows were seen sweep­ing through the air, and, off on the hori­zon, a flock of vul­tures which, for­tu­nate­ly, how­ev­er, kept at a dis­tance.

The sight of these birds led Joe to com­pli­ment his mas­ter on the idea of hav­ing two bal­loons.

“Where would we be,” said he, “with on­ly one bal­loon? The sec­ond bal­loon is like the life-​boat to a ship; in case of wreck we could al­ways take to it and es­cape.”

“You are right, friend Joe,” said the doc­tor, “on­ly that my life-​boat gives me some un­easi­ness. It is not so good as the main craft.”

“What do you mean by that, doc­tor?” asked Kennedy.

“I mean to say that the new Vic­to­ria is not so good as the old one. Whether it be that the stuff it is made of is too much worn, or that the heat of the spi­ral has melt­ed the gut­ta-​per­cha, I can ob­serve a cer­tain loss of gas. It don’t amount to much thus far, but still it is no­tice­able. We have a ten­den­cy to sink, and, in or­der to keep our el­eva­tion, I am com­pelled to give greater di­la­tion to the hy­dro­gen.”

“The deuce!” ex­claimed Kennedy with con­cern; “I see no rem­edy for that.”

“There is none, Dick, and that is why we must has­ten our progress, and even avoid night halts.”

“Are we still far from the coast?” asked Joe.

“Which coast, my boy? How are we to know whith­er chance will car­ry us? All that I can say is, that Tim­buc­too is still about four hun­dred miles to the west­ward.

“And how long will it take us to get there?”

“Should the wind not car­ry us too far out of the way, I hope to reach that city by Tues­day evening.”

“Then,” re­marked Joe, point­ing to a long file of an­imals and men wind­ing across the open desert, “we shall ar­rive there soon­er than that car­avan.”

Fer­gu­son and Kennedy leaned over and saw an im­mense cav­al­cade. There were at least one hun­dred and fifty camels of the kind that, for twelve mutkals of gold, or about twen­ty-​five dol­lars, go from Tim­buc­too to Tafilet with a load of five hun­dred pounds up­on their backs. Each an­imal had dan­gling to its tail a bag to re­ceive its ex­cre­ment, the on­ly fu­el on which the car­avans can de­pend when cross­ing the desert.

These Touareg camels are of the very best race. They can go from three to sev­en days with­out drink­ing, and for two with­out eat­ing. Their speed sur­pass­es that of the horse, and they obey with in­tel­li­gence the voice of the khabir, or guide of the car­avan. They are known in the coun­try un­der the name of mehari.

Such were the de­tails giv­en by the doc­tor while his com­pan­ions con­tin­ued to gaze up­on that mul­ti­tude of men, wom­en, and chil­dren, ad­vanc­ing on foot and with dif­fi­cul­ty over a waste of sand half in mo­tion, and scarce­ly kept in its place by scanty net­tles, with­ered grass, and stunt­ed bush­es that grew up­on it. The wind oblit­er­at­ed the marks of their feet al­most in­stant­ly.

Joe in­quired how the Arabs man­aged to guide them­selves across the desert, and come to the few wells scat­tered far be­tween through­out this vast soli­tude.

“The Arabs,” replied Dr. Fer­gu­son, “are en­dowed by na­ture with a won­der­ful in­stinct in find­ing their way. Where a Eu­ro­pean would be at a loss, they nev­er hes­itate for a mo­ment. An in­signif­icant frag­ment of rock, a peb­ble, a tuft of grass, a dif­fer­ent shade of col­or in the sand, suf­fice to guide them with ac­cu­ra­cy. Dur­ing the night they go by the po­lar star. They nev­er trav­el more than two miles per hour, and al­ways rest dur­ing the noon­day heat. You may judge from that how long it takes them to cross Sa­hara, a desert more than nine hun­dred miles in breadth.”

