The Red Eric by R. M. Ballantyne (web ebook reader txt) 📕

Chapter Eleven. Native Doings, and a Cruel Murder—Jim Scroggles Sees Wonders, and has a Terrible Adventure.

It took two whole days and nights to restore Ailie to her wonted cheerful state of mind, after she had witnessed the death of the gazelle. But although she sang and laughed, and enjoyed herself as much as ever, she experienced the presence of a new and strange feeling, that ever after that day, tinged her thoughts and influenced her words and actions.

The child had for the first time in her life experienced one of those rude shocks—one of those rough contacts with the stern realities of life which tend to deepen and intensify our feelings. The mind does not always grow by slow, imperceptible degrees, although it usually does so. There are periods in the career of every one when the mind takes, as it were, a sharp run and makes a sudden and stupendous jump out of one region of thought into another in which there are things new as well as old.

The present was such an occasion to little Ailie Dunning. She had indeed seen bloody work before, in the cutting-up of a whale. But although she had been told it often enough, she did not realise that whales have feelings and affections like other creatures. Besides, she had not witnessed the actual killing of the whale; and if she had, it would probably have made little impression on her beyond that of temporary excitement—not even that, perhaps, had her father been by her side. But she sympathised with the gazelle. It was small, and beautiful, and lovable. Her heart had swelled the moment she saw it, and she had felt a longing desire to run up to it and throw her arms round its soft neck, so that, when she saw it suddenly struggling and crushed in the tremendous jaws of the horrible crocodile, every tender feeling in her breast was lacerated; every fibre of her heart trembled with a conflicting gush of the tenderest pity and the fiercest rage. From that day forward new thoughts began to occupy her mind, and old ideas presented themselves in different aspects.

We would not have the reader suppose, for a moment, that Ailie became an utterly changed creature. To an unobservant eye—such as that of Jim Scroggles, for instance—she was the same in all respects a few days after as she had been a few hours before the event. But new elements had been implanted in her breast, or rather, seeds which had hitherto lain dormant were now caused to burst forth into plants by the All-wise Author of her being. She now felt for the first time—she could not tell why—that enjoyment was not the chief good in life.

Of course she did not argue or think out all this clearly and methodically to herself. Her mind, on most things, material as well as immaterial, was very much what may be termed a jumble; but undoubtedly the above processes of reasoning and feeling, or something like them, were the result to Ailie of the violent death of that little gazelle.

The very next day after this sad event the travellers came to a native village, at which they stayed a night, in order to rest and procure fresh provisions. The trader was well-known at this village, but the natives, all of whom were black, of course, and nearly naked, had never seen a little white girl before, so that their interest in and wonder at Ailie were quite amusing to witness. They crowded round her, laughing and exclaiming and gesticulating in a most remarkable manner, and taking special notice of her light-brown glossy hair, which seemed to fill them with unbounded astonishment and admiration; as well it might, for they had never before seen any other hair except the coarse curly wool on their own pates, and the long lank hair of the trader, which happened to be coarse and black.

The child was at first annoyed by the attentions paid her, but at last she became interested in the sooty little naked children that thronged round her, and allowed them to handle her as much as they pleased, until her father led her to the residence of the chief or king of the tribe. Here she was well treated, and she began quite to like the people who were so kind to her and her friends. But she chanced to overhear a conversation between the doctor and Tim Rokens, which caused her afterwards to shrink from the negroes with horror.

She was sitting on a bank picking wild-flowers some hours after the arrival of her party, and teaching several black children how to make necklaces of them, when the doctor and Rokens happened to sit down together at the other side of a bush which concealed her from their view. Tim was evidently excited, for the tones of his voice were loud and emphatic.

“Yes,” he said, in reply to some questions put to him by the doctor; “yes, I seed ’em do it, not ten minutes agone, with my own two eyes. Oh! but I would like to have ’em up in a row—every black villain in the place—an’ a cutlass in my hand, an’—an’ wouldn’t I whip off their heads? No, I wouldn’t; oh, no, by no means wotiver.”

There was something unusually fierce in Rokens’ voice that alarmed Ailie.

“I was jist takin’ a turn,” continued the sailor, “down by the creek yonder, when I heerd a great yellin’ goin’ on, and saw the trader in the middle of a crowd o’ black fellows, a-shakin’ his fists; so I made sail, of course, to lend a hand if he’d got into trouble. He was scoldin’ away in the native lingo, as if he’d bin a born nigger.

“‘Wot’s all to do?’ says I.

“‘They’re goin’ to kill a little boy,’ says he, quite fierce like, ‘’cause they took it into their heads he’s bewitched.’

