Kitabı oku: «Harry Milvaine: or, The Wanderings of a Wayward Boy», sayfa 12
All this Raggy duly translated, and Harry strongly suspected that he added a little bit of his own to it. But this is a liberty that interpreters very often take.
The king was laughing. The king was pleased. He pointed to the boat and led the way towards it and without a moment’s hesitation Harry stepped on board, and in another minute they were all away out in the open lake.
Book Three – Chapter Seven.
Amazons – The Lake of the Hundred Isles – The Feast of Flowers
When the king’s barge left the shore, shoved slowly along by the head of the big hulking negro, Harry, of course, had not the faintest notion whence he was being taken.
Perhaps he was just a trifle reckless. He was so at most times, but in this case I imagine he was in the right. For the worst thing one can do on meeting strange savages is to show mistrust or fear of them. If you mistrust them, they at once suspect you, and the consequences may sometimes be anything but pleasant.
It was not long before our hero found out that it was indeed a lake, and not a broad river, on which he was embarked, and that it was studded with about a hundred islands, over all of which this black host of theirs was evidently the potentate.
He landed on one of the largest of them, and on a kind of rude pier where nearly a hundred armed amazons were drawn up to receive their lord and his guests.
Harry afterwards found out that he kept ten amazons for every island, but they all lived near the royal residence, and were his especial body-guard. Fierce-looking, stalwart hussies they were, with knives in their girdles, spears in their hands, and leather-covered shields, that were nearly as big and wide as barn doors.
Over these shields they grinned and glared in a way that was really hideous. They rolled their eyes round and round incessantly, as if they had been moved like clock-work. Perhaps, thought Harry, they go in for eye-drill in this queer country. The reason of this optical movement, he was afterwards told, was to prove to the king that danger could come to him from no direction without their seeing it.
These amazons were dressed in sacks of cocoa-cloth, and wore tippets of skins not unlike those of your dandy coachmen in Hyde Park. From their legs and arms, behind and below, feathers stuck out, and as head-dresses their own hair was done up into an immense dome, which stood straight up and was adorned with the feathers of the red ibis.
All this Harry took in at a glance as he walked on behind the king, through an avenue of most splendid trees, towards his palace.
I must dismiss the palace with a single sentence. It was not unlike a haycock of immense size, with a door in the side, or like the half of a cocoanut turned upside down. It was in an enclosure, in the very middle of the island, and near it were the huts of the king’s amazons, the whole being defended by a strong palisade of roughly hewn wood.
The huts of his other warriors – and every one appeared to be a warrior in this island – were outside the fort and different in shape and appearance. They were, if anything, more elaborately built, and had verandahs supporting their roofs, which only proved that his majesty was a man of simple tastes, and preferred looking after the well-being of his subjects rather than his own.
One of the largest tents in the enclosure was set aside for Harry and his companions. It contained a dais-bed, covered with grass matting, an immense grass-stuffed pillow, and mats on the floor besides.
He had not been long in this tent ere an unarmed amazon entered, bearing a huge leafen basket, laden with the most delicious fruit, the perfume of which filled the whole room. She also brought and placed near it a huge pitcher of water.
This was all very gratifying, and Harry began to wonder where this strange king learned all his civility and hospitality, and he really felt a little sorry now that he had taken the liberty of smacking his majesty on the fingers when he was attempting to cut off a button.
“How, on the other hand,” he asked himself, “have this curious people escaped the raids and ravages of the plundering slaver Arabs?”
Perhaps the Arabs had not yet found them out, or, having found them out, deemed it impossible to attack them, so well protected were they by water.
Nothing was done to-day by Harry except to wander about all over this lovely island.
Indeed, the adjective “lovely” but poorly expresses the wealth and beauty of flower and foliage that met his gaze at every turn.
It seemed a veritable garden of Eden. It must have been miles in extent, yet the king assured him he might wander everywhere, and he would find neither wild beast nor loathsome dangerous reptile.
His majesty went to his tent and did not appear again that day, nor was he visible until late into the next.
Harry was walking about making friends with the cocks and hens, the goats and the pigs, and with several charmingly plumaged birds of the guinea-hen species, when he was summoned into the king’s presence.
