BAUSI THE KING
About midday we made a start for Beza Town where King Bausi lived, which
we understood we ought to reach on the following evening. For some hours
the regiment marched in front, or rather round us, but as we complained
to Babemba of the noise and dust, with a confidence that was quite
touching, he sent it on ahead. First, however, he asked us to pass our
word “by our mothers,” which was the most sacred of oaths among many
African peoples, that we would not attempt to escape. I confess that I
hesitated before giving an answer, not being entirely enamoured of the
Mazitu and of our prospects among them, especially as I had discovered
through Jerry that the discomfited Imbozwi had departed from the
soldiers on some business of his own. Had the matter been left to me,
indeed, I should have tried to slip back into the bush over the border,
and there put in a few months shooting during the dry season, while
working my way southwards. This, too, was the wish of the Zulu hunters,
of Hans, and I need not add of Sammy. But when I mentioned the matter to
Stephen, he implored me to abandon the idea.
“Look here, Quatermain,” he said, “I have come to this God-forsaken
country to get that great Cypripedium, and get it I will or die in the
attempt. Still,” he added after surveying our rather blank faces, “I
have no right to play with your lives, so if you think the thing
too dangerous I will go on alone with this old boy, Babemba. Putting
everything else aside, I think that one of us ought to visit Bausi’s
kraal in case the gentleman you call Brother John should turn up
there. In short, I have made up my mind, so it is no use talking.”
I lit my pipe, and for quite a time contemplated this obstinate young
man while considering the matter from every point of view. Finally, I
came to the conclusion that he was right and I was wrong. It was true
that by bribing Babemba, or otherwise, there was still an excellent
prospect of effecting a masterly retreat and of avoiding many perils. On
the other hand, we had not come to this wild place in order to retreat.
Further, at whose expense had we come here? At that of Stephen Somers
who wished to proceed. Lastly, to say nothing of the chance of meeting
Brother John, to whom I felt no obligation since he had given us the
slip at Durban, I did not like the idea of being beaten. We had started
out to visit some mysterious savages who worshipped a monkey and a
flower, and we might as well go on till circumstances were too much for
us. After all, dangers are everywhere; those who turn back because of
dangers will never succeed in any life that we can imagine.
“Mavovo,” I said presently, pointing to Stephen with my pipe, “the
_inkoosi_ Wazela does not wish to try to escape. He wishes to go on
to the country of the Pongo people if we can get there. And, Mavovo,
remember that he has paid for everything; we are his hired servants.
Also that he says that if we run back he will walk forward alone with
these Mazitus. Still, if any of you hunters desire to slip off, he will
not look your way, nor shall I. What say you?”
“I say, Macumazana, that, though young, Wazela is a chief with a great
heart, and that where you and he go, I shall go also, as I think will
the rest of us. I do not like these Mazitu, for if their fathers were
Zulus their mothers were low people. They are bastards, and of the Pongo
I hear nothing but what is evil. Still, no good ox ever turns in the
yoke because of a mud-hole. Let us go on, for if we sink in the swamp
what does it matter? Moreover, my Snake tells me that we shall not sink,
at least not all of us.”
So it was arranged that no effort should be made to return. Sammy, it is
true, wished to do so, but when it came to the point and he was offered
one of the remaining donkeys and as much food and ammunition as he could
carry, he changed his mind.
“I think it better, Mr. Quatermain,” he said, “to meet my end in the
company of high-born, lofty souls than to pursue a lonely career towards
the inevitable in unknown circumstances.”
“Very well put, Sammy,” I answered; “so while waiting for the
inevitable, please go and cook the dinner.”
