They Are Barren In The Cold Season, And The Nomads Migrate To
The Plains:
When the monsoon covers them with rich pastures, the people
revisit their deserted kraals.
The Kloofs or ravines are the most
remarkable features of this country: in some places the sides rise
perpendicularly, like gigantic walls, the breadth varying from one hundred
yards to half a mile; in others cliffs and scaurs, sapped at their
foundations, encumber the bed, and not unfrequently a broad band of white
sand stretches between two fringes of emerald green, delightful to look
upon after the bare and ghastly basalt of Southern Arabia. The Jujube
grows to a height already betraying signs of African luxuriance: through
its foliage flit birds, gaudy-coloured as kingfishers, of vivid red,
yellow, and changing-green. I remarked a long-tailed jay called Gobiyan or
Fat [2], russet-hued ringdoves, the modest honey-bird, corn quails,
canary-coloured finches, sparrows gay as those of Surinam, humming-birds
with a plume of metallic lustre, and especially a white-eyed kind of
maina, called by the Somal, Shimbir Load or the cow-bird. The Armo-creeper
[3], with large fleshy leaves, pale green, red, or crimson, and clusters
of bright berries like purple grapes, forms a conspicuous ornament in the
valleys. There is a great variety of the Cactus tribe, some growing to the
height of thirty and thirty-five feet: of these one was particularly
pointed out to me. The vulgar Somal call it Guraato, the more learned
Shajarat el Zakkum: it is the mandrake of these regions, and the round
excrescences upon the summits of its fleshy arms are supposed to resemble
men's heads and faces. On Tuesday the 5th December we arose at 6 A.M.,
after a night so dewy that our clothes were drenched, and we began to
ascend the Wady Darkaynlay, which winds from east to south. After an
hour's march appeared a small cairn of rough stones, called Siyaro, or
Mazar [4], to which each person, in token of honor, added his quotum. The
Abban opined that Auliya or holy men had sat there, but the End of Time
more sagaciously conjectured that it was the site of some Galla idol or
superstitious rite. Presently we came upon the hills of the White Ant [5],
a characteristic feature in this part of Africa. Here the land has the
appearance of a Turkish cemetery on a grand scale: there it seems like a
city in ruins: in some places the pillars are truncated into a resemblance
to bee-hives, in others they cluster together, suggesting the idea of a
portico; whilst many of them, veiled by trees, and overrun with gay
creepers, look like the remains of sylvan altars. Generally the hills are
conical, and vary in height from four to twelve feet: they are counted by
hundreds, and the Somal account for the number by declaring that the
insects abandon their home when dry, and commence building another. The
older erections are worn away, by wind and rain, to a thin tapering spire,
and are frequently hollowed and arched beneath by rats and ground
squirrels. The substance, fine yellow mud, glued by the secretions of the
ant, is hard to break: it is pierced, sieve-like, by a network of tiny
shafts. I saw these hills for the first time in the Wady Darkaynlay: in
the interior they are larger and longer than near the maritime regions.
We travelled up the Fiumara in a southerly direction till 8 A.M., when the
guides led us away from the bed. They anticipated meeting Gudabirsis:
pallid with fear, they also trembled with cold and hunger. Anxious
consultations were held. One man, Ali--surnamed "Doso," because he did
nothing but eat, drink, and stand over the fire--determined to leave us:
as, however, he had received a Tobe for pay, we put a veto upon that
proceeding. After a march of two hours, over ground so winding that we had
not covered more than three miles, our guides halted under a tree, near a
deserted kraal, at a place called El Armo, the "Armo-creeper water," or
more facetiously Dabadalashay: from Damal it bore S. W. 190°. One of our
Bedouins, mounting a mule, rode forward to gather intelligence, and bring
back a skin full of water. I asked the End of Time what they expected to
hear: he replied with the proverb "News liveth!" The Somali Bedouins have
a passion for knowing how the world wags. In some of the more desert
regions the whole population of a village will follow the wanderer. No
traveller ever passes a kraal without planting spear in the ground, and
demanding answers to a lengthened string of queries: rather than miss
intelligence he will inquire of a woman. Thus it is that news flies
through the country. Among the wild Gudabirsi the Russian war was a topic
of interest, and at Harar I heard of a violent storm, which had damaged
the shipping in Bombay Harbour, but a few weeks after the event.
The Bedouin returned with an empty skin but a full budget. I will offer
you, dear L., a specimen of the "palaver" [6] which is supposed to prove
the aphorism that all barbarians are orators. Demosthenes leisurely
dismounts, advances, stands for a moment cross-legged--the favourite
posture in this region--supporting each hand with a spear planted in the
ground: thence he slips to squat, looks around, ejects saliva, shifts his
quid to behind his ear, places his weapons before him, takes up a bit of
stick, and traces lines which he carefully smooths away--it being ill-
omened to mark the earth. The listeners sit gravely in a semicircle upon
their heels, with their spears, from whose bright heads flashes a ring of
troubled light, planted upright, and look stedfastly on his countenance
over the upper edges of their shields with eyes apparently planted, like
those of the Blemmyes, in their breasts.
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