The working of a mission station--Buying food--The school--Bakula is afraid to enter the school--Repairing the station--Boys work in the gardens--A quarrel, and how it was settled--An evening’s chat with the white man--Rubbing evil spirits out of a man--Sunday service--Congregation--Sermon--Visit to a near town--Religious talk with the King--Boys pray for their white teacher--Witch-doctor’s trick exposed.

Next morning, at sunrise, Bakula was aroused by the sonorous tones of a large bell, and running out of the house he found the white man pacing slowly up and down the yard of the mission station, waiting for the workmen to arrive. Bakula greeted his friend with a smile, and an inquiry as to whether he had “slept well,”^[45] and then stood on one side to observe all that happened. Soon the workmen came, rubbing the sleep out of their eyes, and the white man, checking them by his note-book, sent some to cut and carry in bundles of thatching-grass, others for fence sticks, and others for posts; three were sent for papyrus^[46] reeds from which to make native string for repairing the fences running round the mission ground, and some were set to work on the station.

Having started the men at their work, the white man sat down to his breakfast. It was not like the dinner to which the King had been invited, for it consisted of porridge, coffee, roasted plantain^[47] and eggs. During this time women and men were gathering with various articles for sale, and as soon as the white man had finished his breakfast he went out to barter for the different articles he needed. Women with large baskets of mfumfu, or cassava flour, and peanuts went with their goods to the door of a store directly the price was agreed upon. Eggs were tested, and a string of a hundred blue pipe beads (worth a farthing) was paid for each, fowls were bought at from ten to twenty strings of beads each, according to size. Yams, sweet potatoes, greens, and small native tomatoes were also purchased with either the ordinary blue beads, which were the currency, or with red, olive, opal or any other coloured beads that happened to be in stock and took the fancy of the seller. Men with bamboos, mats, and planks bartered them for different kinds of trade cloth; and those with goats sold them for cloth, blankets, knives, cast-off soldiers’ coats, or large, bright-coloured handkerchiefs. Then the white man hurried over to the store, measured out the cassava flour and peanuts, and paid the women according to quantity.

On our markets a great amount of time is wasted by haggling over prices--the seller asking a ridiculous sum at first, and gradually bringing it down to a half or third of the original demand. But I noticed that the white man looked keenly at the article for sale, asked the price, carefully considered for a few moments and then stated the amount he would give, and the vender either assented to it at once, or picked up his goods and left.

There was one man, a stranger, who had a goat for sale. The white man examined it.

“How much?” he asked.

“Twenty-four fathoms of cloth,” replied the man.

The white man whistled, smiled, and said: “I will give you nine fathoms for it, and that is a fair price.”

“Give me twenty fathoms. I can get that on the market,” avowed the man.

“Take it to the market, then,” advised the white man. “Let me see,” he continued, “to-day is Nkenge market. You will not have far to go.” And with that he walked on to the next.

A man standing by said to the goat-seller: "If you stay here all day he won’t change his price. He has only ‘one mouth.’ On the market you may get seven fathoms for the goat, but not more. You should accept the offer."

He wisely acted on the advice, received his nine fathoms, and went away with a truer conception of white men’s knowledge of the prices of native goods, and delighted that he had sold his goat before the sun was very high in the sky.

Just now I heard the big bell ring, and shortly after it was again rung loudly, and the boys on the station and others from various parts of the town went hurrying by into the school-house--a long building of mats, posts, and thatch, built along one side of the courtyard. There were about sixty boys of various ages present when the white man entered. He led them in the singing of a hymn, talked to them a short time about God’s palaver, and then they all bowed their heads in prayer.

After this he called out the names of the boys from his book, and divided them into four lots: one group he set to write in books, another received slates and pencils and wrote down and worked the sums that were written on a blackboard, another set of boys sat round their white teacher and read from books, and over in the corner was a class being taught their letters by a native teacher.

Bakula was asked by the white man to enter the school, but my owner was too fearful of what might happen to him--if he did--to accept the invitation, and at the same time was so interested in all that he saw and heard that he could not drag himself away from the door. He asked and received permission to remain at his place of observation.

At intervals the white man walked round the station to see that the workmen had not gone to sleep, or over to some young men who were learning carpentry under the verandah of his house, and needed some further instruction. Occasionally men came to the door of the school to talk with the white man on matters of business or to seek his advice on native palavers.

About the middle of the morning the white man gave a sign, and the boys left the school helter-skelter for a short time of play. Hockey-sticks were quickly brought out, and the station resounded with peals of laughter and the shouts of those at play. Another sign and the boys skurried back to the school-house, and were soon engaged in other lessons. During the second school the white teacher gave a short talk on physiology, and the boys listened to it with much attention, and asked many questions. It surprised them to hear the number of bones in their body, and the wonderful way in which they were made.

I noticed that the teacher spoke of the foolishness of believing that witchcraft could affect the body, and showed how the witch-doctors tricked, deceived and robbed them. They sang another hymn, and repeated together what I afterwards learned to be the Lord’s Prayer, and the school was concluded. The midday bell rang, the workmen stopped work, the boys went to their house or to the town, and the white man had his dinner and rested during the heat of the day.

In due time (2 p.m.) the bell sounded, and Bakula, full of curiosity and interest, went to see what next the white man would do. He found him standing at the door telling the workmen to continue with the repairs of the fence, and allotting to the boys their work in the garden. At this time about twenty boys lived on the station, some of whom came from distant towns. All of them had their own work allotted to them: thus two boys swept, cleaned, and did all the necessary work in the white man’s house; one boy did the washing and ironing, another did the cooking; one boy fetched firewood and water for the cook-house; two boys looked after the goats, cut grass and fed them in the dry season; and one boy fetched the water for the house from the beautiful spring that gurgled out of the ground half-way down the hill-side. The rest of the boys worked on the garden.

