THE SHIMBA HILLS.
IX.
A TROPICAL JUNGLE.
Many months later, and after adventures elsewhere described,[3] besides
others not relevant for the moment, F., an Englishman, and I returned to
Mombasa. We came from some hundred odd miles in the interior where we
had been exploring the sources and the course of the Tsavo River. Now
our purpose was to penetrate into the low, hot, wooded country along the
coast known as the Shimba Hills in quest of a rare beast called the
sable antelope.
These hills could be approached in one of two ways--by crossing the
harbour, and then marching two days afoot; or by voyaging up to the very
end of one of the long arms of the sea that extend many miles inland.
The latter involved dhows, dependence on uncertain winds, favourable
tides, and a heap of good luck. It was less laborious but most
uncertain. At this stage of the plan the hotel manager came forward with
the offer of a gasoline launch, which we gladly accepted.
We embarked about noon, storing our native carriers and effects aboard a
dhow hired for the occasion. This we purposed towing. A very neatly
uniformed Swahili bearing on his stomach a highly-polished brass label
as big as a door plate--"Harbour Police"--threw duck fists over what he
called overloading the boat. He knew very little about boats, but threw
very competent duck fists. As we did know something about boats, we
braved unknown consequences by disregarding him utterly. No consequences
ensued--unless perhaps to his own health. When everything was aboard,
that dhow was pretty well down, but still well afloat. Then we white men
took our places in the launch.
This was a long narrow affair with a four-cylinder thirty-horsepower
engine. As she possessed no speed gears, she had either to plunge ahead
full speed or come to a stop; there were no compromises. Her steering
was managed by a tiller instead of a wheel, so that a mere touch
sufficed to swerve her ten feet from her course. As the dhow was in no
respects built on such nervous lines, she did occasionally some fancy
and splashing curves.
The pilot of the launch turned out to be a sandy-haired Yankee who had
been catching wild animals for Barnum and Bailey's circus. While waiting
for his ship, he, being a proverbial handy Yankee, had taken on this
job. He became quite interested in telling us this, and at times forgot
his duties at the tiller. Then that racing-launch would take a wild
swoop; the clumsy old dhow astern would try vainly, with much spray and
dangerous careening, to follow; the compromise course would all but
upset her; the spray would fly; the safari boys would take their
ducking; the boat boys would yell and dance and lean frantically against
the two long sweeps with which they tried to steer. In this wild and
untrammelled fashion we careered up the bay, too interested in our own
performances to pay much attention to the scenery. The low shores, with
their cocoanut groves gracefully rising above the mangrove tangle,
slipped by, and the distant blue Shimba Hills came nearer.
After a while we turned into a narrower channel with a good many curves
and a quite unknown depth of water. Down this we whooped at the full
speed of our thirty-horsepower engine. Occasional natives, waist deep
and fishing, stared after us open-eyed. The Yankee ventured a guess as
to how hard she would hit on a mudbank. She promptly proved his guess a
rank underestimate by doing so. We fell in a heap on the bottom. The
dhow bore down on us with majestic momentum. The boat boys leaned
frantically on their sweeps, and managed just to avoid us. The dhow also
rammed the mudbank. A dozen reluctant boys hopped overboard and pushed
us off. We pursued our merry way again. On either hand now appeared fish
weirs of plaited coco fibre; which, being planted in the shallows,
helped us materially to guess at the channel. Naked men, up to their
shoulders in the water, attended to some mysterious need of the nets, or
emerged dripping and sparkling from the water with baskets of fish atop
their heads. The channel grew even narrower, and the mudbanks more
frequent. We dodged a dozen in our headlong course. Our local guide, a
Swahili in tarboosh and a beautiful saffron robe, showed signs of strong
excitement. We were to stop, he said, around the next bend; and at this
rate we never could stop. The Yankee remarked, superfluously, that it
would be handy if this dod-blistered engine had a clutch; adding, as an
afterthought, that no matter how long he stayed in the tropics his nose
peeled. We asked what we should do if we over-carried our prospective
landing-place. He replied that the dod-blistered thing did have a
reverse. While thus conversing we shot around a corner into a complete
cul-de-sac! Everything was shut off hastily, and an instant later we and
the dhow smashed up high and dry on a cozy mud beach! We drew a deep
breath and looked around us.
