The overloaded ark, p.13
The Overloaded Ark, page 13
At night the monkeys were untied from their stakes, given a drink of milk with cod-liver oil in it, and then tied up inside a special small hut I had built for them, next door to my tent. The nearer they were to me at night the safer I felt, for I never knew when a local leopard might fancy monkey for his nightly feed, and tied out in the middle of the compound they would not stand a chance. So, each night the monkeys would be carried to their house, dripping milk, and screaming because they did not want to go to bed. George was last, and while the others were being tethered he would make a hasty round of all the pots, hoping against hope that one of the others had left a drop of milk. Then he too, protesting strongly, would be dragged off to bed. One night George revolted. After they had all been put to bed, and I had had my supper, I went down to a dance in the village. George must have watched me going through a crack in his bedroom wall, and he decided that if I could spend an evening out he could also. Very carefully he unpicked his tether and quietly eased his way through the palm-leaf wall. Then he slipped across the compound, and was just gaining the path when the Watchnight saw him.
The Watchnight uttered a wild cry, seized a banana and rushed forward to try and tempt him back. George paused and watched his approach. He let him get within a foot or so of his trailing leash, then he ran forward, bit the poor man in the calf of the leg, and fled down the path towards the village, leaving the Watchnight standing on one leg and screaming. On reaching the village George was surprised to see so many people gathered round a Tilly lamp. Just as he arrived the ‘band’ struck up, and the crowd broke into the shuffling, swaying dance that was the favourite at Eshobi at that time. George watched them for a moment, astonished, and then decided that this was a very superior game which had been arranged for his special benefit. Uttering a loud scream he rushed into the circle of dancers, his trailing rope tripping several couples up, and then he proceeded to leap and scream in the centre of the circle, occasionally making a rush at a passing dancer. Then he overturned the Tilly lamp which promptly went out. Scared of the dark and the pandemonium his sudden appearance had caused, he rushed to the nearest person and clung to his legs, screaming with all his might.
Eventually the lamp was relit, George was chastised and seated on my knee, where he behaved very well, taking sips out of my glass when I wasn’t looking, and watching the dancers with an absorbed expression. The dancers, keeping a wary eye on him, once more formed a circle. Presently I called for a small drum and, putting George on the ground, I gave the instrument to him. He had been watching the band with great attention and knew just what to do. He squatted there showing his great canines in a huge grin of delight, beating the drum with all his might. Unfortunately his sense of rhythm was not as good as the other drummers’ and his erratic playing threw the dancers into confusion once again, so I was forced to take the drum away from him and send him off to bed, protesting loudly all the way.
George attended one other dance, and this was by special request. Two days before I left Eshobi to go and join John at Bakebe, the chief arrived to say that the village was throwing a dance as a sort of farewell party for me. They would be very glad if I would attend, and could I bring the monkey that played the drum as a friend of the chief’s was coming to the dance and he was very anxious to see this feat performed by a monkey. I promised that both George and I would be there. The Tilly lamps were polished and lit, and both transported down to the village half an hour before my arrival. When I arrived, clad in my dressing-gown and pyjamas, George walking sedately beside me on his leash, we were greeted with much handclapping and cries of “welcome”. I was surprised to see such a large crowd, all dressed in their very best clothes, which ranged from a boy clad in a very fetching two-piece costume made out of old flour sacks with the name of the brand printed in large blue letters across his posterior, to the council and chief who were dressed in their brightest ceremonial robes. Elias I hardly recognized: he was to be the Master of Ceremonies, and had dressed himself to kill: plimsoles on his great feet, a bright green shirt, and brown pin-striped trousers. He had an enormous watch-chain on the end of which was a huge whistle which he kept blowing frantically to restore order. The band was the largest yet: three drums, two flutes, and a triangle.
As soon as my table and chair had been set up, and I had shaken hands with the council members and the chief, and exchanged a few complimentary words, Elias sallied into the middle of the street, and stood between the Tilly lamps blowing the whistle for silence. Then he spoke:
“All you people savvay na dis last dance we get Masa. So all you people go dance fine, show Masa what kind of fine dance we make for Eshobi, you hear?”
A roar of delight came from the crowd, and they surged forward to form a circle. Elias stood in the centre of the circle, signalled the band, and they were off. Elias danced round and round inside of the circle, wagging his bottom and roaring instructions to the dancers:
“Advance . . . meet and waltz . . . right turn . . . let we set . . . all move . . . back we set again. . . . Advance . . . right turn . . . meet and waltz . . . conduct for yourself . . . back we set. . . . Advance. . . .” and so on. The dancers bobbed and shuffled round to his directions, arms, legs, bodies, eyes, all dancing, their shadows thrown large and grotesque by the lamps, sliding and interweaving on the red earth. The drums thumped and stuttered in a complicated rhythm, and the flutes bound it together with their thin cries. On and on went the dance, faster and faster, the dancers’ faces gleaming in the lamplight, their eyes glazed, their bodies twisting and their feet stamping until the earth shook. The watchers clapped and swayed, and occasionally ejaculated an appreciative “eh . . . aehh!” as some young blood executed a particularly complicated step. At length, through sheer exhaustion, the band stopped and the dance was at an end. Everyone sat down and the buzz of conversation filled the air.
