HAROLD APPEARS IN A NEW CHARACTER, AND TWO OLD CHARACTERS REAPPEAR TO
HAROLD.
The mind of Yambo was a strange compound--a curious mixture of gravity
and rollicking joviality; at one time displaying a phase of intense
solemnity; at another exhibiting quiet pleasantry and humour, but
earnestness was the prevailing trait of his character. Whether
indulging his passionate fondness for the jumping-jack, or engaged in
guiding the deliberations of his counsellors, the earnest chief was
equally devoted to the work in hand. Being a savage--and, consequently,
led entirely by feeling, which is perhaps the chief characteristic of
savage, as distinguished from civilised, man,--he hated his enemies with
exceeding bitterness, and loved his friends with all his heart.
Yambo was very tender to Harold during his illness, and the latter felt
corresponding gratitude, so that there sprang up between the two a
closer friendship than one could have supposed to be possible,
considering that they were so different from each other, mentally,
physically, and socially, and that their only mode of exchanging ideas
was through the medium of a very incompetent interpreter.
Among other things Harold discovered that his friend the chief was
extremely fond of anecdotes and stories. He, therefore, while in a
convalescent state and unable for much physical exercise, amused
himself, and spent much of his time, in narrating to him the adventures
of Robinson Crusoe. Yambo's appetite for mental food increased, and
when Crusoe's tale was finished he eagerly demanded more. Some of his
warriors also came to hear, and at last the hut was unable to contain
the audiences that wished to enter. Harold, therefore, removed to an
open space under a banyan-tree, and there daily, for several hours,
related all the tales and narratives with which he was acquainted, to
the hundreds of open-eyed and open-mouthed negroes who squatted around
him.
At first he selected such tales as he thought would be likely to amuse,
but these being soon exhausted, he told them about anything that chanced
to recur to his memory. Then, finding that their power to swallow the
marvellous was somewhat crocodilish, he gave them Jack the Giant-killer,
and Jack of Beanstalk notoriety, and Tom Thumb, Cinderella, etcetera,
until his entire nursery stock was exhausted, after which he fell back
on his inventive powers; but the labour of this last effort proving very
considerable, and the results not being adequately great, he took to
history, and told them stories about William Tell, and Wallace, and
Bruce, and the Puritans of England, and the Scottish Covenanters, and
the discoveries of Columbus, until the eyes and mouths of his black
auditors were held so constantly and widely on the stretch, that Disco
began to fear they would become gradually incapable of being shut, and
he entertained a fear that poor Antonio's tongue would, ere long, be
dried up at the roots.
At last a thought occurred to our hero, which he promulgated to Disco
one morning as they were seated at breakfast on the floor of their hut.
"It seems to me, Disco," he said, after a prolonged silence, during
which they had been busily engaged with their knives and wooden spoons,
"that illness must be sent sometimes, to teach men that they give too
little of their thoughts to the future world."
"Werry true, sir," replied Disco, in that quiet matter-of-course tone
with which men generally receive axiomatic verities; "we _is_ raither
given to be swallered up with this world, which ain't surprisin'
neither, seein' that we've bin putt into it, and are surrounded by it,
mixed up with it, steeped in it, so to speak, an' can't werry well help
ourselves."
"That last is just the point I'm not quite so sure about," rejoined
Harold. "Since I've been lying ill here, I have thought a good deal
about forgetting to bring a Bible with me, and about the meaning of the
term Christian, which name I bear; and yet I can't, when I look honestly
at it, see that I do much to deserve the name."
"Well, I don't quite see that, sir," said Disco, with an argumentative
curl of his right eyebrow; "you doesn't swear, or drink, or steal, or
commit murder, an' a many other things o' that sort. Ain't that the
result o' your being a Christian."
"It may be so, Disco, but that is only what may be styled the _don't_
side of the question. What troubles me is, that I don't see much on the
_do_ side of it."
"You says your prayers, sir, don't you?" asked Disco, with the air of a
man who had put a telling question.
"Well, yes," replied Harold; "but what troubles me is that, while in my
creed I profess to think the salvation of souls is of such vital
importance, in my practice I seem to say that it is of no importance at
all, for here have I been, for many weeks, amongst these black fellows,
and have never so much as mentioned the name of our Saviour to them,
although I have been telling them no end of stories of all kinds, both
true and fanciful."
"There's something in that sir," admitted Disco. Harold also thought
there was so much in it that he gave the subject a great deal of earnest
consideration, and finally resolved to begin to tell the negroes Bible
stories. He was thus gradually led to tell them that "old, old story"
of God the Saviour's life and death, and love for man, which he found
interested, affected, and influenced the savages far more powerfully
than any of the tales, whether true or fanciful, with which he had
previously entertained them. While doing this a new spirit seemed to
actuate himself, and to influence his whole being.
While Harold was thus led, almost unconsciously, to become a sower of
the blessed seed of God's Word, Marizano was working his way through the
country, setting forth, in the most extreme manner, the ultimate results
of man's sinful nature, and the devil's lies.