Mangrove thicket to the edge of the slimy ooze; trees behind--that was
all we could see. We gave our attention to the business of getting our
men, our effects, and ourselves ashore. The ooze proved to be just above
knee deep. The porters had a fearful and floundering time, and received
much obvious comment from us perched in the bow of the launch. Finally
everything was debarked. F. and I took off our boots; but our gunbearers
expressed such horror at the mere thought of our plunging into the mud,
that we dutifully climbed them pick-a-back and were carried. The hard
shell beach was a hundred feet away, occupying a little recess where the
persistent tough mangroves drew back. From it led a narrow path through
the thicket. We waved and shouted a farewell to the crews of the launch
and the dhow.
The path for a hundred feet was walled in by the mangroves through which
scuttled and rattled the big land crabs. Then suddenly we found
ourselves in a story-book tropical paradise. The tall coco palms rose
tufted above everything; the fans of the younger palms waved below;
bananas thrust the banners of their broad leaves wherever they could
find space; creepers and vines flung the lush luxuriance of their
greenery over all the earth and into the depths of all the half-guessed
shadows. In no direction could one see unobstructed farther than twenty
feet, except straight up; and there one could see just as far as the
tops of the palms. It was like being in a room--a green, hot, steamy,
lovely room. Very bright-coloured birds that ought really to have been
at home in their cages fluttered about.
We had much vigorous clearing to do to make room for our tents. By the
time the job was finished we were all pretty hot. Several of the boys
made vain attempts to climb for nuts, but without success. We had
brought them with us from the interior, where cocoanuts do not grow; and
they did not understand the method. They could swarm up the tall slim
stems all right, but could not manage to get through the
downward-pointing spikes of the dead leaves. F. tried and failed, to the
great amusement of the men, but to the greater amusement of myself. I
was a wise person, and lay on my back on a canvas cot, so it was not
much bother to look up and enjoy life. Not to earn absolutely the stigma
of laziness, I tried to shoot some nuts down. This did not work either,
for the soft, spongy stems closed around the bullet holes. Then a little
wizened monkey of a Swahili porter, having watched our futile
performances with interest, nonchalantly swarmed up; in some mysterious
manner he wriggled through the defences, and perched in the top, whence
he dropped to us a dozen big green nuts. Our men may not have been much
of a success at climbing for nuts; but they were passed masters at the
art of opening them. Three or four clips from their awkward swordlike
pangas, and we were each presented with a clean, beautiful, natural
goblet brimming full of a refreshing drink.
About this time a fine figure of a man drifted into camp. He was very
smooth-skinned, very dignified, very venerable. He was pure Swahili,
though of the savage branch of that race, and had none of the negro
type of countenance. In fact, so like was he in face, hair, short square
beard and genial dignity to a certain great-uncle of mine that it was
very hard to remember that he had on only a small strip of cloth, that
he was cherishing as a great treasure a piece of soap box he had
salvaged from the shore, and that his skin was red chocolate. I felt
inclined to talk to him as to an intellectual equal, especially as he
had a fine resonant bass voice that in itself lent his remarks some
importance. However, I gave him two ordinary wood screws, showed him how
they screwed in and out, and left him happy.
After supper the moon rose, casting shadows of new and unknown shapes
through this strangely new and unknown forest. A thin white mist
ascending everywhere from the soil tempered but could not obscure the
white brilliance. The thermometer stood now only at 82°, but the
dripping tropical sweat-bath in which our camp was pitched considerably
raised the sensible heat. A bird with a most diabolical shrieking note
cursed in the shadows. Another, a pigeon-like creature, began softly,
and continued to repeat in diminishing energy until it seemed to have
run down, like a piece of clockwork.
Our way next morning led for some time through this lovely but damp
jungle. Then we angled up the side of a hill to emerge into the
comparatively open country atop what we Westerners would call a "hog's
back"--a long narrow spurlike ridge mounting slowly to the general
elevation of the main hills. Here were high green bushes, with little
free open passages between them, and occasionally meadow-like openings
running down the slopes on one side or the other. Before us, some miles
distant, were the rounded blue hills.
