The whole population escorted the good Msimu quite a distance, and took
leave of her with tears in their eyes, at the same time earnestly
begging her to condescend to visit M’Rua once again and occasionally to
think of his people. Stasch considered a moment whether he should tell
the negroes about the gorge where he had hidden the goods and provisions
left him by Linde, which—on account of the lack of baggage-carriers—he
could not take with him, but when he realized that the possession of
such riches might awaken their covetousness, cause them to be jealous,
disturb the tranquillity of their lives, and set them to fighting, he
dismissed this idea; but he shot a large buffalo and left them its
carcass for a parting feast. The sight of such a quantity of “Nyama”
satisfied them.
The next three days the caravan went through a barren stretch of land.
The days were hot, but the nights, on account of the altitude, were so
cold that Stasch found it necessary to have Nell covered up with two
rugs. They now often passed over narrow mountain passes, sometimes
barren and hilly, sometimes covered with such thick vegetation that they
had difficulty in winding their way through them. On the edges of these
ravines they saw large monkeys, and here and there also lions and
panthers, which had taken refuge in the rocky caves. At Kali’s request
Stasch killed one of the animals, and then Kali put on its skin to
impress the negroes with the fact that they had to reckon with a person
of kingly blood.
On a tableland beyond the narrow passes negro hamlets again appeared.
Sometimes they were in groups, sometimes one or two days’ journey apart.
As a protection against lions all the huts were surrounded by high
fences, so interwoven and overrun with vines that even at a short
distance they appeared like the undergrowth of a forest. The smoke
rising from the center of the huts was the only indication that they
were inhabited. The caravan was as welcome everywhere as it had been in
M’Rua’s village, first exciting fear and mistrust, and then surprise,
admiration, and respect. Only on one occasion did the sight of the
elephant, Saba, the horses and the white people cause an entire village
to flee to the neighboring forest, and therefore the travelers had no
chance of making themselves known. But not a single spear was raised
against them, for if the hearts of the negroes are not filled by
Mohammedanism with hatred and treachery against unbelievers, they are
apt to be timid and peaceful. The travelers were welcomed so heartily
that Kali had to eat a piece of the village king and the latter a piece
of Kali, whereupon the most friendly relations were consummated. To the
good Msimu they did homage and showed their reverence by offering fowls,
eggs, and honey, brought from hollow blocks of wood, which had been
fastened in the branches of a large tree by means of palm threads. The
“Great Man,” the ruler of the elephant, the thunder, and the fiery
serpent, aroused general terror, which soon gave place to gratitude when
they were convinced that he was as generous as he was powerful. In
places where the small villages were numerous the news of the arrival of
these extraordinary guests would be communicated to the next settlement
by drum signals, for the negroes announce everything by beating the
drum. Sometimes the whole population advanced to meet them with friendly
greetings.
In one village of nearly a thousand inhabitants the potentate, who was
at the same time sorcerer and king, expressed his willingness to show
them the great “fetish,” which was so much reverenced and dreaded that
the people did not dare to approach the ebony chapel covered with
rhinoceros hide, and so they placed their offerings fifty feet distant.
The king told Stasch and Nell that this fetish had lately fallen from
the moon, that it was white and had a tail. Stasch immediately explained
that the moon had sent it down at the request of the good Msimu, and in
thus speaking he did not deviate from the truth, for it turned out that
the “great fetish” was simply one of the kites which he had sent up from
Linde Mountain. He and Nell felt very happy when they thought the same
wind might have carried the others still farther, and he decided to
continue sending up more from the hill-tops. That evening he made a kite
and let it fly, which convinced the negroes that the good Msimu and the
white man had also come down from the moon and were gods to be served
with humility.
Though pleased with these demonstrations of humility and adoration,
Stasch was much more delighted on hearing that the Basso-Narok was a
little more than ten days’ journey distant, and that the inhabitants of
the village in which they now lived often received salt from that
country in return for palm-wine. The village king had even heard Fumba
spoken of as being the ruler of people called “Doko.” Kali said that the
neighbors living a short distance away gave this name to the Wa-hima and
Samburu.
