“That sounds like a Zulu dancing,” said Ernest, quickly.
It was a Zulu; it was Mazooku, but Mazooku transformed. It had been his fancy to bring a suit of war finery, such as he had worn when he was one of Cetywayo’s soldiers, with him from Natal; and now he had donned it all, and stood before them, a striking yet alarming figure. From his head a single beautiful gray feather, taken from the Bell crane, rose a good two feet into the air; around his waist hung a kilt of white ox-tails, and beneath his right knee and shoulder were small circles of white goat’s hair. For the rest, he was naked. In his left hand he held a milk-white fighting shield made of ox-hide, and in his right his great “bangwan,” or stabbing assegai. Still as a statue he stood before them, his plume bending in the breeze; and Dorothy, looking with wondering eyes, marvelled at the broad chest scarred all over with assegai wounds, and the huge sinewy limbs. Suddenly he raised the spear, and saluted in sonorous tones:
“Koos! Baba!”
“Speak,” said Ernest.
“I speak, Mazimba, my father. I come to meet my father as a man meets a man. I come with spear and shield, but not in war. With my father I came from the land of the sun into this cold land, where the sun is as pale as the white faces it shines on. Is it not so, my father?”
“I hear you.”
“With my father I came. Did not my father and I stand together for many a day? Did I not slay the two Basutus down in the land of Secocoeni, chief of the Bapedi, at my father’s bidding? Did I not once save my father from the jaws of the wild beast that walks by night—from the fangs of the lion? Did I not stand by the side of my father at the place of the Little Hand, when all the plain of Isandhlwana was red with blood? Do I dream in the night, or was it so, my father?”
“I hear you. It was so.”
“Then when the heavens above smelt out my father, and smote him with their fire, did I not say, ‘Ah, my father, now art thou blind, and canst fight no more, and no more play the part of a man. Better that thou hadst died a man’s death, O my father! But as thou art blind, lo! whither thou goest, thither will I go also and be my father’s dog.’ Did I not say this, O Mazimba, my father?”
“Thou didst say it.”