d, but not a bit of dry land could
any where be discovered which was firm enough to bear our weight.
Therefore, we resigned ourselves to circumstances, and all of us
having been refreshed with a little cold rice and honey, and water
from the stream, we permitted the canoe to drift down with the
current, for our men were too much fatigued with the labours of the
day to work any longer. But here a fresh evil arose which we were
unprepared to meet. An incredible number of hippopotami arose very
near us, and came plashing, snorting, and plunging all round the
canoe, and placed us in imminent danger. Thinking to frighten them
off, we fired a shot or two at them, but the noise only called up from
the water and out of the fens, about as many more of their unwieldy
companions, and we were more closely beset than before. Our people,
who had never in all their lives been exposed in a canoe to such
huge and formidable beasts, trembled with fear and apprehension, and
absolutely wept aloud; and their terror was not a little increased by
the dreadful peals of thunder which rattled over their heads, and by
the awful darkness which prevailed, broken at intervals by flashes of
lightning, whose powerful glare was truly awful. Our people told us,
that these formidable animals frequently upset canoes in the river,
when every one in them was sure to perish. These came so close to us,
that we could reach them with the butt-end of a gun. When I fired
at the first, which I must have hit, every one of them came to the
surface of the water, and pursued us so fast over to the north bank,
that it was with the greatest difficulty imaginable we could keep
before them. Having fired a second time, the report of my gun was
followed by a loud roaring noise, and we seemed to increase our
distance from them. There were two Bornou men among our crew who were
not so frightened as the rest, having seen some of these creatures
before on Lake Tchad, where, they say, there are plenty of them.
However, the terrible hippopotami did us no kind of mischief whatever;
they were only sporting and wallowing in the river for their own
amusement, no doubt, at first when we interrupted them; but had they
upset our canoe, we should have paid dearly for it. We observed a bank
on the north side of the river shortly after this, and I proposed
halting on it for the night, for I wished much to put my foot on firm
land again. This, however, not one of the crew would consent to,