THE BLUE NILE

Evening Post, Volume CV, Issue 6, 9 January 1928, Page 4

THE BLUE NILE

'AND LAKE TANA DAM NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE ABYSSINIA'S IDEAS In a caustic complaint addressed last year to the League of Nations Bas Tafari wrote: "The people of Abyssinia are anxious to do right, and we have every intention of guiding them along the path of improvement and progress; but throughout their history they have seldom met with foreigners who did not desire to possess themselves of Abyssinian territory and to destroy their independence. With God's help, and thanks to the courage of our soldiers, wo have always, come what might, stood proud and free upon our native mountains." The attitude is natural enough, comments a correspondent of the "Illustrated London News" during the course of an appreciation of '' In the Country of the Blue Nile," a book recently written by Mr. C. P. .Rey, P.B.G.S. Ethiopia is surrounded; it is without exit to the sea. Italian Eritrea, French Somaliland, British Sonialiland, Italian Somaliland, Kenya, JJgandu, and the Sudan enclose it. Moreover, the Regent, modernist as he Is, conscious as he. is of the need for expanding trade, has to reckon with innumerable "dioliards" —jealous politicians, turbulent priests, and masterful provincial rulers; the Eases, or Heads; the Dajazmachs, the Generals or Keepers of the Gates; the Eitawraris, the llhinoccros Horns; and the rest of those whoso dependents obey them "at the run." And, as Mr. Bey is careful to emphasise, the great chiefs are neither easily led nor controlled: "The majority of them are .... reactionary in view .... a framo of mind which, for men in their position, enjoying tho privileges they do, is quite understandable. In some of the more remote districts the name of the ruler is scarcely known to the population, and the only recognised authority is the Governor. And though such a state of affairs may strengthen the position of this individual, it does not make for tho influence or prestige of the central Government. The position is well examplified by the Abyssinian proverb, 'A dog knows his master, but not his master's master.' " Becalling such things, it is not strange that tho proposal to build a dam across the Blue Nile near Lake Tana should have met with suspicion and brought about dillyings and dallyings and recriminations. The value of such a work is evident. Mr. Key expounds and meets objections. "Tho main question with which Great Britain is concerned," ho notes, "is the regulation of tho outflow of water from Lake Tana down tho Blue Nile' in the interests of the irrigation of Egypt and the Sudan. THIRTY YEARS' DISCUSSION. "For nearly thirty years this question has been under discussion, a question which in the ordinary way should not have taken thirty weeks to settle. Here is no matter of territorial expansion, of frontier rectification, or even of disputed fact. Briefly stated, the position is as follows:— "Tho Blue Nile takes its rise a hundred miles or so south of Tana, runs into and through the lake, and, emerging in tho south-cast, runs south for one hundred and fifty miles, then west, and finally, making a great bend northwards, joins the White Nile near Khartoum, bringing down with it not merely a vast volume of water, but immense quantities of rich, fertilising mud, which, spread over the plains of Egypt, are tho main factor in producing* the agricultural wealth of the country. "During seven months of the year the water flowing down tho Blue, Nile is more than adequate for the irrigation needs of the Sudan; during the remaining-five months the water supply is inadequate for this purpose. And under present conditions Lako Tana gives its greatest contribution to the Blue Nile whilst the river in Egypt and the Sudan is amply supplied from other sources; it gives least when the river is low. "It is proposed, therefore, by erecting a dam across the exit of the Blue Nile from Lako Tana, to regulate the outflow, to store up the surplus water during the seasons of plenty against the intervening lean months when water is lacking." An idea reasonable and pratical but un welcomed. "Certain quite genuine fears were engendered in the Abyssinian minds," continues Mr. Bey. . . "It was, for example, thought that ■the damming of the lake would increase enormously the level of its waters and would not only submerge shrines and churches on the islands and banks, Tout would also invade the shores and rob numbers of people of their land. One of the principal chiefs of the district asked the members of the last mission that visited the place whether they did not contemplate building a •wall one hundred metres high! As a matter of fact, the range between high and low water level of the lake is only about one and a half metres, and, so far from any fantastic erection of the kind being contemplated, the proposal is to lower the outlet by excavation, and then, by the installation of a regulator, no increase of tho flood level of the lake at all would bo involved. ... As for the absurd objection that the proposed works would result in depriving Abyssinia of water she needs for her own purposes, it is only necessary to point out that the water now flows away annually without benefiting anyone, whereas if the proposed dam were installed, the same amount would flow away, but more regularly throughout tho year, to the great advantage of everyone concerned." WHY AMERICA WAS ASKED. The real doubt, however, still lurks in the minds of the Abyssinians. "They fear that should large works, costing (to their ideas) immense sums of money, and directed by foreign engineers, be erected in their country, they might be opening the way to foreign invasion and the possible loss of their independence. Should, for example, a fanatical priest or a band of shiftas assassinate some of tho foreigners, or cause damage to the works, then an excuse would be afforded for the entry of troops along the newly-made motor-road" —the road, that is, which it would have boon necessary to construct for the passage of materials from the Sudan to the site. We slui.ll see what wo shall sec, but. it is significant that Dr. Wargneh Martin should have been entrusted with a commission to invite tenders for the building of the barrage; and it may be added that the Abyssinian envoy's vi.sit to America for this purpose is not surprising: ". . . The Bcgcnt, impressed with the wealth and power of the (Slates, and feeling that he need bo under no fear of territorial troublo from that fax-off country, inasmuch as there is no American territory along his borders, lias filways encouraged tho visits of Americans and urged, them to undertake operations in Abyssinia." But enough of this particular phase of Mr. Hoy's most excellent book: for it is only a phase, and we have dealt with it at length chiefly because it is peculiarly topical. There are many others, and each is engrossing. The author and his wife did much "variegated travelling" in what is well called ihe mediaeval State of Ethiopia; found

welcomes primitive, feudal, and quasimodern; and encountered courtesy and ceremonial everywhere—and no courtesy finer than that shown when Mrs. Bey had fractured an arm and was being borne over tho rough roads. Says Mr. Bey: "Repeatedly . . . casual pass-ers-by would stop and inquiro what had happened, and, on learning that a 'foreign lady' had met with an accident, would get down from their mules, take tho place of ono of our men at the hammock poles, and carry for three or four hundred yards, sometimes farther, as a mark of sympathy. One man indeed not only did this, but insisted on one of our men riding his mule while ho himself carried." In like spirit tho local Governor provided Galla swimmers for the crossing of the Abbai into Gojam, swimmers who piloted ponies, mules, donkeys, and oxen across the fast-flowing waters, while riflemen fusilladed to keep crocodiles at a distance, and navigated the jandis, strange, simple craft dismantled and remade after each crossing. Mr. Rey describes them: "A large tanned ox-skin, with holes perforated all round the edges, is laid on the ground, dry grass is piled on it, and the whole then lashed into a sort of package by means of hide ropes passed through the holes round the edge of the skin. If goods are to bo transported they are put inside; if human beings, they squat on the top a la turque or let their legs dangle in the water; in either case swimmers pull and push the unwieldy craft, which rocks and rolls like a Chanlie] steamer on ■» bad day. It looks much more alarming than it, in fact, is, but I could not really blame some of our men, who, after seeing the first jandi towed over, firmly declined to make the crossing, and had to be tied head to tail, three at a time, and stowed inside a jandi with the grass stuffing." NATIVE CUSTOMS. And there were the compliments of escorts and bands, and of "a little food" borne by thirty or forty servants; with invitations to feasts and festivals, to drinks of beer and of tej —honey and water and pieces of tho gesho plant, and to tho eating of meals which included a pie containing a number of whole chickens ,and unlimited hard-boiled eggs, red-hot peppery compounds, and, of course, raw meat "hot from the cow," a national dish said to have originated when hordes of Somals, Arabians, and Turks invaded Abyssinia in the early sixteenth century, and so harassed the natives that those few who remained in arms were "in such perpetual danger of their lives that it is recorded they were afraid even to light fires to cook their food, and so acquired the habit of eating raw meat —a habit which to-day is a universal custom of the country." As universal, it may be added, as the "fingers before forks" method of conveying the chosen portions to tho mouth: "In all Abyssinia Eas -Tafari is probably tho only person of note who in tho seclusion of his own hearth habitually lives and eats in a European way." To sum up: United Heaven and Ethiopia (the native colours, red, yellow, and green, from the rainbow, typify the wedding) is at the cross-roads. The way it will take depends upon the tact and the reasonableness of its counsellors, within and without. All is not Addis Ababa, Africa with the motorcar and a veneer of the European brand of civilisation; and, though it be well to hasten, it is better to hasten slowly. Mr. Rey quotes Bacon: "It were good that men in their innovations would follow the example of Time itself, which, indeed, innovateth greatly, but. quietly and by degrees scarco to be. perceived. "Wise words! Altogether: "In the Country of the Blue Nile," which, by the way, is introduced ably, if briefly, by Lord Edward Gleichen, is as entertaining as it is enlightening, and must certainly be added to the list of Books That Must be Read.