We climbed steadily. It was still very early morning, but already the
day was hot. Pretty soon we saw over the jungle to the gleaming waters
of the inlet, and then to the sea. Our "hog's back" led us past a ridge
of the hills, and before we knew it we had been deposited in a shallow
valley three or four miles wide between parallel ridges; the said valley
being at a considerable elevation, and itself diversified with rolling
hills, ravines, meadow land, and wide flats. On many of the ridges were
scattered cocoanut palms, and occasional mango groves, while many smokes
attested the presence of natives.
These we found in shambas or groups of little farms, huddled all
together, with wilderness and brush and trees, or the wide open green
grass lawn between. The houses were very large and neat-looking. They
were constructed quite ingeniously from coco branches. Each branch made
one mat. The leaves were all brought over to the same side of the stem,
and then plaited. The resulting mat was then six or seven feet long by
from twelve to sixteen inches broad, and could be used for a variety of
purposes. Indeed, we found Melville's chapter in "Typhee" as to the
various uses of the cocoanut palm by no means exaggerated. The nuts,
leaves, and fibre supplied every conceivable human want.
The natives were a pleasant, friendly, good-looking lot. In fact, so
like was their cast of countenance to that of the white-skinned people
we were accustomed to see that we had great difficulty in realizing that
they were mere savages, costume--or lack of it--to the contrary
notwithstanding. Under a huge mango tree two were engaged in dividing a
sheep. Sixty or seventy others stood solemnly around watching. It may
have been a religious ceremony, for all I know; but the affair looked to
be about two parts business to sixty of idle and cheerful curiosity. We
stopped and talked to them a little, chaffed the pretty girls--they were
really pretty--and marched on.
About noon our elegant guide stopped, struck an attitude, and pointed
with his silver-headed rattan cane.
"This," said he, "is where we must camp."
We marched through a little village. A family party sat beneath the
veranda of a fine building--a very old wrinkled couple; two stalwart
beautiful youths; a young mother suckling her baby; two young girls; and
eight or ten miscellaneous and naked youngsters. As the rest of the
village appeared to be empty, I imagined this to be the caretaker's
family, and the youngsters to belong to others. We stopped and spoke,
were answered cheerfully, suggested that we might like to buy chickens,
and offered a price. Instantly with a whoop of joy the lot of them were
afoot. The fowl waited for no further intimations of troublous times,
but fled squawking. They had been there before. So had our hosts; for
inside a minute they had returned, each with a chicken--and a broad
grin.
After due payment we proceeded on a few hundred yards, and pitched camp
beneath two huge mango trees.
Besides furnishing one of the most delicious of the tropical fruits,
the mango is also one of the most beautiful of trees. It is tall,
spreads very wide, and its branches sweep to within ten feet of the
ground. Its perfect symmetry combined with the size and deep green of
its leaves causes it to resemble, from a short distance, a beautiful
green hill. Beneath its umbrella one finds dense shade, unmottled by a
single ray of sunlight, so that one can lie under it in full confidence.
For, parenthetically, even a single ray of this tropical sunlight is to
the unprotected a very dangerous thing. But the leaves of the mango have
this peculiarity, which distinguishes it from all other trees--namely,
that they grow only at the very ends of the small twigs and branches. As
these, of course, grow only at the ends of the big limbs, it follows
that from beneath the mango looks like a lofty green dome, a veritable
pantheon of the forest.
We made our camp under one of these trees; gave ourselves all the space
we could use; and had plenty left over--five tents and a cook camp, with
no crowding. It was one of the pleasantest camps I ever saw. Our green
dome overhead protected us absolutely from the sun; high sweet grass
grew all about us; the breeze wandered lazily up from the distant
Indian Ocean. Directly before our tent door the slope fell gently away
through a sparse cocoanut grove whose straight stems panelled our view,
then rose again to the clear-cut outline of a straight ridge opposite.
The crest of this was sentinelled by tall scattered cocoanut trees, the
"bursting star" pyrotechnic effect of their tops being particularly fine
against the sky.
After a five hours' tropical march uphill we were glad to sit under our
green dome, to look at our view, to enjoy the little breeze, and to
drink some of the cocoanuts our friends the villagers brought in.
FOOTNOTES:
[3] "The Land of Footprints."
X.
THE SABLE.
About three o'clock I began to feel rested and ambitious. Therefore I
called up our elegant guide and Memba Sasa, and set out on my first hunt
for sable. F. was rather more done up by the hard morning, and so did
not go along. The guide wore still his red tarboosh, his dark short
jacket, his saffron yellow nether garment--it was not exactly a
skirt--and his silver-headed rattan cane. The only change he made was to
tuck up the skirt, leaving his long legs bare. It hardly seemed
altogether a suitable costume for hunting; but he seemed to know what he
was about.