Having laid aside our doubts, we proceeded on the journey comfortably
enough, being well provided with bearers to take the place of those who
had run away. Babemba, accompanied by a single orderly, travelled with
us, and from him we collected much information. It seemed that the
Mazitu were a large people who could muster from five to seven thousand
spears. Their tradition was that they came from the south and were of
the same stock as the Zulus, of whom they had heard vaguely. Indeed,
many of their customs, to say nothing of their language, resembled
those of that country. Their military organisation, however, was not
so thorough, and in other ways they struck me as a lower race. In one
particular, it is true, that of their houses, they were more advanced,
for these, as we saw in the many kraals that we passed, were better
built, with doorways through which one could walk upright, instead of
the Kaffir bee-holes.
We slept in one of these houses on our march, and should have found
it very comfortable had it not been for the innumerable fleas which at
length drove us out into the courtyard. For the rest, these Mazitu much
resembled the Zulus. They had kraals and were breeders of cattle; they
were ruled by headmen under the command of a supreme chief or king; they
believed in witchcraft and offered sacrifice to the spirits of their
ancestors, also in some kind of a vague and mighty god who dominated the
affairs of the world and declared his will through the doctors. Lastly,
they were, and I dare say still are, a race of fighting men who loved
war and raided the neighbouring peoples upon any and every pretext,
killing their men and stealing their women and cattle. They had their
virtues, too, being kindly and hospitable by nature, though cruel enough
to their enemies. Moreover, they detested dealing in slaves and those
who practised it, saying that it was better to kill a man than to
deprive him of his freedom. Also they had a horror of the cannibalism
which is so common in the dark regions of Africa, and for this reason,
more than any other, loathed the Pongo folk who were supposed to be
eaters of men.
On the evening of the second day of our march, during which we had
passed through a beautiful and fertile upland country, very well
watered, and except in the valleys, free from bush, we arrived at Beza.
This town was situated on a wide plain surrounded by low hills and
encircled by a belt of cultivated land made beautiful by the crops
of maize and other cereals which were then ripe to harvest. It was
fortified in a way. That is, a tall, unclimbable palisade of timber
surrounded the entire town, which fence was strengthened by prickly
pears and cacti planted on its either side.
Within this palisade the town was divided into quarters more or
less devoted to various trades. Thus one part of it was called the
Ironsmiths’ Quarter; another the Soldiers’ Quarter; another the Quarter
of the Land-tillers; another that of the Skin-dressers, and so on. The
king’s dwelling and those of his women and dependents were near the
North gate, and in front of these, surrounded by semi-circles of huts,
was a wide space into which cattle could be driven if necessary. This,
however, at the time of our visit, was used as a market and a drilling
ground.
We entered the town, that must in all have contained a great number of
inhabitants, by the South gate, a strong log structure facing a wooded
slope through which ran a road. Just as the sun was setting we marched
to the guest-huts up a central street lined with the population of the
place who had gathered to stare at us. These huts were situated in the
Soldiers’ Quarter, not far from the king’s house and surrounded by an
inner fence to keep them private.
None of the people spoke as we passed them, for the Mazitu are polite by
nature; also it seemed to me that they regarded us with awe tempered
by curiosity. They only stared, and occasionally those of them who were
soldiers saluted us by lifting their spears. The huts into which we were
introduced by Babemba, with whom we had grown very friendly, were good
and clean.
Here all our belongings, including the guns which we had collected just
before the slaves ran away, were placed in one of the huts over which
a Mazitu mounted guard, the donkeys being tied to the fence at a little
distance. Outside this fence stood another armed Mazitu, also on guard.
“Are we prisoners here?” I asked of Babemba.
“The king watches over his guests,” he answered enigmatically. “Have
the white lords any message for the king whom I am summoned to see this
night?”
“Yes,” I answered. “Tell the king that we are the brethren of him who
more than a year ago cut a swelling from his body, whom we have arranged
to meet here. I mean the white lord with a long beard who among you
black people is called Dogeetah.”
Babemba started. “You are the brethren of Dogeetah! How comes it then
that you never mentioned his name before, and when is he going to meet
you here? Know that Dogeetah is a great man among us, for with him alone
of all men the king has made blood-brotherhood. As the king is, so is
Dogeetah among the Mazitu.”
