Kazeh—The noisy market—The Victoria sighted—The wagangas—Sons of the Moon—The doctor's walk—Population—The royal tembe—The sultan's wives—Royal dissipation—Joe worshipped—How they dance in the Country of the Moon—Two moons in the sky

KAZEH, an important settlement in Central Africa, is not a town; there is, in fact, no town in the interior. It is only a collection of six huge excavations. Within these are enclosed dwellings and slave-huts with little courts and carefully cultivated gardens. Onions, sweet potatoes, aubergines, water-melons and delicious mushrooms grow there in great abundance.

Unyamwezi is the Moon Country at its best, the fertile and luxuriant park of Africa. In its centre is the district of Unyamyembe, a delightful place where a few families of the Omani, of pure Arab origin, live in idleness. They have long trafficked with Central Africa and Arabia in gums, ivory, calico and slaves. Their caravans cross these equatorial regions in every direction. They still go to the coast in search of articles required for the life of luxury and pleasure led by the wealthy merchants who, surrounded by women and servants, live in this delightful country the most peaceful and placid life that can be imagined. All day long they recline on couches, laughing, smoking and sleeping.

Around these excavations are native dwellings, vast market-places and fields of cannabis and datura, splendid trees and cool shade; such is Kazeh. It is also the general rendezvous of caravans; those coming from the south with their slaves and loads of ivory, and those from the west carrying cotton and beads to the tribes of the Great Lakes. In the markets, therefore, there is perpetual excitement, an indescribable pandemonium made up of the shouts of the porters, the din of drums and trumpets, the neighing of mules, the braying of donkeys, the singing of women, the screaming of children, with the whip-cracks of the jemadars (head-men of caravans) giving the beat for this pastoral symphony. In attractive disorder are displayed brilliantly-coloured stuffs, ivories, rhinoceros' horns, sharks' teeth, honey, tobacco and cotton. The strangest bargains are conducted, in which the value of each object depends solely on the desires it excites.

Suddenly all the excitement, movement and noise ceased. The Victoria had just been sighted in the sky, hovering majestically, and gradually dropping straight down. Men, women, children, slaves, merchants, Arabs and niggers all vanished, taking cover in the tembes and huts.

'My dear Samuel,' said Kennedy, 'if we go on producing an effect like this, we shan't find it easy to establish business relations with these people.'

'But there's one bit of business which would be easy enough,' said Joe, 'and that would be to go down quietly and pinch some of the more valuable goods, without bothering our heads about the merchants. It would be worth doing.'

'Steady,' answered the doctor. 'These natives were frightened at first, but superstition or curiosity will soon bring them back.'

'Do you think so, sir?'

'We'll see. But it will be just as well not to get too close. The Victoria is not armoured, so there's no protection against bullets or arrows.'

'Are you thinking, then, of trying to talk with these natives, Samuel?'

'Why not? If it can be done,' answered the doctor. 'In a place like Kazeh there must be Arab merchants a little more educated and less uncivilised than the rest. I remember Burton and Speke had nothing but praise for the hospitality of the inhabitants of the town, so we may as well try.'

The Victoria had been almost imperceptibly nearing the ground. They threw out one of the anchors, which caught the crest of a tree near the market-place. The whole population at this very moment emerged from their holes, sticking out their heads cautiously. Several wagangas , distinguishable by their ornaments of conical shells, came forward boldly. These were the local magicians. At their belts they carried little black gourds, smeared with fat, and various devices used in the practice of magic, all of typically medical dirtiness. Gradually a crowd collected round them, including women and children; the drums did their utmost to drown one another, hands were clapped together and arms stretched out towards the sky.

'That's their way of worshipping,' said Doctor Fergusson.

'Unless I'm mistaken, we're going to be called upon to play an important rôle.'

'All right, sir, get on with it.'

'It's quite likely, my dear Joe, that you are about to become a god.'

'Well, sir, that doesn't worry me, and I rather like the smell of incense.'

At this moment one of the magicians, a myanga , made a sign, and all the tumult died down into perfect silence. He addressed some words to the travellers but in an unknown language. Doctor Fergusson, who could not understand what was said, tried at random a few words of Arabic, and was at once answered in the same tongue. The orator burst out into a tremendous harangue in very ornate language, which was attentively listened to by the crowd. The doctor at once realised that the Victoria had been taken for the Moon herself who had graciously come down to the town with her three sons, an honour which would never be forgotten in this, her favourite land.

The doctor replied with great dignity that every thousand years the Moon toured her realm, as she liked to show herself more closely to her worshippers. He begged them, therefore, to put themselves at their ease and to use her divine presence as an opportunity for making known their needs and desires.

The wizard replied in his turn that the sultan, the mwani , who had been an invalid for many years, solicited the aid of heaven and invited the Sons of the Moon to visit him. The doctor communicated the invitation to his companions.

