The First Day In The Forest We Came Across A Snake {205} - A Beauty
With A New Red-Brown And Yellow-Patterned Velvety Skin, About Three
Feet Six Inches Long And As Thick As A Man's Thigh.
Ngouta met it,
hanging from a bough, and shot backwards like a lobster, Ngouta
having among his many weaknesses a rooted horror of snakes.
This
snake the Ogowe natives all hold in great aversion. For the bite of
other sorts of snakes they profess to have remedies, but for this
they have none. If, however, a native is stung by one he usually
conceals the fact that it was this particular kind, and tries to get
any chance the native doctor's medicine may give. The Duke stepped
forward and with one blow flattened its head against the tree with
his gun butt, and then folded the snake up and got as much of it as
possible into his bag, while the rest hung dangling out. Ngouta,
not being able to keep ahead of the Duke, his Grace's pace being
stiff, went to the extreme rear of the party, so that other people
might be killed first if the snake returned to life, as he surmised
it would. He fell into other dangers from this caution, but I
cannot chronicle Ngouta's afflictions in full without running this
book into an old fashioned folio size. We had the snake for supper,
that is to say the Fan and I; the others would not touch it,
although a good snake, properly cooked, is one of the best meats one
gets out here, far and away better than the African fowl.
The Fans also did their best to educate me in every way: they told
me their names for things, while I told them mine. I found several
European words already slightly altered in use among them, such as
"Amuck" - a mug, "Alas" - a glass, a tumbler. I do not know whether
their "Ami" - a person addressed, or spoken of - is French or not. It
may come from "Anwe" - M'pongwe for "Ye," "You." They use it as a
rule in addressing a person after the phrase they always open up
conversation with, "Azuna" - Listen, or I am speaking.
They also showed me many things: how to light a fire from the pith
of a certain tree, which was useful to me in after life, but they
rather overdid this branch of instruction one way and another; for
example, Wiki had, as above indicated, a mania for bush-ropes and a
marvellous eye and knowledge of them; he would pick out from among
the thousands surrounding us now one of such peculiar suppleness
that you could wind it round anything, like a strip of cloth, and as
strong withal as a hawser; or again another which has a certain
stiffness, combined with a slight elastic spring, excellent for
hauling, with the ease and accuracy of a lady who picks out the
particular twisted strand of embroidery silk from a multi-coloured
tangled ball.
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