Part 2
Where the animal kingdom exhibits its greatest vitality, however, is in the insect world: the common fly, dirty and worrying, rules despotically by day, together with gad-flies and big stinging flies of a pretty greenish hue. At nightfall, the very time when one might enjoy a little rest on the terrace of the houses, moths, coleopters, locusts, dragonflies, and bugs become very lively, and whirl madly round the table where a light is shining, so that it is far preferable to dine lighted only by the moon and the stars. When there is no wind at night there are swarms of mosquitoes, and also of a kind of little sand-fly that pass between the meshes of the best mosquito-nets.
[Illustration: SANDSTONE ROCKS NEAR ORORI, BORKOU]
[Illustration: ROCK DRAWINGS, OASIS OF YARDA, BORKOU]
[Illustration: SANDSTONE ROCKS ATTACKED BY MOVING DUNES, OASIS OF YARDA, BORKOU]
_Cultivation._—The soil indeed is not very fertile, which is the reverse of the account given of most oases in the north of the Sahara. It is especially favourable to the cultivation of the date-bearing palm, which loves to have its foot in the water and its summit in the burning sun, but does not stand rain well. The first dates ripen in the month of May, while the latest are gathered in September; they vary in size, and are dark or light in colour according to their variety, but nearly all are of a very good quality, as sweet and fleshy as one could wish. The greater part of the crop is put to dry, while the most luscious are gathered into heaps and pressed into goatskins, to be carried to Wadai and Kanem and other places farther off.
After the date-gathering the natives prepare their gardens for the sowing of corn, which takes place in November and December. The ground is arranged in small squares, ingeniously adapted for irrigation; but the produce is meagre owing to the want of manure; this is remedied, to a certain extent, by an addition of virgin soil, containing more or less soda, which is fetched from some distance on donkey-back. The gardens are intersected with long parallel hedges, which shelter the ears from the withering violence of the north-east wind. The harvest is gathered in towards the end of March, and a short time later the ground is prepared for the sowing of millet, which yields a still smaller crop than the corn. When we add that in some gardens there grow a few onions and tomatoes, as well as a kind of spinach, scarcely appreciated anywhere but in Borkou, we shall have enumerated nearly all the available food-stuffs of the oases.
I must not forget to mention that the Senoussists had succeeded in importing to Gouro and Faya some fig-trees and a few vines; and on our side we managed to acclimatize the sweet potato, a precious resource which came from Kanem. We were less fortunate in our repeated attempts to acclimatize French vegetables, which succeed so well in the neighbourhood of Lake Chad during the cool season; the poverty of the soil, the want of manure, the extreme dryness of the north-east wind, the voracity of the grasshoppers and other destructive insects, were no doubt the causes of our lamentable failure as agriculturists.
_Winds and Rain._—In the heart of the Sahara, where rain is so rare a meteorological phenomenon, the wind is the high arbiter of each day’s weather. The weather is fine when the wind is light, and bad when it is strong; in the latter case nothing is to be seen but whirling columns of sand, raised by the north-east wind, blowing in stormy gusts and covering the whole landscape with a thick dry mist of brownish dust that penetrates everywhere and is very painful to the eyes, so that one does well on such occasions to wear motor-goggles to avoid ophthalmia. These north-east winds blow more or less violently for a great part of the year, sometimes for a few hours only each morning, sometimes for whole days and nights. I may say that we were able to note a fair correlation between the oscillations of the curves of the registering barometer and thermometer and the force and duration of these winds; they usually coincide with low temperatures and high atmospheric pressure, while the light winds or the dead calm accompany low pressure and high temperatures. Taking as a basis the information furnished by the natives, borne out by our four years of regular observations, it may be said that, as a general rule, the north-east wind reigns supreme over Borkou and the neighbouring districts from October to May or June (that is to say, from about the autumnal equinox to the summer solstice); whereas in July, August, and September still weather prevails, alternating with gentle west-south-westerly winds.