But the Vic­to­ria had al­ready dis­ap­peared from the as­ton­ished gaze of the Arabs, who must have en­vied her ra­pid­ity. That evening she passed two de­grees twen­ty min­utes east lon­gi­tude, and dur­ing the night left an­oth­er de­gree be­hind her.

On Mon­day the weath­er changed com­plete­ly. Rain be­gan to fall with ex­treme vi­olence, and not on­ly had the bal­loon to re­sist the pow­er of this del­uge, but al­so the in­crease of weight which it caused by wet­ting the whole ma­chine, car and all. This con­tin­uous show­er ac­count­ed for the swamps and marsh­es that formed the sole sur­face of the coun­try. Veg­eta­tion reap­peared, how­ev­er, along with the mi­mosas, the baob­abs, and the tamarind-​trees.

Such was the Son­ray coun­try, with its vil­lages topped with roofs turned over like Ar­me­ni­an caps. There were few moun­tains, and on­ly such hills as were enough to form the ravines and pools where the pin­ta­does and snipes went sail­ing and div­ing through. Here and there, an im­petu­ous tor­rent cut the roads, and had to be crossed by the na­tives on long vines stretched from tree to tree. The forests gave place to jun­gles, which al­li­ga­tors, hip­popota­mi, and the rhinoceros, made their haunts.

“It will not be long be­fore we see the Niger,” said the doc­tor. “The face of the coun­try al­ways changes in the vicin­ity of large rivers. These mov­ing high­ways, as they are some­times cor­rect­ly called, have first brought veg­eta­tion with them, as they will at last bring civ­iliza­tion. Thus, in its course of twen­ty-​five hun­dred miles, the Niger has scat­tered along its banks the most im­por­tant cities of Africa.”

“By-​the-​way,” put in Joe, “that re­minds me of what was said by an ad­mir­er of the good­ness of Prov­idence, who praised the fore­sight with which it had gen­er­al­ly caused rivers to flow close to large cities!”

At noon the Vic­to­ria was pass­ing over a pet­ty town, a mere as­sem­blage of mis­er­able huts, which once was Goa, a great cap­ital.

“It was there,” said the doc­tor, “that Barth crossed the Niger, on his re­turn from Tim­buc­too. This is the riv­er so fa­mous in an­tiq­ui­ty, the ri­val of the Nile, to which pa­gan su­per­sti­tion as­cribed a ce­les­tial ori­gin. Like the Nile, it has en­gaged the at­ten­tion of ge­og­ra­phers in all ages; and like it, al­so, its ex­plo­ration has cost the lives of many vic­tims; yes, even more of them than per­ished on ac­count of the oth­er.”

The Niger flowed broad­ly be­tween its banks, and its wa­ters rolled south­ward with some vi­olence of cur­rent; but our trav­ellers, borne swift­ly by as they were, could scarce­ly catch a glimpse of its cu­ri­ous out­line.

“I want­ed to talk to you about this riv­er,” said Dr. Fer­gu­son, “and it is al­ready far from us. Un­der the names of Dhioule­ba, Mayo, Egghirre­ou, Quor­ra, and oth­er ti­tles be­sides, it tra­vers­es an im­mense ex­tent of coun­try, and al­most com­petes in length with the Nile. These ap­pel­la­tions sig­ni­fy sim­ply ‘the Riv­er,’ ac­cord­ing to the di­alects of the coun­tries through which it pass­es.”

“Did Dr. Barth fol­low this route?” asked Kennedy.

“No, Dick: in quit­ting Lake Tchad, he passed through the dif­fer­ent towns of Bornou, and in­ter­sect­ed the Niger at Say, four de­grees be­low Goa; then he pen­etrat­ed to the bo­som of those un­ex­plored coun­tries which the Niger em­braces in its el­bow; and, af­ter eight months of fresh fa­tigues, he ar­rived at Tim­buc­too; all of which we may do in about three days with as swift a wind as this.”

“Have the sources of the Niger been dis­cov­ered?” asked Joe.

