on the ground, and growing in the sand,which they ate freely of, and which supplied them for drink as well asforage.
The next day, which was the tenth from our setting out, we came to theedge of this lake, and, very happily for us, we came to it at the southpoint of it, for to the north we could see no end of it; so we passed byit and travelled three days by the side of it, which was a great comfortto us, because it lightened our burthen, there being no need to carrywater when we had it in view. And yet, though here was so much water,we found but very little alteration in the desert; no trees, no grassor herbage, except that thistle, as I called it, and two or three moreplants, which we did not understand, of which the desert began to bepretty full.
But as we were refreshed with the neighbourhood of this lake of water,so we were now gotten among a prodigious number of ravenous inhabitants,the like whereof, it is most certain, the eye of man never saw; for asI firmly believe that never man nor body of men passed this desert sincethe flood, so I believe there is not the like collection of fierce,ravenous, and devouring creatures in the world; I mean not in anyparticular place.
For a day's journey before we came to this lake, and all the three dayswe were passing by it, and for six or seven days' march after it,the ground was scattered with elephants' teeth in such a number as isincredible; and as some of them have lain there for some hundreds ofyears, so, seeing the substance of them scarce ever decays, they may liethere, for aught I know, to the end of time. The size of some of themis, it seems, to those to whom I have reported it, as incredible asthe number; and I can assure you there were several so heavy as thestrongest man among us could not lift. As to number, I question not butthere are enough to load a thousand sail of the biggest ships in theworld, by which I may be understood to mean that the quantity is notto be conceived of; seeing that as they lasted in view for above eightymiles' travelling, so they might continue as far to the right hand, andto the left as far, and many times as far, for aught we knew; for itseems the number of elephants hereabouts is prodigiously great. In oneplace in particular we saw the head of an elephant, with several teethin it, but one of the biggest that ever I saw; the flesh was consumed,to be sure, many hundred years before, and all the other bones; butthree of our strongest men could not lift this skull and teeth; thegreat tooth, I believe, weighed at least three hundredweight; and thiswas particularly remarkable to me, that I observed the whole skull wasas good ivory as the teeth, and, I believe, altogether weighed at leastsix hundredweight; and though I do not know but, by the same rule, allthe bones of the elephant may be ivory, yet I think there is this justobjection against it from the example before me, that then all the otherbones of this elephant would have been there as well as the head.
I proposed to our gunner, that, seeing we had travelled now fourteendays without intermission, and that we had water here for ourrefreshment, and no want of food yet, nor any fear of it, we should restour people a little, and see, at the same time, if perhaps we mightkill some creatures that were proper for food. The gunner, who had moreforecast of that kind than I had, agreed to the proposal, and added, whymight we not try to catch some fish out of the lake? The first thing wehad before us was to try if we could make any hooks, and this indeed putour artificer to his trumps; however, with some labour and difficulty,he did it, and we catched fresh fish of several kinds. How they camethere, none but He that made the lake and all the world knows; for, tobe sure, no human hands ever put any in there, or pulled any out before.
We not only catched enough for our present refreshment, but we driedseveral large fishes, of kinds which I cannot describe, in the sun, bywhich we lengthened out our provision considerably; for the heat ofthe sun dried them so effectually without salt that they were perfectlycured, dry, and hard, in one day's time.
We rested ourselves here five days; during which time we had abundanceof pleasant adventures with the wild creatures, too many to relate. Oneof them was very particular, which was a chase between a she-lion,or lioness, and a large deer; and though the deer is naturally a verynimble creature, and she flew by us like the wind, having, perhaps,about 300 yards the start of the lion, yet we found the lion, by herstrength, and the goodness of her lungs, got ground of her. They passedby us within about a quarter of a mile, and we had a view of them agreat way, when, having given them over, we were surprised, about anhour after, to see them come thundering back again on the other side ofus, and then the lion was within thirty or forty yards of her; and bothstraining to the extremity of their speed, when the deer, coming to thelake, plunged into the water, and swam for her life, as she had beforerun for it.