It is these latter winds that bring with them from the Atlantic what little moisture nature measures out each year so parsimoniously to these dried-up lands. Then the sky clouds over almost every afternoon, but one’s hope of refreshing showers is vain; the heat thrown up from the scorched ground, and the rapidly rising temperature through which the raindrops fall towards the earth (a rise of about 3° Fahr. per 1000 feet), are enough to bring about their more or less complete evaporation before they reach the ground, and one sees long frayed streaks of grey cloud trailing almost along the ground, like unravelled skeins of wool, from which a few rare drops fall on the thirsty earth. When we took possession of Borkou the inhabitants assured us with one voice that it had not rained in their country for eleven years, thus putting back the date of the last rain to the year 1902; by a curious chance our entry into Faya (on 1 December 1913) was greeted by a little shower of utterly unlooked-for rain. The inhabitants saw in this downfall (unusual not only for that region, but for that season of the year) a happy omen for the rainy season of 1914, an omen which was realized, for in the month of August 1914 we had the satisfaction of registering about 90 mm. of rain at Faya. In 1915 the rainfall was hardly worth mentioning, and in 1916 about 35 mm.
Though Borkou is more than 300 miles south of the Tropic of Cancer, and very low-lying (650 feet above sea-level), the heat is really excessive only for six or seven months of the year, from mid-March to mid-October. During our observations, extending over three years, the maxima registered in the hot season never exceeded 117° Fahr., but temperatures of 110° to 115° were frequent. During the cool season, from December to February, the minima sometimes fall below 50° Fahr. without ever getting down to freezing-point. The dryness of the air is very noticeable from November to June, when a difference of more than two to one may regularly be observed between the simultaneous indications of the dry and wet thermometers: for instance, when the former stands at 44° C. the second often reads less than 20°. On the other hand, in August and September, under the influence of the winds blowing from the Atlantic Ocean, the air becomes very damp and the heat grows stifling.
In spite of its excessive heat, the climate of Borkou is comparatively healthy; very relaxing during the hot and damp season, it is extremely pleasant in the months corresponding to our autumn and winter. During my stay, lasting from 1913 to 1917, none of my European fellow-workers had any serious illness, and my black troops, though kept hard at work in the shape of arduous reconnoitring and escort duty, and with barely enough to eat, showed a percentage of sickness and deaths below the average of the other garrisons throughout the Chad Territory.
_Population and Commerce._—The population of Borkou consists of nomads, the Tedas and the Nakazzas—the great nobles of the desert—and of a sedentary tribe, the Dozzas, who are only half noble, for want of the few camels whose possession would enable them to take a share in the profitable plundering raids in the desert. There is also a third category of inhabitants, the Kamajas, half serfs, half slaves, whose duty it is to attend to the gardens and the plantations of palms, and who are profoundly despised by the other two categories. The total population of Borkou would not appear to exceed some ten thousand souls, distributed among a score of more or less flourishing palm plantations.
The commercial activity of the oases of Borkou is far from negligible; they export towards the south salt, soda, and dates, and receive in exchange cereals, butter, cattle, and smoke-dried meat. Caravans of two hundred camels may often be seen coming to load up with salt at the Arouelli salt-pits near Ounianga; and Arab caravans pass by on the way from Cyrenaica, by Koufra and Sarra wells, importing to Wadai stuffs, sugar, coffee, tea, mercery, and (in time past) arms and ammunition; and exporting principally millet, butter, smoked meat, hides raw or tanned, ostrich feathers, elephants’ tusks, and so forth. The slave-trade, formerly carried on through Borkou between Wadai and Cyrenaica on a great scale, has almost entirely ceased since we took possession of the country.
=5. Exploration of the Western Borders of the Libyan Desert: Ounianga- Erdi=
After drawing up the map of the western part of Borkou, subsequent to my reconnaissance in March and April of the various oases that succeed one another between Faya and Ain Galakka on the south and Gouro on the north, I devoted the last quarter of 1914 to an exploration of the unknown regions situated further east. Over and above their geographical interest, the said regions were of great military importance. My object was, in fact, to ascertain whether a counter-attack by the Senoussists, starting from Koufra and crossing the Libyan desert, could easily hope to escape the vigilance of our camel-corps patrols and fall on the remoter borders of Borkou and Ennedi.