One of his first deeds was to visit a village which was beautifully
situated on the banks of a small but deep river. In order to avoid
alarming the inhabitants, he approached it with only about thirty of his
men, twenty of whom were armed. Arrived at the outskirts, he halted his
armed men, and advanced with the other ten, calling out cheerfully, "We
have things for sale! have you anything to sell?" The chief and his
warriors, armed with their bows and arrows and shields, met him, and
forbade him to pass within the hedge that encircled the village, but
told him to sit down under a tree outside. A mat of split reeds was
placed for Marizano to sit on; and when he had explained to the chief
that the object of his visit was to trade with him for ivory--in proof
of which he pointed to the bales which his men carried,--he was well
received, and a great clapping of hands ensued. Presents were then
exchanged, and more clapping of hands took place, for this was
considered the appropriate ceremony. The chief and his warriors, on
sitting down before Marizano and his men, clapped their hands together,
and continued slapping on their thighs while handing their presents, or
when receiving those of their visitors. It was the African "thank you."
To have omitted it would have been considered very bad manners.
Soon a brisk trade was commenced, in which the entire community became
ere long deeply and eagerly absorbed.
Meanwhile Marizano's armed men were allowed to come forward. The women
prepared food for the strangers; and after they had eaten and drunk of
the native beer heartily, Marizano asked the chief if he had ever seen
fire-arms used.
"Yes," replied the chief, "but only once at a great distance off. It is
told to me that your guns kill very far off--much further than our bows.
Is that so?"
"It is true," replied Marizano, who was very merry by this time under
the influence of the beer, as, indeed, were also his men and their
entertainers. "Would you like to see what our guns can do?" asked the
half-caste. "If you will permit me, I shall let you hear and see them
in use."
The unsuspecting chief at once gave his consent. His visitors rose;
Marizano gave the word; a volley was poured forth which instantly killed
the chief and twenty of his men. The survivors fled in horror. The
young women and children were seized; the village was sacked--which
means that the old and useless members of the community were murdered in
cold blood, and the place was set on fire--and Marizano marched away
with his band of captives considerably augmented, leaving a scene of
death and horrible desolation behind him. [See Livingstone's _Zambesi
and its Tributaries_, pages 201, 202.]
Thus did that villain walk through the land with fire and sword
procuring slaves for the supply of the "domestic institution" of the
Sultan of Zanzibar.
By degrees the murderer's drove of black "cattle" increased to such an
extent that when he approached the neighbourhood of the village in which
Harold and Disco sojourned, he began to think that he had obtained about
as many as he could conveniently manage, and meditated turning his face
eastward, little dreaming how near he was to a thousand dollars' worth
of property, in the shape of ransom for two white men!
He was on the point of turning back and missing this when he chanced to
fall in with a villager who was out hunting, and who, after a hot chase,
was captured. This man was made much of, and presented with some yards
of cloth as well as a few beads, at the same time being assured that he
had nothing to fear; that the party was merely a slave-trading one; that
the number of slaves required had been made up, but that a few more
would be purchased if the chief of his village had any to dispose of.
On learning from the man that his village was a large one, fully two
days' march from the spot where he stood, and filled with armed men,
Marizano came to the conclusion that it would not be worth his while to
proceed thither, and was about to order his informant to be added to his
gang with a slave-stick round his neck, when he suddenly bethought him
of inquiring as to whether any white men had been seen in these parts.
As he had often made the same inquiry before without obtaining any
satisfactory answer, it was with great surprise that he now heard from
his captive of two white men being in the very village about which he
had been conversing.
At once he changed his plan, resumed his march, and, a couple of days
afterwards, presented himself before the astonished eyes of Harold
Seadrift and Disco Lillihammer, while they were taking a walk about a
mile from the village.
Disco recognised the slave-trader at once, and, from the troubled as
well as surprised look of Marizano, it was pretty evident that he
remembered the countenance of Disco.
When the recollection of Marizano's cruelty at the time of their first
meeting flashed upon him, Disco felt an almost irresistible desire to
rush upon and strangle the Portuguese, but the calm deportment of that
wily man, and the peaceful manner in which he had approached, partly
disarmed his wrath. He could not however, quite restrain his tongue.
"Ha!" said he, "you are the blackguard that we met and pretty nigh shot
when we first came to these parts, eh? Pity we missed you, you
black-hearted villain!"
As Marizano did not understand English, these complimentary remarks were
lost on him. He seemed, however, to comprehend the drift of them, for
he returned Disco's frown with a stare of defiance.
"Whatever he was, or whatever he is," interposed Harold, "we must
restrain ourselves just now, Disco, because we cannot punish him as he
deserves, however much we may wish to, and he seems to have armed men
enough to put us and our entertainers completely in his power. Keep
quiet while I speak to him."
Jumbo and Antonio, armed with bows and arrows,--for they were in search
of small game wherewith to supply the pot--came up, looking very much
surprised, and the latter a good deal frightened.
"Ask him, Antonio," said Harold, "what is his object in visiting this
part of the country."
"To procure slaves," said Marizano, curtly.
"I thought so," returned Harold; "but he will find that the men of this
tribe are not easily overcome."
"I do not wish to overcome them," said the half-caste. "I have procured
enough of slaves, as you see," (pointing to the gang which was halted
some hundred yards or so in rear of his armed men), "but I heard that
you were prisoners here, and I have come to prove to you that even a
slave-trader can return good for evil. _You_ did this," he said,
looking at Disco, and pointing to his old wound in the arm; "I now come
to deliver you from slavery."
Having suppressed part of the truth, and supplemented the rest of it
with this magnificent lie, Marizano endeavoured to look magnanimous.
"I don't believe a word of it," said Disco, decidedly.
"I incline to doubt it too," said Harold; "but he may have some good
reason of his own for his friendly professions towards us. In any case
we have no resource left but to assume that he speaks the truth."