He looked around upon his sheep and goats—for the sacred enclosure included the kraal which contained his private and particular flock—and he loved them, for he was by nature a born farmer, called by accident, and even then, reluctantly, to rule this nation of fierce and turbulent fighters. He looked upon the flocks surrounding him and wondered how much longer they would be his—how much longer anything would be his—for war was not merely in the air but was actually at his gates; war with the whites, with whom he had ever striven to live on friendly and peaceful terms. But, as had long been foreseen, his people had forced his hand at last.
Unwillingly he had bowed to the inevitable, he the despot, he, before whose frown those ferocious and bloodthirsty human beasts trembled, he the dark-skinned savage, whose word was law, whose ire conveyed terror over a region as wide-spreading and vast as that under the sway of any one of the greater Powers in Europe. But as long as the nation was a nation and he was alive, he intended to remain its King, however reluctant he had been to assume the supreme reins of government, and consistently with this it had been out of his power to check the aggressive ebullitions of his fiery adherents. And now war was within the land, and hourly, runners were bringing in tidings of the advance—straight, fell, unswerving of purpose—of a strong and compact expedition of whites—their goal his capital.
Yes, day by day these were drawing nearer. The intelligence brought by innumerable spies and runners was unvarying. The approaching force in numbers was such that a couple of his best regiments should be able to eat it up at a mouthful. But it was splendidly armed, and its organisation and discipline were perfect. Its leaders seemed to take no risks, and at the smallest alarm all those waggons could be turned into a complete and defensive fort almost as quickly as a man might clap his hands twice. And then, from each corner, from every face of this unscaleable wall, peeped forth a small, insignificant thing, a little shining tube that could be placed on the back of a horse—yet this contemptible-looking toy could rain down bullets into the ranks of his warriors at a rate which would leave none to return to him with the tale. Nay more, even the cover of rocks and bushes would not help them, for other deadly machines had these whites, which could throw great bags of bullets into the air to fall and scatter wherever they chose, and that at well-nigh any distance. All of this Lo Bengula knew and appreciated, but his people did not, and now from without, ever and increasing upon his ears, fell the din and thunder of their boasting songs of war.
“Au! They are poor, lean dogs!” he growled to himself. “They will be even as dogs who snarl and run away, when they get up to these whites. They bark loudly now and show their teeth. Will they be able to bite?”
Personally, too, he liked the English. He had been on very friendly terms with several of them. They were always bringing him presents, things that it was good to have, and of which now he owned considerable store. He liked conversing with them too, for these were men who had travelled far and had seen things—and could tell him wonders about other lands, inhabited by other whites, away beyond the great sea. They were not fools, these English. And their bravery! Who among dark races would go and place themselves in the power of a mighty and warrior race as these did? What three or four men of such would dare to stand before him here—at this very place, calm, smiling, unmoved, while thousands of his warriors were standing around, howling and clamouring for their blood? Not one. Then, too, their knowledge was wonderful. Had not several of them, from time to time, done that which had eased him of his gout, and of the shooting pains which afflicted his eyes, and threatened to deprive him of his sight? No, of a truth he desired not to quarrel with such. Well, it might be, that when these dogs of his had been whipped back—when they had thought to hunt bucks and found that they had assailed instead, a herd of fierce and fearless buffalo bulls—that then he might order them to lie down, and that peace between himself and the whites might again prevail.
Having arrived at this conclusion, and also at that of his repast, the King gave utterance to a call, and immediately there appeared two izinceku, or personal attendants of the royal household. These ran forward in a crouching attitude, with bodies bent low, and while one removed the utensils and traces of the feast, the other produced a great bowl of baked clay, nearly filled with fresh water. Into this the King plunged his hands, throwing the cold water over his face and head with great apparent enjoyment, then, having dried himself with a towel of genuine civilisation, he rose, strode over to his waggon—the two attendants lying prostrate in the dust before him as he moved—and lifting the canvas flap, disappeared from mortal ken: for this waggon was the place of his most sacred seclusion, and woe indeed to the luckless wight who should presume to disturb him in that retreat.
Without, the aspect of the mighty circle was stirring and tumultuous to the last degree. The huge radius of grass roofs lay yellow and shining in the fierce sunlight, alive too, with dark forms ever on the move, these however, being those of innumerable women, and glistening, rotund brats, chattering in wide-eyed excitement; for the more important spot, the great open space in front of the King’s enclosure, was given over to the warriors.
With these it was nearly filled. Regiment upon regiment was mustered there: each drafted according to the standing of those who composed its ranks, from the Ingubu, which enjoyed the high privilege of attending as bodyguard upon the King, hence its name—the Blanket, i.e. the King’s—ever around the royal person—the fighting Imbizo, and the Induba—down to the slave regiments such as the Umcityu, composed of slaves and the descendants of conquered and therefore inferior races. All these were in full war array. The higher of them wore the intye, a combination of cape and headpiece made of the jetty plumage of the male ostrich, others were crowned with the isiqoba, a ball of feathers nodding over the forehead, and supporting the tall, pointed wing feather of the vulture, or the blue crane. Mútyas of monkey-skin and cat-tails, in some few instances leopard’s skin, fantastic bunches of white cowhair at elbow and knee and ankle, with bead necklaces, varying in shape and colour, completed the adornment. But all were fully armed. The national weapon, the traditional implement of Zulu intrepidity and conquest, the broad-bladed, short-handled, close-quarter assegai—of such each warrior carried two or three: a murderous-looking battle-axe with its sickle-like blade: a heavy-headed, short-handled knob-kerrie, and the great war-shield, black, with its facings of white, a proportion white entirely—others red—others again, streaked, variegated, and surmounted by its tuft of fur or jackal’s tail, or cowhair—this array, chanting in fierce strophes, stamping in unison, and clashing time with weapon-haft upon hard hide shield, amid the streaming dust, made up a picture—as terrific as it was formidable—of the ferocious and pent-up savagery of a hitherto unconquered, and in its own estimation, unconquerable race.
A musky, foetid effluvium hung in the air, the mingled result of all this gathering of perspiring, moving humanity, and vast heaps of decaying bones, already decomposing in the fierce sunlight there on the killing place just outside the huge kraal at its eastern end, where a great number of the King’s cattle had been slaughtered on the previous day in order to feast the regiments mustered for war—while myriads of buzzing flies combined to render the surcharged atmosphere doubly pestilential. Seated together, in a group apart, the principal indunas of the nation were gathered in earnest conference, while, further on, the whole company of izanusi, or war-doctors, arrayed in the hideous and disgusting trappings of their order, were giving a final eye to the removal of huge mutt bowls, containing some concoction equally hideous and disgusting, from the secluded and mysterious precincts wherein such had been brewed: for the whole army was about to be doctored for war.
Now a fresh stir arose among the excited armed multitude gathered there, and all eyes were turned to the eastward. Away over the rolling plain, from the direction of the flat-topped Intaba-’Zinduna, a moving mass was approaching, and as it drew nearer the gleam of spears and the sheen of hide shields flickered above the dark cloud. It was the Insukamini regiment, for whose presence those here had been waiting in order to render the master complete. As it swung up the slope, an old war-song of Umalikazi came volleying through the air to those here gathered: