Fighting was useless; the natives, under cover of the numerous
detached rocks, offered no mark for an aim, while the crowd of armed
savages thrust them forward with wild yells to the very verge of the
great precipice about five hundred feet below. Down they fell, hurled to
utter destruction by the mass of Latookas pressing onward! A few fought
to the last, but one and all were at length forced, by sheer pressure,
over the edge of the cliff, and met a just reward for their atrocities.
My men looked utterly cast down, and a feeling of horror pervaded the
entire party. No quarter had been given by the Latookas, and upward of
two hundred natives who had joined the slave-hunters in the attack had
also perished with their allies. Mahommed Her had not himself
accompanied his people, both he and Bellaal, my late ringleader, having
remained in camp, the latter having, fortunately for him, been disabled,
and placed hors de combat by the example I had made during the mutiny.
My men were almost green with awe when I asked them solemnly, "Where are
the men who deserted from me?" Without answering a word they brought two
of my guns and laid them at my feet. They were covered with clotted
blood mixed with sand, which had hardened like cement over the locks and
various portions of the barrels. My guns were all marked. As I looked at
the numbers upon the stocks, I repeated aloud the names of the owners.
"Are they all dead?" I asked. "All dead," the men replied. "FOOD FOR
THE VULTURES?" I asked. "None of the bodies can be recovered," faltered
my vakeel. "The two guns were brought from the spot by some natives who
escaped, and who saw the men fall. They are all killed." "Better for
them had they remained with me and done their duty. The hand of God is
heavy," I replied. My men slunk away abashed, leaving the gory witnesses
of defeat and death upon the ground. I called Saat and ordered him to
give the two guns to Richarn to clean.
Not only my own men but the whole of Ibrahim's party were of opinion
that I had some mysterious connection with the disaster that had
befallen my mutineers. All remembered the bitterness of my prophecy,
"The vultures will pick their bones", and this terrible mishap having
occurred so immediately afterward took a strong hold upon their
superstitious minds. As I passed through the camp the men would quietly
exclaim, "Wah Illahi Hawaga!" (My God, Master!) To which I simply
replied, "Robine fe!" (There is a God.) From that moment I observed an
extraordinary change in the manner of both my people and those of
Ibrahim, all of whom now paid us the greatest respect.
One day I sent for Commoro, the Latooka chief, and through my two young
interpreters I had a long conversation with him on the customs of his
country. I wished if possible to fathom the origin of the extraordinary
custom of exhuming the body after burial, as I imagined that in this act
some idea might be traced to a belief in the resurrection.
Commoro was, like all his people, extremely tall. Upon entering my tent
he took his seat upon the ground, the Latookas not using stools like the
other White Nile tribes. I commenced the conversation by complimenting
him on the perfection of his wives and daughters in a funeral dance
which had lately been held, and on his own agility in the performance,
and inquired for whom the ceremony had been performed. He replied that
it was for a man who had been recently killed, but no one of great
importance, the same ceremony being observed for every person without
distinction.
I asked him why those slain in battle were allowed to remain unburied.
He said it had always been the custom, but that he could not explain it.
"But," I replied, "why should you disturb the bones of those whom you
have already buried, and expose them on the outskirts of the town?"
"It was the custom of our forefathers," he answered, "therefore we
continue to observe it."
"Have you no belief in a future existence after death? Is not some idea
expressed in the act of exhuming the bones after the flesh is decayed ?"
Commoro (loq.). - "Existence AFTER death! How can that be? Can a dead
man get out of his grave, unless we dig him out?"
"Do you think man is like a beast, that dies and is ended?"
Commoro. - "Certainly. An ox is stronger than a man, but he dies, and
his bones last longer; they are bigger. A man's bones break quickly; he
is weak."
"Is not a man superior in sense to an ox? Has he not a mind to direct
his actions?"
Commoro - "Some men are not so clever as an ox. Men must sow corn to
obtain food, but the ox and wild animals can procure it without sowing."
"Do you not know that there is a spirit within you different from flesh?
Do you not dream and wander in thought to distant places in your sleep?
Nevertheless your body rests in one spot. How do you account for this?"
Commoro (laughing) - "Well, how do YOU account for it? It is a thing I
cannot understand; it occurs to me every night."
"The mind is independent of the body. The actual body can be fettered,
but the mind is uncontrollable. The body will die and will become dust
or be eaten by vultures; but the spirit will exist forever."
Commoro - "Where will the spirit live ?"
"Where does fire live? Cannot you produce a fire* (* The natives always
produce fire by rubbing two sticks together.) by rubbing two sticks
together? Yet you SEE not the fire in the wood.
