The Country of the Dwarfs

by Paul B. Du Chaillu

There was great excitement among them as I distributed the beads, and they would shout, "Look at his djivie (nose); look at his mouna (mouth); look at his diarou (head); look at his nchouié (hair); look at his mishou (beard)!" and, in spite of my big mustache, they would shout, "Is he a bagala oguizi (man spirit), or an oguizi mokasho (woman spirit)?" Some declared that I was a mokasho, others that I was a bagala. I did not forget my friend Misounda.

After I had given them beads I took out a large looking-glass which I had hidden, and put it in front of them. Immediately they trembled with fright, and said, "Spirit, don't kill us!" and turned their heads from the looking-glass. Then the musical box was shown, and when I had set it playing the Dwarfs lay down on the ground, frightened by the brilliant, sparkling music of the mechanism, and by turns looked at me and at the box. Some of them ran away into their little huts. After their fears were allayed I showed them a string of six little bells, which I shook, whereat their little eyes brightened, and their joy was unbounded when I gave them the bells. One, of course, was for friend Misounda, who hung it by a cord to her waist, and shook her body in order to make it ring.

After this I ordered Igalo to bring me the meat, and taking from my sheath my big, bright, sharp hunting-knife, I cut it and distributed it among the Dwarfs. Then I gave them the plantains, and told them to eat. I wish you had seen the twisting of their mouths; it would have made you laugh. Immediately the little Dwarfs scattered round their fires, and roasted the food I had given them, and it was no sooner cooked than it was eaten, they seemed to be so fond of flesh.

When they had finished eating the Obongos seemed more sociable than I had ever seen them before. I seated myself on a dead limb of a tree, and they came round me and asked me to talk to them as the spirits talk. So I took my journal, and read to them in English what I had written the day before. After speaking to them in the language of the Oguizis, I said, "Now talk to me in the language of the Dwarfs;" and, pointing to my fingers, I gave them to understand that I wanted to know how they counted. So a Dwarf, taking hold of his hand, and then one finger after another, counted one, moï; two, beï; three, metato; four, djimabongo; five, djio; six, samouna; seven, nchima; eight, misamouno; nine, nchouma; ten, mbò-ta; and then raised his hands, intimating that he could not count beyond ten.

One of them asked me if I lived in the soungui (moon), then another if I lived in a niechi (star), another if I had been long in the forest. Did I make the fine things I gave them during the night?

"Now, Obongos," I said to them, "I want you to sing and to dance the Dwarf dance for me." An old Dwarf went out, and took out of his hut a ngoma (tam-tam), and began to beat it; then the people struck up a chant, and what queer singing it was! what shrill voices they had! After a while they got excited, and began to dance, all the while gesticulating wildly, leaping up, and kicking backwards and forwards, and shaking their heads.

Then I fired two guns, the noise of which seemed to stun them and fill them with fear. I gave them to understand that when I saw an elephant, a leopard, a gorilla, or any living thing, by making that noise I could kill them, and to show them I could do it I brought down a bird perched on a high tree near their settlement. How astonished they seemed to be!

"After all," I said to myself, "though low in the scale of intelligence, like their more civilized fellow-men, these little creatures can dance and sing."

"Now, Obongos, that you have asked me about the Oguizis," I said to them, "tell me about yourselves. Why do you not build villages as other people do?"

"Oh," said they, "we do not build villages, for we never like to remain long in the same place, for if we did we should soon starve. When we have gathered all the fruits, nuts, and berries around the place where we have been living for a time, and trapped all the game there is in the region, and food is becoming scarce, we move off to some other part of the forest. We love to move; we hate to tarry long at the same spot. We love to be free, like the antelopes and gazelles."