I PROPOSE TO GO INTO THE FOREST TO HUNT--ROTEMBO PROMISES ME THREE
GIFTS--ROGALA, THE FAMOUS HUNTER, THE FIRST OF THEM--DESCRIPTION OF
ROGALA--ANDEKKO, THE DOG, THE SECOND GIFT--NDOVA, THE MONKEY, THE
THIRD--HOW NDOVA WAS CAPTURED AND REARED--I GIVE ROTEMBO SOME OF MY
HAIR.
ONE day after I had been in the village some time, being in the house
of Rotembo, I said to him: "I have been with you quite a while, and I
wish now to go far into the forest. I wish you to give me a man whom
you trust, a great hunter, who is not afraid of danger and who can face
with his gun the most ferocious beasts of the country. He and I will
live together in the forest."
Rotembo looked at me with great astonishment, for he wondered why I
wished to go and live in the forest by myself with only one man.
He remained silent for a minute or two, thinking deeply; then he said:
"Oguizi, I will give you three gifts to go with you in the forest."
"What are they?" I asked.
"I will not tell you now," he replied, "but you will know when they are
before you."
Then we separated, I wondering what were to be the three gifts Rotembo
was to give me.
Four days passed by, and on the fifth, while I was seated by the side
of Rotembo, a strange-looking man came before him, and bending very low
took hold of his foot and said: "To do your bidding your faithful slave
has come."
I looked at the man with great curiosity, and learned that his name was
Rogala and that he was one of the most famous hunters in the country.
Rogala was of medium height and exceedingly well proportioned. His legs
and arms were very muscular and as hard as wood. His chest was broad,
and his hands and feet were small,--a very common occurrence among the
people of the forest. His eyes were full of fire and daring. He had
a fighting chin, and he appeared to be about forty years old. Scars
upon one of his legs told where a leopard had once wounded him. He
wore a huge head-dress of eagle's feathers. His eyelids were painted
red, and a red stripe from the nose upward divided his forehead in two
parts. The face was painted white, and on each side of the mouth were
two round red spots. He was covered with mondahs, or charms. One of
these protected him against witchcraft; another made him invulnerable
against bullets, spears, or poisoned arrows--in a word, every one of
them protected him against some evil or other.
Rotembo said to me: "I can trust Rogala more than any other man in the
country. I bought him when he was quite young, and he has forgotten the
language of his tribe. He faces without fear the ngina (gorilla), the
elephant, the leopard, and the fiercest bear of the country. He has
killed during his life more than one hundred elephants and he has kept
all their tails as proofs. The number of hippopotami that have fallen
under his gun is very great; the necklace I wear round my neck is made
of the canines of some of the leopards he has killed."
I counted forty-eight of them; so Rogala had killed twelve leopards for
the chief's necklace. He himself wore one with twenty-four canines; so
before me were the witnesses of eighteen leopards that he had killed.
As I looked at Rogala, I said to myself: "He is just the kind of man I
should like to take into the forest with me."
"Rogala is one of the three gifts I have promised you," said Rotembo.
I thanked the chief for the gift of Rogala, whereupon he said to him:
"You know that I have always treated you well. Several times when I
wanted to marry the daughters of chiefs they said, 'Only upon one
condition can you marry my daughter, and that is, that you give me
Rogala.' I always refused them, for I would not part with you."
I did not wonder at it, for if Rogala had killed over one hundred
elephants, the barter of their tusks had brought wealth to Rotembo.
"I have given you to the Oguizi while he is in my country," continued
the chief. "You must take care of him as you do of me. You must follow
him in the forest. You must sleep by his side. You must face the wild
beasts with him, and show him that Rogala's heart knows no fear. Put no
shame on me by running away before danger; if you do you might just as
well die in the jaws of a wild beast, for I myself will kill you. He is
my Oguizi, and I love him. See that he is never hungry or thirsty."
While the chief was talking, Rogala listened reverently. When Rotembo
had done speaking, Rogala said: "Chief, the best of masters, Rogala
always does what you order him to do. I will do all you say, and follow
the Oguizi wherever he goes, and live with him in the great forest
and hunt with him. I will take care of him just as if he were my
sweetheart."
"Rogala," said I, "I will be your friend. When we get into the forest,
we will be like two men who are born the same day." Among the Africans
of the great forest, when two men are born the same day, they are
foster brothers.