“An’ sayin’ that, he sot to agin in the other lingo, but the king came up an’ told him that the boy had to be killed ’cause he had a devil in him, and had gone and betwitched a number o’ other people; an’ before he had done speakin’, up comes two fellers, draggin’ the poor little boy between them. The king axed him if he wos betwitched, and the little chap—from sheer fright, I do believe—said he wos. Of coorse I couldn’t understand ’em, but the trader explained it all arter. Well, no sooner had he said that, than they all gave a yell, and rushed upon the poor boy with their knives, and cut him to pieces. It’s as sure as I’m sittin’ here,” cried Rokens, savagely, as his wrath rose again at the bare recital of the terrible deed he had witnessed. “I would ha’ knocked out the king’s brains there and then, but the trader caught my hand, and said, in a great fright, that if I did, it would not only cost me my life, but likely the whole party; so that cooled me, and I come away; an’ I’m goin’ to ax the captin wot we shud do.”

“We can do nothing,” said the doctor sadly. “Even suppose we were strong enough to punish them, what good would it do? We can’t change their natures. They are superstitious, and are firmly persuaded they did right in killing that poor boy.”

The doctor pondered for a few seconds, and then added, in a low voice, as if he were weighing the meaning of what he said: “Clergymen would tell us that nothing can deliver them from this bondage save a knowledge of the true God and of His Son Jesus Christ; that the Bible might be the means of curing them, if Bibles were only sent, and ministers to preach the gospel.”

“Then why ain’t Bibles sent to ’em at once?” asked Rokens, in a tone of great indignation, supposing that the doctor was expressing his own opinion on the subject. “Is there nobody to look arter these matters in Christian lands?”

“Oh, yes, there are many Bible Societies, and both Bibles and missionaries have been sent to this country; but it’s a large one, and the societies tell us their funds are limited.”

“Then why don’t they git more funds?” continued Rokens, in the same indignant tone, as his mind still dwelt upon the miseries and wickedness that he had seen, and that might be prevented; “why don’t they git more funds, and send out heaps o’ Bibles, an’ no end o’ missionaries?”

“Tim Rokens,” said the doctor, looking earnestly into his companion’s face, “if I were one of the missionaries, I might ask you how much money you ever gave to enable societies to send Bibles and missionaries to foreign lands?”

Tim Rokens was for once in his life completely taken aback. He was by nature a stolid man, and not easily put out. He was a shrewd man, too, and did not often commit himself. When he did, he was wont to laugh at himself, and so neutralise the laugh raised against him. But here was a question that was too serious for laughter, and yet one which he could not answer without being self-condemned. He looked gravely in the doctor’s face for two minutes without speaking; then he heaved a deep sigh, and said slowly, and with a pause between each word—

“Doctor Hopley—I—never—gave—a—rap—in—all—my—life.”

“So then, my man,” said the doctor, smiling, “you’re scarcely entitled to be indignant with others.”

“Wot you remark, doctor, is true; I—am—not.”

Having thus fully and emphatically condemned himself, and along with himself all mankind who are in a similar category, Tim Rokens relapsed into silence, deliberately drew forth his pipe, filled it, lit it, and began to smoke.

None of the party of travellers slept well that night, except perhaps the trader, who was accustomed to the ways of the negroes, and King Bumble, who had been born and bred in the midst of cruelties. Most of them dreamed of savage orgies, and massacres of innocent children, so that when daybreak summoned them to resume their journey, they arose and embarked with alacrity, glad to get away from the spot.

During that day and the next they saw a great number of crocodiles and hippopotami, besides strange birds and plants innumerable. The doctor filled his botanical-box to bursting. Ailie filled her flower-basket to overflowing. Glynn hit a crocodile on the back with a bullet, and received a lazy stare from the ugly creature in return, as it waddled slowly down the bank on which it had been lying, and plumped into the river. The captain assisted Ailie to pluck flowers when they landed, which they did from time to time, and helped to arrange and pack them when they returned to the canoe. Tim Rokens did nothing particularly worthy of record; but he gave utterance to an immense number of sententious and wise remarks, which were listened to by Bumble with deep respect, for that sable gentleman had taken a great fancy for the bold harpooner, and treasured up all his sayings in his heart.

Phil Briant distinguished himself by shooting an immense serpent, which the doctor, who cut off and retained its head, pronounced to be an anaconda. It was full twenty feet long; and part of the body was cut up, roasted, and eaten by Bumble and the trader, though the others turned from it with loathing.

“It be more cleaner dan one pig, anyhow,” remarked Bumble, on observing the disgust of his white friends; “an’ you no objic’ to eat dat.”

“Clainer than a pig, ye spalpeen!” cried Phil Briant; “that only shows yer benighted haithen ignerance. Sure I lived in the same cabin wid a pig for many a year—not not to mintion a large family o’ cocks and hens—an’ a clainer baste than that pig didn’t stop in that cabin.”

“That doesn’t say much for your own cleanliness, or that of your family,” remarked Glynn.

“Och! ye’ve bin to school, no doubt, haven’t ye?” retorted Phil.

“I have,”