mat, and let us be friendly and sociable” ; and
as I say it I thrust into his wide open hand
twenty cowries, the currency of the land. On«
look at his hand as he extended it made me
think I could carve a better-looking hand out
of a piece of rhinoceros hide.
While speaking I look at his face, which is
like an ugly and extravagant mask, clumsily
manufactured from some strange, dark brown
coarse material. The lips proved the thickness
of skin which nature had endowed him with,
and by the obstinacy with which they refused
to meet each other the form of the mouth was
but ill-defined, though capacious and garnished
with its full complement of well-preserved teeth.
His nose was so flat that I inquired in a perfectly
innocent manner as to the reason for such
a feature.
“Ah,” said he, with a sly laugh, “ it is the
fault of my mother, who, when I was young,
bound me too tight to her back.”
His hair had been compelled to obey the
capricious fashion of his country, and was therefore
worked up into furrows and ridges and central
cones, bearing a curious resemblance to the
formation of the land around Uhombo. I wonder
if the art grew by perceiving nature’s fashion
and mould of his country?
Descending from the face, which, crude, large-
featured, rough-hewn as it was, bore witness to
the possession of much sly humour and a kindly
disposition, my eyes fastened on his naked body.
Through the ochreous daubs I detected strange
freaks of pricking on it, circles and squares and
crosses, and traced with wonder the many hard
lines and puckers created by age, weather, ill-
usage, apd rude keeping.
His feet were monstrous abortions, with soles
as hard as hoofs, and his legs as high up as
the knees were plastered with successive strata
of dirt; his loin-cover or the queer “ girding
tackle ” need not be described. They were
absolutely appalling to good taste, and the most
ragged British beggar or Neapolitan lazzarone
is sumptuously, nay, regally, clothed in comparison
to this “ king” in Uhombo.
If the old chief appeared so unprepossessing,
how can I paint without offence my humbler
brothers and sisters who stood round us? As
I looked at the array of faces, I could only
comment to myself—ugly— uglier—-ugliest. As
I looked at their nude and filthy bodies, and
the enormous dugs which hung down the bosoms
of the women, and the general indecency of their
nakedness, I ejaculated “ Fearful!” as the sum
total of what I might with propriety say, and
what indeed is sufficiently descriptive.
And what shall I say of the hideous and queer
appendages that they wear about their waists;
the tags of monkey-skin and bits of gorilla bone,