Presently, after three or four more dances, Elias approached leading a detestable youth called Samuel by the hand. Samuel was a most objectionable young man, a product of a Mission School education which made him speak in that stilted style of English which I detested. However, he was the only one in the village that could speak proper English, Elias explained, and he was to act as interpreter, for the chief council member was about to make a speech. The chief council member rose to his feet on the other side of the street, drew his lovely pale pink robes closer about him, and commenced to speak loudly, volubly, and rapidly in Banyangi. Samuel had taken a place by his side and listened carefully. At the end of each sentence he would rush across the street, translate into English for me, and then rush back to catch the next sentence. At first the council member would wait for Samuel to return before starting the next sentence, but as the speech progressed he got carried away by his own flow of words, and poor Samuel was kept dashing to and fro at some speed. The night was warm and Samuel unused to such exercise; his white shirt was soon grey with sweat. The speech, as translated to me, went something like this:
“People of Eshobi! You all know why we are here to-night . . . to say good-bye to the master who has been with us for so long. Never in the whole history of Eshobi have we had such a master . . . money has flowed as freely from him as water in the river-bed. [As it was a dry season and most of the rivers a mere trickle, I felt this was hardly complimentary.] Those who had the power went to bush and caught beef, for which they were paid handsomely. Those who were weak, the women and children, could obtain salt and money by bringing grasshoppers and white ants. We, the elders of the village, would like the master to settle down here: we would give him land, and build him a fine house. But he must go back to his own country with the beef that we of Eshobi have got for him. We can only hope that he tells the people of his country how we of Eshobi tried to help him, and to hope that, on his next tour, he will come back here and stay even longer.”
This speech was followed by prolonged cheers, under cover of which Samuel was helped away by a friend. I then rose and thanked them for their kindness, and promised that I would come back if I could, for I had grown very fond of Eshobi and all the inhabitants. This, indeed, was quite true. I spoke in my very best pidgin, and apologized for not being able to speak in their own language. Tumultuous cheers followed, aided and abetted by George, who yelled his applause loudly. Then the band struck up again, George was given a drum and proceeded to play it with great dash and vigour to the amazement and delight of the visiting tribesman. It was very late when I led George, yawning prodigiously on the end of his leash, back to the camp. The dance went on until dawn flamed in the sky.
We worked all night before we left, packing up the animals, tying the cages into suitable head loads. At five o’clock the entire village turned out: half were to act as carriers for my large collection, and the other half had come to see me off. The cook had been sent on ahead to prepare breakfast at Mamfe, where we were to be picked up by the lorry. Slowly the camp site disintegrated. Loads were carefully tested, all the more valuable specimens being given to the most trustworthy carriers. The women carried the palm mats, the collecting equipment, the kitchen things, and other items of little value, and they were sent on ahead. Then the carriers with the animals picked up their loads and followed. I disposed of a pile of empty tins and bottles to various hunters and others in the village who had come to say good-bye, as these things were most valuable in their eyes. Then, accompanied by a dense crowd of villagers all rushing to shake my hand and say good-bye, I walked to the banks of the small stream outside the village, where the forest path began. More handshaking, white teeth gleaming, cries of good-bye, and I crossed the stream and started in pursuit of the carriers, whose voices I could hear echoing in the depths of the forest ahead.
By the time my long line of carriers had emerged from the forest into the grass fields dawn had broken. The sky was azure blue, and the rising sun was gilding the tops of the forest trees. Ahead of us, across the grass field and the line of carriers, three hornbills flew, honking wildly and soulfully as hornbills will. Elias turned to me, his face gleaming with sweat, a great cage of fruit bats balanced on his head.
“Dis bird sorry too much, sah, that you leave Eshobi,” he said.
I, also, was sorry too much that I was leaving Eshobi.
PART TWO
BAKEBE & BEYOND
CHAPTER EIGHT
SNAKES AND SUNBIRDS
AT Bakebe I found that John had obtained permission to live in a huge native hut that had once done duty as a Public Works Department store. It was a three-sided structure, light and airy, perched on top of a hill above the village. This vantage-point gave us a magnificent view over an endless, undulating sea of forest, to the French Cameroon borders and beyond. Every conceivable shade of green seemed to have been used in the composition of this picture, with here and there a bombax tree glowing like a great bonfire, its branches full of scarlet flowers and sunbirds. There were feathery, delicate trees in pale green; thick-set oak-like trees with deep olive leaves; tall, spreading, aristocratic trees, whose pale silver trunks stretched up elegantly several hundred feet from the ground, and whose slender branches negligently supported a mass of shimmering yellow- green leaves, as well as the deep green, untidy bundles of orchids and tree ferns that clung to its bark. Curious hills rose from the forest on all sides, hills shaped as perfect isosceles triangles, as square as bricks, or ridged and humped as the back of an old crocodile, and each one covered to its summit with the shaggy cloak of forest. In the early morning, looking out from under our hilltop, the forest would be invisible under the blanket of white mist; as the sun rose this dispersed, twisting and coiling in great columns up to the blue sky, so that it seemed as though the whole forest was on fire. Soon the mist would only cling round the curiously shaped hills, so that they looked like islands in a sea of milk.