Bakula could understand boys working about the house, kitchen, and goats of the white man; but he could not understand boys working on the land like women and girls; and when he went to look at them, and found them digging with hoes, he asked: “Why do you do this woman’s work? Are you girls?”

“No,” they answered, “we are not girls. At one time we refused to work in the garden, and told the white man that this kind of work was only fit for women; but he came and worked with us day after day, and we thought that the work a white man was not ashamed to do we black boys should not be ashamed of. Since then we have worked as you see us.”

Bakula returned to the courtyard, and found the white man very busy dressing sores, and dispensing medicine to the sick, after which he accompanied him on a visit to various patients about the town who were too ill to come to the dispensary. The rest of the afternoon the white man spent with the carpenter lads, by whose aid he was building a large store.

By sunset the white man looked fagged, and I think it was with a sigh of relief that he drove the last nail for the day, and gave the order to ring the stop-work bell. Just then loud shouts were heard, angry, passionate words came on the air, and the white man, hurrying in the direction of the sounds, found a big boy fighting a small one. He instantly separated them, and turning on the big fellow upbraided him for cowardice in striking a little boy, and charged him with breaking one of the station laws in hitting one smaller than himself.

“He cursed me and was insolent,” aggressively answered the law-breaker in defence of his action.

“Yes, I dare say he was cheeky,” said the judge; “but you know the rule of this place is: All big boys that hit little boys must be punished with the cane, and all small boys who curse and are insolent to their elders must be brought to the white man for him to cane. There is only one who punishes on this station, and that is myself. Is it not so?”

“Yes, that is the law,” they unanimously assented.

“I have told you repeatedly,” continued the white man, “that without such a rule you cannot live happily here. The big ones among you would constantly harry and make drudges of the little ones, and their lives would become unbearable; and the younger ones, too, would irritate you older ones with their curses and impudence. It is a good law, is it not?”

“Yes, it is a good law,” they all agreed.

Thereupon the white man picked up a cane, and gave the law-breaker six good strokes with it on his hands, and turning to the small boy, he said: “If you get cursing or cheeking the other lads I will give you a thrashing that you will not quickly forget.”

The boys trooped off to their house. And Bakula, as he accompanied the lads, was surprised to hear no angry exclamations against the white man. The majority acknowledged the rule to be a good one, and that the white man was absolutely impartial in enforcing it.

During the evening my owner, together with eight or ten other lads, went to have a chat with their white man. On entering his house we found him reading a book and eating roasted peanuts. His evening meal was over, and he was just reading and resting. On our arrival he smiled, and putting down his book, at once began to chat with us. There had been a discussion in the boys’ house as to which was the greatest country: Portugal, Holland, or England,^[48] and as the supporters of each were about equally divided they had come to the white man to settle the palaver for them. He listened to our questions, and taking down one of his books, told us the size of each country, the number of people in each, and the different kinds of articles made in each place. He then told us a story he had just read, and asked us to tell him one of our stories, which the oldest lad amongst us at once did, to our amusement. It was now late, but before wishing our white friend “to sleep well,” we all knelt in prayer and thanked the great God for His goodness, and especially for the loving gift of His Son Jesus Christ.

The next day was Saturday, so the boys swept up the courtyard, and all the various paths about the station, those also leading to the station and the “town square.” Bakula entered heartily into the work of tidying up the place, and by midday all the rubbish had been carried away and burnt. The boys had the rest of the day for themselves--some visited friends in the neighbourhood, others played hockey, one group went off to the forest in search of wild fruits, and another went rat-hunting in the farms and bush.

While Bakula was walking this afternoon through the town he saw a man stretched on a mat with a fowl tied to his leg, and a witch-doctor vigorously rubbing him. He was a sick man, and the “medicine man” had told him to bring a fowl before he could attempt to cure him. The fowl had been brought and a string had been tied from a leg of the fowl to a leg of the outstretched patient.

The witch-doctor was now kneeling by the side of the sick man, rubbing the evil spirit out of his arms into his body; then he chased it out of the body over towards the leg to which the fowl was tied; he thereupon worked it out of the other leg into that to which the fowl was connected by the string, and thus he followed it until he had cornered it near to the string, when suddenly he gave a tremendous push and away it went through the rest of the leg and through the string into the fowl. The witch-doctor cut the connecting string, wrung the neck of the fowl, and threw it over to his wife to cook for his next meal, for he was not afraid of any number of evil spirits that might be in the fowl. The practice was that if a patient did not recover after this rubbing out of the malignant spirits, he had to take another and another fowl until he was either cured or his fowls were finished.

There was no bell at sunrise the next morning calling the men to work; but before the sun was far above the distant tree-tops a bugle sounded out over the town.

“What is that?” asked Bakula of a companion, for he had never heard a bugle before.

“To-day is Sunday,” his friend replied, “and that is Petelo blowing his bugle to remind the people that it is the rest day, and those who want to attend the service to hear God’s palaver must not go to the farms.”

“I know what God’s palaver means,” said Bakula. “But what do Sunday and service mean? I never heard of them before.”

His informant explained the meaning of the day, and also of the word service. He said that ever since the white teachers had come to live in their town many of the folk observed the day and attended the service, but others laughed at both and went off to their farms as usual.