The news that a great war was now raging on the banks of this vast sheet
of water was not very reassuring, for in consequence of this it would be
necessary to reach the Basso-Narok by marching over wild mountains and
through deep ravines infested by beasts of prey. But Stasch was no
longer afraid of such beasts, and he preferred the wildest mountains to
the low plains, where fever lurked. So they courageously continued their
journey.
After leaving that large village they passed but one other, a small
settlement, that hung like a nest on the edge of a precipice. Then the
country became mountainous, the hills in places being separated by deep
ravines. To the east rose a dark chain of mountain-peaks, which, seen
from a distance, looked quite black. They were now traveling through an
unexplored stretch of country, and so they could not tell what might
happen to them before they reached Fumba’s land. On the mountain slopes
there were plenty of bananas, but with the exception of the dragon-tree
and acacias, which stood out by themselves, the trees grew in groups,
forming small groves. The travelers often halted in these groves to rest
and renew their strength, as well as to enjoy the abundant shade.
The trees swarmed with birds. Many different species—large rhinoceros
birds (which Stasch called pepper-eaters), roller, starling,
laughing-dove, and countless beautiful “bengalis”—fluttered in the
thick foliage or flew from one grove to another, singly or in groups,
glittering in every color of the rainbow. Many trees, seen from a
distance, appeared to be covered with colored flowers. Nell was
particularly delighted on seeing flycatchers[30] and large black birds
with bright red feathers on their breasts, whose voices sounded like a
shepherd’s flute.[31] Beautiful bee-eaters, pink on top and pale-blue
underneath, glistened in the sunlight, catching bees and dragonflies
while on the wing. The screams of green parrots could be heard from the
tree-tops, as could a sound of silver bells, the mutual greetings of
small, gray-green birds hidden in the foliage.
Between sunset and dawn such large flocks of native sparrows[32] flew
past that but for their chirping and the flapping of their wings they
might have been mistaken for clouds, and Stasch would have thought that
the songsters who made the trees vocal during the day were humming
throughout the night.
But the children were still more surprised and delighted with some other
birds which flew in flocks and sang delightfully. Each group consisted
of five or six females and one male, with glittering, metal-like
feathers. They alighted on acacias—the male perching on the top of the
tree, while the females sat on the lower branches—and after the first
notes, which sounded as though he were tuning his voice, the male began
to sing, while the females listened in silence. When he had finished
they repeated in unison the last refrain of his song. After a brief
pause he would begin again, and when he had ended they would again
repeat the refrain; then the flock would fly in an airy, wave-like line
to the next acacia, and the concert of soloist and chorus would ring out
once more through the silence of noon. The children never grew tired of
listening. Nell would catch the notes and join the chorus, twittering
the last tones in her little thin voice, which sounded like a quick
repetition of the sounds, “tui, tui, tui, tui, twi-ling-ting, ting!”
Once, when they were following the winged songsters from one tree to
another, the children found that they were alone and nearly a kilometer
away from their camping-place, for they had left the three negroes and
King and Saba behind. Stasch, who had planned to go hunting, had not
wanted to take Saba for fear he might bark and frighten the game. When
the flock of birds had flown from the last acacia to the other side of
the broad ravine, the young boy stood still and said:
“Now I shall take you back to King, and then I shall see if there are
any antelopes or zebras in the high jungle, for Kali says we have only
enough smoked meat to last two days.”
“But I am a big girl now,” answered Nell, who was always desirous of
showing that she was no longer a little girl, “and therefore I will
return by myself. The camp and the smoke can easily be seen from here.”
“I am afraid you might get lost.”
“I shall not get lost. In the high jungle I might, but here—look how
low the grass is.”
“Something might attack you!”
“You said that lions and panthers do not hunt their prey in the daytime.
Besides, do you hear how King is trumpeting because he is lonesome for
us? What lion would dare to hunt where King’s voice is heard?”
And she began to coax and in fact to be quite insistent on going.
“No, Stasch, I shall go alone. Remember, I am grown up!”
Stasch at first hesitated, but in the end let her have her own way. The
camp and the smoke of the campfire could be distinctly seen, and King,
who was lonesome without Nell, trumpeted continually. As Nell had said,
there was no fear of getting lost in the low grass, and as far as lions,
panthers, and hyenas were concerned, they need not be taken into
consideration, for these beasts hunt their prey only at night. Besides,
he knew he could do nothing to please the girl more than to show her
that he no longer considered her a child.