“Long since,” replied the doc­tor. “The ex­plo­ration of the Niger and its trib­utaries was the ob­ject of sev­er­al ex­pe­di­tions, the prin­ci­pal of which I shall men­tion: Be­tween 1749 and 1758, Adam­son made a re­con­nois­sance of the riv­er, and vis­it­ed Gorea; from 1785 to 1788, Gol­ber­ry and Ge­of­froy trav­elled across the deserts of Senegam­bia, and as­cend­ed as far as the coun­try of the Moors, who as­sas­si­nat­ed Saug­nier, Bris­son, Adam, Ri­ley, Cochelet, and so many oth­er un­for­tu­nate men. Then came the il­lus­tri­ous Mun­go Park, the friend of Sir Wal­ter Scott, and, like him, a Scotch­man by birth. Sent out in 1795 by the African So­ci­ety of Lon­don, he got as far as Bam­bar­ra, saw the Niger, trav­elled five hun­dred miles with a slave-​mer­chant, re­con­noitred the Gam­bia Riv­er, and re­turned to Eng­land in 1797. He again set out, on the 30th of Jan­uary, 1805, with his broth­er-​in-​law An­der­son, Scott, the de­sign­er, and a gang of work­men; he reached Gorea, there added a de­tach­ment of thir­ty-​five sol­diers to his par­ty, and saw the Niger again on the 19th of Au­gust. But, by that time, in con­se­quence of fa­tigue, pri­va­tions, ill-​us­age, the in­clemen­cies of the weath­er, and the un­health­iness of the coun­try, on­ly eleven per­sons re­mained alive of the forty Eu­ro­peans in the par­ty. On the 16th of Novem­ber, the last let­ters from Mun­go Park reached his wife; and, a year lat­er a trad­er from that coun­try gave in­for­ma­tion that, hav­ing got as far as Bous­sa, on the Niger, on the 23d of De­cem­ber, the un­for­tu­nate trav­eller’s boat was up­set by the cataracts in that part of the riv­er, and he was mur­dered by the na­tives.”

“And his dread­ful fate did not check the ef­forts of oth­ers to ex­plore that riv­er?”

“On the con­trary, Dick. Since then, there were two ob­jects in view: name­ly, to re­cov­er the lost man’s pa­pers, as well as to pur­sue the ex­plo­ration. In 1816, an ex­pe­di­tion was or­ga­nized, in which Ma­jor Grey took part. It ar­rived in Sene­gal, pen­etrat­ed to the Fonta-​Jal­lon, vis­it­ed the Foul­lah and Mandin­go pop­ula­tions, and re­turned to Eng­land with­out fur­ther re­sults. In 1822, Ma­jor Laing ex­plored all the west­ern part of Africa near to the British pos­ses­sions; and he it was who got so far as the sources of the Niger; and, ac­cord­ing to his doc­uments, the spring in which that im­mense riv­er takes its rise is not two feet broad.

“Easy to jump over,” said Joe.

“How’s that? Easy you think, eh?” re­tort­ed the doc­tor. “If we are to be­lieve tra­di­tion, who­ev­er at­tempts to pass that spring, by leap­ing over it, is im­me­di­ate­ly swal­lowed up; and who­ev­er tries to draw wa­ter from it, feels him­self re­pulsed by an in­vis­ible hand.”

“I sup­pose a man has a right not to be­lieve a word of that!” per­sist­ed Joe.

“Oh, by all means!–Five years lat­er, it was Ma­jor Laing’s des­tiny to force his way across the desert of Sa­hara, pen­etrate to Tim­buc­too, and per­ish a few miles above it, by stran­gling, at the hands of the Oue­lad-​shi­man, who want­ed to com­pel him to turn Mus­sul­man.”

“Still an­oth­er vic­tim!” said the sports­man.