_From Faya to Ounianga._—With this intention I left the oasis of Faya on 1 October 1914, at the head of a small escort, taking with me only some thirty lean camels tired and mangy, only capable of short stages and of carrying light loads. The result was that I spent nine days in covering the 117 miles between Faya and Ounianga, a journey that offers no difficulties and is usually completed in five or six stages. The points at which water may be found are frequent—at least one every 20 miles—and permanent; but grazing-grounds were almost non-existent at that time in consequence of the eleven years’ drought the country had just suffered from. The rain that had fallen in August had, it is true, made a few green blades spring here and there, and they were eagerly snapped up by our camels as they passed; but they were still so scattered among the broken rocks that they rather emphasized than diminished the desolate barrenness of these dreary solitudes. From place to place, round a water-hole, one found a few wretched acacias, bushes of _rtem_ or tufts of _akrech_. By chance one would come across what had once been a field of dried-up _hâd_ whose thorny branches were grey with dust; but in a general way the landscape was disappointingly bare, and I wondered anxiously how long my camels would hold out on this starvation diet.
The route passed alternately through hamadas of sandstone, the blackened rocks of which emerged from irregular dunes, and through sandy plains into which one sank, raising thick clouds of dust finer than ashes. We did not meet a living soul on the way, except a detachment going back to Faya, and a little caravan consisting of two delegates of the Grand Senoussi coming from Cyrenaica on their way to Fort Lamy as an embassy to the commander of the territory. I spent an afternoon with them near the wells of Eddeki, and so had the pleasure of offering them tea. The chief delegate, Si Mahmoud Sheikh, was a Khoan of fairly high rank in the Senoussist confraternity. His appearance was that of a good Mussulman “brother” by no means indifferent to the good things of this world; fifty years old, and of a fine corpulence, he had a fair but sunburnt complexion, grey hair, a black beard, a round face, thin lips, small eyes, and a sensual nose. He was dressed all in white, walked with gravity, and spoke little. His attitude, free from arrogance, was not without a touch of awkwardness, and his reserve concealed but ill his uneasiness about the fate that might await him during his long journey among the infidels.
His companion, Abdallah Ghariani, was younger and of a very modest rank among the Khoans. He had a jovial, bustling manner, and talked volubly, but his eyes were sly and shifty. While we drank tea flavoured with mint, he boasted of the pacific intentions of Ahmed Sherif, insisted on the desire of the Confraternity to maintain active commercial relations between Cyrenaica and the Wadai, and on the necessity for suppressing the Toubou brigandage that hindered the march of the caravans. In conclusion, he declared that he had eaten no meat for a long time and begged me to make him a present of a small quantity of smoke-dried meat—a precious commodity in the desert, where the resources of hunting do not exist.
[Illustration: NATURAL CISTERN, ERDI]
[Illustration: THE PEAK OF DIMI (600 m.), ERDI]
[Illustration: THE PEAKS OF DOURDOURO (1000. m.), ERDI]
_Ounianga._—I reached the valley of Ounianga on October 9 in the morning, and was not a little astonished at failing to see the palm plantation till the moment of entering it; for, unlike those of Borkou, which can be seen from a distance, the oasis of Ounianga is hidden in a rocky excavation some 30 yards in depth and 4 or 5 miles long by 1 or 2 wide. The landscape thus formed is incomparably picturesque: a great sheet of calm water with blue shadows, edged with rosy-tinted beaches of sand, and fringed with green palm-trees stretched within a circle of bare wind-carved sandstone whose sombre hues cast here and there, under the blazing sun, warm shadows glowing with red or gold.
But it must be recognized that in spite of its beauty the palm plantation of Ounianga is but wretchedness, gloom, and disappointment. The inhabitants, known as Ounias, are few—some hundreds at most. On the other hand, millions of flies fiercely exercise their buzzing activity for fourteen hours a day on man and beast. The soil is unfruitful, and produces hardly anything but dates. The foodstuffs necessary to life—cereals, butter, smoke-dried meat—are brought at great cost by caravans coming from Abéché to seek the supplies of salt from Arouelli needed by the inhabitants of Wadai. Even the camels cannot live in the neighbourhood for want of enough pasture, and from this cause our little garrison had the utmost difficulty not only in getting supplies, but in fulfilling the mission of watching the approaches of the frontier, and especially the great road from Koufra that emerges from the Libyan desert in the region of Tekro Arouelli.
It occupied at the north end of the lake a little rectangular fort, solidly built, but surrounded at a short distance by rocks that blocked the view and overlooked it to the north and east. It had not been possible to find a more favourable site, offering at the same time extensive views and an easily accessible water-supply.
I devoted two days to different tasks (inspections of the garrison, interviews with the Ounia chiefs and with two Khoans, former governors of the country in the time of the Senoussist domination, and so forth), and set out again on October 11 to visit the last water-points before entering the Libyan desert.