'And you really mean to visit this negro king?' Kennedy asked.

'Certainly. These people seem friendly and the weather is calm; there's not a breath of wind; so we have nothing to worry about as far as the Victoria is concerned.'

'But what will you do?'

'Set your mind at rest, old man. A little medicine will pull me through.'then, addressing the crowd: 'The Moon, taking pity on the beloved sovereign of the children of Unyamwezi, has entrusted to us the charge of healing him. Let him prepare to receive us.'

The shouting, singing and demonstrations redoubled in vigour, and the vast swarm of black heads were once more set in motion.

'And now, my friends,' said Doctor Fergusson, 'we must be ready for anything. We may at any moment be forced to make a bolt for it. Dick, therefore, will remain in the car and keep the necessary lift with the furnace. The anchor is firmly fixed. There's nothing to be afraid of. I'm going down and Joe will come with me, but he will remain at the foot of the ladder.'

'What! you're going to see this cut-throat alone?' exclaimed Kennedy.

'What!' cried Joe, 'you're not going to let me come with you?'

'No! I'm going alone. These good people imagine that their great goddess the Moon has come to visit them. I'm protected by superstition, so don't worry, and each of you stay at the post I have assigned.'

'Since you insist—' said the Scot.

'Keep an eye on the gas expansion.'

'Right ho!'

The shouts of the negroes grew louder still. They were energetically invoking celestial intervention.

'Just look,' said Joe. 'Surely they're taking rather a high line with their good moon and her mighty sons.'

Armed with his portable medicine chest, the doctor landed, preceded by Joe. The latter, solemn and dignified as the occasion demanded, sat down at the foot of the ladder with his legs crossed under him in the Arab fashion, and part of the crowd gathered round him in a respectful circle. Meanwhile Doctor Fergusson, accompanied by the blare of musical instruments and by religious dances, deliberately approached the royal tembe , which was situated some way outside the town. It was about three o'clock in the afternoon and the sun was shining brilliantly, which was the least it could do under the circumstances. The doctor walked with dignity, surrounded by the wagangas , who controlled the crowd. He was soon joined by the natural son of the sultan, quite a well-set-up young man who, in accordance with the custom of the country, was the sole heir to his father's possessions, to the exclusion of the legitimate children. He prostrated himself before the Son of the Moon, who raised him to his feet with a gracious gesture.

Three-quarters of an hour later the excited procession, following shady paths cut through the luxuriant vegetation, reached the sultan's palace, a square building called Ititenya , on the slope of a hill. A kind of veranda formed by the overhanging thatched roof surrounded the exterior, supported by wooden pillars upon which there had been some attempt at carving. The walls were ornamented with long lines of reddish clay, intended to portray the forms of men and serpents; the latter, of course, being the more successful. The roof of this dwelling did not rest immediately upon the walls, so that the air could circulate freely. For the rest, there were no windows and little in the way of doors.

Dr Fergusson was received with great ceremony by the guards and favourites, men of high birth called wanyamwezis , the purest breed of the Central African populations, strong and vigorous, well-built and of fine bearing. Their hair, divided into a large number of little plaits, fell on to their shoulders, and their cheeks were striped from forehead to mouth with black or blue scars. From their ears, which were horribly distended, hung wooden discs and resin ornaments. They were dressed in brilliantly-dyed stuffs. The soldiers were armed with assegais, bows with barbed arrows poisoned with the juice of the euphorbia, cutlasses, simes (a long sabre toothed like a saw), and small battle-axes.

The doctor entered the palace, where, in spite of the sultan's illness, the clamour, already terrific, redoubled as he entered. On the lintel of the door he noticed the tails of hares and the manes of zebras hanging as talismans. He was received by the whole troop of the sultan's wives to the harmonious music of the upatu (a kind of cymbal made from the bottom of a copper pot) and the crash of the klindo (a drum five feet high, hollowed out of a tree trunk), which two virtuosi were attacking with their fists.

Most of the women were very pretty. They laughed and smoked thang in great black pipes. Their well-formed figures were draped in long gracefully-hanging robes, and they wore kilts of calabash fibre fastened at the waist. Six of them, and these were not the least gay of the company, were set apart from the rest as they were under sentence of cruel torture. On the death of the sultan they were to be buried alive at his side to distract his eternal solitude.

Doctor Fergusson, who had taken all this in at a glance, approached the bedside of the sovereign. There he saw a man of about forty years of age, wrecked by debauchery of every kind, and with whom there was obviously nothing to be done. His malady, which had lasted for years, was nothing more than chronic drunkenness. The royal rake had practically lost consciousness, and all the ammoniac in the world could not have set him on his legs again.