The dusky monarch was seated in the middle of his tent on a mat. So black was he, and so dark was the hut, that, coming right in from the glare of the noonday sun, it was some time before Harry could see him or anything else. He heard the king’s hearty laugh, however, and went towards it.
He was beckoned to a mat on the floor, and fruit was handed to him.
Then the royal host began to show all the inquisitiveness of a child, and evinced so much curiosity that Harry could not answer his questions fast enough. But he delighted him greatly by saying that at home he too lived on an island.
The king was exceedingly tickled, though, when told through Raggy that we were subjects to a queen.
He laughed so immoderately that he was obliged to lie back and roll on his mat, and for quite three minutes could say nothing but “Lobo! Lobo! Lobo!”
In the midst of all this pleasant discourse two amazons entered, and helped the king to rise.
He said something which Raggy translated, “Come on for true.”
They went on “for true,” and soon found themselves in a grove and under a canopy of grass-cloth. On the green-sward they all squatted down to a banquet, the like of which Harry had not seen for many days.
It was not served on china, you may be sure, and there were no forks, only knives. The plates were of yellow-brown clay, and as soft as a brick. In the centre was a huge dish of curried rice; before each of his guests was placed a curried fowl. Then there were floury and well-cooked yams, sweet potatoes and plantains, and a large chattee of water.
Raggy ate up his fowl every bit, so did Somali Jack. Harry failed on his last drumstick, and the king laughed again, and cried, “Lobo! Lobo!”
Then there was more wandering about the island, and another banquet or fried fish and fruit on their return.
All the time Harry and Jack stuck to their rifles. One never knows what savages may turn out to be, and had anything occurred they were determined to sell their lives as dearly as possible.
Next day, and next, and next, were simply repetitions of the first, with this difference – that the king took his guests round his islands in his barge, rowed now by five dark-skinned boatmen on each side, and this will give you some idea of the size of it.
Every evening after supper, sitting out under the stars, the king being only dimly visible as a kind of shape, Harry had to tell stories of all the kings and potentates and countries in the world.
He got a little tired at last, and found it better and easier to invent tales of imagination, based upon the stories he had read, such as the novels of Cooper and Walter Scott, than to stick to plain geography and pure history. This pleased this strange king even better, and he was constantly saying, “Lobo!” during Harry’s recitals.
I dare say, however, that Raggy, through whom, as a medium, the stories had to pass, embellished them somewhat on his own account.
Among the gifts from Somali Jack’s packet that Harry presented to his majesty was a shirt and a pair of pyjamas. These he wore until they were black, albeit Harry had several times suggested that they should be washed.
A whole month flew by. Very quickly indeed the days went too, for the air made Harry lazy, and he felt as if he had eaten the lotus leaf. He roused himself at last, and, fearful that he might be outstaying his welcome, he told the king he must go.
“Go! did you not come here to stay and talk to me for ever and ever? Go! No, no! Lobo! Lobo!”
It began gradually to dawn upon Harry that he really and virtually was a prisoner in these friendly islands. He certainly could not leave them without his majesty’s permission. To steal a boat and try to escape was out of the question, the amazons with the rolling eyes would effectually prevent this.
So he stayed on quietly another month. Then, firm in the belief that a constant drop will wear away a stone, he began persistently to tease the king into letting him go on his journey.
The king would promise one day, and retract the next.
Three months passed away, then four. Harry was getting desperate. At the risk of giving mortal offence he refused to tell any more stories. And his majesty got so sad and morose that he felt grieved to see him.
“I will let you go,” he said at length, “if you will promise to return and bring me more gifts.”
Harry gladly promised that he would do everything in his power to come back that way.
The king had most minutely examined the rifles, but hitherto not a shot had been fired. Ammunition was far too valuable.
But one day Harry determined to give the king a treat. He took his rifle, and pointing to a great vulture that was slowly floating around the village, fired, and to his own surprise brought it down.
But the consternation among the natives was intense. It was a strange, superstitious dread, and if they could have turned pale with fear I feel sure they would have done so. Harry had made thunder and lightning, smoke and flame, and killed an evil bird. No wonder the king capsized on his back on the mat, and said “Lobo!” more than a dozen times!