“We never mentioned him because we do not talk about everything at once,
Babemba. As to when Dogeetah will meet us I am not sure; I am only sure
that he is coming.”
“Yes, lord Macumazana, but when, when? That is what the king will want
to know and that is what you must tell him. Lord,” he added, dropping
his voice, “you are in danger here where you have many enemies, since it
is not lawful for white men to enter this land. If you would save your
lives, be advised by me and be ready to tell the king to-morrow when
Dogeetah, whom he loves, will appear here to vouch for you, and see that
he does appear very soon and by the day you name. Since otherwise when
he comes, if come he does, he may not find you able to talk to him. Now
I, your friend, have spoken and the rest is with you.”
Then without another word he rose, slipped through the door of the hut
and out by the gateway of the fence from which the sentry moved aside
to let him pass. I, too, rose from the stool on which I sat and danced
about the hut in a perfect fury.
“Do you understand what that infernal (I am afraid I used a stronger
word) old fool told me?” I exclaimed to Stephen. “He says that we must
be prepared to state exactly when that other infernal old fool, Brother
John, will turn up at Beza Town, and that if we don’t we shall have our
throats cut as indeed has already been arranged.”
“Rather awkward,” replied Stephen. “There are no express trains to Beza,
and if there were we couldn’t be sure that Brother John would take one
of them. I suppose there _is_ a Brother John?” he added reflectively.
“To me he seems to be--intimately connected with Mrs. Harris.”
“Oh! there is, or there was,” I explained. “Why couldn’t the confounded
ass wait quietly for us at Durban instead of fooling off butterfly
hunting to the north of Zululand and breaking his leg or his neck there
if he has done anything of the sort?”
“Don’t know, I am sure. It’s hard enough to understand one’s own
motives, let alone Brother John’s.”
Then we sat down on our stools again and stared at each other. At this
moment Hans crept into the hut and squatted down in front of us. He
might have walked in as there was a doorway, but he preferred to creep
on his hands and knees, I don’t know why.
“What is it, you ugly little toad?” I asked viciously, for that was just
what he looked like; even the skin under his jaw moved like a toad’s.
“The Baas is in trouble?” remarked Hans.
“I should think he was,” I answered, “and so will you be presently when
you are wriggling on the point of a Mazitu spear.”
“They are broad spears that would make a big hole,” remarked Hans
again, whereupon I rose to kick him out, for his ideas were, as usual,
unpleasant.
“Baas,” he went on, “I have been listening--there is a very good hole in
this hut for listening if one lies against the wall and pretends to
be asleep. I have heard all and understood most of your talk with that
one-eyed savage and the Baas Stephen.”
“Well, you little sneak, what of it?”
“Only, Baas, that if we do not want to be killed in this place from
which there is no escape, it is necessary that you should find out
exactly on what day and at what hour Dogeetah is going to arrive.”
“Look here, you yellow idiot,” I exclaimed, “if you are beginning
that game too, I’ll----” then I stopped, reflecting that my temper was
getting the better of me and that I had better hear what Hans had to say
before I vented it on him.
“Baas, Mavovo is a great doctor; it is said that his Snake is the
straightest and the strongest in all Zululand save that of his master,
Zikali, the old slave. He told you that Dogeetah was laid up somewhere
with a hurt leg and that he was coming to meet you here; no doubt
therefore he can tell you also _when_ he is coming. I would ask him, but
he won’t set his Snake to work for me. So you must ask him, Baas, and
perhaps he will forget that you laughed at his magic and that he swore
you would never see it again.”
“Oh! blind one,” I answered, “how do I know that Mavovo’s story about
Dogeetah was not all nonsense?”
Hans stared at me amazed.
