CHAPTER XVII.

Notwithstanding the efforts of our hospitable entertainers to induce us to remain at the seriba, the last days of March found us still continuing on our way southwards, impelled onwards, because, amongst other reasons, the attractions of the seribas were causing frequent desertions from our ranks. Five of the soldiers and twenty bearers had already left us, and the absentees would have been more numerous still, had it not been for the exertions and eloquence of our two interpreters, Omar and Ali, whose influence over our followers is very great.

But if there is a falling off in the number of our men, there is no corresponding lack in the quantity of our provisions, for not only do we possess a quantity of sheep and oxen, but our bearers are also laden with all the eatables we could lay our hands on.

Two days' marching sufficed to take us across a portion of the territory belonging to the Djour tribe, whose name signifies "man of the woods," or "wild man." This tribe consists of about twenty thousand souls, devoted entirely to agriculture, and greatly resembling, in language, personal appearance, and habits, our old friends the Shillooks.

We passed, the seriba of Geer and the village of Koolongo without halting at either, and we soon afterwards entered the district inhabited by the Bongos or Dours (Dohrs, according to the German authorities), who must not be confounded with the Djours already mentioned.

The Bongos occupy a territory lying between lat. 6° and 8° N., almost deserted, but equal in extent to those of our Departments, and joining, on the south, the outer portion of the extensive country of the Niam-Niam. It is evident, therefore, that the caravan is adhering closely to the route traversed by M. de Guéran.

The Khartoum merchants, assisted by the Nubians and Dinkas, invaded this territory about five and twenty years ago, and reduced its inhabitants to subjection, but the Bongos, notwithstanding their condition of vassalage, have managed to preserve their primitive manners and customs almost intact. As soon as ever we set foot in this district we perceived very easily that we had entered upon a region perfectly novel, and were amongst a series of tribes extending southwards and possessing essentially original characteristics. Amongst the Bongos we found individuals as black as ebony, but the prevailing tint, the ground of their complexions, is red-brown, approaching to copper-colour. De Morin yesterday attempted a portrait of a Bongo, and he found it necessary to use the colour known under the name of Pompeian red.

The men, who are of medium height and very muscular, have short and curly hair, differing from the other tribes whose acquaintance we have made in this respect, as well as in the matter of clothing. Amongst the Bongos the men wear an apron of leather, or a strip of stuff fastened to the girdle, but the women are, as a rule, completely nude, a few only of them, after the fashion of our first parents, depending on leaves for their toilet. Ugly enough naturally, they add to their hideous appearance by extending the lower lip, by the insertion of cylindrical plugs of wood, until it projects two or three inches beyond the upper one. And, not content even with this, they allow themselves to grow so fat that they become positively deformed. With them all the curves and lines of the body disappear beneath a shapeless mass of fat. They have neither waist nor hips, and a perpendicular line can be drawn from their shoulders to their feet. By the side of these phenomena Joseph, the unwieldly, appeared thin, and, as for Miss Beatrice Poles, when she drew near a female Bongo, it was like a lucifer match approaching an elephant.

The match, it must be confessed, had the best of it, for leanness, ungraceful though it be, is less repulsive than excessive obesity. Our beloved Englishwoman, consequently, was withering in her contempt for the Bongo ladies, regarding them as the very lowest in the scale of female humanity, and venting all her most biting sarcasm on their rotundity.

"That is just how you would like to see me, is it not?" she says occasionally, and with asperity, to Doctor Delange, whose admiration for the Bayaderes and dancing girls of the Soudan she has never forgiven.

"By no means. Miss Poles," Delange replies, with his habitual coolness. "I should be very sorry to see you like these women, but you must admit that at all events there is some connection between a perfectly developed woman and monsters such as these."

"I see no connection at all," exclaimed Miss Poles. "All your perfectly-developed women, as you call them, become masses of obesity sooner or later, and, if I were a man, I should not admire them one bit."

Without attaching as much importance to the _embonpoint_ of the Bongo women, we could not help being somewhat curious to know whether it arose from natural causes or whether it was a matter of caprice. Nassar, who lived for a long time amongst them with Schweinfurth, declares that his master could never gain any information on the subject, but he says that if we really wish it, he will do his best to obtain for us an opportunity of settling the question. Delange and de Morin jumped at the offer, and we have commissioned Nassar to escort us to a species of harem, the proprietor of which, a Bongo chief, has expressed his willingness to receive us. Miss Poles wants to come also, and we do not see our way to saying no, especially as her presence in a harem is much more according to the proprieties than ours. We only exact from her a solemn promise that she will put a curb on her indignation as soon as she finds herself face to face with the phenomena we are about to see.