"Good indeed you are, Oguizi," replied Rogala. "I will obey you in
everything."
Then I presented him with a big hunting-knife, which pleased him
greatly.
The following day, while I was seated by Rotembo under the veranda
of his house, I saw Rogala coming towards us. He had with him a very
strange-looking dog.
Rotembo said to me: "Look at this dog. His name is Andekko. He is
fearless and always in the thick of the fight. He is not afraid of any
wild beast. In war he always warns us of an enemy hiding in the jungle.
He is the best of hunting dogs. He goes into the forest all alone in
search of game, and will drive the antelope or gazelle up to Rogala
or the hunter he knows, even if it takes him the whole day to do so.
He has captured several young nginas and nshiegos after their mothers
were killed, and gone into the lair of leopards and killed their young.
The wonder is that he has not been killed by a gorilla or leopard long
before now or been gashed in two by a boar or disabled by monkeys.
Many times he will prevent you from being hungry while you are in the
forest."
[Illustration: _Rogala and Andekko_.]
I gazed at Andekko with wonder, he looked so very ugly. He was covered
with scars, marks of the wounds he had received in his conflicts with
wild animals. One of his ears was split in two. His upper and lower
lips were also cut on the left side. These two wounds had been made by
a large monkey, called a mandril, which often walks on the ground and
had been surprised there by Andekko.
Rotembo, seeing that I was looking at the scars of Andekko, said:
"Oguizi, when wounded, this dog becomes even fiercer and more
courageous than before. He is famous for his courage."
Andekko belonged to the same family of dogs as those that had gone
gorilla-hunting with me at King Mombo's plantation. His hair was of
yellowish color, and he had a white spot on his throat. His tail could
not have been more curly, and he was quite lean; his legs were somewhat
long.
Then Rotembo said: "Oguizi, Andekko is the second gift I promised you."
The next day Rogala came again, but this time with a monkey called
Ndova. He was a fine creature, with a nice coat of hair and a white
nose. The chief, pointing to the monkey, said: "His name is Ndova, and
he has the intelligence of a man. He goes with Rogala into the forest.
We have given him the name of Ndova because the species of monkeys to
which he belongs is so called. You will not often be hungry in the
forest when Ndova is with you, for he will call upon other ndovas to
come to him while he stands close to you and Rogala, and when these
come you will shoot them. You will have plenty of monkey meat to eat.
When monkeys are fat," he added, "they taste fine, especially if they
are broiled on a bright charcoal fire. While living on my plantations,
I often take Ndova with me. He can only call on his fellow ndovas, for
the other species do not understand his talk.
"There will be days," added Rotembo, "when you will find no monkeys or
other game and hunger will come upon you. Then Ndova must follow you.
There are many kinds of fruits, berries, and nuts in the forest; these
look very tempting, but several of them are very poisonous, and people
die if they eat them. So when you see any fruit, berries, or nuts you
do not know, do not eat them until you give them to Ndova first. If he
eats them, these are also good for you."
"Monkeys never make a mistake; they have a gift which no man
possesses. By the sense of smell they can tell if a berry, nut, or
fruit is poisonous. They always smell a thing they do not know before
eating it, and when it is poisonous they throw it away. If it is not
poisonous, they give it a bite. In that case what is good for the
monkey is good for the man. But I must tell you that often the nuts,
berries, or fruits a monkey likes men do not like, for monkeys and men
have not always the same taste."
After hearing the words of Rotembo I looked with renewed curiosity at
Ndova. He was almost as large as Andekko. His nose was white, which
contrasted strongly with the color of his dark hair tipped with whitish
gray. He had long canine teeth. I was glad to hear he was gentle, for I
should not have liked to be bitten by him.
"Oguizi, I give you Ndova," Rotembo said. "He is the third gift I
promised you. I think you will get on well in the forest with Rogala,
Andekko, and Ndova. There are two other of my slaves who are also great
hunters. Their names are Shinshooko and Alapai. These three men live
close together in the forest and spend their lives in hunting; they
have their families with them.
"I got Ndova in the following manner," he continued. "I and my slave
Rogala were hunting together near the plantation where you are going.
We were lying in wait for boars, when finally we heard their grunts.
