Every day they had to go a little farther from their bowers to find food. After ten or twelve days they had to go so far that they decided to move again and build another shelter somewhere else. And this they had to keep doing throughout their lives. Time went on; they moved many times, but they never forgot the pale-faced human being with long black shaggy hair hanging over his shoulders. They were constantly afraid of meeting him.
CHAPTER XXXII
A BABY NKENGO IS BORN TO THE OLD NKENGOS
One day a tiny baby was born to the old nkengos. He was yellow in the face like his parents; his elongated little hands, with their slender fingers, and his small feet, with their diminutive toes, could have gone through an ordinary finger ring of a human being, so small were they.
The skin of his body was somewhat lighter than his face and thinly covered with short black glossy hair. His ears were very large for his head. The palms of his tiny hands were white, but no sign or color of blood showing through his skin was to be seen on any part of his body.
The second day after he was born he could cling to his mother, so that she could easily carry him. The baby nkengos are not so helpless as human babies.
Every evening the mother took the little nkengo to her bower and he slept by her side. She loved him dearly and took good care of him, and saw that he was not cold, and would cuddle him many times during the day and night close to her breast. The old nkengos would often say to each other, “Let us take good care of our little one.”
The time came when the little nkengo began to get some of his first teeth. He also began to talk nkengo, which he learned from his parents. He was exceedingly fond of his mother, and loved to be continually fondled, and as soon as she stood still, he would go to her to be caressed. He would stand between her legs, or lie on her breast, while Papa Nkengo stood gazing at them both.
The little one soon showed a bad temper, and was very self-willed; and if anything displeased him, he would become angry, utter piercing cries, stamp his foot on the ground, and refuse to be pacified until he had his own way. He was a great trial to his mamma. Sometimes she would let him cry until he was tired. At other times she would fondle him. Then he became quiet and fell asleep between her legs, or down by her side, with his little head resting on her breast. Strange to say, all the babies of the men of the woods have bad tempers.
The little nkengo took naturally to climbing trees, being born with long arms and long hands, and feet that could be used as hands. One day, as he was practising on a young tree, and was hanging, holding on to a branch by one of his arms and then raising himself by the power of his muscles, the big nkengo said to his mate: “Our little one is making great progress in climbing; soon he will climb trees and go about among their branches as well as we do, and then he will be able to get his living without help.”
The little nkengo grew up fast, but his jaws were not strong enough, nor his mouth big enough, to enable him to crush the hard koola nuts. So when they came to a koola-nut tree, under which the nuts had fallen, his parents would break them and pass them to him afterward, to his great delight. Every time he came across any koola nuts, he would try to crack them, but he could not, and this would make him very angry. He wanted to become a full-grown, powerful nkengo at once.