The overloaded ark, p.20
The Overloaded Ark, page 20
It was not long after we settled in at Kumba that Sue arrived. She was the youngest chimp I had ever seen: she could not walk, and was the proud possessor of four teeth only. She arrived in a basket out of which she peered with wide-eyed interest, sucking her left foot. How she had been kept alive by her native owner, who had been feeding her on a diet of mashed coco yam, I don’t know. Within an hour she was sucking away at a bottle full of warm milk, liberally laced with sugar and cod-liver oil. When I took her out to show her to Chumley he displayed no interest other than trying to poke her in the eye with his forefinger, so my hopes of a romantic attachment faded.
To any mother who is sick of her squealing red-faced brat I would say, “Go and exchange it for a chimpanzee like Sue: she will be half the trouble and give you just as much pleasure.” She spent the night in a warm basket, and the day on my bed, and there was never a murmur out of her. The only time she screamed, clenching her little fists and kicking her legs in gusts of fury, was on those occasions when I showed her the bottle and then discovered it was too hot for her to drink straight away. This was a crime, and Sue would let you know it. She had her first feed at about seven o’clock in the morning, and her last feed at midnight. She would sleep right through the night, a trick that some human babies would do well to adopt. During the day, as I say, she would sprawl on my bed, lying there sucking her thumb or foot, or occasionally doing press-ups on the edge of the bed to get her arm muscles in trim for feeding time. Most of the day, however, she just slept.
Her face, hands, and feet were pink, and she had a thick coat of wiry black hair. On her head this looked as though it had been parted in the middle and then cut in a fringe over her large ears. She reminded me of a solemn-faced Japanese doll. At first sight her tender years (or months) had rather put me off, as I felt that she would require endless attention which I had not the time to give her. But, as it turned out, she was considerably less trouble than any of the other animals. The animal staff were so captivated by her that they would fight for the privilege of giving her a bottle, and I even found John, on more than one occasion, prodding her fat tummy and muttering baby talk at her, when he thought I was not within earshot.
Chumley was, I think, a little jealous of Sue, but he was too much of a gentleman to show it. Not long after her arrival, however, London Zoo’s official collector arrived in the Cameroons, and with great regret I handed Chumley over to be transported back to England. I did not see him again for over four months, and then I went to visit him in the sanatorium at Regent’s Park. He had a great straw-filled room to live in, and was immensely popular with the sanatorium staff. I did not think that he would recognize me, for when he had last seen me I had been clad in tropical kit and sporting a beard and moustache, and now I was clean-shaven and wearing the garb of a civilized man. But recognize me he did, for he whirled around his room like a dervish when he saw me and then came rushing across to give me his old greeting, gently biting my finger. We sat in the straw and I gave him some sugar I had brought for him, and then we smoked a cigarette together while he removed my shoes and socks and examined my feet and legs to make sure there was nothing wrong with them. Then he took his cigarette butt and carefully put it out in one corner of his room, well away from his straw. When the time came to go, he shook hands with me formally and watched my departure through the crack in the door. Shortly after he was moved to the monkey-house, and so he could receive no more visitors in his private room.
I never saw Chumley again, but I know his history: he became a great television star, going down to Alexandra Palace and doing his act in front of the cameras like an old trouper. Then his teeth started to worry him, and so he was moved from the monkey-house back to the sanatorium to have an operation. One day, feeling bored with life, he broke out and sallied forth across Regent’s Park. When he reached the main road he found a bus conveniently at hand, so he swung himself aboard; but his presence caused such horror amongst the occupants of the bus that he got excited and forgot himself so far as to bite someone. If only people would realize that to scream and panic is the best way of provoking an attack from any wild animal. Leaving the bus and its now bloodstained passengers, Chumley walked down the road, made a pass at a lady with a pram (who nearly fainted) and was wandering about to see what else he could do to liven life up for Londoners, when a member of the sanatorium staff arrived on the scene. By now I expect Chumley had realized that civilized people were no decent company for a well-brought-up chimp, so he took his keeper’s hand and walked back home. After this he was branded as not safe and sent back to the monkey-house. But he had not finished with publicity yet, for some time later he had to go back to the sanatorium for yet more treatment on his teeth, and he decided to repeat his little escapade.
It was Christmas Eve and Chumley obviously had memories of other and more convivial festivities, probably spent at some club in the depths of Africa. Anyway, he decided that if he had a walk round London on Christmas Eve, season of goodwill, he might run across someone who would offer him a beer. So he broke open his cage and set off once more across Regent’s Park. At Gloucester Gate he looked about hopefully for a bus, but there was not one in sight. But there were some cars parked there and Chumley approached them and beat on the doors vigorously, in the hope that the occupants would open up and offer him a lift. Chumley loved a ride in any sort of conveyance. But the foolish humans misconstrued his actions: there he was full of Christmas spirit, asking for a lift, and all they could do was to wind up their windows and yell for help. This, thought Chumley, was a damn poor way to show a fellow the traditional British hospitality. But before he had time to explain his mission to the car owners, a panting posse of keepers arrived, and he was bundled back to the Zoo. Chumley had escaped twice, and they were not going to risk it happening again: from being a fine, intelligent animal, good enough to be displayed on television, he had suddenly become (by reason of his escapades) a fierce and untrustworthy monster, he might escape yet again and bite some worthy citizen, so rather than risk this Chumley was sentenced to death and shot.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
THE VILLAGE IN THE LAKE
KUMEA was a large village and, for the Cameroons, comparatively civilized: that is to say, it had a white population of about ten people, it could boast of a United Africa Company store and a small hospital, and it was a regular stopping point for all the lorries from the coast. In consequence we thought that it would produce little in the way of rare specimens for us, and we looked on it more as a base within easy reach of port rather than a collecting station of possible value. To our surprise Kumba, and its inhabitants, produced for us some of our very choicest specimens.
The first of these arrived not long after we had settled in the three nice, airy school-houses which were situated on the edge of the village. A wild-looking fellow presented himself one day, bearing on his head a long cage skilfully made out of bamboo, and carefully wrapped in banana leaves. The man, it turned out, was a native from the French Cameroons, some thirty miles away, and he could speak nothing but his own dialect and a sort of pidgin-French. As my French is of much the same variety anyway, I found that we could converse. He told me that he had heard that I was buying monkeys, and so he had gone off to his farm and caught me some. Just like that. He then tore off the banana leaves and displayed to my astonished eyes three monkeys of a species that I had never seen before, sitting in the bamboo cage. On looking closer, moreover, I discovered that there were, in reality, four monkeys, for one of the females clutched a tiny baby to her breast, but it was so small that it was half buried in her fur. They were big handsome beasts, a very dark slate-grey all over, except for two spots of colour: under their chins the hair was soft and fluffy, like a powder-puff, and pure white; on the lower back the hair was a bright rust red in certain lights. Without argument I paid him the very modest price he demanded, and then tried to interrogate him in my very best French. A man who could catch monkeys in this quantity, and of this species, was, I knew, worth cultivating.
“Allons, mon ami, avec quelles choses avez-vous entrappe ces animaux?” I asked hopefully. “Pardon, monsieur ?”
I repeated, substituting a word for “animaux” that I hoped meant monkey.
The man thought for a long time, scratching his head.
“Je ne comprendspas, monsieur,” he said apologetically.
Frantically I looked around for rescue, and at that moment John appeared. Now I knew that my stalwart companion had spent some time in Belgium, and remembered that he could speak French or, at least, had told me that he could. So I called him over and he entered the fray. Speaking with a delightful Oxford accent he translated to my wild tattooed tribesman, and to my surprise the man understood. He replied with a flood of speech, and this time it was John who could not understand. After a hectic half-hour, during which we all spouted French, pidgin, and English at each other, and used nearly every French phrase except “the pen of my aunt”, we got the man’s story out of him. Apparently he would build a small cage of logs in his farm, somewhere near the place he knew monkeys to be, and then bait it with ripe bananas. When the monkey troop entered to feast on the fruit they dislodged some sticks, carefully balanced, and the door slammed shut behind them. I implored him to go and catch me more, and underlined it by dashing him two packs of cigarettes. He promised he would try, and left, but I never saw him again. I expect the price he had received for the first lot of monkeys had been enough to keep him going for several months and, according to the Cameroon outlook, why bother to work when you have enough money to buy what you want? Time enough to find a job when you are out of cash. A delightful sentiment, no doubt, and one that displays a very attractive philosophy, but it is hardly the sort of thing a collector wants of his hunters.
The monkeys turned out to be Preuss’s Guenon, or the Red-backed Monkey, and a species that had not been seen alive in England for about forty years. As soon as I could I moved them into decent cages, separating the mother and the baby so that they would not be worried or bullied by the others. They were the pride of my monkey collection, and I gloated over them for several days. Then, one frightful morning, some dreadful little child (who I sincerely trust has met with a bad and painful end) crept unseen into the animal house and started to open the cage doors to feed the monkeys. This did not matter with most of them, for they were tame and would accept food from the hand with confidence. But my precious Preuss’s had not settled down yet and were certainly not used to strangers opening their cage doors and waving fruit at them. One of the males jumped down and proceeded to bite the hand that was trying to feed him. The boy, of course, leapt back and for a couple of minutes the door was unguarded and open. That was time enough for the monkeys, who were out of their cage and on to the rafters in a second. Just at that moment the animal boys arrived and captured the culprit, saw the monkeys dancing on the rafters, and came running for me. But by the time we had rushed back to the animal house with nets it was too late, and my lovely pair of monkeys were galloping away across the grass in the direction of the nearest trees. The staff gave chase, but they were hopelessly outdistanced. I only hoped that the animals would have the sense to make for the deep forest with all speed, for if they hung around the trees in the village they would most certainly be shot for chop. So now I was left with my solitary female and her baby.