Bakebe, I soon found, was a good place for reptiles. Half a mile away was a deep broad river, and every so often a small boy would appear with a baby Broad-fronted Crocodile dangling from a noose of grass. On arrival I had had a pool constructed for the crocodiles, and I found very soon that I was forced to enlarge it. Every week I had a count of the inmates of the pool, as I had a shrewd suspicion that unless I did this I might be buying the same reptiles over and over again. These counts were exciting affairs which generally ended in the animal staff having bandaged fingers. It is astonishing how hard even a six-inch crocodile can bite when it puts its mind to it. Needless to say the staff did not look upon this duty with any enthusiasm: they considered it a most dangerous occupation, and always tried to shirk it if they could.
One day the staff had been more dilatory than usual over their duties and so, more as a punishment than anything, I told them to go and count the crocodiles. Presently I heard a loud wail, followed by a crashing sound and a splash. Hurrying out I found chaos reigning at the pool: Daniel, in climbing the fence, had slipped and fallen against it, and the entire side, not having been designed to withstand this sort of treatment, had given way. Daniel had then completed the destruction by rolling into the pool, and thus scaring some forty baby saurians out of the water, up on to the bank, and so out of the broken fence. When I arrived the ground was covered with crocodiles. They scuttled in all directions with great speed and agility, their mouths open threateningly. The Africans, who were unshod, were also moving with speed and agility. I yelled for reinforcements, and the household staff rushed from the kitchen to join in the chase, and they were followed by the bird staff from the house. In times of crisis such as this, everyone, no matter what his station or job, was called upon to lend a hand. Well in the rear, upholding the Englishman’s traditional reputation for calmness, came John, in his normal slow and unhurried manner. By the time he arrived on the scene most of the reptiles had taken cover in the surrounding undergrowth. Peering round he could only see one or two crocodiles in sight, and so naturally wanted to know what all the shouting and fuss was for.
“I thought all the crocs had escaped,” he said aggrievedly. “That’s why I came down.”
As if in answer, five crocodiles appeared out of the grass and converged about his feet. John looked at them broodingly for a minute, unaffected by the cries of alarm from the bird staff, and then he bent down and, picking one carefully up by the tail, he waved it at me.
“Here’s one, old boy,” he called.
“Don’t hold it like that, John,” I called, “it will turn . . ”
Acting as if under instructions the tiny reptile curved itself up and fastened its jaws on John’s finger. To his credit let it be said that not a sound escaped him; he shook the reptile free, not without some effort, and backed away from the battle area.
“I don’t think I will join in after all, if you don’t mind,” he said, sucking his fingers, “ I am supposed to be a bird man.” He retired to the hut and fastened an enormous bandage round his finger, while the rest of us spent a hot and painful hour rounding up the remaining crocodiles, and mending the fence.
This incident was the beginning of a whole row of irritating episodes in John’s life, all of which involved reptiles. He insisted that all these episodes took place at my instigation: before my return from Eshobi, he said, he had led a happy and reptile-free existence. As soon as I appeared on the scene the reptile world, so to speak, converged on him. John was not afraid of snakes, but he treated them with caution and respect and, while able to appreciate their beauty from afar, he did not want them on too intimate a footing with him. And so the fact that, for a short time, reptiles in general and snakes in particular seemed to find him irresistible, was a source of considerable annoyance to him. Not long after the escape of the crocodiles John’s finger was healing nicely, and the second episode occurred.
I was just leaving the hut one day to go and examine some traps I had set, when a man arrived with a wicker fish-trap full of water-snakes. Now these snakes, I was fairly sure, were non-poisonous. Even if venomous they would only be mildly so. As I was in a hurry I purchased the creatures and pushed them into an empty kerosene tin and placed a plank on top, meaning to attend to them on my return. When I got back that evening I found that the carpenter had removed the plank to convert it into a cage, and all the water-snakes had disappeared. As this had happened in the open I presumed that the reptiles had dashed back to the forest, so, beyond lecturing the carpenter on carelessness, I did nothing. Half an hour later John was doing some moving in the bird section, and on lifting up a large and heavy cage was startled to find five fat water-snakes coiled up beneath it. Unfortunately, in his surprise, he let fall one end of the cage, which landed on his instep. There followed a hectic chase, during which John had to move most of his bird-cages as the reptiles slid from one to the other with great rapidity. John was not amused, and his short soliloquy on the reptile kingdom (in which he included me) was a joy to listen to.