But Harry explained everything to him, and his majesty was satisfied.
The day before Harry’s departure from the Lake of the Hundred Isles was devoted to feasting and dancing. The king even proposed killing one or two of his subjects in honour of the occasion.
Harry would not hear of this.
“Well,” the king said, “he would put them up at a distance, and his guest should bring them down, with his rifle.”
“No, no, no,” laughed Harry; “kill hens and we can eat them, but not human beings.”
It was such a drowsy island this that Harry never thought of turning out of bed till about eight o’clock.
When he got up next day, and went forth to breathe the balmy morning air, the sight that was presented to him made him open his eyes wide with astonishment. It was like a scene of enchantment.
The king’s hut, and every other hut, and even the palisade around this camp, was completely covered with flowers of the most gorgeous hues and sweetest perfume, while all the ground was deeply bedded with green leaves and boughs. Even the shields and spears of the amazons were decorated with flowers, and they wore garlands around their necks and heads. Near the king’s tent sat a few musicians, beating low on tom-toms, and singing a dreamy kind of a chant.
It was late before the king put in an appearance; he did so at last, however, and very pleased he seemed when he gazed about him. Then his eye sought Harry’s; he was anxious to know if he was also pleased with —
The Feast of Flowers
Harry hastened to assure him that he was more than pleased, he was delighted.
Would the queen of his country be pleased if she were here? That was his next question, and he laughed as he put it till his sides shook again. The answer was, “Undoubtedly.”
I do not intend to give a complete description of all the performances of the day – they were far too numerous. Suffice it to say that there was a grand procession of warriors, headed by the flower-bedecked amazons; after the soldiers came the king’s butchers or executioners; and next a crew of naked natives, bearing a pig, a goat, and several cocks and hens for the slaughter. The goat looked rather astonished and kicked a little at times; the cocks looked boldly unconcerned; but the pig was a lusty one, he was not content with kicking and biting, but he screamed so loudly that the sound, or bleating one might call it, of the chanters was hardly heard. All this, accompanied by the beating of tom-toms and the occasional unearthly yells of the amazons, made up a concert that it is far beyond my powers of description to give the reader any correct notion of.
The animals were slain. The amazons danced around the hole into which the creatures’ blood had been poured, frequently dipping their fingers therein and besmearing their faces, which certainly did not improve their grim beauty.
Then the procession returned to the king’s enclosure, and more wild dancing was carried on, much to the delectation of his majesty.
Suddenly he wheeled round to the mat where Harry and Raggy were squatted.
“Can you dance?” said the king. “Yes, you must dance.”
When Raggy translated his majesty’s words Harry could not keep from laughing aloud.
The idea, he thought, of his leading one of those bloody-faced amazons through a mazy dance, or of his dancing in her majesty’s uniform to please a savage king!
“No,” he said, “he could not dance; but Raggy would.”
Raggy whispered something to his master, and the reply was —
“So you have, Raggy; I had quite forgotten. Go and fetch it.”
Raggy was back in less than a minute with a German concertina, which he had looted from Mahmoud, and which had been intended for King ’Ngaloo.
The effect of Harry’s playing on this instrument was magical. There was a half-frightened silence at first, succeeded by murmurs of delight.
“Lobo! Lobo!! Lobo!!!” cried the king, emphatically, and when Harry finished he smoothed the back of his hand with one finger, as if he had been a pet rat, and Harry could have sworn he saw tears in the poor man’s eyes.
“Now, Raggy,” cried Harry, striking into a hornpipe, “now for your breakdown.”
Raggy required no second bidding, and I am sure no stage nigger ever could have gone through one half the capers Raggy did, in that wonderful breakdown of his.
During the dance the king’s face was something to behold and wonder at, his excitement was intense, and when Raggy finished he had simply to begin again. So it was “encore” and “encore” till the poor boy fairly sank on the ground panting from exertion, and the king shouted “Lobo! Lobo! Lobo! Lobo!”
To change the programme, Harry commenced to sing “Rule Britannia,” and somewhat to his surprise, while the king beat time with his hand on his knee, several of the amazons joined the chorus and actually followed the tune.