The lioness plunged in after her, and swam a little way, but came backagain; and when she was got upon the land she set up the most hideousroar that ever I heard in my life, as if done in the rage of having losther prey.
We walked out morning and evening constantly; the middle of the day werefreshed ourselves under our tent. But one morning early we saw anotherchase, which more nearly concerned us than the other; for our blackprince, walking by the side of the lake, was set upon by a vast, greatcrocodile, which came out of the lake upon him; and though he was verylight of foot, yet it was as much as he could do to get away. He fledamain to us, and the truth is, we did not know what to do, for we weretold no bullet would enter her; and we found it so at first, for thoughthree of our men fired at her, yet she did not mind them; but my friendthe gunner, a venturous fellow, of a bold heart, and great presenceof mind, went up so near as to thrust the muzzle of his piece into hermouth, and fired, but let his piece fall, and ran for it the very momenthe had fired it. The creature raged a great while, and spent its furyupon the gun, making marks upon the very iron with its teeth, but aftersome time fainted and died.
Our negroes spread the banks of the lake all this while for game, and atlength killed us three deer, one of them very large, the other two verysmall. There was water-fowl also in the lake, but we never came nearenough to them to shoot any; and as for the desert, we saw no fowlsanywhere in it but at the lake.
We likewise killed two or three civet cats; but their flesh is the worstof carrion. We saw abundance of elephants at a distance, and observedthey always go in very good company, that is to say, abundance of themtogether, and always extended in a fair line of battle; and this, theysay, is the way they defend themselves from their enemies; for if lionsor tigers, wolves or any creatures, attack them, they being drawn in aline, sometimes reaching five or six miles in length, whatever comes intheir way is sure to be trod under foot, or beaten in pieces with theirtrunks, or lifted up in the air with their trunks; so that if a hundredlions or tigers were coming along, if they meet a line of elephants,they will always fly back till they see room to pass by the right handor the left; and if they did not, it would be impossible for one ofthem to escape; for the elephant, though a heavy creature, is yet sodexterous and nimble with his trunk, that he will not fail to lift upthe heaviest lion, or any other wild creature, and throw him up in theair quite over his back, and then trample him to death with his feet. Wesaw several lines of battle thus; we saw one so long that indeed therewas no end of it to be seen, and I believe there might be 2000 elephantsin row or line. They are not beasts of prey, but live upon the herbageof the field, as an ox does; and it is said, that though they are sogreat a creature, yet that a smaller quantity of forage supplies one ofthem than will suffice a horse.
The numbers of this kind of creature that are in those parts areinconceivable, as may be gathered from the prodigious quantity ofteeth which, as I said, we saw in this vast desert; and indeed we saw ahundred of them to one of any other kind.
One evening we were very much surprised. We were most of us laid downon our mats to sleep, when our watch came running in among us, beingfrighted with the sudden roaring of some lions just by them, which, itseems, they had not seen, the night being dark, till they were just uponthem. There was, as it proved, an old lion and his whole family, forthere was the lioness and three young lions, besides the old king, whowas a monstrous g
reat one. One of the young ones--who were good, large,well-grown ones too--leaped up upon one of our negroes, who stoodsentinel, before he saw him, at which he was heartily frighted, criedout, and ran into the tent. Our other man, who had a gun, had notpresence of mind at first to shoot him, but struck him with the butt-endof his piece, which made him whine a little, and then growl at himfearfully; but the fellow retired, and, we being all alarmed, three ofour men snatched up their guns, ran to the tent door, where they saw thegreat old lion by the fire of his eyes, and first fired at him, but, wesupposed, missed him, or at least did not kill him; for they went alloff, but raised a most hideous roar, which, as if they had called forhelp, brought down a prodigious number of lions, and other furiouscreatures, we know not what, about them, for we could not see them;but there was a noise, and yelling and howling, and all sorts of suchwilderness music on every side of us, as if all the beasts of the desertwere assembled to devour us.