We marched along ridges, and down into ravines, and across gulleys
choked with brush. Horrible thickets alternated with and occasionally
surrounded open green meadows hanging against the side hills. As we
proceeded, the country became rougher, the ravines more precipitous. We
struggled up steep hills, fairly bucking our way through low growth that
proved all but impenetrable. The idea was to find a sable feeding in one
of the little open glades; but whenever I allowed myself to think of the
many adverse elements of the game, the chances seemed very slim. It took
a half-hour to get from one glade to the next; there were thousands of
glades. The sable is a rare shy animal that likes dense cover fully as
well if not better than the open. Sheer rank bull luck alone seemed the
only hope. And as I felt my strength going in that vicious struggle
against heavy brush and steep hills, I began to have very strong doubts
indeed as to that sable.
For it was cruel, hard work. In this climate one hailed a car or a
rickshaw to do an errand two streets away, and considered oneself quite
a hero if one took a leisurely two-mile stroll along the cliff heads at
sunset. Here I was, after a five-hour uphill march, bucking into brush
and through country that would be considered difficult going even in
Canada. At the end of twenty minutes my every garment was not wringing
but dripping wet, so that when I carried my rifle over my arm water ran
down the barrel and off the muzzle in a steady stream. After a bit of
this my knees began to weaken; and it became a question of saving
energy, of getting along somehow, and of leaving the actual hunting to
Memba Sasa and the guide. If they had shown me a sable, I very much
doubt if I could have hit it.
However, we did not see one, and I staggered into camp at dusk pretty
well exhausted. From the most grateful hot bath and clean clothes I
derived much refreshment. Shortly I was sitting in my canvas chair,
sipping a cocoanut, and describing the condition of affairs to F., who
was naturally very curious as to how the trick was done.
"Now," I concluded, "I know just about what I can and what I cannot do.
Three days more of this sort of work will feed me up. If we do not run
across a sable in that time, I'm afraid we don't get any."
"Two days will do for me," said he.
We called up the guide and questioned him closely. He seemed quite
confident; and asserted that in this country sable were found, when they
were found at all, which was not often. They must be discovered in the
small grassy openings. We began to understand why so very few people get
sable.
We dismissed the guide, and sat quietly smoking in the warm soft
evening. The air was absolutely still save for various night insects and
birds, and the weird calling of natives across the valleys. Far out
towards the sea a thunderstorm flashed; and after a long interval the
rumblings came to us. So very distant was it that we paid it little
attention, save as an interesting background to our own still evening.
Almost between sentences of our slow conversation, however, it rushed up
to the zenith, blotting out the stars. The tall palms began to sway and
rustle in the forerunning breeze. Then with a swoop it was upon us, a
tempest of fury. We turned in; and all night long the heavy deluges of
rain fell, roaring like surf on an unfriendly coast.
By morning this had fallen to a light, steady drizzle in which we
started off quite happily. In this climate one likes to get wet. The
ground was sodden and deep with muck. Within a mile of camp we saw many
fresh buffalo tracks.
This time we went downhill and still downhill through openings among
batches of great forest trees. The new leaves were just coming out in
pinks and russets, so that the effect at a little distance was almost
precisely that of our autumn foliage in its duller phases. So familiar
were made some of the low rounded knolls that for an instant we were
respectively back in the hills of Surrey or Michigan, and told each
other so.
Thus we moved slowly out from the dense cover to the grass openings. Far
over on another ridge F. called my attention to something jet-black and
indeterminate. In another country I should have named it as a charred
log on an old pine burning, for that was precisely what it looked like.
We glanced at it casually through our glasses. It was a sable buck lying
down right out in the open. He was black and sleek, and we could make
out his sweeping scimitar horns.
Memba Sasa and the Swahili dropped flat on their faces while F. and I
crawled slowly and cautiously through the mud until we had gained the
cover of a shallow ravine that ran in the beast's general direction.