“It was then that a brave young man, with his own fee­ble re­sources, un­der­took and ac­com­plished the most as­ton­ish­ing of mod­ern jour­neys–I mean the French­man Rene Cail­lie, who, af­ter sundry at­tempts in 1819 and 1824, set out again on the 19th of April, 1827, from Rio Nunez. On the 3d of Au­gust he ar­rived at Time, so thor­ough­ly ex­haust­ed and ill that he could not re­sume his jour­ney un­til six months lat­er, in Jan­uary, 1828. He then joined a car­avan, and, pro­tect­ed by his Ori­en­tal dress, reached the Niger on the 10th of March, pen­etrat­ed to the city of Jenne, em­barked on the riv­er, and de­scend­ed it, as far as Tim­buc­too, where he ar­rived on the 30th of April. In 1760, an­oth­er French­man, Im­bert by name, and, in 1810, an En­glish­man, Robert Adams, had seen this cu­ri­ous place; but Rene Cail­lie was to be the first Eu­ro­pean who could bring back any au­then­tic da­ta con­cern­ing it. On the 4th of May he quit­ted this ‘Queen of the desert;’ on the 9th, he sur­veyed the very spot where Ma­jor Laing had been mur­dered; on the 19th, he ar­rived at El-​Arouan, and left that com­mer­cial town to brave a thou­sand dan­gers in cross­ing the vast soli­tudes com­prised be­tween the Soudan and the north­ern re­gions of Africa. At length he en­tered Tang­iers, and on the 28th of Septem­ber sailed for Toulon. In nine­teen months, notwith­stand­ing one hun­dred and eighty days’ sick­ness, he had tra­versed Africa from west to north. Ah! had Cal­lie been born in Eng­land, he would have been hon­ored as the most in­trepid trav­eller of mod­ern times, as was the case with Mun­go Park. But in France he was not ap­pre­ci­at­ed ac­cord­ing to his worth.”

“He was a stur­dy fel­low!” said Kennedy, “but what be­came of him?”

“He died at the age of thir­ty-​nine, from the con­se­quences of his long fa­tigues. They thought they had done enough in de­cree­ing him the prize of the Ge­ograph­ical So­ci­ety in 1828; the high­est hon­ors would have been paid to him in Eng­land.

“While he was ac­com­plish­ing this re­mark­able jour­ney, an En­glish­man had con­ceived a sim­ilar en­ter­prise and was try­ing to push it through with equal courage, if not with equal good for­tune. This was Cap­tain Clap­per­ton, the com­pan­ion of Den­ham. In 1829 he reen­tered Africa by the west­ern coast of the Gulf of Benin; he then fol­lowed in the track of Mun­go Park and of Laing, re­cov­ered at Bous­sa the doc­uments rel­ative to the death of the for­mer, and ar­rived on the 20th of Au­gust at Sack­atoo, where he was seized and held as a pris­on­er, un­til he ex­pired in the arms of his faith­ful at­ten­dant Richard Lan­der.”

“And what be­came of this Lan­der?” asked Joe, deeply in­ter­est­ed.

“He suc­ceed­ed in re­gain­ing the coast and re­turned to Lon­don, bring­ing with him the cap­tain’s pa­pers, and an ex­act nar­ra­tive of his own jour­ney. He then of­fered his ser­vices to the gov­ern­ment to com­plete the re­con­nois­sance of the Niger. He took with him his broth­er John, the sec­ond child of a poor cou­ple in Corn­wall, and, to­geth­er, these men, be­tween 1829 and 1831, re­descend­ed the riv­er from Bous­sa to its mouth, de­scrib­ing it vil­lage by vil­lage, mile by mile.”

“So both the broth­ers es­caped the com­mon fate?” queried Kennedy.

“Yes, on this ex­pe­di­tion, at least; but in 1833 Richard un­der­took a third trip to the Niger, and per­ished by a bul­let, near the mouth of the riv­er. You see, then, my friends, that the coun­try over which we are now pass­ing has wit­nessed some no­ble in­stances of self-​sac­ri­fice which, un­for­tu­nate­ly, have on­ly too of­ten had death for their re­ward.”