Explorers of the Nile: The Triumph and Tragedy of a Great Victorian Adventure Read Free Page B

himself in dhoti trousers in order to look more like him, and his success with the Queen Mother and various women at court was another source of pride. 11 So much so that when the departure of Mutesa’s men for Gani (without Speke) seemed imminent, the explorer warned Petherick in an unintentionally comical letter, that: ‘The game I am now playing will oblige you to drop your dignity for the moment and to look on me as your superior officer.’ Petherick was told not to bring a uniform because Speke did not have one with him. 12 Clearly, Speke did not want anyone to undermine Mutesa’s and the Queen Mother’s conception of him as a man of high rank and importance in his own country.
    Unless Speke had by now started to find daily life at Mengo so diverting, the kabaka ’s refusal to help him locate either Petherick or the lake’s outflow would have depressed him horribly. Nor were his spirits about to take a plunge. Suddenly, just when most required, a brand new source of happiness transformed his life at court. To his amazement, Speke found himself in love.

PART 2
    THE CONSEQUENCES
     

TWENTY-EIGHT
    Pretensions on the Congo
     
    Samuel Baker had demonstrated, theoretically at least, to European rulers how African territories – even remarkably inaccessible ones – could be snatched by relatively few armed men and then held by means of forts, trading posts and alliances with local people. But thanks to Ismail’s precarious finances, the khedive’s plans for further southward advances soon juddered to a halt. So with the British government not quite ready to take over from the khedive in Egypt, Baker’s foray failed to kick-start a European scramble for colonies along the Nile and in East Africa. It was the sudden and surprising appearance of Stanley on the Atlantic coast, almost 3,000 miles from Egypt, that would do that – in an unexpected way.
    The news that Stanley had reached the Congo’s mouth, at the end of his Nile quest, had caused worldwide excitement. But it was the impression this feat made upon one minor European monarch that would have the most lasting consequences. In ignorance of Leopold II of Belgium’s carefully concealed plan to pillage the Congo, Stanley was persuaded by the king to return there as his Chief Agent to set up (as Stanley thought) international trading stations on the river so the Congolese would be able to exchange their ivory, hardwoods, resins and gums for factory goods brought upriver by traders of all nations. In public the king had no trouble applauding Stanley’s promise ‘to open up the valley of this mighty African river to the commerce of the world … or die in the attempt’. But in private, and in reality, Leopold meant to close the Congo to all nations but his own, just as soon as he felt he could get away with it. 1
    Between 1879 and 1884 Stanley built a road past the cataracts on the Lower Congo, launched steamers on the upper riverand built a string of trading stations for the Belgian king. This pioneering work would lay the foundations for the future Congo Free State and so constitutes an important episode in West African colonial history. But while Stanley was working on the Congo, significant events occurred there which would also have a direct bearing upon the competitive behaviour of European nations several thousand miles away in East Africa and along the Nile.

    King Leopold II of Belgium.
     
    In November 1880, while Stanley was building his road west of Stanley Pool, an Italian-born French naval officer, Lieutenant Pierre Savorgnan de Brazza, walked boldly into his camp and introduced himself. With ambitions to extend their West African possessions, the French government had funded de Brazza to pioneer a route along the Ogowe river from the Gabon coastto the River Congo in the region of the Pool. Although the Frenchman admitted that he had set up a small post on the north shore of Stanley Pool, Stanley took a liking to him and refused to believe