How They Stand
The Long Submersion They Must Undergo I Do Not Know; The Natives
Tell Me They Begin To
Spring up as soon as ever the water falls and
leaves the island exposed; that they very soon grow up
And flower,
and keep on flowering until the Ogowe comes down again and rides
roughshod over Kondo Kondo for months. While the men were making
their fire I went across the island to see the great Alemba rapid,
of which I had heard so much, that lay between it and the north
bank. Nobler pens than mine must sing its glory and its grandeur.
Its face was like nothing I have seen before. Its voice was like
nothing I have heard. Those other rapids are not to be compared to
it; they are wild, headstrong, and malignant enough, but the Alemba
is not as they. It does not struggle, and writhe, and brawl among
the rocks, but comes in a majestic springing dance, a stretch of
waltzing foam, triumphant.
The beauty of the night on Kondo Kondo was superb; the sun went down
and the afterglow flashed across the sky in crimson, purple, and
gold, leaving it a deep violet-purple, with the great stars hanging
in it like moons, until the moon herself arose, lighting the sky
long before she sent her beams down on us in this valley. As she
rose, the mountains hiding her face grew harder and harder in
outline, and deeper and deeper black, while those opposite were just
enough illumined to let one see the wefts and floating veils of
blue-white mist upon them, and when at last, and for a short time
only, she shone full down on the savage foam of the Alemba, she
turned it into a soft silver mist. Around, on all sides, flickered
the fire-flies, who had come to see if our fire was not a big
relation of their own, and they were the sole representatives, with
ourselves, of animal life. When the moon had gone, the sky, still
lit by the stars, seeming indeed to be in itself lambent, was very
lovely, but it shared none of its light with us, and we sat round
our fire surrounded by an utter darkness. Cold, clammy drifts of
almost tangible mist encircled us; ever and again came cold faint
puffs of wandering wind, weird and grim beyond description.
I will not weary you further with details of our ascent of the Ogowe
rapids, for I have done so already sufficiently to make you
understand the sort of work going up them entails, and I have no
doubt that, could I have given you a more vivid picture of them, you
would join me in admiration of the fiery pluck of those few
Frenchmen who traverse them on duty bound. I personally deeply
regret it was not my good fortune to meet again the French official
I had had the pleasure of meeting on the Eclaireur. He would have
been truly great in his description of his voyage to Franceville. I
wonder how he would have "done" his unpacking of canoes and his
experiences on Kondo Kondo, where, by the by, we came across many of
the ashes of his expedition's attributive fires. Well! he must have
been a pleasure to Franceville, and I hope also to the good Fathers
at Lestourville, for those places must be just slightly sombre for
Parisians.
Going down big rapids is always, everywhere, more dangerous than
coming up, because when you are coming up and a whirlpool or eddy
does jam you on rocks, the current helps you off - certainly only
with a view to dashing your brains out and smashing your canoe on
another set of rocks it's got ready below; but for the time being it
helps, and when off, you take charge and convert its plan into an
incompleted fragment; whereas in going down the current is against
your backing off. M'bo had a series of prophetic visions as to what
would happen to us on our way down, founded on reminiscence and
tradition. I tried to comfort him by pointing out that, were any
one of his prophecies fulfilled, it would spare our friends and
relations all funeral expenses; and, unless they went and wasted
their money on a memorial window, that ought to be a comfort to our
well-regulated minds. M'bo did not see this, but was too good a
Christian to be troubled by the disagreeable conviction that was in
the minds of other members of my crew, namely, that our souls,
unliberated by funeral rites from this world, would have to hover
for ever over the Ogowe near the scene of our catastrophe. I own
this idea was an unpleasant one - fancy having to pass the day in
those caves with the bats, and then come out and wander all night in
the cold mists! However, like a good many likely-looking
prophecies, those of M'bo did not quite come off, and a miss is as
good as a mile. Twice we had a near call, by being shot in between
two pinnacle rocks, within half an inch of being fatally close to
each other for us; but after some alarming scrunching sounds, and
creaks from the canoe, we were shot ignominiously out down river.
Several times we got on to partially submerged table rocks, and were
unceremoniously bundled off them by the Ogowe, irritated at the
hindrance we were occasioning; but we never met the rocks of M'bo's
prophetic soul - that lurking, submerged needle, or knife-edge of a
pinnacle rock which was to rip our canoe from stem to stern, neat
and clean into two pieces.
The course we had to take coming down was different to that we took
coming up. Coming up we kept as closely as might be to the most
advisable bank, and dodged behind every rock we could, to profit by
the shelter it afforded us from the current.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 47 of 190
Words from 46932 to 47933
of 194943