“Mavovo’s story nonsense! Mavovo’s Snake a liar! Oh! Baas, that is what
comes of being too much a Christian. Now, thanks to your father the
Predikant, I am a Christian too, but not so much that I have forgotten
how to know good magic from bad. Mavovo’s Snake a liar, and after he
whom we buried yonder was the first of the hunters whom the feathers
named to him at Durban!” and he began to chuckle in intense amusement,
then added, “Well, Baas, there it is. You must either ask Mavovo, and
very nicely, or we shall all be killed. _I_ don’t mind much, for I
should rather like to begin again a little younger somewhere else, but
just think what a noise Sammy will make!” and turning he crept out as he
had crept in.
“Here’s a nice position,” I groaned to Stephen when he had gone. “I,
a white man, who, in spite of some coincidences with which I am
acquainted, know that all this Kaffir magic is bosh am to beg a savage
to tell me something of which he _must_ be ignorant. That is, unless we
educated people have got hold of the wrong end of the stick altogether.
It is humiliating; it isn’t Christian, and I’m hanged if I’ll do it!”
“I dare say you will be--hanged I mean--whether you do it or whether you
don’t,” replied Stephen with his sweet smile. “But I say, old fellow,
how do you know it is all bosh? We are told about lots of miracles which
weren’t bosh, and if miracles ever existed, why can’t they exist now?
But there, I know what you mean and it is no use arguing. Still, if
you’re proud, I ain’t. I’ll try to soften the stony heart of Mavovo--we
are rather pals, you know--and get him to unroll the book of his occult
wisdom,” and he went.
A few minutes later I was called out to receive a sheep which, with
milk, native beer, some corn, and other things, including green forage
for the donkeys, Bausi had sent for us to eat. Here I may remark that
while we were among the Mazitu we lived like fighting cocks. There was
none of that starvation which is, or was, so common in East Africa where
the traveller often cannot get food for love or money--generally because
there is none.
When this business was settled by my sending a message of thanks to the
king with an intimation that we hoped to wait upon him on the morrow
with a few presents, I went to seek Sammy in order to tell him to kill
and cook the sheep. After some search I found, or rather heard him
beyond a reed fence which divided two of the huts. He was acting as
interpreter between Stephen Somers and Mavovo.
“This Zulu man declares, Mr. Somers,” he said, “that he quite
understands everything you have been explaining, and that it is probable
that we shall all be butchered by this savage Bausi, if we cannot tell
him when the white man, Dogeetah, whom he loves, will arrive here. He
says also that he thinks that by his magic he could learn when this will
happen--if it is to happen at all--(which of course, Mr. Somers, for
your private information only, is a mighty lie of the ignorant heathen).
He adds, however, that he does not care one brass farthing--his actual
expression, Mr. Somers, is ‘one grain of corn on a mealie-cob’--about
his or anybody else’s life, which from all I have heard of his
proceedings I can well believe to be true. He says in his vulgar
language that there is no difference between the belly of a Mazitu-land
hyena and that of any other hyena, and that the earth of Mazitu-land
is as welcome to his bones as any other earth, since the earth is the
wickedest of all hyenas, in that he has observed that soon or late it
devours everlastingly everything which once it bore. You must forgive me
for reproducing his empty and childish talk, Mr. Somers, but you bade me
to render the words of this savage with exactitude. In fact, Mr. Somers,
this reckless person intimates, in short that some power with which he
is not acquainted--he calls it the ‘Strength that makes the Sun to
shine and broiders the blanket of the night with stars’ (forgive me for
repeating his silly words), caused him ‘to be born into this world, and,
at an hour already appointed, will draw him from this world back into
its dark, eternal bosom, there to be rocked in sleep, or nursed to life
again, according to its unknown will’--I translate exactly, Mr. Somers,
although I do not know what it all means--and that he does not care a
curse when this happens. Still, he says that whereas he is growing old
and has known many sorrows--he alludes here, I gather, to some nigger
wives of his whom another savage knocked on the head; also to a child to
whom he appears to have been attached--you are young with all your days
and, he hopes, joys, before you. Therefore he would gladly do anything
in his power to save your life, because although you are white and he
is black he has conceived an affection for you and looks on you as his
child. Yes, Mr. Somers, although I blush to repeat it, this black
fellow says he looks upon you as his child. He adds, indeed, that if the
opportunity arises, he will gladly give his life to save your life,
and that it cuts his heart in two to refuse you anything. Still he must
refuse this request of yours, that he will ask the creature he calls his
Snake--what he means by that, I don’t know, Mr. Somers--to declare
when the white man, named Dogeetah, will arrive in this place. For this
reason, that he told Mr. Quatermain when he laughed at him about his
divinations that he would make no more magic for him or any of you, and
that he will die rather than break his word. That’s all, Mr. Somers, and
I dare say you will think--quite enough, too.”