Carefully I approached the cause of my loss whose hand, I noticed with immense satisfaction, was badly bitten. But he glanced at my face, realized that I was not going to be charitable, and fled as fast as his little black legs could carry him. The panting staff returned, and immediately set off in pursuit of the boy, but he, like the monkeys, had too much of a start, and he disappeared among the back streets of the village.
I was still moaning about my loss two days later and hoping that the man from the French Cameroons would return with more of the Guenons, when I received a specimen that more than compensated for the loss of my monkeys. A youth presented himself to me clutching in his arms a box that had once, according to the label, contained bars of Lifebuoy soap. A strong odour argued that it was only recently the soap had been removed from the interior. I prised off the lid and looked into the dark and smelly box, and there crouched an Angwantibo.
Once more there was an uproar: the animal had to be confined in a makeshift cage while a proper one was constructed. The temporary home was not worthy of the beast’s rarity and value, but it was better than that suffocating box. The boy was paid, congratulated, and told to try again, which he promised to do. The next day I had just placed the animal in its proper cage, and placed the cage lovingly next to the one that contained the original specimen, when the same boy walked in carrying the same soap box.
“Ah . . . aaa!” I greeted him jovially, “na what beef you done bring? Another same same for dis one?” and I gestured at the Angwantibos.
“Yes, sah,” he said unemotionally.
“What?” I said. “You no get same beef again, eh?”
For answer he lifted the lid of the box and displayed a third Angwantibo inside. I could hardly believe my eyes: to get two Angwantibos in two days struck me as being the sort of thing you dream about but never accomplish. Shakily I paid him, told him to try for more, and went to see John about it.
“Guess what I’ve just got?”
“Something interesting?”
“Another Angwantibo. . . .”
“I say, that’s very good,” said John, in a pleased tone of voice. “Now we’ve got three.”
“Yes, but what worries me is that I just ask this boy to try for another, and the next day he walks in with one, as though it’s no trouble at all. I’ve just told him to try and get me a fourth. What I will do if he comes back to-morrow with about six of them, I don’t know. After all, I can’t go on paying that fantastic price.”
“Don’t worry,” said John cheerfully, “I don’t expect you will get any more.”
As it turned out he was right, but the thought of being confronted with a basketful of Angwantibos at any moment haunted me for several days. I knew I could not have resisted buying them if they had been brought in.
The next good item was a rare and beautiful Superb Sunbird which a small boy brought in, clutched in one hot and sticky hand. Moreover, it was a male, the more colourful of the sexes, and undamaged. I happened to be in the bird house when it arrived and had the pleasure of seeing the usually unemotional John actually gasp with surprise and delight when he saw it. He recovered himself quickly, and became once more the cool and self-possessed Englishman, but there was a feverish glitter in his eye as he bargained with the boy, beating him down mercilessly penny by penny. When he had purchased it he asked the boy how he had caught it.
“With my hand, sah,” the boy replied.
“With your hand?” “Yes, sah, ’e done fly close to me and I done catchum with my hand, so . . .” said the boy, making a fly-swatting gesture with his hand.
John turned to me.
“You are supposed to be the expert on native mentality,” he said; “can you tell me why the boys never tell me the truth about catching these birds? To catch this on the wing he would have to have the eyesight of a hawk and the speed of a rifle bullet. . . . Why does he think I am going to believe such a blatant lie?”
“You look so nice and innocent, old boy, the sort of person that they sell Buckingham Palace to as a rule. There’s a sort of shining innocence about you.”
John sighed, told the boy to try and get him more birds, and went back to his feeding. But I saw him creep back to gloat over his sunbird later, when he thought I was not looking.
Not long after this the Reverend Paul Schibler asked me if I would like to accompany him and his wife on a trip they were going to make to a village at a lake called Soden, some miles from Kumba. He said, to tempt me, that there were hundreds of birds on the lake, and I would be sure to obtain some nice specimens. I suggested the idea to John and he was very enthusiastic, saying that he would watch over my now considerable collection of mammals and reptiles until I returned. We planned to go for a week, and I prepared a number of small cages and boxes for my captures, rolled up my camp-bed, and set off early one morning in the back of the Schiblers’ kit-car, with Pious, who was to minister to my wants. We took the car as far as the road went, and there we collected our carriers and started on our twelve- or fifteen-mile hike to the lake.
Our route was very level and the path wound gently through the forest, in and out of small native farms, and through villages that were mere handfuls of huts scattered about clearings among the great trees. Everywhere the people would come out to greet the Schiblers, shaking hands and calling welcome. Everyone we met stood to one side of the path for us to pass, and would mumble a greeting to us. If they were heavily laden, or suffering from some disease, the Schiblers would pause and inquire after their health or the distance they would have to travel, always ending with the sympathetic “Iseeya”. Sometimes we passed beneath bombax trees a-blaze with their scarlet flowers, and a quilt of yellow or white convolvulus draped around the base of their great silvery trunks. In the fields the corn husks were heavy and swollen, and their silken tassels waved in the breeze, the bananas hung in great yellow bunches from the trees, looking like misshapen chandeliers fashioned out of wax.