By and by my owner went with the other lads to the school-house, where we found some boys from the town already assembled. The white man came in and greeted us, sat down among us and conducted what I afterwards learned was a Sunday-school class. He talked to us about God’s mercy and justice, and we asked him all kinds of questions. If we started any inquiry that did not belong to the lesson he told us to remind him of it one evening when we went for a chat with him and he would try to answer it then.

When the sun was well up the bell was rung for God’s palaver. All the boys picked up two or three mats and carried them to the “town square,” where they spread them along three sides and placed two of them in the middle. These preparations being completed, the bell was again loudly rung, and the white man, locking up his house, went to the square, followed by a boy carrying his chair.

By this time the people had gathered--the women and girls sat on the mats along one side, the men and boys on the mats extending along two sides. The school-boys arranged themselves on the mats that had been put in the middle, against which the white man’s chair had been placed, and finally the King sat on a chair with a few head men about him at the entrance to his lumbu, or enclosure, which occupied the whole of the fourth side. He was gorgeously arrayed in a bright red coat and waistcoat, with a large, bright blue cloth round his loins and a gaudy smoking-cap on his head. Most of the people were dressed in gay-coloured cloths and bright beads, and had oily faces. Here and there were young dandies who, to enhance their charms, had polished their faces with black lead, or streaked them with lines of scarlet, blue, or yellow pigments.

It was a strange, grotesque, pathetic gathering upon which the eyes of the pale-face teacher rested that radiant Sunday morning. The faces of the old women portrayed their greed, jealousy, hatred and vice. From the very youngest girl to the oldest woman there was not a pure, virgin soul to be found. Among the older men there was not one but had broken the whole ten commandments, and the younger men and boys who had not broken them all had failed not from lack of inclination, but of opportunities. There at the back sat in scarlet and blue the man who had murdered the very mother who had nursed him and cared for him in infancy and childhood. What message had the teacher for these men and women?

The white man gave out a hymn, and the schoolboys sang it heartily. Bakula recognized it as the one he heard in Tonzeka’s town on the night of the drunken riot--“God loved the world of sinners lost.”

Then a strange thing happened: the teacher knelt in prayer, and the men and women, boys and girls turned over from their squatting postures on the mats, and bowed their heads while in reverent tones they repeated the prayers phrase by phrase--a confession of guilt, a petition for strength to do right, a note of thankfulness for God’s mercy, and, for His great gift of Jesus Christ, and a request that they might all receive His pardon and salvation. Then came another hymn, and the white man spoke to us on God’s readiness to forgive, if we will but repent and turn to Him, and he illustrated what he meant by telling us a story out of God’s book called “The Prodigal Son.” Another hymn and prayer and the strange meeting was over. The teacher went and spoke to the King and greeted all whom he passed on his way to his empty house.

Soon after dinner the white man called three or four of his boys, and, taking his long walking-stick, started for Mputu, to hold a service in that town. Bakula met the little party and received permission to join it.

Passing through the town, we descended a steep side of the hill, and came to the river Mposo, which we crossed by means of a rickety bridge, and a long walk up and down low-lying hills brought us to Mbumba’s town of Mputu. Apparently the white man was expected, for the folk gathered before the greetings between the chief and the teacher were concluded.

A service was conducted similar to the morning one, the chief and people joining in the hymns and prayer, and listening attentively to God’s palaver. The sun by now was fast sinking, so the white man bade the chief and his people good-bye and hurried back to Congo dia Ngunga. On the way out our white companion had chatted freely with us, but now he asked us not to talk to him, as he had to think over what teaching he should give the King on his return.

In our small party was a lad belonging to the town we had just left, so Bakula asked him if all the rumours of cruelty and murder he had heard about Mbumba were true, for he was notorious throughout the whole district for cutting off ears on the slightest provocation, murdering folk for the smallest offences, and stirring up quarrels and war between towns for the most trivial causes. “Yes,” admitted the lad, “it is all true. He cut off my brother’s ear, because, while sitting in front of him one day, he happened to stretch out his legs;^[49] and I was present on another occasion when he ordered a slave to be killed for the same small offence.”

Mbumba’sMbumba’s record was that of one “whose feet were swift to shed blood.” He had listened quietly to the teaching that afternoon, and had begged the teacher to “come again quickly.”

It was almost sunset by the time we had climbed the hill and reached the town. On arriving at the entrance to the King’s enclosure the white man turned in, we following at his heels. The King, hearing us, called to us to enter without ceremony, and we found his majesty squatting on a low stool with an empty chair opposite him. He shook hands cordially with the white man and, pointing to the chair, invited him to be seated. And sitting there face to face, with only a few boys about them, the white man said--

“The white teachers who first came to live in your town visited you every Sunday evening to explain God’s palaver to you, and for many months now I have been coming, when well, every Sunday evening for the same purpose. What is it that keeps your heart closed so tightly against our message?” Then he pleaded with him to repent of his many great sins and seek help and salvation in God. The shadows deepened as the conversation proceeded, but it was not too dark to see the tears trickling down the pock-marked cheeks of the old man.

At last the quiet talk was ended, and the white man, promising to see him again soon, bade the King “sleep well,” and returned to the lonely stone house that echoed with the voices of those who had lived and worked there before him.

Soon after dark the white man’s personal boy came and informed us that his master had taken some tea and gone to bed with a bad fever, and he had sent to say that he could not talk with any of the lads that night, and begged them not to make much noise, as his head ached severely. A quietness fell upon us all, and although the stone house was some distance off, the boys spoke in whispers for fear of disturbing their teacher. When the light was put out that night, one of the elder boys timidly suggested we might pray to God on behalf of their teacher. As no one dissented he falteringly prayed: “O God, we do not know much about you, for we are foolish and do not learn quickly what our white man tells us about you; but we beg you to cure him of his fever, so that he may teach us every day. O God, take a sharp hoe, dig into our hearts, pull up all the weeds and sow Thy good seed there. In the name of Jesus we beg it. Amen.”

