Part 12 (1/2)
Early the next morning, just before daybreak, the wailings and mournful songs of the natives rent the air. The whole village was in lamentation.
Poor Mpomo had just died; he had gone to his long rest. He had died a poor heathen, believing in idols, witchcraft, fetiches, and in evil and good spirits.
How mournful were their cries! ”All is done with Mpomo! We shall never see him again! He will never speak to us any more! We shall not see him paddle his canoe any more! He will walk no more in the village!”
At the last moment, when a Commi man is dying, his head wife comes and throws herself beside him on his bed, and surrounds his body with her arms, telling him that she loves him, and begging him not to die. As if the poor man wanted to die!
I immediately went to Mpomo's hut. I saw his poor wives in tears sitting upon the ground, throwing moistened ashes and dust over their bodies, shaving their hair, and tearing the clothes they wore into rags.
Now and then they took the lifeless body of poor Mpomo in their arms; at other times they would kneel at his motionless feet, and implore him to open his eyes and look at them.
As soon as the news of Mpomo's death spread in the village, there was great excitement from one end of it to the other. Fear was on every face; each man and woman thought death was soon to overtake them. Each one dreaded his neighbor; fathers dreaded their sons and their wives; the sons their fathers and mothers; brothers and sisters were in fear of each other. A panic of the wildest kind had spread among the people of Goumbi; neither men nor women were in their senses. They fancied themselves surrounded by the shadow of death, and they saw it ready to get hold of them and carry them away to that last sleep of which they were so afraid.
The people talked of nothing but witchcraft, of wizards, and witches.
They were sure that Mpomo had been bewitched.
Two days elapsed before Mpomo was buried, and then a large canoe came, and Mpomo's relatives took the body down the river, where the cemetery of the Abouya clan was situated. This cemetery was some fifty miles down the river, beyond Quayombi.
As the body was placed in the canoe, the people of the whole village mourned. The shrieks of his wives were heart-rending, and it was, who should show the greatest sorrow among the people; for every one was afraid of being accused of aniemba (sorcery); for if they did not appear very sorry, they would be sure to be suspected of being aniembas (sorcerers).
Immediately after the departure of the funeral procession, every man came out armed to the teeth, their faces betokening angry fear, all shouting and screaming, ”There are people among us who kill other people. Let us find them out. Let us kill them. How is it--Mpomo was well a few days ago, and now Mpomo is dead?” A canoe was then immediately dispatched among the Bakalai in order to get a celebrated doctor, who had the reputation of being able to discover wizards at once.
The excitement of the savages became extreme. They wanted blood. They wanted to find victims. They wanted to kill somebody. Old and young, men and women, were frantic with a desire for revenge on the sorcerers.
The doctor came. The people surrounded him, shouting, ”We have wizards among us. We have sent for you to find them. Do find them out, for if you do not, our people will be dying all the time.”
Then the mboundou was prepared. I have described it to you before, and how it is prepared. The doctor drank a big cup of it in one draught.
Oh how his body trembled; how his eyes afterward became bloodshot, his veins enlarged. How the people looked at him with bloodthirsty eyes, and with mouths wide open.
Every man and boy was armed, some with spears, some with swords, some with guns loaded to the muzzle, some with axes and huge knives, and on every face I could see a determination to wreak a b.l.o.o.d.y revenge on those who should be pointed out as the criminals. The whole people were possessed with an indescribable fury and horrid thirst for human blood.
I shall never forget the sight. There I stood, alone in the midst of this infuriated populace, looking at those faces, so frightened, but, at the same time, so thirsty for blood. A cold shudder ran through me, for I knew not what would come next. I knew not but the whole village of Goumbi might be deluged in blood. I am sure you would have felt as I did.
For the first time my voice was without authority in Goumbi. No one wanted to hear me when I said that n.o.body must be killed; that there were no such things as sorcerers. ”Chally, we are not the same people you are. Our country is full of witchcraft. Death to the wizards!”
shouted they all, in tones which made the village shake. ”Death to the _aniembas_!”
They, were all surrounding the doctor, as I have said before, when, at a motion from the stranger, the people became at once very still. Not a whisper could be heard. How oppressed I felt as I looked on. This sudden silence lasted about one minute, when the loud, harsh voice of the doctor was heard.
The people did not seem to be able to breathe, for no one knew if his name would be the one that should be called, and he be accused of the crime of witchcraft.
”There is a very black woman--a young woman--who lives in a house having one door only, with a large bunch of lilies growing by the door. Not far off is a tree to which the _ogouloungou_ birds come every day.”
Scarcely had he ended when the crowd, roaring and screaming like so many beasts, rushed frantically for the place indicated, when, to my horror, I saw them enter the hut of my good friend Okandaga, and seize the poor girl, who looked so frightened that I thought she had lost her reason. I shouted with all the power of my voice, ”You are not going to kill the beautiful and good Okandaga--the pride and beauty of the village? No,”
said I, ”you are not to kill her.” But my voice was drowned. They dragged her from her hut, and waved their deadly weapons over her head.
They tore her off, shouting and cursing, and as the poor, good African girl pa.s.sed in the hands of her murderers, I thought the big tree behind which I was looking might hide me from her view. But lo! she saw me, and with a terrible shriek she cried, extending her arms toward me, ”Chally, Chally, do not let me die. Do not let these people kill me. I am not a witch. I have not killed Mpomo. Chally, be a friend to me. You know how I have taken care of you--how I have given you food; how often I have given you water.”
I trembled all over. I shook like a reed. It was a moment of terrible agony to me. The blood rushed toward my head. I seized my gun and one of my revolvers which was in my belt. I had a mind to fire into the crowd--shoot people right and left--send dismay among them--rescue dear and kind Okandaga, who was now poor and helpless--who had not a friend; put her in a canoe, and carry her down the river. But then, run away--where? I too would have murdered people. Perhaps some of the nephews of my friend Quengueza would be among those I should kill. Then what should I say to Quengueza? They were too frantic and crazed. The end would have been, I should have been murdered without saving the life of Okandaga. How I cried that same evening. I remember it so well. I cried like a child. I would have given all I had to save Okandaga's life.