Unhappily for the stay-at-home geographer, no matter how skilfully he may set forth the discoveries made in his study, his triumph can only come after they have been demonstrated by actual travel, and even then the credit that falls to his share is small. The case of M‘Queen is one in point. We have no evidence that his theory regarding the Niger’s termination made any special impression upon the general opinion of the time. Unfortunately for him, too, his views were published immediately after several disastrous attempts from the West Coast to settle the question he had so ably worked out, so that Government and people alike were disposed to fight shy of the fatal region.

Yet with every succeeding failure the attraction of the mysterious river seemed ever to become greater, and a stubborn determination was evinced to break through the deadly belt which hedged in the countries of the interior. Conquered and rebuffed in one direction, there was nothing for it but to try another, and once more the Arab caravan route from Tripoli to the Sudan was thought of. As has been elsewhere shown, attempts in this direction had already been made by other travellers, and all had alike failed. Of these Horneman alone had penetrated beyond the northern borderland of the desert, only, however, to disappear for ever. In every other case these expeditions had failed at the outset through fatal fevers and Oriental obstructiveness—what, then, had the traveller to expect, who, surmounting these initial dangers, found himself face to face with the terrors of the great Sahara, where nature in its fiercest aspects reigned supreme, and man was represented only by wild roving tribes savage as their environment.

Nevertheless men there were ready and eager to try this route, as had been others before them to brave the dangers of the West Coast.

In 1820 Britain held an exceptionably favourable position in the councils of the Court of Tripoli, while at the same time the Basha, thanks to his guns, exercised a very marked influence over all the Arab, Berber, and Tibbu tribes lying between his country and the far-distant regions of the Sudan. Hence any one starting under the protection of the Basha had a fair guarantee of success, provided he could withstand the possible onslaughts of disease, and the terrible privations incidental to desert marches.

Encouraged by this favourable state of matters, the British Government determined to make another attempt to explore by the Arab route the regions which they had so signally failed to reach from the Atlantic.

Lieutenant Clapperton—like Park, a Scottish borderer—Dr. Oudney, and Major Denham, were selected for the task, and the 18th November 1821 saw them landed in Tripoli. Little time was lost in making their preparations and in setting forth for Murzuk in Fezzan, where they were to make their final arrangements before plunging into the dread Sahara. Here, though received kindly enough by the Sultan, they were threatened with the system of Oriental delays which had proved fatal to previous travellers. This, however, they were not the men to brook, and Major Denham promptly returned to Tripoli to lay a complaint before the Basha. As promptly he started for England on getting nothing but promises. This was sufficient to throw the Basha and his Court into consternation, and vessel after vessel was despatched to bring back the indignant traveller. They succeeded in catching him up at Marseilles, and induced him to return. On his arrival in Tripoli he was informed that already his escort awaited him at Sokna, on the borders of the Tripolitan desert.

Murzuk was triumphantly re-entered on the 30th October 1822. Clapperton and Oudney were found much reduced by the fevers, which were here so prevalent that even amongst the natives anything like a healthy-looking person was a rarity. To get away from this dangerously unhealthy place, Bu Khalum, the leader of the caravan, exerted himself with most unoriental and praiseworthy energy, though the task of gathering together the various elements of such a company as his was no small matter.

When ready, the party consisted of four Europeans, and servants to the number of ten, an Arab escort of 210, gathered from the most obedient tribes under the rule of Tripoli, and a number of merchants and freed slaves, who brought up the roll to about 300.

It was the 29th November before the whole party was ready for the road. The Europeans were in no very promising plight. They were all more or less down with fever, and Oudney and Hillman, a carpenter, were in a specially hopeless condition, considering what was before them. Nevertheless each one was eager and determined to go on, always hoping in the future, as is the manner of enthusiasts.

Almost with the disappearance of the walls, mosques, and date-trees of Murzuk in their rear, the desert rose up grim and terrible before them. The second day saw them among wild wastes of burning billowy sands, where was seen no living thing, nor other sound heard than the melancholy sweep of the wind over the endless tracts of sand. For some days, however, watering-places were not unfrequent, while here and there small oases gave a temporary relief to the monotonous landscape, and afforded a scanty subsistence to Tibbu or Berber inhabitants, who preferred to face the terror of the wilderness rather than live under the harsh rule of Arab masters. With the continued advance southward the wells grew more scarce, and it became a matter of congratulation when the day’s march ended beside one. With the wells went the date-trees and the cultivated oases, the prowling beast and the wandering native—only a great yellow expanse perpetually unrolled its vastness and monotony beneath the brazen canopy of a cloudless sky.

