This Variety Has A
Sharp Spur Upon The Wing An Inch Long, And Exceedingly Powerful; It Is
Used As A Weapon Of Defence For Striking, Like The Spurred Wing Of The
Plover.
I frequeutly shot ten or twelve ducks, and as many cranes, before
breakfast; among others the beautiful crested crane,
Called by the Arabs
"garranook." The black velvet head of this crane, surrounded by a golden
crest, was a favourite ornament of the Latookas, and they were
immediately arranged as crests for their helmets. The neighbourhood of
my camp would have made a fortune for a feather-dealer; it was literally
strewn with down and plumes. I was always attended every morning by a
number of Latooka boys, who were eager sportsmen, and returned to camp
daily laden with ducks and geese.
No sooner did we arrive in camp than a number of boys volunteered to
pluck the birds, which they did for the sake of the longest feathers,
with which they immediately decked their woolly heads. Crowds of boys
were to be seen with heads like cauliflowers, all dressed with the
feathers of cranes and wild ducks. It appears to be accepted, both by
the savage and civilized, that birds' feathers are specially intended
for ornamenting the human head.
It was fortunate that Nature had thus stocked Latooka with game. It was
impossible to procure any other meat; and not only were the ducks and
geese to us what the quails were to the Israelites in the desert, but
they enabled me to make presents to the natives that assured them of our
good will.
Although the Latookas were far better than other tribes that I had met,
they were sufficiently annoying; they gave me no credit for real good
will, but they attributed my forbearance to weakness. On one occasion
Adda, one of the chiefs, came to ask me to join him in attacking a
village to procure molotes (iron hoes); he said, "Come along with me,
bring your men and guns, and we will attack a village near here, and
take their molotes and cattle; you keep the cattle, and I will have the
molotes." I asked him whether the village was in an enemy's country. "Oh
no!" he replied, "it is close here; but the people are rather
rebellious, and it will do them good to kill a few, and to take their
molotes. If you are afraid, never mind, I will ask the Turks to do it."
Thus forbearance on my part was supposed to be caused from weakness, and
it was difficult to persuade them that it originated in a feeling of
justice. This Adda most coolly proposed that we should plunder one of
his own villages that was rather too "liberal" in its views. Nothing is
more heartbreaking than to be so thoroughly misunderstood, and the
obtuseness of the savages was such, that I never could make them
understand the existence of good principle; - their one idea was
"power," - force that could obtain all - the strong hand that could wrest
from the weak. In disgust I frequently noted the feelings of the moment
in my journal - a memorandum from which I copy as illustrative of the
time. "1863, 10th April, Latooka. - I wish the black sympathisers in
England could see Africa's inmost heart as I do, much of their sympathy
would subside. Human nature viewed in its crude state as pictured
amongst African savages is quite on a level with that of the brute, and
not to be compared with the noble character of the dog. There is neither
gratitude, pity, love, nor self-denial; no idea of duty; no religion;
but covetousness, ingratitude, selfishness and cruelty. All are thieves,
idle, envious, and ready to plunder and enslave their weaker
neighbours."
CHAPTER VI.
THE FUNERAL DANCE.
Drums were beating, horns blowing, and people were seen all running in
one direction; - the cause was a funeral dance, and I joined the crowd,
and soon found myself in the midst of the entertainment. The dancers
were most grotesquely got up. About a dozen huge ostrich feathers
adorned their helmets; either leopard or the black and white monkey
skins were suspended from their shoulders, and a leather tied round the
waist covered a large iron bell which was strapped upon the loins of
each dancer, like a woman's old-fashioned bustle: this they rung to the
time of the dance by jerking their posteriors in the most absurd manner.
A large crowd got up in this style created an indescribable hubbub,
heightened by the blowing of horns and the beating of seven nogaras of
various notes. Every dancer wore an antelope's horn suspended round the
neck, which he blew occasionally in the height of his excitement. These
instruments produced a sound partaking of the braying of a donkey and
the screech of an owl. Crowds of men rushed round and round in a sort of
"galop infernel," brandishing their lances and iron-headed maces, and
keeping tolerably in line five or six deep, following the leader who
headed them, dancing backwards. The women kept outside the line, dancing
a slow stupid step, and screaming a wild and most inharmonious chant;
while a long string of young girls and small children, their heads and
necks rubbed with red ochre and grease, and prettily ornamented with
strings of beads around their loins, kept a very good line, beating the
time with their feet, and jingling the numerous iron rings which adorned
their ankles to keep time with the drums. One woman attended upon the
men, running through the crowd with a gourd full of wood-ashes, handfuls
of which she showered over their heads, powdering them like millers; the
object of the operation I could not understand. The "premiere danseuse"
was immensely fat; she had passed the bloom of youth, but, "malgre" her
unwieldy state, she kept up the pace to the last, quite unconscious of
her general appearance, and absorbed with the excitement of the dance.
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