Two or three days after the above events Bakula heard some shouting in the town, and hurried in the direction of the voices. There, in the centre of a crowd, was a witch-doctor, dancing and prancing about in the most ridiculous, though approved, fashion.

In his hand was a bunch of feathers, which he flourished in the air and then darted at the grass wall of a hut near by. Every time he threw it the bunch of feathers stuck in the wall, and everybody shouted with admiration because they thought it was a great charm, as otherwise simple feathers would not fly with such accuracy and stick tightly on a wall. The witch-doctor danced in triumph, and the crowd of onlookers shouted and clapped.

Again the feathers are thrown, and, wonder of wonders, they stick; but before the witch-doctor has finished his fandango of exultation, a school-lad darts from the crowd and, grasping the feathers, he drags them from the wall.

A scream of horror arises from the men and women, for they expect him to fall dead or paralyzed on the ground as a punishment for touching another’s fetish.

But, no, there he stands nervously pulling at the feathers; and before the witch-doctor can reach him he extracts from amid the feathers a sharp iron prong, and throws it and the feathers at the feet of their maddened owner.

Then the people see the trick that has been played upon them and, turning on the witch-doctor, drive him from the town amid hooting, hisses and laughter.

The King sends for medicine--He is told to apply to St. Catherine--The King’s promise--Bakula bids farewell to his white friend--King’s deputy goes with us to Satu’s town--Ceremony of conferring the title--Killing a leopard--Satu redeems his brother--Releases his niece from a hateful marriage--A story: "Appearances are sometimes Deceptive"--A chief asks for Satu’s niece in marriage--Marriage money is paid--The wedding--Satu gains a new slave.

One day Bakula was chatting with the white man in his house when a head man arrived from his majesty, saying: “The King has many pains in his stomach, and he wants some medicine to stop them. Will you send some?”

“No,” replied the white man, “I will not send him any. For several weeks I attended the King during his severe illness, and immediately on his recovery he, at the request of the padres, went to their church and thanked St. Catherine for his restoration to health. Go and tell him that as he thanked St. Catherine for his recovery, he must now ask St. Catherine for medicine to stop the pains in his stomach.”

The messenger could hardly repress a smile as he said: “That is only fair,” and hurried off to deliver his message.

“Will you not send some medicine?” asked the King’s nephew, who was standing by.

“Yes, perhaps by and by, but not just yet,” replied the white man. “He has eaten too much, and colic is the result. It will not hurt him to bear the gripings for a time; and then I will send him some medicine and advice. You know,” continued the speaker, “that I went at sunrise every morning for five weeks to wash his foul, sloughing sore, and bind it in clean bandages; and he was grateful for all that was done for him, and often said that I had saved his life, and now I want to teach him that these saints who have rotted away to dust generations ago cannot help him.”

By now the messenger returned to say that the King will not go to St. Catherine again if the white man will send him some medicine at once.

To him the missionary replied: “Tell the King he had better wait a little longer before making such a conditional promise. St. Catherine may be busy somewhere else, and cannot come to Congo just now, even for a King. You see, she must have a lot to do in all parts of the world, and as she is only a saint, and not God, she cannot be everywhere at once.”

Off went the man with the message, and this time he could not suppress his laughter.

“Tell the cook-boy to make some hot water quickly,” said the white man to a boy who was squatting near the door.

The King’s nephew, in apologetic tones, said: "The King’s position is a very difficult one. He loves Vianga, Yoani, Bentele, Alli^[50] and you very much. You English were the first to bring God’s palaver to him and his people, every day you cure them of their diseases with your medicines, and you teach them all kinds of good ways; but the padres give him bales and bales of cloth and many boxes of beads. You know he is always greedy for trade goods and fine clothes; and these he receives in abundance from the Roman Catholic padres, hence when they asked him to go to their church to thank St. Catherine for his recovery, he was afraid to refuse them, although he believes in his heart what you frequently told him: that God blessed your medicine to his restoration. To show how he loves you English teachers, listen to what happened about a month ago. All the padres went to the King and told him that he was to order all his people to attend their church, and never again to go to your services. They were angry because their church was nearly empty every Sunday. They threatened to leave the town immediately, and that would mean a stoppage of all their presents, if he did not issue the order they requested. The King absolutely refused to command his people to attend either service, and said: ‘They shall be free to go wherever they like.’"

“I have always felt sorry for the trying position of the King,” said the white man, “and fully sympathize with him in his difficulties; but he is, as we say in English, trying to sit on two stools, and that is always very uncomfortable to the sitter, and most irritating to the stools.”

Just then three head men came hurrying into the house to beg again for some medicine, and to promise on behalf of the King that he would never again thank St. Catherine for what she did not, and could not accomplish. So the white man called for the hot water, and, mixing a glass of physic, sent it to the King.

In a short time the man returned with the report that the King felt better directly he drank the medicine.

“What was it you gave him?” he asked of the white man.

“Only some peppermint, hot water and sugar,” replied the missionary. “You tell the King from me,” he continued, “that he is not to eat so much.”

Bakula informed his white friend that he had come to bid him good-bye, for at “cock-crow” in the morning he and his party would be starting back for their town.

“Will you not come and live with me, and let me teach you God’s palaver?” asked the white man of the lad.

“For many reasons,” replied Bakula, “I would like to come and learn to read, write, do carpentry and hear more about God; but this station is a long way from my home, and my family will not let me come so far. My uncle lives in the Ngombe district, and perhaps they will let me go to the mission school there.”