The amazons after this took chains of flowers and threw over Harry’s head till he was nearly choked.
The concert ended at last and feasting began, and after this the king was led away and deposited on a couch of leaves and flowers, and at once went off to sleep.
“And no wonder,” said Harry to himself, “for he has picked the bones of a couple of fowls, and eaten nearly half a goat.”
Next morning his majesty was up betimes, and as bright as a lark.
He was full of business. There was Harry’s boat to get ready, and also his own, for he meant to send his guest away in state.
“Ask or me anything,” he said to Harry, “and I will give it if you promise to return.”
“I will assuredly return,” replied Harry, “if the Great Father spares me.”
“And now, when I think of it, I shall be for ever grateful to you for your hospitality. Will you add to it by lending me two of your people to help me as carriers on my march?”
The answer was made in the following way. The king ran rapidly along the ranks of his amazons, and dragged out two of the sturdiest, whom he almost flung into Harry’s arms.
Harry stepped back laughing.
“Oh, no, your majesty,” he said, “not the ladies, please.”
“Lobo! Lobo!” said his majesty.
The boat in which Harry and his companions embarked for the distant eastern shore, was bedded with beautiful flowers, and when he bade the king goodbye on the shore he took away with him three sturdy islanders to act as guides, and to help to carry his guns and packages.
These last contained a supply of rice sufficient to last the little expedition for many months.
When he reached the hill-top and looked back, lo! there on the beach still stood the honest king. Once more adieus were waved; then Harry and his people went down over the mountain side, and bore away to the West.
It was when in bivouac that night, halfway up a hill, with the moon and stars shining in a clear blue sky and brilliantly reflected in a little lake down beneath, that Harry remembered that all the time he had been a guest of the island king, he had never spoken to either him or his people of the good tidings of the Gospel.
He felt his face burn red as he thought of his neglect. But he vowed to himself that if spared to return he would try to make amends for such thoughtlessness.
“You should sow good seed when you can,” something seemed to whisper to Harry; “the ground may be rough, the soil may be hard, but good seed often makes good soil for itself.”
Book Four – Chapter One.
On the War Path.
Adventure with a Python – The Unwholesome Fen – The Village of the Dismal Swamp – The Man-Eater
Not only as guides and carriers, but in a variety of other ways did Harry find his new men useful. They were undoubtedly honest, they were just as undoubtedly brave, and last, but not least, they were willing.
Well, they were servants and subjects of the island king, and depend upon it a good master always makes a good servant.
It was but two men that Harry desired to have lent to him, but his majesty insisted on sending three, wisely observing that while the two could carry the packages, the other could act as guide and scout.
At the time, then, that the last “act” in this tale of ours opens, Harry had already been three months on the road.
Three months only? Why it seemed like three years, so filled had the days been with toil and adventure. No wonder that Harry felt a man when he looked back to all he had come through. He had seen many strange sights, and been among many strange tribes and peoples, and yet he could have told you truthfully that he had not as yet made an enemy. To do so needs that wonderful skill and judgment, tact and calmness of mind, which only men like Stanley and Cameron possess.
My own impression is that one is more safe among the really unsophisticated tribes of the far interior, than among those that lie more near the coast, and who have been leavened with a modicum of civilisation – and mayhap a modicum of rum. I would rather trust myself among savages who had never seen a white man before, than among the Somali Indians to the north of the line – whose tricks and manners, by the way, I have good cause to remember.
Harry inquired the names of his islanders, but found they were so difficult to pronounce, unless he tried to swallow his tongue, and screwed his mouth out of all shape, that he determined to give them English ones, so he called them Walter – the scout – and Bob and Bill – the carriers. But in the mouths of these Indians Walter became “Walda,” Bob became “Popa,” and Bill became “Peela;” so let them stand: Walda, Popa, and Peela.
They were so much alike that it was quite a long time before Harry could tell the one from the other – tell Popa from Peela, I mean.
As for Walda, though he was quite as tall, quite as straight, and every bit as jetty black as his companions, his teeth had been filed into triangles, and stained crimson by some mysterious means or other, and as he was always on the grin there was no mistaking him.
