As may be imagined, at the very first sign of a Masai the entirepopulation of the Mission Station had sought refuge inside thestout stone wall, and were now to be seen--men, women, and countlesschildren--huddled up together in little groups, and all talking at oncein awed tones of the awfulness of Masai manners and customs, and of thefate that they had to expect if those bloodthirsty savages succeeded ingetting over the stone wall.
Immediately after we had settled upon the outline of our plan of actionas suggested by Umslopogaas, Mr Mackenzie sent for four sharp boys offrom twelve to fifteen years of age, and despatched them to variouspoints where they could keep an outlook upon the Masai camp, with othersto report from time to time what was going on. Other lads and even womenwere stationed at intervals along the wall in order to guard against thepossibility of surprise.
After this the twenty men who formed his whole available fighting forcewere summoned by our host into the square formed by the house, andthere, standing by the bole of the great conifer, he earnestly addressedthem and our four Askari. Indeed, it formed a very impressive scene--onenot likely to be forgotten by anybody who witnessed it. Immediately bythe tree stood the angular form of Mr Mackenzie, one arm outstretchedas he talked, and the other resting against the giant bole, his hat off,and his plain but kindly face clearly betraying the anguish of his mind.Next to him was his poor wife, who, seated on a chair, had her facehidden in her hand. On the other side of her was Alphonse, lookingexceedingly uncomfortable, and behind him stood the three of us, withUmslopogaas' grim and towering form in the background, resting, asusual, on his axe. In front stood and squatted the group of armedmen--some with rifles in their hands, and others with spears andshields--following with eager attention every word that fell from thespeaker's lips. The white light of the moon peering in beneath thelofty boughs threw a strange wild glamour over the scene, whilst themelancholy soughing of the night wind passing through the millions ofpine needles overhead added a sadness of its own to what was already asufficiently tragic occasion.
'Men,' said Mr Mackenzie, after he had put all the circumstances of thecase fully and clearly before them, and explained to them the proposedplan of our forlorn hope--'men, for years I have been a good friend toyou, protecting you, teaching you, guarding you and yours from harm, andye have prospered with me. Ye have seen my child--the Water-lily, as yecall her--grow year by year, from tenderest infancy to tender childhood,and from childhood on towards maidenhood. She has been your children'splaymate, she has helped to tend you when sick, and ye have loved her.'
'We have,' said a deep voice, 'and we will die to save her.'
'I thank you from my heart--I thank you. Sure am I that now, in thishour of darkest trouble; now that her young life is like to be cut offby cruel and savage men--who of a truth "know not what they do"--ye willstrive your best to save her, and to save me and her mother from brokenhearts. Think, too, of your own wives and children. If she dies, herdeath will be followed by an attack upon us here, and at the best, evenif we hold our own, your houses and gardens will be destroyed, and yourgoods and cattle swept away. I am, as ye well know, a man of peace.Never in all these years have I lifted my hand to shed man's blood; butnow I say strike, strike, in the name of God, Who bade us protect ourlives and homes. Swear to me,' he went on with added fervour--'swear tome that whilst a man of you remains alive ye will strive your uttermostwith me and with these brave white men to save the child from a bloodyand cruel death.'
'Say no more, my father,' said the same deep voice, that belonged toa stalwart elder of the Mission; 'we swear it. May we and ours die thedeath of dogs, and our bones be thrown to the jackals and the kites,if we break the oath! It is a fearful thing to do, my father, so few tostrike at so many, yet will we do it or die in the doing. We swear!'
'Ay, thus say we all,' chimed in the others.
'Thus say we all,' said I.
'It is well,' went on Mr Mackenzie. 'Ye are true men and not brokenreeds to lean on. And now, friends--white and black together--let uskneel and offer up our humble supplication to the Throne of Power,praying that He in the hollow of Whose hand lie all our lives, Whogiveth life and giveth death, may be pleased to make strong our armsthat we may prevail in what awaits us at the morning's light.'