We asked our black prince what we should do with them. "Me go," says he,"and fright them all." So he snatches up two or three of the worst ofour mats, and getting one of our men to strike some fire, he hangs themat up at the end of a pole, and set it on fire, and it blazed abroada good while; at which the creatures all moved off, for we heard themroar, and make their bellowing noise at a great distance. "Well," saysour gunner, "if that will do, we need not burn our mats, which are ourbeds to lay under us, and our tilting to cover us. Let me alone," sayshe. So he comes back into our tent, and falls to making some artificialfireworks and the like; and he gave our sentinels some to be readyat hand upon occasion, and particularly he placed a great piece ofwild-fire upon the same pole that the mat had been tied to, and set iton fire, and that burnt there so long that all the wild creatures leftus for that time.
However, we began to be weary of such company; and, to be rid of them,we set forward again two days sooner than we intended. We found now,that though the desert did not end, nor could we see any appearance ofit, yet that the earth was pretty full of green stuff of one sort oranother, so that our cattle had no want; and secondly, that therewere several little rivers which ran into the lake, and so long as thecountry continued low, we found water sufficient, which eased us verymuch in our carriage, and we went on still sixteen days more without yetcoming to any appearance of better soil. After this we found the countryrise a little, and by that we perceived that the water would fail us;so, for fear of the worst, we filled our bladder-bottles with water.We found the country rising gradually thus for three days continually,when, on the sudden, we perceived that, though we had mounted upinsensibly, yet that we were on the top of a very high ridge of hills,though not such as at first.
When we came to look down on the other side of the hills, we saw, tothe great joy of all our hearts, that the desert was at an end; that thecountry was clothed with green, abundance of trees, and a large river;and we made no doubt but that we should find people and cattle also; andhere, by our gunner's account, who kept our computations, we hadmarched about 400 miles over this dismal place of horror, having beenfour-and-thirty days a-doing of it, and consequently were come about1100 miles of our journey.
We would willingly have descended the hills that night, but it wastoo late. The next morning we saw everything more plain, and restedourselves under the shade of some trees, which were now the mostrefreshing things imaginable to us, who had been scorched above a monthwithout a tree to cover us. We found the country here very pleasant,especially considering that we came from; and we killed some deer herealso, which we found very frequent under the cover of the woods. Also wekilled a creature like a goat, whose flesh was very good to eat, but itwas no goat; we found also a great number of fowls like partridge, butsomething smaller, and were very tame; so that we lived here very well,but found no people, at least none that would be seen, no, not forseveral days' journey; and to allay our joy, we were almost every nightdisturbed with lions and tigers; elephants, indeed, we saw none here.
In three days' march we came to a river, which we saw from the hills,and which we called the Golden River; and we found it ran northward,which was the first stream we had met with that did so. It ran with avery rapid current, and our gunner, pulling out his map, assured me thatthis was either the river Nile, or run into the great lake out of whichthe river Nile was said to take its beginning; and he brought out hischarts and maps, which, by his instruction, I began to understand verywell, and told me he would convince me of it, and indeed he seemed tomake it so plain to me that I was of the same opinion.
But I did not enter into the gunner's reason for this inquiry, not inthe least, till he went on with it farther, and stated it thus:--"Ifthis is the river Nile, why should not we build some more canoes, and godown this stream, rather than expose ourselves to any more deserts andscorching sands in quest of the sea, which when we are come to, we shallbe as much at a loss how to get home as we were at Madagascar?"