Walda had a wondrous way of his own of making his peace with native tribes. He seemed to know the whole country well, and used to run on miles in front of the company, and by the time Harry got up it was no uncommon thing to find everything prepared and ready, and even a rude tent made for the white man’s reception.
So that life became now a deal easier for our hero.
Poor Walda, though, had one day a narrow escape from a most terrible death.
It was well for him that Harry and the rest of his people were near to save him.
I cannot tell you whether or not the python or marsh boa of Central Africa is a spiteful reptile, for I have never seen but one, and he made no attempt to attack me, although I stood not twenty yards away. I cannot believe all the fearful tales I have read and been told about the creature, of its enormous length – sometimes sixty feet – of its power to swallow a small bullock, and of its chasing travellers till they heard its panting behind them, and felt its fulsome breath beating warm between their shoulders. This would surely be more fearsome than any nightmare. It puts one in mind of the words of the immortal Coleridge —
“Like one that on a lonesome road
Doth walk in fear and dread,
And having once turned round, walks on,
And turns no more his head;
Because he knows a frightful fiend
Doth close behind him tread.”
Walda was only a little way ahead of the rest on the day he was attacked by the python. Nor was it of very large size, else would I not have Walda’s adventures to write.
The guide was near a tree when suddenly, with a loud hiss, the monster sprang upon him. It seized the unfortunate man by the naked shoulder with its fangs, and, twisting its tail round a tree, commenced to roll Walda up in its coils.
His companions dropped their burdens and rushed to his rescue.
None too soon. Yet the attack and relief both together could hardly have occupied more than twenty seconds. It was evident from the quickness with which Peela and Popa commenced untwisting the coils from the tree, that they had been actors in a scene like this before. They at the same time hacked at the tail with their knives.
Meanwhile Harry had run his sword-bayonet, which luckily was fixed to the end of the rifle, through the boa constrictor’s body. Its folds were instantly released, and Walda fell forward insensible, only to be speedily dragged away by Somali Jack.
It was time for all to run now, to escape the lashings and writhings of the monster. It coiled round the tree, and uncoiled again. It lay for moments dormant, then sprang high in air.
Harry now took steady aim with his rifle and shot it through the neck, close to the head, and soon after it expired.
In journeying on and on, ever towards the west, Harry and his people had met with many a wild beast; sometimes, indeed, they were far too close to lions to feel quite at home with their position. Very few, however, fell to the guns, for the simplest of all reasons, they only fired when really obliged to.
They found themselves one day on a hill-top, overlooking a vast stretch of level country that extended towards the then setting sun as far as the eye could reach.
In some places it seemed bare and sandy, while in others there were clumps of forest trees, but for the most part it was treeless. Here and there little lakes of water glittered in the sun’s parting rays, and looked like pools of blood.
It was an eerisome and ugly-looking district to cross, and Harry looked north and south in the hope of seeing hills which he might reach, and thus make a détour and avoid it. He consulted Walda on the subject.
But Walda shook his head.
“No, no,” he said; “no way round. Must cross.”
They entered on this dismal swamp early next morning.
It appeared like going down into a black and dreary ocean, and Harry could not help a feeling of hopelessness and melancholy stealing over him before he had walked for an hour, and the farther on he went the more gloomy and depressed in spirits did he become.
Perhaps this was the effects of breathing the tainted and unwholesome air.
“Why am I toiling and moiling here,” he asked himself peevishly, again and again, “when I might be far away and happy? This is no pleasure,” he said, half aloud; “better by far I were dead.”
Then he remembered he had a duty to perform – that of endeavouring to find out and rescue his poor men.
But was he doing it? No, he was only bent on his own pleasure and enjoyment. Enjoyment indeed! He was a fool for his pains, and a great sinner besides. What were his parents doing all this weary time? The Bunting must be home long ago. And he would have been given up for lost. They must have thought the dhow foundered at sea, or been lost among the breakers and every one drowned. Well, then, if he was given up for lost, the bitterness of his mother’s grief must already be nearly assuaged. What mattered a year or two more of wandering? He would wander. He would find his men or perish in the attempt. So ran his thoughts.
And thus moodily, and half angrily, did Harry muse as he marched over the dismal waste at the heels of his faithful guide Walda.