“Well, you can learn there as well as here; but I should have liked you to live with me,” and there was a note of tenderness in the teacher’s voice, and tears were not far from his eyes as he spoke to the lad. And after a quiet talk with my owner about what he had heard at the services, and expressing the hope that they would see each other again soon, the white man and Bakula separated, never to meet again on earth.

Bakula had frequently tried to induce Old Plaited-Beard to have some conversation with the white man, but had failed every time, not through lack of earnestness and persistency on Bakula’s part; but because of the old man’s superstitious fear and hatred of white men. The discussions on the subject had been long and often loud, and when Old Plaited-Beard was unsuccessful in proving his charges of witchcraft against the white man, or failed in proving that the white man bought up dead bodies and sent them to Mputu, he then fell back on another accusation: that the white men had come to steal their country from them.

On one occasion Bakula led the white man towards the place where Old Plaited-Beard was sitting; but no sooner did the superstitious old man see him coming in the distance than he ran into the inner room of the nearest house, and would not come out until he was assured that the white man had gone.

Early next morning Bakula and his party, accompanied by Kapitau and some followers, started on their return journey. On the road Old Plaited-Beard and the Kapitau had long talks, and although the prejudiced views of the old man were received with coldness by the King’s deputy, yet in one point they agreed, and that was “that the white man would rob them of their country and make them all slaves.”^[51]

Wherever we stayed for a night the people paid most humble homage to Kapitau, as representing the King, and supplied him with plenty of food and palm-wine; consequently every evening was spent in feasting and drinking, and there was scarcely a night that the elders of the party went to bed sober.

On arriving at Satu’s town Kapitau and his companions received a great ovation. The people crowded the road to set eyes on the man who had been sent by the great King of Congo to confer a title on their own chief. They vied with each other in shouting, clapping, and beating their mouths. Drums were thumped, ivory horns blown, and guns fired; and the din was such that it seemed more like pandemonium let loose for a riot than a friendly welcome to an honoured visitor and guest. To show due respect to the King’s deputy a good house was given him, and an abundant supply of food. In two or three days the party was rested and the necessary preparations for the ceremony were completed.

On the appointed day a large crowd gathered, composed of Satu’s mother’s clan, who were especially called. Those members of his father’s clan who desired to be present were welcomed, but all other clans were carefully excluded. The assembly formed a large circle, in the centre of which a leopard’s skin was spread and a seat placed on it.

The Kapitau went up to Satu, who was sitting among his people, and hooking his index finger in the little finger of Satu’s left hand, led him up to the leopard’s skin, and walking him round it as far as the tail, told him to step over it. Then, leading him to the front of the chair, he seated him in it, whereupon the crowd of onlookers slapped the loosely closed fists of their left hands with the palms of their right hands.

The Kapitau put on the new noble’s head some lemba-lemba leaves, and wetting his hands with palm-wine, pressed them to Satu’s temples, to the back and front of his head, to his shoulders and to his knees. This was to make him throb with life, wise in the head, strong in body and legs. This ceremony was repeated three times, and a blessing was pronounced in the following words: May you be happy and lucky, and when you speak may your words be heard (i. e. obeyed) by the people. And again the crowd shouted and clapped.

When the folk had exhausted themselves into quietness the Kapitau asked loudly three times: “Do you know this man’s name?” and the people replied each time: “No, we do not know his name!” Then the King’s deputy exclaimed loudly: “It is Ngudi a nkama Katendi.” The men and women, hearing this, rounded their mouths with pursed lips, and beat them with the extended fingers of their right hands, making thereby a long series of Wo! Wo! Wo! and again the drums were beaten, guns fired, and ivory trumpets sounded until the very air seemed to quiver with discordant noises.

The Kapitau then instructed the new noble how he was to deport himself as a man of high rank. In future he must not, when walking, visiting, hunting or trading, carry anything except his walking-stick or gun. In fact, he was never again to carry anything like a boy or an ordinary man. Should any person meet him bearing any article, save his stick or gun, such a person may take away the said article and either keep it for himself or sell it. Should he shoot any game he must send some one for it, for if he attempted to bring it into the town himself, the first to meet him may deprive him of his spoils. He must never, under any circumstances, gather firewood or fetch water; and, lastly, the new noble must never beat his wives, and should he so far forget himself as to do so, he may be mulcted in a fine of several fowls or one goat. These instructions completed, a bracelet was put on his arm as a sign of his new and important rank.

Satu gave the Kapitau four pieces of cloth and a pig to compensate him for his trouble; and a great feast of pigs, goats and palm-wine was prepared for the people in honour of the occasion. The night was occupied with gluttony, dancing, immorality and drunkenness, for men and women, boys and girls were reeling about in maudlin intoxication all over the town. Fortunately they had nothing but palm-wine to drink, which never makes the drinkers quarrelsome, like the fiery waters supplied by traders.

Only chiefs are permitted to own and use leopards’ skins, and when one of these animals is slain there is considerable local excitement as to which chief will gain possession of the skin by his largesse to the fortunate slayer of the brute.

The other week a leopard was killed in our neighbourhood, and the lucky man who shot it had it carried from chief to chief in the district. The front and back paws were tied, and a pole was passed through the legs and hoisted on to the shoulders of some men. In this ignominious fashion--dangling from a pole--the prize was hawked from place to place. One chief gave four kegs of gunpowder (worth 16s.); another gave seven blankets (worth 21s.); another, who already owned a leopard skin, and could not afford a second, presented eight looking-glasses (worth 5s.); and thus each gave, not knowing what the others had given. Satu gave four blankets, three kegs of powder, and two rugs (worth in all 30s.), and thus exceeded the others in generous presents. Directly it was known who gave the largest sum to the leopard slayer, Satu went and put his foot on the beast, and thus established his claim to it. The animal was removed and in due time skinned. It could not be flayed until it was trodden on by its future owner.