Noting carefully a certain small thicket as landmark, we stooped and
moved as fast as we could down to that point of vantage. There we
cautiously parted the grasses and looked. The sable had disappeared. The
place where he had been lying was plainly to be identified, and there
was no cover save a tiny bush between two and three feet high. We were
quite certain he had neither seen nor winded us. Either he had risen
and fled forward into the ravine up which we had made our stalk, or else
he had entered the small thicket. F. agreed to stay on watch where he
was, while I slipped back and examined the earth to leeward of the
thicket.
I had hardly crawled ten yards, however, before the gentle snapping of
F.'s fingers recalled me to his side.
"He's behind that bush," he whispered in my ear.
I looked. The bush was hardly large enough to conceal a setter dog, and
the sable is somewhat larger than our elk. Nevertheless F. insisted that
the animal was standing behind it, and that he had caught the toss of
its head. We lay still for some time, while the soft, warm rain drizzled
down on us, our eyes riveted on the bush. And then we caught the
momentary flash of curved horns as the sable tossed his head. It seemed
incredible even then that the tiny bush should conceal so large a beast.
As a matter of fact we later found that the bush grew on a slight
elevation, behind which was a depression. In this the sable stood,
patiently enduring the drizzle.
We waited some time in hopes he would move forward a foot or so; but
apparently he had selected his loafing place with care, and liked it.
The danger of a shift of wind was always present. Finally I slipped back
over the brink of the ravine, moved three yards to the left, and crawled
up through the tall dripping grass to a new position behind a little
bush. Cautiously raising my head, I found I could see plainly the
sable's head and part of his shoulders. My position was cramped and out
of balance for offhand shooting; but I did my best, and heard the loud
plunk of the hit. The sable made off at a fast though rather awkward
gallop, wheeled for an instant a hundred yards farther on, received
another bullet in the shoulder, and disappeared over the brow of the
hill. We raced over the top to get in another shot, and found him stone
dead.
He was a fine beast, jet-black in coat, with white markings on the face,
red-brown ears, and horns sweeping up and back scimitar fashion. He
stood four feet and six inches at the shoulder, and his horns were the
second best ever shot in British East Africa. This beast has been
described by Heller as a new subspecies, and named Rooseveltii. His
description was based upon an immature buck and a doe shot by Kermit
Roosevelt. The determination of subspecies on so slight evidence seems
to me unscientific in the extreme. While the immature males do exhibit
the general brown tone relied on by Mr. Heller, the mature buck differs
in no essential from the tropical sable. I find the alledged subspecies
is not accepted by European scientists.
XI.
A MARCH ALONG THE COAST.
With a most comfortable feeling that my task was done, that suddenly the
threatening clouds of killing work had been cleared up, I was now
privileged to loaf and invite my soul on this tropical green hilltop
while poor F. put in the days trying to find another sable. Every
morning he started out before daylight. I could see the light of his
lantern outside the tent; and I stretched myself in the luxurious
consciousness that I should hear no deprecating but insistent "hodie"
from my boy until I pleased to invite it. In the afternoon or evening F.
would return, quite exhausted and dripping, with only the report of new
country traversed. No sable; no tracks of sable; no old signs, even, of
sable. Gradually it was borne in on me how lucky I was to have come upon
my magnificent specimen so promptly and in such favourable
circumstances.
A leisurely breakfast alone, with the sun climbing; then the writing of
notes, a little reading, and perhaps a stroll to the village or along
the top of the ridge. At the heat of noon a siesta with a cool cocoanut
at my elbow. The view was beautiful on all sides; our great tree full of
birds; the rising and dying winds in the palms like the gathering
oncoming rush of the rains. From mountain to mountain sounded the wild,
far-carrying ululations of the natives, conveying news or messages
across the wide jungle. Towards sunset I wandered out in the groves,
enjoying the many bright flowers, the tall, sweet grasses, and the
cocoa-palms against the sky. Piles of cocoanuts lay on the ground,
covered each with a leaf plaited in a peculiarly individual manner to
indicate ownership. Small boys, like little black imps, clung naked
half-way up the slim trunks of the palms, watching me bright-eyed above
the undergrowth. In all directions, crossing and recrossing, ran a maze
of beaten paths. Each led somewhere, but it would require the memory
of--well, of a native, to keep all their destinations in mind.