“I understand,” replied Stephen. “Tell the chief, Mavovo” (I observed he
laid an emphasis on the word, _chief_) “that I _quite_ understand, and
that I thank him very much for explaining things to me so fully. Then
ask him whether, as the matter is so important, there is no way out of
this trouble?”
Sammy translated into Zulu, which he spoke perfectly, as I noted without
interpolations or additions.
“Only one way,” answered Mavovo in the intervals of taking snuff. “It is
that Macumazana himself shall ask me to do this thing, Macumazana is my
old chief and friend, and for his sake I will forget what in the case
of others I should always remember. If he will come and ask me, without
mockery, to exercise my skill on behalf of all of us, I will try to
exercise it, although I know very well that he believes it to be but as
an idle little whirlwind that stirs the dust, that raises the dust and
lets it fall again without purpose or meaning, forgetting, as the wise
white men forget, that even the wind which blows the dust is the same
that breathes in our nostrils, and that to it, we also are as is the
dust.”
Now I, the listener, thought for a moment or two. The words of this
fighting savage, Mavovo, even those of them of which I had heard only
the translation, garbled and beslavered by the mean comments of the
unutterable Sammy, stirred my imagination. Who was I that I should dare
to judge of him and his wild, unknown gifts? Who was I that I should
mock at him and by my mockery intimate that I believed him to be a
fraud?
Stepping through the gateway of the fence, I confronted him.
“Mavovo,” I said, “I have overheard your talk. I am sorry if I laughed
at you in Durban. I do not understand what you call your magic. It is
beyond me and may be true or may be false. Still, I shall be grateful to
you if you will use your power to discover, if you can, whether Dogeetah
is coming here, and if so, when. Now, do as it may please you; I have
spoken.”
“And I have heard, Macumazana, my father. To-night I will call upon my
Snake. Whether it will answer or what it will answer, I cannot say.”
Well, he did call upon his Snake with due and portentous ceremony and,
according to Stephen, who was present, which I declined to be, that
mystic reptile declared that Dogeetah, alias Brother John, would arrive
in Beza Town precisely at sunset on the third day from that night. Now
as he had divined on Friday, according to our almanac, this meant that
we might hope to see him--hope exactly described my state of mind on the
matter--on the Monday evening in time for supper.
“All right,” I said briefly. “Please do not talk to me any more about
this impious rubbish, for I want to go to sleep.”
Next morning early we unpacked our boxes and made a handsome selection
of gifts for the king, Bausi, hoping thus to soften his royal heart.
It included a bale of calico, several knives, a musical box, a cheap
American revolver, and a bundle of tooth-picks; also several pounds
of the best and most fashionable beads for his wives. This truly noble
present we sent to the king by our two Mazitu servants, Tom and Jerry,
who were marched off in the charge of several sentries, for I hoped
that these men would talk to their compatriots and tell them what good
fellows we were. Indeed I instructed them to do so.
Imagine our horror, therefore, when about an hour later, just as we were
tidying ourselves up after breakfast, there appeared through the gate,
not Tom and Jerry, for they had vanished, but a long line of Mazitu
soldiers each of whom carried one of the articles that we had sent.
Indeed the last of them held the bundle of toothpicks on his fuzzy head
as though it were a huge faggot of wood. One by one they set them down
upon the lime flooring of the verandah of the largest hut. Then their
captain said solemnly:
“Bausi, the Great Black One, has no need of the white men’s gifts.”
