We Sat Talking In Subdued Tones For Some Time, Expecting Every
Minute To Hear The Thrilling War Cry Of The
Doboduras, but nothing was
to be heard but the crackling of the embers of the burning houses,
the low murmur
Of our people around their camp fire, and the most
dismal falsetto howls of the native dogs in the distance. These howls
were not particularly exhilarating at such a time, and I more than
once mistook them for the distant war-cry of the Doboduras.
The Papuans, as a rule, do not torture their prisoners for the
mere idea of torture, though they have often been known to roast a
man alive, for the reason that the meat is supposed to taste better
thus. This they also do to pigs, and I myself, on this very expedition,
caught some of our carriers making preparations to roast a pig alive,
and just stopped them in time. For this reason Monckton would always
shoot the pigs brought in for his carriers, but in this case one pig
was overlooked. I have heard of cases of white men having been roasted
alive, one case being that of the two miners, Campion and King. But
we had learnt that this Dobodura tribe had a system of torture that
was brutal beyond words. In the first place they always try to wound
slightly and capture a man alive, so that they can have fresh meat
for many days. They keep their prisoner tied up alive in the house and
cut out pieces of his flesh just when they want it, and we were told,
incredible as it seems, that they sometimes manage to keep him alive
for a week or more, and have some preparation which prevents him from
bleeding to death.
Monckton advised both Acland and myself to shoot ourselves with
our revolvers if we saw that we were overwhelmed, so as to escape
these terrible tortures, and he assured us that he should keep the
last bullet in his own revolver for himself. This was my first taste
of warfare. Monckton had had many fights with Papuans, and Acland,
besides, had seen many severe engagements in the Boer war, but he
said he would rather be fighting the Boers than risking the infernal
tortures of these cannibals. It all, somehow, seemed unreal to me,
and I could hardly realise that I was in serious danger of being
tortured, cooked and eaten. It is impossible to depict faithfully
our weird surroundings. We chatted on for some time, and tried
to cheer each other up by making jokes about the matter, such as
"This time to-morrow we shall be laughing over the whole affair,"
but the depressed tone of our voices belied our words, and it proved
to be but a very feeble attempt at joking. We longed for the moon,
though that would have helped us little, as it was cloudy.
It is quite unnecessary to go into further details of that awful
night.
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