“Well, all right,” he said; “go alone, but walk straight ahead and do
not stop on the way.”
“But may I pick these flowers myself?” she asked, pointing to a bush of
kousso,[33] which was covered with a heavy mass of pink flowers.
“Yes, you may!”
With these words he turned around, and after taking the precaution of
showing her the group of trees from which the smoke issued and from
which King’s trumpeting was heard, he disappeared into the high jungle
at the edge of the ravine.
He had taken scarcely a hundred steps when he felt exceedingly anxious.
“It was very stupid of me,” he thought, “to let Nell go alone in the
heart of Africa—how foolish, foolish! She is still a child! I should
not have left her side even for an instant unless King had been with
her. Who knows what may happen? Who knows whether there is not a snake
under that pinkish shrubbery, or large monkeys might come from this
narrow pass and carry her off or bite her. Heaven help me! I have done a
most foolish thing!”
Instead of being only uneasy, he now became angry with himself and
terribly frightened. Without reasoning further, he turned back, as
though with a foreboding of evil. He stepped quickly to one side, and,
as a matter of habit, formed in his daily hunting expeditions, he held
his gun ready to shoot and glided through the prickly mimosas as
silently as a panther creeping upon an antelope herd at night. Then he
thrust his head above the tall shrubbery—and stood there as if
petrified.
Nell was standing under the kousso bush with hands extended; the pinkish
flowers, which she had dropped in her dismay, lay at her feet, and about
twenty feet away a large golden-yellow animal was creeping toward her
through the low grass.
Stasch distinctly saw its green eyes fixed on the chalk-white face of
the girl, he saw its bowed head and flattened ears, its upraised paw
stretched forward, expressing its waiting and stealthy attitude, its
long body and even longer tail, the end of which was moving with an
almost imperceptible cat-like movement. Another moment—a spring—and it
would have been the last of Nell!
At this sight the boy, accustomed as he was to danger, at once realized
that if he did not immediately regain his composure and presence of
mind, if he were to shoot and merely wound the animal, no matter how
badly, the girl would be doomed. Controlling himself, and stimulated by
these thoughts, his arms and legs suddenly became as rigid as steel.
Thanks to his habit of observation, he noticed a dark spot near the
animal’s ear, took aim, and pulled the trigger.
At the same instant came the report of the shot, a scream from Nell, and
a dreadful growl. Stasch sprang in front of Nell, and while protecting
her with his own body took aim again.
The second shot was quite unnecessary. The terrible cat lay stretched
out like a rag, its nose on the ground, its paws in the grass, and it
never even twitched. The bullet, an explosive one, had torn away the
entire back of the head and neck, above which the eyes glared and the
bloody, torn ganglia of the brain could be seen.
The little huntsman and Nell stood for a moment side by side, looking
first at the slain beast, then at each other—speechless. Then a strange
thing happened. Stasch, whose self-possession and calmness would have
astonished the most experienced marksman, suddenly turned pale, his legs
began to tremble, tears started from his eyes, he put his hands to his
head and repeated over and over again:
“Oh, Nell, Nell, if I had not turned back!”
Here he was seized with terror, a terror bordering on despair, and every
nerve in his body twitched and trembled as if he had an attack of ague.
After his tremendous mental and bodily tension there came a moment of
weakness and lassitude. He imagined he saw the terrible beast lying in a
dark cave tearing Nell’s body to pieces with its bloody mouth. And
indeed this might really have happened—it would have happened had he
not turned back. A moment, a second more, and it would have been too
late. These thoughts were too much for him to bear.
The result was that Nell, who was the first to recover from the fright,
was obliged to comfort him. The dear little child threw both her small
arms around his neck and wept, crying out as loudly as though trying to
awaken him out of a sound sleep.
“Stasch! Stasch! Nothing has happened to me! Only look and see! Nothing
has happened to me! Little Stasch! Dear Stasch!”
It was some time before Stasch recovered his composure and calmness.