And he knelt down, an example that we all followed except Umslopogaas,who still stood in the background, grimly leaning on Inkosi-kaas. Thefierce old Zulu had no gods and worshipped nought, unless it were hisbattleaxe.
'Oh God of gods!' began the clergyman, his deep voice, tremulous withemotion, echoing up in the silence even to the leafy roof; 'Protector ofthe oppressed, Refuge of those in danger, Guardian of the helpless, hearThou our prayer! Almighty Father, to Thee we come in supplication.Hear Thou our prayer! Behold, one child hast Thou given us--an innocentchild, nurtured in Thy knowledge--and now she lies beneath the shadow ofthe sword, in danger of a fearful death at the hands of savage men. Bewith her now, oh God, and comfort her! Save her, oh Heavenly Father! OhGod of battle, Who teacheth our hands to war and our fingers to fight,in Whose strength are hid the destinies of men, be Thou with us in thehour of strife. When we go forth into the shadow of death, make Thouus strong to conquer. Breathe Thou upon our foes and scatter them;turn Thou their strength to water, and bring their high-blown pride tonought; compass us about with Thy protection; throw over us the shieldof Thy power; forget us not now in the hour of our sore distress; helpus now that the cruel man would dash our little ones against the stones!Hear Thou our prayer! And for those of us who, kneeling now on earthin health before Thee, shall at the sunrise adore Thy Presence onthe Throne, hear our prayer! Make them clean, oh God; wash away theiroffences in the blood of the Lamb; and when their spirits pass, ohreceive Thou them into the haven of the just. Go forth, oh Father, goforth with us into the battle, as with the Israelites of old. Oh God ofbattle, hear Thou our prayer!'
He ceased, and after a moment's silence we all rose, and then began ourpreparations in good earnest. As Umslopogaas said, it was time to stop'talking' and get to business. The men who were to form each littleparty were carefully selected, and still more carefully and minutelyinstructed as to what was to be done. After much consideration it wasagreed that the ten men led by Good, whose duty it was to stampede thecamp, were not to carry firearms; that is, with the exception of Goodhimself, who had a revolver as well as a short sword--the Masai 'sime'which I had taken from the body of our poor servant who was murderedin the canoe. We feared that if they had firearms the result of threecross-fires carried on at once would be that some of our own peoplewould be shot; besides, it appeared to all of us that the work theyhad to do would best be carried out with cold steel--especially toUmslopogaas, who was, indeed, a great advocate of cold steel. We hadwith us four Winchester repeating rifles, besides half a dozen Martinis.I armed myself with one of the repeaters--my own; an excellent weaponfor this kind of work, where great rapidity of fire is desirable, andfitted with ordinary flap-sights instead of the cumbersome slidingmechanism which they generally have. Mr Mackenzie took another, and thetwo remaining ones were given to two of his men who understood theuse of them and were noted shots. The Martinis and some rifles ofMr Mackenzie's were served out, together with a plentiful supply ofammunition, to the other natives who were to form the two parties whoseduty it was to be to open fire from separate sides of the kraal on thesleeping Masai, and who were fortunately all more or less accustomed tothe use of a gun.
As for Umslopogaas, we know how he was armed--with an axe. It may beremembered that he, Sir Henry, and the strongest of the Askari were tohold the thorn-stopped entrance to the kraal against the anticipatedrush of men striving to escape. Of course, for such a purpose as thisguns were useless. Therefore Sir Henry and the Askari proceeded to armthemselves in like fashion. It so happened that Mr Mackenzie had in hislittle store a selection of the very best and English-made hammer-backedaxe-heads. Sir Henry selected one of these weighing about two and a halfpounds and very broad in the blade, and the Askari took another a sizesm
aller. After Umslopogaas had put an extra edge on these twoaxe-heads, we fixed them to three feet six helves, of which Mr Mackenziefortunately had some in stock, made of a light but exceedingly toughnative wood, something like English ash, only more springy. When twosuitable helves had been selected with great care and the ends of thehafts notched to prevent the hand from slipping, the axe-heads werefixed on them as firmly as possible, and the weapons immersed in abucket of water for half an hour. The result of this was to swell thewood in the socket in such a fashion that nothing short of burning wouldget it out again. When this important matter had been attended toby Umslopogaas, I went into my room and proceeded to open a littletin-lined deal case, which contained--what do you think?--nothing moreor less than four mail shirts.
