Describes African Domesticity, and Many Other Things Relative Thereto, Besides Showing that Alarms and Flights, Surprises and Feasts, are not Confined to Particular Places.
When our negro chief—whose name, by the way, was Kambira—left the banks of the river, followed by his men bearing the hippopotamus-flesh, he set off at a swinging pace, like to a man who has a considerable walk before him.
The country through which they passed was not only well wooded, but well watered by numerous rivulets. Their path for some distance tended upwards towards the hills, now crossing over mounds, anon skirting the base of precipitous rocks, and elsewhere dipping down into hollows; but although thus serpentine in its course, its upward tendency never varied until it led them to the highest parts of a ridge from which a magnificent prospect was had of hill and dale, lake, rivulet and river, extending so far that the distant scenery at the horizon appeared of a thin pearly-grey colour, and of the same consistency as the clouds with which it mingled.
Passing over this ridge, and descending into a wide valley which was fertilised and beautified by a moderately-sized rivulet, Kambira led his followers towards a hamlet which lay close to the stream, nestled in a woody hollow, and, like all other Manganja villages, was surrounded by an impenetrable hedge of poisonous euphorbia—a tree which casts a deep shade, and renders it difficult for bowmen to aim at the people inside.
In the immediate vicinity of the village the land was laid out in little gardens and fields, and in these the people—men, women, and children,—were busily engaged in hoeing the ground, weeding, planting, or gathering the fruits of their labour.
These same fruits were plentiful, and the people sang with joy as they worked. There were large crops of maize, millet beans, and ground-nuts; also patches of yams, rice, pumpkins, cucumbers, cassava, sweet potatoes, tobacco, cotton, and hemp, which last is also called “bang,” and is smoked by the natives as a species of tobacco.
It was a pleasant sight for Kambira and his men to look upon, as they rested for a few minutes on the brow of a knoll near a thicket of bramble bushes, and gazed down upon their home. Doubtless they thought so, for their eyes glistened, so also did their teeth when they smilingly commented on the scene before them. They did not, indeed, become enthusiastic about scenery, nor did they refer to the picturesque grouping of huts and trees, or make any allusion whatever to light and shade; no, their thoughts were centred on far higher objects than these. They talked of wives and children, and hippopotamus-flesh; and their countenances glowed—although they were not white—and their strong hearts beat hard against their ribs—although they were not clothed, and their souls (for we repudiate Yoosoof’s opinion that they had none), their souls appeared to take quiet but powerful interest in their belongings.
It was pleasant also, for Kambira and his men to listen to the sounds that floated up from the valley,—sweeter far than the sweetest strains of Mozart or Mendelssohn,—the singing of the workers in the fields and gardens, mellowed by distance into a soft humming tone; and the hearty laughter that burst occasionally from men seated at work on bows, arrows, fishing-nets, and such-like gear, on a flat green spot under the shade of a huge banyan-tree, which, besides being the village workshop, was the village reception-hall, where strangers were entertained on arriving,—also the village green, where the people assembled to dance, and sing, and smoke “bang,” to which last they were much addicted, and to drink beer made by themselves, of which they were remarkably fond, and by means of which they sometimes got drunk;—in all which matters the intelligent reader will not fail to observe that they bore a marked resemblance to many of the civilised European nations, except, perhaps, in their greater freedom of action, lightness of costume, and colour of skin.
The merry voices of children, too, were heard, and their active little black bodies were seen, while they engaged in the play of savages—though not necessarily in savage play. Some romped, ran after each other, caught each other, tickled each other, occasionally whacked each other—just as our own little ones do. Others played at games, of which the skipping-rope was a decided favourite among the girls, but the play of most of the older children consisted in imitating the serious work of their parents. The girls built little huts, hoed little gardens, made small pots of clay, pounded imaginary corn in miniature mortars, cooked it over ideal fires, and crammed it down the throats of imitation babies; while the boys performed deeds of chivalric daring with reed spears, small shields, and tiny bows and arrows, or amused themselves in making cattle-pens, and in sculpturing cows and crocodiles. Human nature, in short, was powerfully developed, without anything particular to suggest the idea of “savage” life, or to justify the opinion of Arabs and half-caste Portuguese that black men are all “cattle.”
The scene wanted only the spire of a village church and the tinkle of a Sabbath bell to make it perfect.