The Libyan desert is still almost completely unknown, no European traveller having been able as yet to cross it from side to side, whether from north to south or from east to west. In 1870 Gerhardt Rohlfs visited the northern part, as far as the oases of Koufra; a quarter of a century later British officers penetrated the south-eastern region as far as Bir Natrun, about 200 miles west of the Nile. On our part, we have been able to explore the south-western district and to obtain in respect of the central part fresh information, which it will not be easy to verify and extend until the French, British, and Italian governments combine in organizing for that purpose a geographical expedition, which would be of considerable scientific and even political interest.
I first took the direction of the salt-pits of Arouelli, situated 28 miles to the northwards, where I met a caravan that had just loaded up with 30 tons of salt for the Wadai markets. The salt-bed lies at the bottom of an absolutely bare sandy depression, covering some 25 acres. The bed of salt, which is only about 6 or 8 inches thick, is on the surface, and more or less mixed with sand. The water-bearing stratum lies at a depth of 5 or 6 feet, and the water is naturally very salt. The water, rising to the surface by capillarity, evaporates, forming the salt crust that the caravans carry away in pieces, and which the natives of the Wadai and the countries bordering on it consume without further preparation. If one may trust the information supplied by the Ounias, the salt crust forms again about three months after being taken away, so that the output of the Arouelli pits would amount to nearly 100,000 cubic metres of salt annually, an output sufficient to satisfy the culinary needs of more than ten million people, and worth on the spot, as prices were before the war, some fifteen million francs.
From Arouelli I went eastwards to fix the position of the well of Tekro, where there is also a deposit of salt which is not worked, the admixture of sand being too great. The well of Tekro is particularly important, because it is situated at the extremity of the great caravan route joining the Mediterranean to the Soudan by the oases of Koufra and the well of Sarra. The water is abundant and fairly fresh, but the vegetation is reduced to a hundred clumps of siwak and a few tufts of grass of no value for the feeding of camels.
_The Route towards Koufra._—Between Tekro and Koufra the distance to be covered is about 350 miles, about half of which had just been reconnoitred by Lieutenant Fouché, commanding the garrison of Ounianga. Marching in a general direction north-north-east he had first crossed a rocky zone of slight elevation, spending four hours in doing so; then for two days he traversed an immense sandy plain, bare of all vegetation, with here and there stretches of rock surface level with the ground; broken lines of rocky heights were visible in the distance to east and west. These heights went to join the plateau of Jef-Jef, in the direction of which he marched for twelve hours during the third day. On the fourth, he found himself in a vast plain from which the Djebel Habid, 50 miles away to the east, can be seen during the first few hours. The fifth day ranges of moving sand-dunes that served as landmarks for the guides were observed to the north-west, and at last, at nightfall on the sixth day, he reached the well of Sarra, lying in a hollow running from south-west to north-east and 30 metres deep.
The site of the well was chosen by the revered Sidi el Mahdi about 1898, and the works began almost at once. The boring, all done with picks and crowbars, was effected in hard reddish sandstone, by gangs of six workmen, relieved every month, and supplied with food and water by an endless succession of camel-convoys. At the end of eighteen or twenty months of uninterrupted work the water was at length found, clear, fresh, and abundant, at a depth of 80 yards, and since then the crossing of the Libyan desert has become relatively easy, the longest stretch without water being reduced to about 180 miles, whereas it was formerly almost 300. From the well of Sarra to Koufra the distance to be covered is only about 160 miles and offers no further difficulties, thanks to the intermediate well of Bechra.
What makes the journey from Ounianga to Koufra particularly troublesome is the total absence of pasturage for 500 miles, a state of things that results in the loss of many camels on every journey. The only good pasturage in the whole region is said to be found 80 or 100 miles to the east of the Sarra well, in the Djebel El Aouinat, an unexplored mountain mass of an extent not exceeding 1500 to 2000 square miles, as I am informed, and whose altitude may be roughly put at from 4000 to 5000 feet. It goes without saying that I only give these figures as a mere indication, and as subject to caution in every respect.
The break in continuity between the surveys of Rohlfs from the Mediterranean to Koufra and ours from the Wadai to the well of Sarra is consequently reduced to about 180 miles; but this gap does not seem likely to be bridged before Italy proceeds to an effective occupation of the oasis of Koufra, which falls within her sphere of influence.