Soon after Kali arrived on the scene; he had heard a shot near the camp,
and knowing that Bwana Kubwa never shot in vain, he immediately brought
a horse to carry away the game. But when the young negro saw the slain
beast he suddenly drew back and his face became ashen-gray.
“Wobo!” he screamed.
Not until now did the children approach the stiffening carcass, for
Stasch as yet had no definite idea of the kind of beast he had shot. At
first sight the boy thought it might be a very large “serval,”[34] but
on taking a nearer view he knew that he was mistaken, for the dead beast
was even larger than a leopard. Its golden-yellow skin was dotted with
chestnut-brown spots; but its head was narrower than that of a leopard
and resembled somewhat that of a wolf; its legs were longer, its paws
broader, and its eyes enormous. One of them had been completely torn
away by the bullet; the second still stared at the children as if out of
a chasm, immovable, frightful. Stasch felt sure that it was some species
of panther which zoologists knew as little about as geographers did of
the Basso-Narok Sea.
Kali continued to gaze with terror at the outstretched animal, repeating
in an undertone, as if afraid to awaken it:
“Wobo!—The Great Man has killed a wobo!”
But Stasch, turning to the girl, laid his hand on her little head, as if
he wanted to make sure that wobo had not stolen her, and said:
“Do you see, Nell, do you see that even if you were quite grown up, you
ought not to go alone in the jungle?”
“You are right, Stasch,” answered Nell with a penitent expression. “But
may I go with you or with King?”
“Tell me, how did this happen? Did you hear it approach you?”
“No. A large golden fly flew out of the flowers, so I turned around
toward it, and then I saw the beast just as it was creeping out from the
ravine.”
“And what happened next?”
“It stood still and began to look at me.”
“Did it look at you long?”
“Long! It was only when I dropped the flowers and covered my face with
my hands to protect myself that it began to creep up——”
Stasch knew that if Nell had been a negress she would have been carried
off at once, and that she owed her deliverance to the surprise of the
animal, which was disconcerted for a moment on the first sight of a
creature so different from the people he had seen.
Again the boy shivered from head to foot.
“Thank heaven! Thank heaven that I turned back!”
Then he inquired further:
“What were you thinking of at that moment?”
“I wanted to call you, and—did not dare—but——”
“But—what?”
“But I thought that you would certainly defend me. I don’t know——”
At these words she threw her arm around his neck once more, and he began
to stroke her hair.
“Are you not afraid now?”
“No.”
“My little Msimu! my Msimu! You see now what Africa is!”
“Yes. But you will kill all the vicious animals.”
“Yes, so I will!”
Both took another look at the beast of prey. Stasch, who wished to keep
its skin as a souvenir, told Kali to skin it, but the negro was afraid
that a second wobo might appear from out of the ravine, and he begged
not to be left there alone, and when asked whether he was really more
afraid of a wobo than he was of a lion he said:
“A lion roars in the night and does not jump over a fence, but a wobo
jumps over it in broad daylight, kills many negroes in the very heart of
the village, and then steals one and eats him. Neither a spear nor a bow
is any protection against a wobo, for a wobo can’t be killed.”
“Nonsense,” said Stasch; “look at this one; isn’t it quite dead?”
“White man can kill a wobo, but not black man!” answered Kali.
At last they took a rope and tied the enormous cat to the horse, and the
latter dragged it toward the camp.
But Stasch was unable to keep the skin, because King, who apparently
guessed that the wobo had attempted to steal his little mistress, flew
into such a rage that even Stasch was unable to pacify him. Grasping the
slain beast with his trunk, he threw it twice into the air, then he
began to beat it against a tree, and at last stamped it under his feet
until it was a pulpy, formless mass. Stasch was only able to save its
teeth, which with some other parts of its head he had laid down in the
path of a swarm of ants, and an hour later they had cleaned up the bones
so thoroughly that there was not a sign of flesh or of blood to be seen.
-----
Footnote 30:
Terpsichore viridis.
Footnote 31:
Laniarius erythrogaster.
Footnote 32:
Quelia Æthiopica.
Footnote 33:
Brojera Anthelmitica is a beautiful plant, the seeds of which are a
valuable remedy for tapeworm. It is mostly found in Southern Abyssinia.
Footnote 34:
A grey animal the size of a lynx, a species of tiger-cat.