Into this realm of Desolation and Death the caravan now passed, their route marked out by the skeletons of human beings, ominously indicative of the dangers ahead and the horrors of the slave trade. As many as 107 such skeletons were counted by the wayside in a single march, and 100 were found around one well. At some places the numbers were beyond calculation. For days together now there was nothing but desert—hummocky mounds, painful stone-strewn stretches of barrenness, and shattered ribs of rock, grim, gaunt, and terrible. The wind came like blasts from a furnace, and from the cloudless sky the sun poured down its burning rays in a painful flood. Under the influences of heat, thirst, and fatigue, no word was spoken—even the camels uttered not a groan, as if conscious of the dire alternative to not pushing on. At times the horses’ hoofs crunched through the bones of human beings who had perished on the march. Night only brought relief from the hardships of the route. Then came the clear soothing darkness lit by a myriad stars, the cool refreshing breezes, and the soft couch of sand, so inexpressibly welcome to the weary, parched, and blinded wayfarers.

Thus the year passed away, and 1823 was ushered in, bringing promise of a successful issue to the enterprise. The explorers had now reached a scantily populated Tibbu country, where, in equal danger from drought, famine, sandstorms, and the murderous raids and plundering onslaughts of Berber tribes and passing caravans, men somehow contrived to wring from the flinty, almost arid, bosom of mother earth the wherewithal to keep body and soul together.

On leaving Bilma, the chief centre of this district, another desert tract had to be crossed, necessitating long and harassing marches, under the hardships of which as many as twenty camels would sink down exhausted in a single day. This dread region was at length also safely traversed, and infinite was the relief and thankfulness of all when towards the end of January the approach to more fertile tracts was indicated by the appearance of clumps of grass, and further on of a few scattered and stunted trees. This miserable and dingy vegetation looked delightful and refreshing to travellers who for over two weary months had been in a land of death and desolation. Tibbu inhabitants, with their flocks and herds, reappeared with the vegetation, and fresh meat and camel’s milk were to be had in abundance.

The caravan had this time reached no mere oasis. With each day’s march south the country improved in appearance, till the party found themselves in charming valleys shaded by leafy trees, festooned with creeping vines of the Colocynth, while underneath the sheltering canopy the ground was aglow with many-hued and brilliantly-coloured flowers. Nor was there lack of animal life to give animation and variety to the scene. Hundreds of twittering birds fluttered from tree to tree, careless of the vultures and kites which gracefully circled far up in the heavens. From a distance shy gazelles watched the newcomers with their beautiful eyes wide-stretched, but ready, if alarmed, to bound away at a moment’s notice to their forest haunts. The very sky reflected the softer conditions of nature, and showed a brighter blue cloud-speckled; and the natives in their smiling faces and hospitality harmonised with the happier conditions under which they lived, though from time to time the ruthless acts of the Arab caravan sent them flying in terror.

There was no mistaking the fact that the Sudan—the country known by hearsay for over four centuries, but which so far had baffled all attempts to explore it—had at last been reached. On the 4th February 1823 the travellers’ eyes were greeted with a sight “so gratifying and inspiring that it would be difficult for language to convey an idea of its force. The great lake Chad, glowing with the golden rays of the sun in its strength, appeared within a mile of the spot on which we stood. My heart bounded within me at the prospect, for I believed this lake to be the key to the great object of our search (presumably the Niger), and I could not refrain from silently imploring Heaven’s continued protection, which had enabled us to proceed so far in health and strength even to the accomplishment of our task.”

Nine days later the river Yeou was discovered flowing from the west. The name given to it by the Arabs unlocked the secrets of many geographical misconceptions. But that it was neither the true Nile nor the Niger was soon made patent—for, on the one hand, its course ended in the Chad; and, on the other, its size, and the reports of the natives, made it clear that it drained only the eastern Haussa States.

February 17 was a momentous date in the history of the expedition, for on that day they reached Kuka, the capital of Bornu.

Their entry was made in great state, worthy the traditions of a powerful semi-civilised Sultan. Several thousand well equipped and marvellously caparisoned horsemen awaited the strangers outside the town, and on seeing them, charged as if with the intention of annihilating the little band. Suddenly, while at full gallop, they pulled up right in the faces of the newcomers, almost smothering them with clouds of dust, and putting them in some danger from the crowding of horses and clashing of spears.

The Sultan’s negroes, as they were called, were specially conspicuous, “habited in coats of mail composed of iron chain, which covered them from the throat to the knees, dividing behind and coming on each side of the horse. Some of them had helmets, or rather skull caps, of the same metal, with china pieces all sufficiently strong to ward off the shock of a spear. Their horses’ heads were also defended by plates of iron, brass, and silver.”

It would be difficult to give the faintest idea of the strange sights and scenes which now opened up before our travellers in the centre of the ancient empire of Bornu. Nothing more remarkable had ever been seen by any European explorer—at least in Africa. From the Sultan and his much-robed courtiers down to the scantily-draped country people, all were alike interesting. The teeming life in all its varied forms—Arab, Berber, Fulah, and negro of twenty different tribes—made up a picture of strange attractiveness. Not less interesting were the curious customs, the industries, the mixture of a considerable degree of civilisation and religious elevation with the lowest depths of barbarism and degrading superstition. These were the more marked, inasmuch as when the English travellers saw Bornu and its remarkable court, it was just re-emerging from a temporary eclipse of its national glory. Only a short time before it had thrown off the temporary domination of the Fulahs, to whom it had succumbed in their first irresistible onrush.