It had happened to us three on a previous journey that we had made inanother part of Africa to owe our lives to iron shirts of native make,and remembering this, I had suggested before we started on our presenthazardous expedition that we should have some made to fit us. Therewas a little difficulty about this, as armour-making is pretty well anextinct art, but they can do most things in the way of steel work inBirmingham if they are put to it and you will pay the price, and theend of it was that they turned us out the loveliest steel shirts it ispossible to see. The workmanship was exceedingly fine, the web beingcomposed of thousands upon thousands of stout but tiny rings of thebest steel made. These shirts, or rather steel-sleeved and high-neckedjerseys, were lined with ventilated wash leather, were not bright, butbrowned like the barrel of a gun; and mine weighed exactly seven poundsand fitted me so well that I found I could wear it for days next to myskin without being chafed. Sir Henry had two, one of the ordinarymake, viz. a jersey with little dependent flaps meant to afford someprotection to the upper part of the thighs, and another of hisown design fashioned on the pattern of the garments advertised as'combinations' and weighing twelve pounds. This combination shirt, ofwhich the seat was made of wash-leather, protected the whole body downto the knees, but was rather more cumbersome, inasmuch as it had to belaced up at the back and, of course, involved some extra weight. Withthese shirts were what looked like four brown cloth travelling caps withear pieces. Each of these caps was, however, quilted with steel links soas to afford a most valuable protection for the head.
It seems almost laughable to talk of steel shirts in these days ofbullets, against which they are of course quite useless; but where onehas to do with savages, armed with cutting weapons such as assegais orbattleaxes, they afford the most valuable protection, being, if wellmade, quite invulnerable to them. I have often thought that if only theEnglish Government had in our savage wars, and more especially in theZulu war, thought fit to serve out light steel shirts, there would bemany a man alive today who, as it is, is dead and forgotten.
To return: on the present occasion we blessed our foresight in bringingthese shirts, and also our good luck, in that they had not been stolenby our rascally bearers when they ran away with our goods. As Curtis hadtwo, and after considerable deliberation, had made up his mind to wearhis combination one himself--the extra three or four pounds' weightbeing a matter of no account to so strong a man, and the protectionafforded to the thighs being a very important matter to a fighting mannot armed with a shield of any kind--I suggested that he should lend theother to Umslopogaas, who was to share the danger and the glory of hispost. He readily consented, and called the Zulu, who came bearing SirHenry's axe, which he had now fixed up to his satisfaction, with him.When we showed him the steel shirt, and explained to him that we wantedhim to wear it, he at first declined, saying that he had fought in hisown skin for thirty years, and that he was not going to begin now tofight in an iron one. Thereupon I took a heavy spear, and, spreading theshirt upon the floor, drove the spear down upon it with all my strength,the weapon rebounding without leaving a mark upon the tempered steel.This exhibition half converted him; and when I pointed out to him hownecessary it was that he should not let any old-fashioned prejudices hemight possess stand in the way of a precaution which might preserve avaluable life at a time when men were scarce, and also that if he worethis shirt he might dispense with a shield, and so have both hands free,he yielded at once, and proceeded to invest his frame with the 'ironskin'. And indeed, although made for Sir Henry, it fitted the great Zululike a skin. The two men were almost of a height; and, though Curtislooked the bigger man, I am inclined to think that the difference wasmore imaginary than real, the fact being that, although he was plumperand rounder, he was not really bigger, except in the arm. Umslopogaashad, comparatively speaking, thin arms, but they were as strong as wireropes. At any rate, when they both stood, axe in hand, invested inthe brown mail, which clung to their mighty forms like a web garment,showing the swell of every muscle and the curve of every line, theyformed a pair that any ten men might shrink from meeting.
