Lost in the Jungle; Narrated for Young People

by Paul B. Du Chaillu

CHAPTER XXIV.

THEY ALL COME TO SEE ME.—THEY SAY I HAVE AN EVIL EYE.—ASHIRA VILLAGES.—OLENDA GIVES A GREAT BALL IN MY HONOR.—BEER-HOUSES.—GOATS COMING OUT OF A MOUNTAIN ALIVE.

Several days have elapsed since my arrival at Olenda. From more than one hundred and fifty villages of the plain, the people streamed to Olenda's town to see "the spirit." They came in the night, slept on the ground outside the town, and in the morning crowded about me, wondering at my hair, at my clothes, at my shoes; declaring that my feet were like elephant's feet, for they did not see the toes; and they would try to get a glance at my eyes. The moment I looked at them they ran off screaming, and especially the women and children. The Africans had a great dread of my look. They believe in the evil eye, and often, when I would look steadily at them, my best friends, with a shudder, would beg me not to do it.

So I may say that since my arrival the time has been devoted to seeing and being seen. And I assure you it was no joke to hear that uproarious crowd and their wild shouts—to have always in my sight a crowd of people yelling at every movement I made.

I had a Yankee clock, which was an object of constant wonder to them. They thought that there was a kind of spirit inside that made the noise, and that watched over me. Its constant ticking, day and night, was noticed, and they had an idea that the noise could never stop. At night of course the sound is louder, and this frightened them, and not one dared to come close to my hut.

Every day Olenda beats his kendo; every day he comes to get a look at me.

This Ashira prairie seemed to be shut in on all sides by mountains, which of course were covered with forest. Fancy the forest a sea of trees, and the Ashira Land an island. Pine-apples grew in great abundance, and thousands and thousands of them were clustered close together, and formed otôbi (prairies) by themselves.

This plain is the finest and most delightful country I had thus far seen in the jungle. The undulations of the prairie, which is a kind of table-land surrounded on every side by high mountains, gave the landscape a charming variety. The surrounding mountains, the splendid peak of the Nkoomoo Nabouali on the north, said by the superstitious Ashiras to be inhabited by satyrs like men; the Andelè and Ofoubou-Orèrè to the south, and the Ococoo to the east, are all covered with dense masses of foliage. In those forests are living tribes of wild men and wilder beasts, roaming at pleasure.

I have arrived in a country where I could see grass, and see distinctly the moon, the stars, and the sun without first being obliged to cut the trees down. Oh, you have no idea how nice it is to see an open space after you have been shut up in the forest for years.