The argument was good, had there been no objections in the way of a kindwhich none of us were capable of answering; but, upon the whole, itwas an undertaking of such a nature that every one of us thought itimpracticable, and that upon several accounts; and our surgeon, who washimself a good scholar and a man of reading, though not acquaintedwith the business of sailing, opposed it, and some of his reasons, Iremember, were such as these:--First, the length of the way, which bothhe and the gunner allowed, by the course of the water, and turningsof the river, would be at least 4000 miles. Secondly, the innumerablecrocodiles in the river, which we should never be able to escape.Thirdly, the dreadful deserts in the way; and lastly, the approachingrainy season, in which the streams of the Nile would be so furious, andrise so high--spreading far and wide over all the plain country--thatwe should never be able to know when we were in the channel of the riverand when not, and should certainly be cast away, overset, or runaground so often that it would be impossible to proceed by a river soexcessively dangerous.
This last reason he made so plain to us that we began to be sensible ofit ourselves, so that we agreed to lay that thought aside, and proceedin our first course, westwards towards the sea; but, as if we had beenloth to depart, we continued, by way of refreshing ourselves, to loitertwo days upon this river, in which time our black prince, who delightedmuch in wandering up and down, came one evening and brought us severallittle bits of something, he knew not what, but he found it felt heavyand looked well, and showed it to me as what he thought was some rarity.I took not much notice of it to him, but stepping out and calling thegunner to me I showed it to him, and told him what I thought, viz.,that it was certainly gold. He agreed with me in that, and also in whatfollowed, that we would take the black prince out with us the next day,and make him show us where he found it; that if there was any quantityto be found we would tell our company of it, but if there was but littlewe would keep counsel, and have it to ourselves.
But we forgot to engage the prince in the secret, who innocently told somuch to all the rest, as that they guessed what it was, and came to usto see. When we found it was public, we were more concerned to preventtheir suspecting that we had any design to conceal it, and openlytelling our thoughts of it, we called our artificer, who agreedpresently that it was gold; so I proposed that we should all go withthe prince to the place where he found it, and if any quantity was to behad, we would lie here some time and see what we could make of it.
Accordingly we went every man of us, for no man was willing to be leftbehind in a discovery of such a nature. When we came to the place wefound it was on the west side of the river, not in the main river, butin another small river or stream which came from the west, and ran intothe other at that place. We fell to raking in the sand, and washing itin our hands; and we seldom took up a handful of sand but we washedsome little round lumps as big as a pin's head, or sometimes as big as agrape stone, into our hands; and we found, in two or three hours'time, that every one had got some, so we agreed to leave off, and go todinner.
While we were eating, it came into my thoughts that while we work
ed atthis rate in a thing of such nicety and consequence, it was ten to oneif the gold, which was the make-bait of the world, did not, first orlast, set us together by the ears, to break our good articles and ourunderstanding one among another, and perhaps cause us to part companies,or worse; I therefore told them that I was indeed the youngest man inthe company, but as they had always allowed me to give my opinion inthings, and had sometimes been pleased to follow my advice, so Ihad something to propose now, which I thought would be for all ouradvantages, and I believed they would all like it very well. I told themwe were in a country where we all knew there was a great deal of gold,and that all the world sent ships thither to get it; that we did notindeed know where it was, and so we might get a great deal, or a little,we did not know whether; but I offered it to them to consider whether itwould not be the best way for us, and to preserve the good harmonyand friendship that had been always kept among us, and which was soabsolutely necessary to our safety, that what we found should be broughttogether to one common stock, and be equally divided at last, ratherthan to run the hazard of any difference which might happen among usfrom any one's having found more or less than another. I told them, thatif we were all upon one bottom we should all apply ourselves heartily tothe work; and, besides that, we might then set our negroes all to workfor us, and receive equally the fruit of their labour and of our own,and being all exactly alike sharers, there could be no just cause ofquarrel or disgust among us.
They all approved the proposal, and every one jointly swore, and gavetheir hands to one another, that they would not conceal the least grainof gold from the rest; and consented that if any one or more shouldbe found to conceal any, all that he had should be taken from himand divided among the rest; and one thing more was added to it by ourgunner, from considerations equally good and