“Indeed,” I replied, for my dander was up. “Then he won’t get another
chance at them.”
The men turned away without more words, and presently Babemba turned up
with a company of about fifty soldiers.
“The king is waiting to see you, white lords,” he said in a voice of
very forced jollity, “and I have come to conduct you to him.”
“Why would he not accept our presents?” I asked, pointing to the row of
them.
“Oh! that is because of Imbozwi’s story of the magic shield. He said he
wanted no gifts to burn his hair off. But, come, come. He will explain
for himself. If the Elephant is kept waiting he grows angry and
trumpets.”
“Does he?” I said. “And how many of us are to come?”
“All, all, white lord. He wishes to see every one of you.”
“Not me, I suppose?” said Sammy, who was standing close by. “I must stop
to make ready the food.”
“Yes, you too,” replied Babemba. “The king would look on the mixer of
the holy drink.”
Well, there was no way out of it, so off we marched, all well armed as I
need not say, and were instantly surrounded by the soldiers. To give an
unusual note to the proceedings I made Hans walk first, carrying on his
head the rejected musical box from which flowed the touching melody of
“Home, Sweet Home.” Then came Stephen bearing the Union Jack on a pole,
then I in the midst of the hunters and accompanied by Babemba, then the
reluctant Sammy, and last of all the two donkeys led by Mazitus, for it
seemed that the king had especially ordered that these should be brought
also.
It was a truly striking cavalcade, the sight of which under any other
circumstances would have made me laugh. Nor did it fail in its effect,
for even the silent Mazitu people through whom we wended our way, were
moved to something like enthusiasm. “Home, Sweet Home” they evidently
thought heavenly, though perhaps the two donkeys attracted them most,
especially when these brayed.
“Where are Tom and Jerry?” I asked of Babemba.
“I don’t know,” he answered; “I think they have been given leave to go
to see their friends.”
Imbozwi is suppressing evidence in our favour, I thought to myself, and
said no more.
Presently we reached the gate of the royal enclosure. Here to my dismay
the soldiers insisted on disarming us, taking away our rifles, our
revolvers, and even our sheath knives. In vain did I remonstrate, saying
that we were not accustomed to part with these weapons. The answer was
that it was not lawful for any man to appear before the king armed even
with so much as a dancing-stick. Mavovo and the Zulus showed signs of
resisting and for a minute I thought there was going to be a row, which
of course would have ended in our massacre, for although the Mazitus
feared guns very much, what could we have done against hundreds of
them? I ordered him to give way, but for once he was on the point of
disobeying me. Then by a happy thought I reminded him that, according to
his Snake, Dogeetah was coming, and that therefore all would be well. So
he submitted with an ill grace, and we saw our precious guns borne off
we knew not where.
Then the Mazitu soldiers piled their spears and bows at the gate of the
kraal and we proceeded with only the Union Jack and the musical box,
which was now discoursing “Britannia rules the waves.”
Across the open space we marched to where several broad-leaved trees
grew in front of a large native house. Not far from the door of this
house a fat, middle-aged and angry-looking man was seated on a stool,
naked except for a moocha of catskins about his loins and a string of
large blue beads round his neck.
“Bausi, the King,” whispered Babemba.
At his side squatted a little hunchbacked figure, in whom I had no
difficulty in recognising Imbozwi, although he had painted his scorched
scalp white with vermillion spots and adorned his snub nose with a
purple tip, his dress of ceremony I presume. Round and behind there were
a number of silent councillors. At some signal or on reaching a given
spot, all the soldiers, including old Babemba, fell upon their hands and
knees and began to crawl. They wanted us to do the same, but here I drew
the line, feeling that if once we crawled we must always crawl.
So at my word we advanced upright, but with slow steps, in the midst of
all this wriggling humanity and at length found ourselves in the august
presence of Bausi, “the Beautiful Black One,” King of the Mazitu.