The reception of Clapperton and Denham was exceedingly promising, and a bright career of discovery seemingly lay open to them.

Matters assumed a worse aspect, however, when differences of opinion arose among the Arabs of the caravan. They had been despatched as an escort to the travellers, it is true, but they were not placed directly under their command. To do absolutely nothing but look after the safety of the Europeans was as alien to their conception of duty as the idea of travelling all the way to Bornu without turning the journey to profitable account. The majority of them not being merchants, and therefore not supplied with goods for barter, had only their weapons to depend upon to recoup them for their trouble. A slave raid was therefore determined on, in spite of the opposition and remonstrances of Bu Khalum and the Europeans. As the Arabs were not to be turned aside from their project, the leader reluctantly agreed to go with them, and Denham, finding himself helpless, resolved to join the party likewise in order to extend his knowledge of the region.

The mountains of Mandara, to the south of Bornu, were chosen as the most suitable spot for a slave hunt, and thither the raiders proceeded, accompanied by a considerable contingent of the Bornu army.

Leaving Kuka in the middle of April, they reached Mandara towards the end of the month, without any misadventure. Here they found themselves surrounded with mountain scenery, which could scarcely be exceeded for beauty and richness. On all sides interminable chains of hill closed in the view in rugged magnificence and picturesque grandeur. Here, too, nature revelled in its most luxuriant forms among giant trees almost masked under the wealth of creepers which wound around the trunks and branches, or hung in graceful festoons swaying responsive to the passing breeze. Native villages were everywhere to be seen perched airily, like eagles’ nests, far up on the rocks and mountain tops, or nestling in the valleys, hidden like the wild deer’s lair in the depths of the forest. Such was the lovely district into which the Arabs had come to bring death, ruin, and slavery. But for once they had miscalculated their powers, or depended too much on the co-operation of the Bornu contingent. At the first attack the invaders drove the natives before them, but soon they were outnumbered. Bu Khalum was severely wounded along with the leader of the Bornuese, and Denham received a wound in the face. Beaten on all sides, the only safety of the survivors lay in flight.

A frightful scene ensued. Denham passed through a series of the most marvellous escapes, but at last, unhorsed and unarmed, was seized and stripped, receiving several wounds from spear thrusts in the process. Seeing nothing but a cruel death before him, he resolved to make one more effort to escape, and putting the thought into action, he slipped below a horse, and started for the woods, pursued by two Fulah. Reaching the shelter of the trees, hope revived on his seeing a ravine opening in front of him, and offering a further chance of life. As he was on the point of letting himself down the cliff into the stream, a puff-adder raised its head to strike. He recoiled horror-stricken, and fell headlong into the ravine, his fall fortunately made harmless by a deep pool of water, where, recovering his presence of mind, three strokes of his arms sent him to the opposite side, and placed him in comparative safety among the dense vegetation.

Shortly after, he met the remnants of the defeated party, and six days later they re-entered Kuka, after enduring great hardships.

For the next few months little of importance was done to elucidate the geography of the Chad Region. An expedition westward to Manga was accomplished with less disastrous results than that to the Mandara mountains; and then the rainy season set in, threatening for a time to end the days of the European travellers by the fevers which accompanied it. With the return of the dry season came renewed health and renewed determination to add further to their discoveries.

On the 14th December, Clapperton and Oudney set forth to visit Kano and the Haussa States in the company of a trading caravan.

Two days later a Mr. Toole arrived at Kuka with fresh supplies for the expedition, at a moment when they were much needed.

In the beginning of the year 1824 Denham and Toole started for the district of Logun with the object of visiting the Shari River. The project was safely accomplished, and they found a majestic river 400 yards broad, flowing from the south and south-west into the Chad.

The difficulty of obtaining correct geographical information from the natives was well illustrated in their case, it being clear that they confounded with the Shari a great river (the BenuÉ) they heard of as flowing from the south and south-west of Mandara, whereas in reality the latter flows to the west. It is extremely probable, however, that some sort of connection exists between them in the wet season.

At Logun Mr. Toole died.

Meanwhile Clapperton and Oudney were travelling towards Kano, and giving shape and form to the confused and conflicting accounts over which geographers had quarrelled for a couple of centuries. Unfortunately on this journey, Oudney, who had never enjoyed good health from the day he left Tripoli, gradually became worse, and died on the 12th January 1824. Left to himself, Clapperton passed on to Kano, which he found to be a town of 30,000 to 40,000 inhabitants, and chiefly important as a trading and industrial centre, it being famed as such from the most remote times.

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