The Ivory Trail - Talbot Mundy

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE DARKNESS COMPREHENDED IT NOT

When Kenia's peak glows gold and rose
A dawn breeze whispers to the plain
With breath cooled sweet by mountain snows—
"The darkness soon shall come again!"
Stirs then the sleepless, lean Masai
And stands o'er plain and peak at gaze
Resentful of the bright'ning sky,
Impatient of the white man's days.

Oh dark nights, when the charcoal glowed and falling hammers rang!
When fundis* forged the spear-blades, and the warriors danced and sang!
When the marriageable spearmen gathered, calling each to each
Telling over proverbs that the tribal wisemen teach,
Brother promising blood-brother partnership in weal and woe—
Nightlong stories of the runners come from spying on the foe—
Nights of boasting by the thorn-fire of the coming tale of slain—
Oh the times before the English! When will those times come again!

Oh the days and nights of raiding, when the feathered spearmen strode
With the hide shields on their forearms, and the wild Nyanza road
Grew blue with smoking villages, grew red with flaring roofs,
Grew noisy with the shouting and the thunder of the hoofs
As we drove the plundered cattle—when we burned the night with haste—
When we leapt at dawn from ambush—when we laid the shambas waste!

———————— *Fundis—skilled workman. ————————

Oh the new spears dipped in life-blood as the women shrieked in vain!
Oh the days before the English! When will those days come again!
Oh the homeward road in triumph with the plunder borne along
On the heads of taken women! Oh the daughter and the song!
Oh the tusks of yellow ivory—the frasilas of beads—
And, best of all, the heifers that the marriageable needs!
The yells when village eyes at last our sky-line feathers see
And the maidens run to count how many marriages shall be—
Ten heifers to a maiden (and the chief's girl stands for twain)—
Oh the days before the English! When will those days come again!

Now the fat herds grow in number, and the old are rich in trade,
Now the grass grows green and heavy where the six-foot spears were made.
Now the young men walk to market, and the wives have beads and wire—
Brass and iron—glass and cowrie—past the limit of desire.
There is peace from lake to mountain, and the very zebra breed
Where a law says none may hurt them (and the wise are they who heed!)
Yea—the peace lies on the country as our herds oerspread the plain—
But the days before the English—when shall those days come again!

What first looked like a pleasant place dwindled into charmlessness and insignificance as we approached. There was neatness—of a kind. The round huts were confined to certain streets, and all inhabited by natives. Arabs, Swahili, Indians, Goanese, Syrians, Greeks and so on had to live in rectangular huts and keep to other streets. On one street, chiefly of stores, all the roofs were of corrugated iron. And all the streets were straight, with shade trees planted down both sides at exactly equal intervals.