Bukhet
Then Returned To Mahamed And Reported His Defeat And Losses; Upon
Hearing Which, Mahamed At Once Said To Him, "What Do You Mean By
Returning To Me Empty-Handed?
Go back at once and recover your
things else how can I make my report at Gondokoro?" With these
peremptory orders Bukhet went back to Panyoro, and commenced to
attack it.
The contest did not last long; for, after three of
Bukhet's men had been wounded, he set fire to the villages,
killed fifteen of the natives, and, besides recovering his own
lost property, took one hundred cows.
31st. - To-day Mahamed came in, and commenced to arrange for the
march onwards. This, however, was no easy matter, for the Turks
alone required six hundred porters - half that number to carry
their ivory, and the other half to carry their beds and bedding;
whilst from fifty to sixty men was the most a village had to
spare, and all the village chiefs were at enmity with one
another. The plan adopted by Mahamed was, to summon the heads of
all the villages to come to him, failing which, he would seize
all their belongings. Then, having once got them together, he
ordered them all to furnish him with so many porters a-head,
saying he demanded it of them, for the "great government's
property" could not be left on the ground. Their separate
interests must now be sacrificed, and their feuds suspended: and
if he heard, on his return again, that one village had taken
advantage of the other's weakness caused by their employment in
his service, he would then not spare his bullets, - so they might
look out for themselves.
Some of the Turks, having found ninty-nine eggs in a crocodile's
nest, had a grand feast. They gave us two of the eggs, which we
ate, but did not like, for they had a highly musky flavour.
1st. - On the 1st of February we went ahead again, with Bukhet and
the first half of Mahamed's establishment, as a sufficient number
of men could not be collected at once to move all together. In a
little while we struck on the Nile, where it was running like a
fine Highland stream between the gneiss and mica-schist hills of
Kuku, and followed it down to near where the Asua river joined
it. For a while we sat here watching the water, which was
greatly discoloured, and floating down rushes. The river was not
as full as it was when we crossed it at the Karuma Falls, yet,
according to Dr Khoblecher's[FN#26] account, it ought to have
been flooding just at this time: if so, we had beaten the stream.
Here we left it again as it arched round by the west, and forded
the Asua river, a stiff rocky stream, deep enough to reach the
breast when waded, but not very broad. It did not appear to me as
if connected with Victoria N'yanza, as the waters were falling,
and not much discoloured; whereas judging from the Nile's
condition, it ought to have been rising.
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