But there was a tinkle among the other sounds, not unlike a bell which would have sounded marvellously familiar to English ears had they been listening. This was the ringing of the anvil of the village blacksmith. Yes, savage though they were, these natives had a blacksmith who wrought in iron, almost as deftly, and to the full as vigorously, as any British son of Vulcan. The Manganja people are an industrious race. Besides cultivating the soil extensively, they dig iron-ore out of the hills, and each village has its smelting-house, its charcoal-burners, its forge with a pair of goatskin bellows, and its blacksmith—we might appropriately say, its very blacksmith! Whether the latter would of necessity, and as a matter of course, sing bass in church if the land were civilised enough to possess a church, remains to be seen! At the time we write of he merely hummed to the sound of the hammer, and forged hoes, axes, spears, needles, arrow-heads, bracelets, armlets, necklets, and anklets, with surprising dexterity.
Pity that he could not forge a chain which would for ever restrain the murderous hands of the Arabs and half-caste Portuguese, who, for ages, have blighted his land with their pestilential presence!
After contemplating the picture for a time, Kambira descended the winding path that led to the village. He had not proceeded far when one of the smallest of the children—a creature so rotund that his body and limbs were a series of circles and ovals, and so black that it seemed an absurdity even to think of casting a shadow on him—espied the advancing party, uttered a shrill cry of delight, and ran towards them.
His example was followed by a dozen others, who, being larger, outran him, and, performing a war-dance round the men, possessed themselves, by amicable theft, of pieces of raw meat with which they hastened back to the village. The original discoverer of the party, however, had other ends in view. He toddled straight up to Kambira with the outstretched arms of a child who knows he will be welcomed.
Kambira was not demonstrative, but he was hearty. Taking the little ball of black butter by the arms, he whirled him over his head, and placed him on his broad shoulders, with a fat leg on each side of his neck, and left him there to look after himself. This the youngster did by locking his feet together under the man’s chin, and fastening his fat fingers in his woolly hair, in which position he bore some resemblance to an enormous chignon.
Thus was he borne crowing to the chief’s hut, from the door of which a very stout elderly woman came out to receive them.
There was no one else in the hut to welcome them, but Yohama, as the chief styled her, was sufficient; she was what some people call “good company.” She bustled about making preparations for a feast, with a degree of activity that was quite surprising in one so fat—so very fat—asking questions the while with much volubility, making remarks to the child, criticising the hippopotamus-meat, or commenting on things in general.
Meanwhile Kambira seated himself in a corner and prepared to refresh himself with a pipe of bang in the most natural and civilised fashion imaginable; and young Obo—for so Yohama called him—entered upon a series of gymnastic exercises with his father—for such Kambira was—which partook of the playfulness of the kitten, mingled with the eccentricity and mischief of the monkey.
It would have done you good, reader, if you possess a spark of sympathy, to have watched these two as they played together. The way in which Obo assaulted his father, on whose visage mild benignity was enthroned, would have surprised you. Kambira was a remarkably grave, quiet and reserved man, but that was a matter of no moment to Obo, who threatened him in front, skirmished in his rear, charged him on the right flank with a reed spear, shelled him on the left with sweet potatoes, and otherwise harassed him with amazing perseverance and ingenuity.
To this the enemy paid no further attention than lay in thrusting out an elbow and raising a knee, to check an unusually fierce attack, or in giving Obo a pat on the back when he came within reach, or sending a puff of smoke in his face, as if to taunt and encourage him to attempt further deeds of daring.
While this was going on in the chief’s hut, active culinary preparations were progressing all over the village—the women forsook their hoes and grinding-mortars, and the looms on which they had been weaving cotton cloth, the men laid down various implements of industry, and, long ere the sun began to descend in the west, the entire tribe was feasting with all the gusto, and twenty times the appetite, of aldermen.
During the progress of the feast a remarkably small, wiry old negro, entertained the chief and his party with a song, accompanying himself the while on a violin—not a European fiddle, by any means, but a native production—with something like a small keg, covered with goatskin, for a body, a longish handle, and one string which was played with a bow by the “Spider.” Never having heard his name, we give him one in accordance with his aspect.
Talk of European fiddlers! No Paganini, or any other nini that ever astonished the Goths and Vandals of the north, could hold a candle—we had almost said a fiddle—to this sable descendant of Ham, who, squatted on his hams in the midst of an admiring circle, drew forth sounds from his solitary string that were more than exquisite,—they were excruciating.
The song appeared to be improvised, for it referred to objects around, as well as to things past, present, and to come; among others, to the fact that slave parties attacked villages and carried off the inhabitants.
At such points the minstrel’s voice became low and thrilling, while his audience grew suddenly earnest, opened their eyes, frowned, and showed their teeth; but as soon as the subject was changed the feeling seemed to die away. It was only old memories that had been awakened, for no slavers had passed through their country for some time past, though rumours of an attack on a not very distant tribe had recently reached and greatly alarmed them.
Thus they passed the afternoon, and when ............