Indeed I
Must Say That Never - Even In A Picture Book - Have I Seen Such A Set
Of Wild Wicked-
Looking savages as those we faced this night, and
with whom it was touch-and-go for twenty of the
Longest minutes I
have ever lived, whether we fought - for our lives, I was going to
say, but it would not have been even for that, but merely for the
price of them.
Peace having been proclaimed, conversation became general. Gray
Shirt brought his friend up and introduced him to me, and we shook
hands and smiled at each other in the conventional way. Pagan's
friend, who was next introduced, was more alarming, for he held his
hands for half a minute just above my elbows without quite touching
me, but he meant well; and then we all disappeared into a brown mass
of humanity and a fog of noise. You would have thought, from the
violence and vehemence of the shouting and gesticulation, that we
were going to be forthwith torn to shreds; but not a single hand
really touched me, and as I, Pagan, and Gray Shirt went up to the
town in the midst of the throng, the crowd opened in front and
closed in behind, evidently half frightened at my appearance. The
row when we reached the town redoubled in volume from the fact that
the ladies, the children, and the dogs joined in. Every child in
the place as soon as it saw my white face let a howl out of it as if
it had seen his Satanic Majesty, horns, hoofs, tail and all, and
fled into the nearest hut, headlong, and I fear, from the
continuance of the screams, had fits. The town was exceedingly
filthy - the remains of the crocodile they had been eating the week
before last, and piles of fish offal, and remains of an elephant,
hippo or manatee - I really can't say which, decomposition was too
far advanced - united to form a most impressive stench. The bark
huts are, as usual in a Fan town, in unbroken rows; but there are
three or four streets here, not one only, as in most cases. The
palaver house is in the innermost street, and there we went, and
noticed that the village view was not in the direction in which we
had come, but across towards the other side of the lake. I told the
Ajumba to explain we wanted hospitality for the night, and wished to
hire three carriers for to-morrow to go with us to the Rembwe.
For an hour and three-quarters by my watch I stood in the
suffocating, smoky, hot atmosphere listening to, but only faintly
understanding, the war of words and gesture that raged round us. At
last the fact that we were to be received being settled, Gray
Shirt's friend led us out of the guard house - the crowd flinching
back as I came through it - to his own house on the right-hand side
of the street of huts.
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