Looking down the river we could see in the distance many canoes darting about, but as we had given the natives of those towns no reason for attacking us, and as we were the guests of another town we knew they would not assail us without collusion with our neighbours; and as our neighbours had every opportunity of easily killing two unarmed men if they desired so to do without calling in outsiders to share the loot, we thought that the staring down-river, their statements regarding the evil designs of the lower towns, and their offers of help were simply attempts to fleece us of barter goods in payment for their proffered aid; so we used to get out our binoculars, look down-river, and making some laughing remark, go on with our work.
This laughter and brave show were more often forced than not, for we were at times puzzled by the apparent earnestness of our neighbours, and their repeated assurances that they would help us if we would only bring out our guns and properly prepare to support them when the attack was made. As a matter of fact, we had only one gun between us, and that was in pieces at the bottom of one of my trunks. We had no cartridges, and although we had cartridge cases, shots, balls, caps, and outfit for making cartridges, yet we had not a grain of gunpowder; but all this we kept to ourselves and refused to make preparations until we were certain the enemy really intended to attack us.
It was not until some years later that I heard the reason for these frequent demonstrations on our beach; there was a large party, composed of the principal head-men in the town, who wanted to kill and rob us of our goods, but they were not sure of our resources. “What have they in those cases and trunks? Are they full of guns and cartridges?” These were the questions discussed around their fires, hence they hit on the ruse of pretending the other towns were coming to fight us that we might make a show of such weapons of defence as were in our possession. They were nonplussed by our apparent indifference and calmness, and were as much puzzled by our quiet attitude as we were by their warlike demonstrations.
After their unsuccessful attempts to make us exhibit our force, other questions were agitated: “Why are the white men so calm and quiet? Have they some wonderful magic or powerful ‘medicine’ that will kill us all directly we begin to fight them? What have they behind them that they are not afraid when we tell them the people are coming to attack them? Have they little guns (revolvers) concealed about their clothes?” Doubtless our very calmness not only mystified them, but saved us from an attack that would have been disastrous to us, and would have frustrated our plans on behalf of the people. Some nine years before our arrival at Monsembe I had been told by an old German missionary with whom I was travelling, that a display of force often incited the natives to try issues with the sojourner in their midst; and while the above incident is a confirmation of the soundness of his advice, we have a better example of it in Dr. Livingstone, who travelled among the wildest tribes and won their confidence and friendship because he moved freely amongst them unarmed, and unaccompanied by any exhibition of physical force.
One evening in November (1890), soon after we entered our new house, the whole town was thrown into a state of confusion by the report that some of the up-river towns were coming to attack Monsembe on the morrow. Women hurried by with their children, their fowls, and their most treasured belongings, and, putting them in canoes, they paddled away in the darkness to hide them and themselves on the numerous islands opposite and below Monsembe; men gathered their spears, knives, and shields, and stood in groups near the various roads that connected their town with the upper towns; the bigger lads sharpened sticks and hardened the points in the fire so as to embarrass and annoy the enemy with them even if they could not kill; and all through the long night they sounded drums and gongs not only to keep up their own spirits, but to warn the foe that they were on the alert.
As the sun next morning began to creep above the eastern line of trees that bounded our horizon there was great activity in the town. Men ran by with their faces daubed with a thick coating of oil and soot, or painted with red, blue or white streaks, their heads adorned with feather caps, and their waists bound tightly with closely woven cotton belts; others had cuirasses of hippopotamus hide protecting their backs, and all were in a greatly excited state, waving their spears, shields, and knives, and boasting of what they would do to the enemy. The women who had no children, and consequently had not left the town, gathered near our mission house, feeling perhaps more secure there than anywhere else.
Soon we heard the shouts of the combatants, and the occasional bang of a gun (there were only three or four flint-locks in the whole town); and in came a man with a deep spear wound. He gave an account of the battle, and the women screamed in anger, or shouted in derision as his narrative either told of a friend wounded or an enemy killed. We dressed his wound, and his wives led him away. For nearly two hours we were busy dressing wounds to a chorus of screaming and shouting women; and then we heard that the attackers had given way, and were in full retreat. By this time the natives of the lower towns had arrived to support their neighbours, and they too joined in the pursuit of the beaten foes, whom they followed to their towns, where the fight was renewed until the Monsembe people took possession of them.
For a time the only sounds heard in the town were the low wails of the women mourning for the slain, or weeping over those who were badly wounded; and the songs and shouts of the women whose husbands and relatives had escaped death and wounds. Before sunset the victorious party returned with their loot of goods and prisoners. Goats, sheep, and fowls were led or carried by our house; men laden with bunches of plantains and bananas, or carrying heavy baskets of peanuts, cassava, and native bread; others were weighted down with fish-nets, animal nets, doors, paddles, saucepans, and jars; for anything that would fetch a few brass rods was stolen and formed a part of the procession of miscellaneous oddments that streamed by our house. After raiding the enemies’ towns they set fire to the houses, and some told us with glee of old and sick folk who had hidden themselves in the dark corners of their huts who were burnt to death, preferring, apparently, the tender mercies of the fire to the cruel death that awaited them if they fell into the savage hands of their ferocious victors.
While we were sitting at our tea the last party of returning warriors filed past our house, carrying the limbs of those who had been slain in the fight. Some had human legs over their shoulders, others had threaded arms through slits in the stomachs of their dismembered foes, had tied the ends of the arms together, thus forming loops, and through these ghastly loops they had thrust their own living arms and were carrying them thus with the gory trunks dangling to and fro. The horrible sight was too much for us, and retching badly we had to abandon our meal, and it was some days before we could again eat with any relish. The sight worked on our nerves, and in the night we would start from our sleep, having seen in our dreams exaggerated processions passing before us burdened with sanguinary loads of slain and dismembered bodies.
That night Monsembe and the neighbouring towns were given up to cannibal feasts, and the next morning they brought some of the cooked meat to the station, and thinking they were doing us a favour, they offered to share it with us—the meat looked like black boiled pork. We refused their offering with disgust, and told them what we thought of their horrible custom. Long before we settled amongst them we had heard rumours of their cannibalism, but we regarded the tales as more or less mythical; we could no longer now disbelieve the stories we had heard. And later still there came to our ears a very circumstantial report that the folk of the lower part of our district were procuring for their cannibal orgies the natives of a tributary of the Congo. They gave ivory and received human beings in exchange, who quickly found their way to the saucepan; and a white trader was the intermediary. However, as soon as the white folk of the district had gathered such evidence as was irrefutable they brought such pressure to bear on that white trader and his company (the company was not implicated) that the horrible traffic was stopped. That an educated white man could sink so low as to become a wholesale dealer in human flesh to a tribe of African savages is a psychological mystery that I must leave others to solve.