I used to follow some of them to their ending in little cocoa-leaf
houses on the tops of knolls or beneath mangoes; and would talk with the
people. They were very grave and very polite, and seemed to be living
out their lives quite correctly according to their conceptions. Again,
it was borne in on me that these people are not stumbling along the
course of evolution in our footsteps, but have gone as far in their path
as we have in ours; that they have reached at least as complete a
correspondence with their environment as we with our own.[4]
If F. had not returned by the time I reached camp, I would seat myself
in my canvas chair, and thence dispense justice, advice, or medical
treatment. If none of these things seemed demanded, I smoked my pipe. To
me one afternoon came a big-framed, old, dignified man, with the heavy
beard, the noble features, the high forehead, and the blank statue eyes
of the blind Homer. He was led by a very small, very bright-eyed naked
boy. At some twenty feet distance he squatted down cross-legged before
me. For quite five minutes he sat there silent, while I sat in my camp
chair, smoked and waited. At last he spoke in a rolling deep bass voice
rich and vibrating--a delight to hear.
"Jambo (greeting)!" said he.
"Jambo!" I replied mildly.
Again a five-minute silence. I had begun reading, and had all but
forgotten his presence.
"Jambo bwana (greeting, master)!" he rolled out.
"Jambo!" I repeated.
The same dignified, unhasting pause.
"Jambo bwana m'kubwa (greeting, great master)!"
"Jambo!" quoth I, and went on reading. The sun was dropping, but the old
man seemed in no hurry.
"Jambo bwana m'kubwa sana (greeting, most mighty master)!" he boomed at
last.
"Jambo!" said I.
This would seem to strike the superlative, and I expected now that he
would state his business, but the old man had one more shot in his
locker.
"Jambo bwana m'kubwa kabeesa sana (greeting, mightiest possible
master)!" it came.
Then in due course he delicately hinted that a gift of tobacco would not
come amiss.
F. returned a trifle earlier than usual, to admit that his quest was
hopeless, that his physical forces were for the time being at an end,
and that he was willing to go home.
Accordingly very early next morning we set out by the glimmer of a
lantern, hoping to get a good start on our journey before the heat of
the day became too severe. We did gain something, but performed several
unnecessary loops and semicircles in the maze of beaten paths before we
finally struck into one that led down the slope towards the sea. Shortly
after the dawn came up "like thunder" in its swiftness, followed almost
immediately by the sun.
Our way now led along the wide flat between the seashore and the Shimba
Hills, in which we had been hunting. A road ten feet wide and innocent
of wheels ran with obstinate directness up and down the slight contours
and through the bushes and cocoanut groves that lay in its path. So
mathematically straight was it that only when perspective closed it in,
or when it dropped over the summit of a little rise, did the eye lose
the effect of its interminability. The country through which this road
led was various--open bushy veld with sparse trees, dense jungle,
cocoanut groves, tall and cool. In the shadows of the latter were the
thatched native villages. To the left always ran the blue Shimba Hills;
and far away to the right somewhere we heard the grumbling of the sea.
Every hundred yards or so we met somebody. Even thus early the road was
thronged. By far the majority were the almost naked natives of the
district, pleasant, brown-skinned people with good features. They
carried things. These things varied from great loads balanced atop to
dainty impromptu baskets woven of cocoa-leaves and containing each a
single cocoanut. They smiled on us, returned our greeting, and stood
completely aside to let us pass. Other wayfarers were of more
importance. Small groups of bearded dignitaries, either upper-class
Swahili or pure Arabs, strolled slowly along, apparently with limitless
leisure, but evidently bound somewhere, nevertheless. They replied to
our greetings with great dignity. Once, also, we overtook a small
detachment of Sudanese troops moving. They were scattered over several
miles of road. A soldier, most impressive and neat in khaki and red
tarboosh and sash; then two or three of his laughing, sleek women, clad
in the thin, patterned "'Mericani," glittering with gold ornaments; then
a half dozen ragged porters carrying official but battered painted
wooden kit boxes, or bags, or miscellaneous curious plunder; then more
troopers; and so on for miles. They all drew aside for us most
respectfully; and the soldiers saluted, very smart and military.
Under the broad-spreading mangoes near the villages we came upon many
open markets in full swing. Each vendor squatted on his heels behind his
wares, while the purchasers or traders wandered here and there making
offers. The actual commerce compared with the amount of laughing,
joking, shrieking joy of the occasion as one to a thousand.
Generally three or four degenerate looking dirty East Indians slunk
about, very crafty, very insinuating, very ready and skilful to take
what advantages they could. I felt a strong desire to kick every one of
them out from these joyful concourses of happy people. Generally we sat
down for a while in these markets, and talked to the people a little,
and perhaps purchased some of the delicious fruit. They had a small
delicate variety of banana, most wonderful, the like of which I have
seen nowhere else. We bought forty of these for a coin worth about eight
cents. Besides fruit they offered cocoanuts in all forms, grain, woven
baskets, small articles of handicraft--and fish. The latter were farther
from the sea than they should have been! These occasional halts greatly
refreshed us for more of that endless road.
For all this time we were very hot. As the sun mounted, the country
fairly steamed. From the end of my rifle barrel, which I carried across
my forearm, a steady trickle of water dripped into the road. We neither
of us had a dry stitch on us, and our light garments clung to us
thoroughly wet through. At first we tried the military method, and
marched fifty minutes to rest ten, but soon discovered that twenty-five
minutes' work to five minutes off was more practical. The sheer weight
of the sun was terrific; after we had been exposed to it for any great
length of time--as across several wide open spaces--we entered the
steaming shade of the jungle with gratitude. At the end of seven hours,
however, we most unexpectedly came through a dense cocoanut grove plump
on the banks of the harbour at Kilindini.
Here, after making arrangements for the transport of our safari, when it
should arrive, we entrusted ourselves to a small boy and a cranky boat.
An hour later, clad in tropical white, with cool drinks at our elbows,
we sat in easy-chairs on the veranda of the Mombasa Club.
The clubhouse is built on a low cliff at the water's edge. It looks
across the blue waters of the bay to a headland crowned with
cocoa-palms, and beyond the headland to the Indian Ocean. The cool
trades sweep across that veranda. We idly watched a lone white oarsman
pulling strongly against the wind through the tide rips, evidently bent
on exercise. We speculated on the incredible folly of wanting exercise;
and forgot him. An hour later a huge saffron yellow squall rose from
China 'cross the way, filled the world with an unholy light, lashed the
reluctant sea to white-caps, and swooped screaming on the cocoa-palms.
Police boats to rescue the idiot oarsman! Much minor excitement! Great
rushing to and fro! We continued to sit in our lounging chairs, one hand
on our cool long drinks.
FOOTNOTES:
[4] For a fuller discussion, see "The Land of Footprints."
XII.
THE FIRE.
We were very tired, so we turned in early. W Unfortunately, our rooms
were immediately over the billiard room, where a bibulous and
cosmopolitan lot were earnestly endeavouring to bolster up by further
proof the fiction that a white man cannot retain his health in the
tropics. The process was pretty rackety, and while it could not keep us
awake, it prevented us from falling thoroughly asleep. At length, and
suddenly, the props of noise fell away from me, and I sank into a
grateful, profound abyss.
Almost at once, however, I was dragged back to consciousness. Mohammed
stood at my bedside.
"Bwana," he proffered to my rather angry inquiry, "all the people have
gone to the fire. It is a very large fire. I thought you would like to
see it."
I glanced out of the window at the reddening sky, thrust my feet into a
pair of slippers, and went forth in my pyjamas to see what I could see.
We threaded our way through many narrow dark and deserted streets,
beneath balconies that overhung, past walls over which nodded tufted
palms, until a loud and increasing murmuring told us we were nearing the
centre of disturbance. Shortly, we came to the outskirts of the excited
crowd, and beyond them saw the red furnace glow.
"Semeelay! Semeelay!" warned Mohammed authoritatively; and the
bystanders, seeing a white face, gave me passage.
All of picturesque Mombasa was afoot--Arabs, Swahilis, Somalis, savages,
Indians--the whole lot. They moved restlessly in the narrow streets;
they hung over the edges of balconies; they peered from barred windows;
interested dark faces turned up everywhere in the flickering light. One
woman, a fine, erect, biblical figure, stood silhouetted on a flat
housetop and screamed steadily. I thought she must have at least one
baby in the fire, but it seems she was only excited.
