Then another man took his place and played on what we might call a small guitar, covered with a snake skin, singing at the same time. The strings of these instruments were of vegetable fibre.
Ten men then came on with their tomtoms, which varied in size and length according to the fashions of the tribes to which they belonged. The cylinder of the longest was about six feet in length, of the shortest about four feet. The wood was hollowed out quite thin, and antelope skin stretched over both ends tightly. The drummers beat furiously on the upper or larger end with two sticks. The more excited the people became, the louder the drummers beat. No music can excite the savage more than these tomtoms. The singing became terrific; the women, as well as the men, made the wildest contortions and gesticulations as they danced. By the light of the torches, with the great forest surrounding us, the scene appeared weird and fantastic, as if it did not belong to this world. It was almost morning when the festivities ended.
“The first musician played on a ‘handja’”
CHAPTER XV
A TALK WITH KING MOMBO’S SLAVES—WHY SLAVES DO NOT RUN AWAY—VARIOUS FEATURES OF THE TRAFFIC—THE CANNIBALS OF THE INTERIOR—MY DAILY OCCUPATIONS.
After the feast the slaves and I became more friendly than ever. The following evening they all came to see me. I told them to fill their pipes and sit down—that I was going to light the pipe of every one with my sticks giving fire. The matches gave them great delight. Some wanted their pipes lighted several times, but I could not afford this great extravagance. I did not want to run short of matches.
We made a big blazing fire and I stood under the little piazza having Regundo, Oshoria, Ngola, Ogoola, Quabi, and the medicine-man by me. I had made friends with the medicine-man by giving him four of my long hairs. The men and women and children formed a group in the shape of a horseshoe.
At first nobody uttered a word, but all looked at me, and I said with a loud voice, so that every one could hear me: “I have wandered in this great forest for a long time—can any one here tell me how large it is, and where it ends?” Then all shouted at the same time: “No one amongst us can tell where this forest ends, but we think that it goes as far as the country where the sun rises in the morning.”
A queer-looking slave tattooed all over then got up and said: “Oguizi, it is so. Here are slaves that have come from very far countries, but none of them has ever been out of this great forest. There are prairies, but as soon as you get out of them you are once more in the forest. Those prairies are like the islands, found in the rivers. When you leave them there is water all round; when we leave the prairie there is the forest all round.”