The leopard after it is killed is always referred to with great respect as Mfumu, or chief; and after the carcass has made the circuit of the chiefs it is carried back to the hunter’s town, and two or three days are given wholly to festivities. Guns are fired, drums are beaten, the people dance and sing songs in honour of the slayer of Mfumu, and much palm-wine is drunk. The leopard is then flayed and eaten. Some ate the flesh believing they would become lithe, cunning and strong like the leopard, but others refused to eat it from a superstitious fear of spots--like the leopard’s--breaking out on their own skins.

The gifts presented by the various chiefs paid the expenses of the festivities, and Satu sat on this skin when he was invested with the high rank of a noble. If the skin had been given to a chief out of the district in which the hunter killed the animal it would have been resented as an insult, and the towns and villages would have combined to fight the hunter’s town or enforced the payment of a heavy fine.

Satu’s deceased brother was a very poor trader, and had such frequent losses on his trading journeys that on one occasion he was compelled to “pawn” one of his younger brothers to a neighbouring chief to pay his many debts. He had borrowed fifty pieces of cloth on his brother, and although he frequently afterwards possessed more than that number, and in fact died worth more than three hundred pieces, yet he never troubled to redeem his brother, but left him in servitude. As a “pledge in pawn” the brother received no pay from the one who held him, no matter how hard he laboured.

Satu, on the other hand, was a keen, successful trader, and had accumulated a great amount of native wealth. Consequently, as a rich man and a noble, he was expected by public opinion to redeem his brother out of bondage. One of Satu’s first acts after his dignity was conferred on him was to take the fifty pieces of cloth, a calabash of palm-wine and a white goat; and, calling Bakula and others to carry the goods and accompany him as witnesses, went to the town where his brother was held in slavery.

On reaching the town he sent for the pawnbroker or holder, who came at once followed by a few friends, who all paid homage to Satu as a great noble. The natives bowed to the King and rendered homage three times at each of the three places as they approached; but to Satu they bowed only once at each place as they drew near.

When all were seated, the calabash of wine was handed round and solemnly drunk by the two principal men and their witnesses. The fifty pieces of cloth were counted out and handed over, and the white goat was presented. This white gift was called nkusw’ a mpemba, or a being rubbed white. On receiving this white goat the man who held the pawn in pledge arose to his feet and rubbed some chalk with his fingers by the side of the right ear of the pawn. The ceremony is complete, the pawn is redeemed, and the chalk is a sign that he is clean from his bondage, and there is nothing more against him. Satu and his brother embraced each other and returned together to their town. The slur of slavery now being wiped out of the family, no one would again taunt them with it.

Satu now turned his attention to help his only niece. It appears that when she was a baby only one or two days old, a man of middle age entered her mother’s house, and dropped a bead into the saucepan that stood by the fire, and from which the hot water was taken to wash the baby. The dropping in of the bead gave the man a claim on the girl to become his wife when old enough. No one else could marry her unless the girl were released by the payment of a heavy sum for breach of custom.

When the child, Sono, reached the age of seven, her deceased uncle had acknowledged the claims of the “bead dropper” to his niece’s hand by asking him to pay ten pieces of cloth as marriage money. He could and should have asked more, but he was in difficulty, and glad to accept any sum he could get. As Sono came to realize the small amount that was given for her, she became angry with her uncle and with the man who regarded her as his cheaply bought wife; and this feeling was increased by the girls and boys in her town jeering at her for not being worth more than the price of two pigs.

When she arrived at a marriageable age she refused to marry the old man, and had repeatedly begged her uncle to release her by returning the marriage money and another ten pieces as interest for the use of the money for the past ten years. Her deceased uncle, who was then the head of her family, had refused to part with so much cloth merely to gratify the whim of a girl, and, besides, he always pleaded poverty.

There seemed no prospect of release for her from a very hateful marriage with an old man who already possessed twelve wives--most of whom had bad, quarrelsome tempers, and would make her life miserable. She had determined to kill herself^[52] as her only means of escape; but now that another and richer uncle was head of the family she renewed her appeal with success.

The bridegroom-elect was a crafty old man who thoroughly recognized the advantage of an alliance with so great a family if he could coerce the girl into marrying him, or the possibility of making some money out of the breaking of the covenant should her uncle support her in her continued refusal of him.

He therefore feigned surprise when he was requested to release Sono from her betrothal to him, and asked in anger: “Was he not great enough to become a member of Satu’s family! Was he not a great man himself, and owned twelve wives! What objection had lord Satu to him?”

Satu did not attempt to argue these matters with the old man, but went straight to the point by asking how much he wanted before he would release his niece.

“Well,” replied the man, “I paid ten pieces of cloth, besides palm-wine, and various odds and ends of trade goods, worth in all fifteen pieces, as marriage money, and your family has had the use of that amount for ten years; so I shall not take less than one hundred pieces of cloth to release her from the betrothal.”

“That is a ridiculous price to put on her,” retorted Satu angrily. “I will give you twenty-five pieces, one pig, one keg of gunpowder, one calabash of palm-wine, and one soldier’s coat.”

“But you are now a great chief, and a noble of high rank,” contended the old man, “and any one will give sixty pieces of cloth for your niece as marriage money in order to marry into so grand a family. I will not take a fathom less than ninety pieces. Let me tell you a story of a girl who refused her betrothed for frivolous reasons, and was badly treated by her chosen husband.” The old man then related this story, called

“Appearances are Sometimes Deceptive.”