We heard at the same time the chatter of monkeys above our heads. The
boars came in sight and we fired. Then, to our astonishment, a little
monkey fell from the tree above our heads. The firing of our guns had
frightened his mother, who dropped him. He did not have the strength to
hold on to the branches. I seized the little fellow and put him into my
bag. The mother followed all the way back to the plantation, uttering
cries of distress and anger. Sometimes she would come down to the
ground, look at us, and go up into the trees again. She did not dare
to approach too near us. After coming to the house we fed the little
monkey with the milk of a goat and called him Ndova. His mother at the
same time remained on a commanding tree close by, calling the little
fellow. Soon she was joined by her mate, who added his calls to hers.
They slept on a tree near the plantation that night, and we kept the
baby in the house. At daylight the two big monkeys were still on the
same tree, and uttered cries of anguish and distress, calling for the
little fellow, but did not dare to come down.
"Three days passed and we thought little Ndova's mother had got tired
and gone away for good into the forest, leaving her offspring to his
fate, for we no longer heard her cries.
"We made a little bed of leaves and used to leave Ndova upon it in the
sun. We had gone into our huts one afternoon. After a while I came out
of the house and just in time. For Ndova's mother had apparently been
watching from a tree and seeing nobody had come down and had taken
hold of Ndova and was carrying him away into the forest as fast as she
could. I shouted with all my might, and Ndova lost his hold and dropped
to the ground.
"We went into the forest and made a trap to catch the mother, and
brought the little monkey and put him in the trap. We were then
sure that she would come and see him and try to get him away. When
everything was ready, we hid and waited. After a time we saw a monkey
quietly coming down a tree. It was the mother; we recognized her by her
white nose. She uttered a sound of joy as she approached Ndova. Then
she got into the cage, and the trap-door closed behind her.
"When we came towards the cage, the big monkey was much frightened. We
took the cage with us.
"The mother nursed the little one for over ten moons (months), and
after that she stayed with him until she died. By that time Ndova
could take care of himself, and had learned the language of the ndova
monkeys from his mother.
"After the death of his mother, Rogala took Ndova, who had grown fond
of him, into the forest every day, to find food for himself, leading
him by a string. Often the monkeys of his kind would come around above
his head and talk to him, and Ndova would answer them. After a time
Rogala tied a long rope to Ndova, so that he might go higher up the
trees after fruits. Then came the time when Ndova could talk very loud
and call other ndovas to him, and Rogala found that Ndova had become
very useful. Rogala, Ndova, and Andekko are now three inseparable
friends. Ndova and Andekko are great chums, for they love to play
together."
I thanked Chief Rotembo for his valuable gifts, and said that they
would be of great service to me, and promised that when ready to leave
the country I would return Ndova and Andekko to him.
When Rogala heard these words, a broad grin of satisfaction overspread
his face. He was the keeper of Andekko and Ndova, both of whom were his
constant companions. He was afraid that Rotembo had given them to me
for all time.
I gave a bone to Andekko, who was inclined to growl at me at first,
and a ripe plantain to Ndova, who gave a peculiar "_Oh oh_" to show his
joy. I found afterward that Ndova was very fond of ripe plantains and
bananas.
[Illustration: _Ndova's mother tries to carry him away into the
forest._]
"I will feed Ndova and Andekko often," said I to Rogala, "so that they
may get accustomed to me."
I often think that if it had not been for Andekko and Ndova I should
probably have died of starvation in the great forest.
A few days afterwards Rotembo came to me and said: "Oguizi, I want you
to give me some of your hair. I shall consider this the greatest gift
that I have ever received."
My hair had become very long and hung over my shoulders. I had let it
grow, for it excited great wonder among the natives. It was very black
and silky. So I pulled out half a dozen hairs and presented them to
Rotembo. As soon as he received the gift, he muttered words I could not
understand, then took his little idol from the bag that always hung
by his side, and wound two of the hairs round and round its neck. The
four others he carefully put aside in a little wooden box. After this
he looked perfectly happy, and said to me, "Oguizi, the six long hairs
you have given me are more valuable in my eyes than many tusks of
elephants, brass kettles, wives, or slaves."
I often wished I had had flaxen hair and blue eyes instead of black
hair and hazel eyes, for I should then have appeared still more
wonderful in the eyes of these wild and savage men.