It was now nearly one o'clock in the morning, and the spies reportedthat, after having drunk the blood of the oxen and eaten enormousquantities of meat, the Masai were going to sleep round theirwatchfires; but that sentries had been posted at each opening of thekraal. Flossie, they added, was sitting not far from the wall in thecentre of the western side of the kraal, and by her were the nurse andthe white donkey, which was tethered to a peg. Her feet were bound witha rope, and warriors were lying about all round her.
As there was absolutely nothing further that could be done then we alltook some supper, and went to lie down for a couple of hours. I couldnot help admiring the way in which old Umslopogaas flung himself uponthe floor, and, unmindful of what was hanging over him, instantly sankinto a deep sleep. I do not know how it was with the others, but I couldnot do as much. Indeed, as is usual with me on these occasions, I amsorry to say that I felt rather frightened; and, now that some of theenthusiasm had gone out of me, and I began to calmly contemplate what wehad undertaken to do, truth compels me to add that I did not like it.We were but thirty men all told, a good many of whom were no doubt quiteunused to fighting, and we were going to engage two hundred and fiftyof the fiercest, bravest, and most formidable savages in Africa, who,to make matters worse, were protected by a stone wall. It was, indeed,a mad undertaking, and what made it even madder was the exceedingimprobability of our being able to take up our positions withoutattracting the notice of the sentries. Of course if we once didthat--and any slight accident, such as the chance discharge of a gun,might do it--we were done for, for the whole camp would be up in asecond, and our only hope lay in surprise.
The bed whereon I lay indulging in these uncomfortable reflections wasnear an open window that looked on to the veranda, through which came anextraordinary sound of groaning and weeping. For a time I could not makeout what it was, but at last I got up and, putting my head out of thewindow, stared about. Presently I saw a dim figure kneeling on the endof the veranda and beating his breast--in which I recognized Alphonse.Not being able to understand his French talk or what on earth he was at,I called to him and asked him what he was doing.
'Ah, monsieur,' he sighed, 'I do make prayer for the souls of those whomI shall slay tonight.'
'Indeed,' I said, 'then I wish that you would do it a little morequietly.'
Alphonse retreated, and I heard no more of his groans. And so the timepassed, till at length Mr Mackenzie called me in a whisper through thewindow, for of course everything had now to be done in the most absolutesilence. 'Three o'clock,' he said: 'we must begin to move at half-past.'
I told him to come in, and presently he entered, and I am bound to saythat if it had not been that just then I had not got a laugh anywhereabout me, I should have exploded at the sight he presented armed forbattle. To begin with, he had on a clergyman's black swallow-tail anda kind of broad-rimmed black felt hat, both of which he had donned onaccount, he said, of their dark colour. In his hand was the Winchesterrepeating rifle we had lent him; and stuck in an elastic cricketingbelt, like those worn by English boys, were, first, a hugebuckhorn-handled carving knife with a guard to it, and next along-barrelled Colt's revolver.
'Ah, my friend,' he said, seeing me staring at his belt, 'you arelooking at my "carver". I thought it might come in handy if we came toclose quarters; it is excellent steel, and many is the pig I have killedwith it.'
By this time everybody was up and dressing. I put on a light Norfolkjacket over my mail shirt in order to have a pocket handy to hold mycartridges, and buckled on my revolver. Good did the same, but Sir Henryput on nothing except his mail shirt, steel-lined cap, and a pair of'veldt-schoons' or soft hide shoes, his legs being bare from the kneesdown. His revolver he strapped on round his middle outside the armouredshirt.
Meanwhile Umslopogaas was mustering the men in the square under the bigtree and going the rounds to see that each was properly armed, etc. Atthe last moment we made one change. Finding that two of the men who wereto have gone with the firing parties knew little or nothing of guns,but were good spearsmen, we took away their rifles, supplied them withshields and long spears of the Masai pattern, and took them off to joinCurtis, Umslopogaas, and the Askari in holding the wide opening; ithaving become clear to us that three men, however brave and strong, weretoo few for the work.
CHAPTER VII A SLAUGHTER GRIM AND GREAT
Allan Quatermain Page 7