The fire was at present confined to two buildings, in which it was
raging fiercely. Its spread, however, seemed certain; and, as it was
surrounded by warehouses of valuable goods, moving was in full swing. A
frantic white man stood at the low doorway of one of these dungeon-like
stores hastening the movements of an unending string of porters. As each
emerged bearing a case on his shoulder, the white man urged him to a
trot. I followed up the street to see where these valuables were being
taken, and what were the precautions against theft. Around the next
corner, it seemed. As each excited perspiring porter trotted up, he
heaved his burden from his head or his shoulders, and promptly scampered
back for another load. They were loyal and zealous men; but their
headpieces were deficient inside. For the burdens that they saved from
the fire happened to be cases of gin in bottles. At least, it was in
bottles until the process of saving had been completed. Then it trickled
merrily down the gutter. I went back and told the frantic white man
about it. He threw up both hands to heaven and departed.
By dodging from street to street Mohammed and I succeeded in circling
the whole disturbance, and so came at length to a public square. Here
was a vast throng, and a very good place, so I climbed atop a rescued
bale of cotton the better to see.
Mombasa has no water system, but a wonderful corps of water-carriers.
These were in requisition to a man. They disappeared down through the
wide gates of the customs enclosure, their naked, muscular, light-brown
bodies gleaming with sweat, their Standard Oil cans dangling merrily at
the ends of slender poles. A moment later they emerged, the cans full of
salt water from the bay, the poles seeming fairly to butt into their
bare shoulders as they teetered along at their rapid, swaying, burdened
gait.
The moment they entered the square they were seized upon from a dozen
different sides. There was no system at all. Every owner of property was
out for himself, and intended to get as much of the precious water as he
could. The poor carriers were pulled about, jerked violently here and
there, besought, commanded, to bring their loads to one or the other of
the threatened premises. Vociferations, accusations, commands arose to
screams. One old graybeard occupied himself by standing on tiptoe and
screeching, "Maji! maji! maji!" at the top of his voice, as though that
added anything to the visible supply. The water-carrier of the moment
disappeared in a swirl of excited contestants. He was attending strictly
to business, looking neither to right nor to left, pushing forward as
steadily as he could, gasping mechanically his customary warning,
"Semeelay! Semeelay!" Somehow, eventually, he and his comrades must have
got somewhere; for after an interval he returned with empty buckets.
Then every blessed fool of a property owner took a whack at his bare
shoulders as he passed, shrieking hysterically, "Haya! haya! pesi!
pesi!" and the like to men already doing their best. It was a grand
sight!
In the meantime the fire itself was roaring away. The old graybeard
suddenly ceased crying "maji," and darted forward to where I stood on
the bale of cotton. With great but somewhat flurried respect he begged
me to descend. I did so, somewhat curious as to what he might be up to,
for the cotton was at least two hundred feet from the fire. Immediately
he began to tug and heave; the bale was almost beyond his strength; but
after incredible exertions he lifted one side of it, poised it for a
moment, got his shoulder under it, and rolled it over once. Then he
darted away and resumed his raucous cry for water. I climbed back again.
Thrice more, at intervals, he repeated this performance. The only result
was to daub with mud every possible side of that bale. I hope it was his
property.
You must remember that I was observing the heavy artillery of the attack
on the conflagration. Individual campaigns were everywhere in progress.
I saw one man standing on the roof of a threatened building. He lowered
slowly, hand over hand, a small tea-kettle at the end of a string. This
was filled by a friend in the street, whereupon the man hauled it up
again, slowly, hand over hand, and solemnly dashed its contents into the
mouth of the furnace. Thousands of other men on roofs, in balconies, on
the street, were doing the same thing. Some had ordinary cups which they
filled a block away! The limit of efficiency was a pail. Nobody did
anything in concert with anybody else. The sight of these thousands of
little midgets each with his teacup, or his teapot, or his tin pail,
throwing each his mite of water--for which he had to walk a street or
so--into the ravening roaring furnace of flame was as pathetic or as
comical as you please. They did not seem to have a show in the world.
Nevertheless, to my vast surprise, the old system of the East triumphed
at last. The system of the East is that if you get _enough_ labour you
can accomplish anything. Little by little those thousands of tea kettles
of water had their aggregate effect. The flames fed themselves out and
died down leaving the contiguous buildings unharmed save for a little
scorching. In two hours all was safe, and I returned to the hotel,
having enjoyed myself hugely. I had, however, in the interest and
excitement, forgotten how deadly is the fever of Mombasa. Midnight in
pyjamas did the business; and shortly I paid well for the fun.