“Once upon a time a girl was betrothed by her parents to a Mr. Hawk, and for a time she was satisfied with her sweetheart; but by and by she complained that his face was too black. Her parents tried to teach her that a man was not to be accepted simply because he had a beautiful face, nor rejected for only possessing a very plain, black one; but she would not listen to them.

“One day she put on her ornaments and best cloths, and went to the market, where she met a young man whose name was Oily-face,^[53] because it was polished so brightly with palm-oil.

“Mr. Oily-face’s country was a long way off, and when he left home he had a nasty body covered with pimples and scabs, and his eyes bulged out. As he passed through the towns he borrowed a face, some hair, new teeth and a nice skin; consequently when he reached the market he looked a very pleasant young man.

“This Mr. Oily-face saw the girl standing in the market, and said to her: ‘I would like to marry you.’ She looked at him, and seeing he had a beautiful light skin, well-plaited hair, and nice white teeth, she said: ‘All right, come and see my parents.’

“When they reached her town she said to her family: ‘Here is a young man who wants to marry me.’ Oily-face looked so bashful, and showed such respect to the girl’s mother, that they were all pleased with him. Very soon they were married, and shortly after started for Oily-face’s country.

“They had not gone very far on the road when some one called out: ‘Oily-face, return my hair.’ Another shouted: ‘Give me back my teeth.’ In another town a man requested Oily-face to return the face that he had lent him; and another said: ‘Give me back my stomach and take your own; it eats too much.’ Thus at last he was reduced to his own nasty body, pimply skin and bulging, ugly eyes.

“After walking many days they reached their town, and the people came round asking Oily-face where he had procured his wife. He told them that she had come from a far country which was ten days’ journey away. They welcomed her, but next morning they surrounded the house wishing to eat her.

“She came outside and said: ‘Wait, don’t eat me yet; but beat your drums and I will dance.’

“So she danced all day to amuse them, and sang a song about a Mr. Hawk being very good, with beautiful, curving feathers; and how sorry she was for not accepting him as her husband. Every morning they wanted to kill and eat her; but she danced and sang to please them.

“One day Mr. Hawk passed that way, and, looking down, saw the woman, heard her song, and felt full of pity for her. He told her parents of their daughter’s danger, and promised to save her. Next day, therefore, he flew off, swooped down, and carried her back to her own family, who were glad to receive her amongst them again. After a time she married Mr. Hawk, and never any more found fault with the colour of his face.”

“There,” continued the narrator, “your niece will be sorry she did not marry me when she is badly treated by some dandy who has borrowed his beauty from other people. Give me eighty pieces of cloth and I will release her.”

To him Satu replied, with a laugh: “I will take care that no such dandy marries my niece and carries her off to a distant country. Besides, my niece is not so foolish as to make friends with any swells (etoko dia fioti) on the market.” Satu offered twenty-eight pieces and the other articles, and asserted that he would not put another fathom on the price.

They argued about the affair all that afternoon and for the two succeeding days, and at last it was agreed that Satu should pay thirty-five pieces of cloth to the old man, one pig, one keg of gunpowder, one soldier’s coat, one gun, and a calabash of palm-wine, and thus the palaver was settled to every one’s satisfaction.

A month or two after the release of Sono, a young chief of a neighbouring village arrived, followed by a man carrying a large calabash of palm-wine. Bakula greeted him, and walked with him to Satu’s house. There the young man asked for Satu, who, on appearing, received homage from the chief and inquired his business.

“I very much wish to marry your niece, Sono,” replied the young man, “and I have brought a calabash of palm-wine to start the negotiations. Will you drink it?”

If Satu had refused to drink the wine the young chief would have taken it away, knowing that there was not the smallest hope of him ever marrying into Satu’s family; but Satu did not refuse the wine; he accepted it, and sat down and drank it with the suitor for his niece’s hand.

Having drunk the wine, Satu sent for some food, so that the young chief might refresh himself for his return journey; and without giving him a decided answer he told his niece’s admirer to come back in four days. So far Satu had not pledged himself, but had simply listened favourably to the suit.

On the appointed day the chief, carrying more palm-wine, returned to Satu, who, having drunk the wine, informed the aspirant to his niece’s hand that he was quite willing to regard him as a suitable husband for Sono if all other matters could be arranged; and that the marriage money would be fifty pieces of cloth, two blankets, one pig, fifty brass rods, and five round looking-glasses.

This large sum was asked on the ground that Satu wanted a guarantee that the suitor for his niece was wealthy before he would admit him into so great a family.

The young man was staggered at the price demanded; and tried to reduce it, without success. He was, however, enamoured of the lady, and at last promised to collect the various goods. But it required repeated trading expeditions about the country and to the coast before the young chief had added sufficient to his savings to pay the marriage money and meet the expenses of the wedding.

A few months passed, and Satu received word that the young chief had gathered the cloth and other articles; and requesting him to come and inspect them. This Satu did, and being satisfied with the quality of the cloth and the size of the pig, he arranged to return for the goods on a certain day and to bring the girl’s father^[54] to be introduced to him.

The day arrived, and with it Satu and the girl’s father, accompanied by a man carrying their calabashes of palm-wine. The young man called some of his friends to help him drink the wine, and to act as witnesses. The uncle’s wine was drunk first, as he is always of more importance in these marriage transactions than the father, mother, or even the girl herself. After the uncle’s calabash was finished the father’s wine was drunk. The “money” was then counted, and the two blankets and one or two pieces of cloth were given to the father, but the rest was claimed^[55] by the uncle.

Up to the present neither the girl nor her mother are supposed to have been consulted; but he would be indeed a foolish swain who went far in the “palaver” without knowing something of the girl’s feelings towards him, or sending presents to the girl’s mother.

This young man was well acquainted with the girl’s favourable regard for him, for had she not received little presents^[56] from him? He knew, too, that his future mother-in-law was on his side, for he had acted generously towards her; hence, when questioned on the matter, she readily agreed^[57] that the marriage could take place at once.

The young chief had seven wives already, consequently he was well versed in the rites and ceremonies of marriage. At these affairs there is generally a pretence at carrying off the bride; hence on the wedding-day the bridegroom, accompanied by many friends, went to the bride’s town, and as they drew near they beat their drums, shouted loudly, fired guns, and made as much noise as possible, as though they were attacking the town. There was a sham struggle, and at last the girl was carried off. This great ado was regarded as an honour to the girl, and a proof of the bridegroom’s position.

On returning to his own village the bridegroom told his friends to bring the drums and plenty of palm-wine, and on that and the succeeding three days goats and pigs were killed and eaten, palm-wine was drunk, and guns fired. The bride went without food the day before the wedding, and as a new wife she was not allowed to eat in sight of her husband for three months.

When the crowd had gone the elders met and gave the girl into the hands of the young chief, and they taught them both in the presence of witnesses. To the young woman they said: “You are to respect your husband and his family; and you are to behave yourself properly in your house. You have never had thieving or witchcraft palavers in the past; continue without them, and conduct yourselves properly towards each other.”

To the young man they said: “You are to respect your wife and her family; you must not speak harshly to her, nor treat her as a slave, nor stamp on her things, nor tread her beneath your feet.”

Then the young man went to one of the witnesses, and taking him by the wrist, rubbed a bullet on the palm of the witness’s hand, and said: “I have heard all the words spoken, and if I destroy the marriage may I die by this bullet.”

The young woman then stepped forward and shyly took the same oath. This ceremony completed, the witnesses went into Sono’s house and arranged the hearthstones, and instructed the bride in the duties of a wife.

The young chief, in anticipation of his marriage, had built a house for his new wife, because every wife had her own house in which to live and be mistress. The Congo man is too ’cute to put two women in one house; perhaps he has learned by bitter experience the unwisdom of it, and no matter how many wives he may be fortunate enough to marry, he builds a house for each, and one for himself.

Sono, coming as she did from a town which was half a day’s journey from her new home, had no farm from which she could draw her supplies of food for herself and husband, in supporting whom she had now to take an eighth share. So a few days after the marriage she went with the other women, her fellow-wives, and they helped her to clear a patch of ground, hoe it, and plant it with seasonable seeds and roots. In return for their kindness she assisted them in weeding their farms.

It was the custom for the bridegroom to supply his bride with all the necessary food until her farm was matured and yielding; and from that time to give her meat and fish as frequently as possible, while she found her own vegetable food and a share of his. It was also the man’s duty to present each of his wives with at least one good cloth every year, and more if he were a wealthy man.

Sono settled down fairly comfortably with her husband and seven fellow-wives. She had her farm to cultivate, a house of her own, an occasional bit of meat or fish sent her from her husband; what more could she want?

One morning our town was aroused by the firing of guns and shouts of Nkombo! Nkombo! (Goat! Goat!)

Bakula ran out of the house and joined most vigorously in the shouting.

We saw a man covered with perspiration and panting with running. He hurried by to the chief’s lumbu or enclosure, and fell at the feet of Satu, where he paid most humble homage, covering his face with dirt.

As soon as he gained his breath he said: “I have been badly treated by my master Dimbula, who frequently beat me severely with his whip. See, here are the marks!” and he showed some deep wales across his back, legs and chest. “He not only thrashed me,” he continued, “but he robbed me of the small earnings to which by right of custom I am entitled. I have therefore run away from him to you. Will you accept of me?” and he looked beseechingly at Satu, for now his very life depended on the answer. If Satu refused him, and handed him back to Dimbula as a runaway slave, it was most probable that his master, in his rage and shame, would kill him.

Satu considered the matter, and at last, to the relief of the poor wretch, called for a piece of goat’s flesh, and giving half to the slave, ate the other half himself.

The crowd that had gathered, directly they saw the piece of goat’s meat eaten, shouted: Nkombo! Nkombo! (Goat! Goat!) and fired off a salvo with their guns.

The slave was practically now a free man. The piece of goat eaten by Satu was a pledge that he would protect the man who had eaten with him from ever falling again into the hands of his old master, even though he had to use the last brass rod, or shed the last drop of blood he possessed, in so doing. And the slave, by the eating of his piece of goat, was bound, as long as life lasted, to Satu as a free man.

On the next market day Satu took the whilom slave and showed him on the market as one who had “eaten his goat,” and was now no longer a slave. Dimbula was present, and was chagrined to witness the whole affair; but he was compelled by custom to accept from Satu the merely nominal price of a slave. In selling a slave ordinarily the seller gets as much as he can, and generally makes a good profit on the exchange; but in a transaction of this kind he must take what is offered as the equivalent of a slave, and be satisfied.

Dimbula was a man of ungovernable passions, and it was not the first time that his slaves had escaped from his cruelty by “eating goat” with neighbouring chiefs; while, on the other hand, no slaves had ever run to him for protection or to “eat goat” with him. His fierce, hasty temper was well known and feared.

Slaves free in this way take the name of Nkombo, or Goat; and these “goats” are very highly prized by chiefs, as they become very faithful followers of those with whom they have “eaten the goat.”