During the doctor's solemn examination of the patient the favourites and women knelt in an attitude of reverence. With a few drops of strong cordial the doctor put a brief spark of life into the torpid body. The sultan moved, and this sign of life in what for some hours had seemed a corpse was received by a further redoubling of the shouting in the doctor's honour. The latter, who had had enough of it, waved aside his over-demonstrative admirers and left the palace. It was six o'clock in the evening.

During his absence Joe waited patiently at the foot of the ladder, the crowd meanwhile showing him the greatest respect. As a true Son of the Moon he resigned himself to this. For a divine being he looked a good fellow, showing himself approachable, even familiar towards the young African women, who never tired of gazing at him and kept up a friendly conversation.

'Worship away, ladies; keep it up,' he said. 'I'm not such a bad sort of cove, even though I am the son of a goddess.'

Propitiatory gifts were offered him, such as are usually deposited in the mzimus or fetish huts. These consisted of ears of barley and pombe . Joe felt called upon to taste this kind of strong beer, but his palate, though broken to wine and whisky, could not stand the potency of this beverage. He pulled a terrible face which the spectators took for a pleasant smile. Then, mingling their voices in a drawling melody, the girls executed a solemn dance around him.

'Dancing, are you? All right. I'm not going to be outdone. I'll show you one of our dances.' And he broke into a dizzy jig, twirling, leaping, dancing with his feet, knees and hands, throwing himself into amazing contortions and impossible postures and indulging in incredible grimaces, all of which gave the natives an extraordinary impression of the way gods dance in the moon. The Africans, however, who are as imitative as monkeys, soon began to mimic his extravagances. Not a single gesture or posture escaped them. It became a hustling, excited pandemonium, of which it would be impossible to convey even a slight idea. When the ball was at its height, Joe caught sight of the doctor hastily forcing his way through the shrieking, abandoned crowd.

This produced a strange reaction. Had the sultan been clumsy enough to die under the treatment of his celestial physician? Kennedy, from his look-out, saw the danger but did not realise its cause. The balloon, responding to a considerable expansion of the gas, was straining at her moorings, eager to take flight.

The doctor reached the foot of the ladder. A superstitious fear still held the crowd and prevented them from indulging in any violence. He quickly climbed up the rungs, followed nimbly by Joe.

'We haven't a minute to spare,' said the doctor. 'Don't bother to loose the anchor. We'll cut the rope. Follow me.'

'But what's the matter, sir?' asked Joe as he climbed into the car.

'What's up?' said Kennedy, carbine in hand.

'Look,' answered the doctor, pointing to the horizon.

'Well?' asked Kennedy.

'Well! The moon!'

Indeed, red and imposing against the azure background, the moon was rising like a globe of fire. There she was, and there, too, was the Victoria . Either there were two moons or these strangers were nothing but impostors, adventurers, false gods. Such had naturally been the reflections of the crowd; hence the reaction.

Joe could not restrain a great guffaw of laughter. The inhabitants of Kazeh, realising that their prey was slipping through their fingers, uttered long-drawn howls; bows and muskets were levelled against the balloon.

But, just then, one of the magicians made a sign and the weapons were lowered. Climbing into the tree he tried to seize the rope and bring the machine to the earth. Joe dashed forward, an axe in his hand.

'Shall I cut?'he asked.

'Wait,' replied the doctor.

'But this nigger—?'

'We may be able to save our anchor, and I should like to. There'll still be time to cut.'

The magician, having climbed the tree, put in such good work that he managed, by breaking a few branches, to free the anchor which, answering to the strong pull of the balloon, caught the magician between the legs and, astride this unexpected hippogriff, he set off for the regions of the air. When they saw one of their wagangas flying through space, the amazement of the crowd was tremendous.

'Hurray!' shouted Joe, as the Victoria , impelled by her lifting force, leapt upwards at terrific speed.

'He's all right,' said Kennedy, 'a little trip won't do him any harm.'

'Shall we drop him off, sir?' Joe asked.

'Steady, Joe,' replied the doctor. 'We'll let him gently down, and I expect his trip will do a good deal to enhance his reputation as a magician among his contemporaries.'

'They're quite capable of making a god of him,' said Joe.

The Victoria had reached a height of about a thousand feet. The negro was frenziedly clinging to the rope in silence, his eyes starting out of his head with terror and astonishment. A light west wind was driving the balloon away from the town. Half ah hour later the doctor, seeing that the country was now deserted, lowered the flame of the furnace and came down. When he was twenty feet from the ground the negro came to a rapid decision. Throwing himself off, he fell on his feet and made off towards Kazeh, while the balloon, suddenly relieved of his weight, rose once more in the air. a159FEE6ZCuzb1MEyjE4yBJ3mt901fOM4+FqxnO4nyG/rVf+Gz/cdcCYJUJbr9rq