It was not easy walking here either; there were darksome murky pools to go round, and brown unwholesome streams to wade through.
Nothing could have been more depressing than the view around him, look where he would.
As far as wild beasts were concerned, the dismal swamp was untenanted. Here were no lordly elephants, no sturdy rhinoceroses, no giraffes towering in their strength, nor deer, nor gnu, nor hartbeeste, nor the herds of swift-footed ambling zebras they had been so used to behold.
But in the great pools, and in the sluggish mud-stained streams, wallowed crocodiles more large and loathsome than Harry could have imagined even in his dreams, while often several of these at one time could be seen on the banks huddled together asleep or basking in the sunshine.
They walked onwards as fast as they could, hardly pausing to eat, but there seemed no end to the horrible fen. It seemed to Harry as if he was bound to go on, and still go on, but never come to anything.
The sun began to set at last, glaring purple through a watery-looking sky.
There was nothing for it but sleep in the swamp till another day dawned. Harry and his men now sought the shelter of a clump of stunted trees which they reached after some difficulty.
While daylight lasted they were careful to beat the bush well before they thought of lighting the camp-fire, for close under the trees in places like this the giant anaconda or python often lies coiled up till roused to fury by the presence of man or other animals.
The sun went down, and gloaming and gloom settled down over the marsh. The very stars seemed to give a feebler light than was their wont, for their rays were shorn by a rising haze.
It took quite a long time to-night to light the camp-fire, for the materials had got damp.
The process of making fire is very simple to appearance, but requires no little skill; it is, however, common among nearly all savage nations, and my readers may, if they please, try their hands at it. Suppose yourself a savage and have another savage to assist you. Well, you are possessed of a round piece of hard dry wood about the length but not nearly so thick as an ebony ruler, it is tapered to a point at one end. Your companion savage sits in front of you holding firmly a bit of softer wood, flat at the bottom for steadiness’ sake, and with a little hole in the top. Into this hole you insert the point of your hard wood drill, then you have only to roll it rapidly back and fore between your two palms, till sparks are emitted and smoke, then fanning or blowing with your breath, and partially surrounding the hole with dried meadow grass, or anything that will catch easily, will do the rest. If you try it, I hope you will be successful; I myself lack two important essentials to success – patience and dexterity.
But Jack and the guide “made fire” at last, and supper was cooked and eaten.
During the time it was being got ready Harry had taken a little walk in the dim starlight. He did not go far, for he soon got into a miry place. Here he almost trampled upon a gigantic eel creature – it could hardly have been a snake – it was slowly dragging its body through the slime.
While he was looking at it there was the sound of wings in the sky right above him. It was a great vulture of some kind: birds of this kind are scarcely ever a mile distant from a party of African travellers, and have the lion’s share of all that is killed. The flapping of wings was very loud and accompanied by a rustling noise; so close overhead was it that he could hear it breathe hoarsely – so at least he thought. But hardly had he turned away ere the great bird swooped down, and next moment it had re-ascended carrying the great eel with it. Seeing the latter, though but for a moment, wriggling in the talons of the unclean bird was quite enough for Harry. He walked no farther that way, but speedily returned to the camp.
The fire and his supper rendered him a shade more comfortable; his people went into the wood to collect dry material to make their master a bed. They beat the grass first with their spears before they ventured to put their hands down, for several deadly-looking, triangular-headed snakes had been seen before sunset, rustling through the undergrowth or hanging to the branches of the trees.
Harry lay down at last, but he slept but little. How could he in such a place, with the horrid bellowing of crocodiles ever and anon rising on the night air, the intervals being filled up with the continuous hoarse snoring of some creatures in the marsh, probably gigantic frogs! (Dactylathrae.)
Next morning there was no chance of proceeding so early as they had wished, for all the swamp was enveloped in a dark grey fog or mist, and it was nearly noon before the sun had succeeded in dispelling it.
On they journeyed now, happy to be able to start at last, for Harry shuddered to think what the consequences would be if the mist did not lift for days.
They had not gone above five miles ere a village came into view.
Harry made Raggy ask the guide why he had not mentioned the existence of this town.
