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<h1> ALLAN AND THE HOLY FLOWER </h1>
<p><br/><br/></p>
<h2> By H. Rider Haggard </h2>
<p><br/><br/></p>
<h3> First Published 1915. </h3>
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<blockquote>
<p><big><b>CONTENTS</b></big></p>
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<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0001"> CHAPTER I </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0002"> CHAPTER II </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0003"> CHAPTER III </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0004"> CHAPTER IV </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0005"> CHAPTER V </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0006"> CHAPTER VI </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0007"> CHAPTER VII </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0008"> CHAPTER VIII </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0009"> CHAPTER IX </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0010"> CHAPTER X </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0011"> CHAPTER XI </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0012"> CHAPTER XII </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0013"> CHAPTER XIII </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0014"> CHAPTER XIV </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0015"> CHAPTER XV </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0016"> CHAPTER XVI </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0017"> CHAPTER XVII </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0018"> CHAPTER XVIII </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0019"> CHAPTER XIX </SPAN></p>
<p><SPAN href="#link2HCH0020"> CHAPTER XX </SPAN></p>
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<br/>
<h2> CHAPTER I<br/> BROTHER JOHN </h2>
<p>I do not suppose that anyone who knows the name of Allan Quatermain would
be likely to associate it with flowers, and especially with orchids. Yet
as it happens it was once my lot to take part in an orchid hunt of so
remarkable a character that I think its details should not be lost. At
least I will set them down, and if in the after days anyone cares to
publish them, well—he is at liberty to do so.</p>
<p>It was in the year—oh! never mind the year, it was a long while ago
when I was much younger, that I went on a hunting expedition to the north
of the Limpopo River which borders the Transvaal. My companion was a
gentleman of the name of Scroope, Charles Scroope. He had come out to
Durban from England in search of sport. At least, that was one of his
reasons. The other was a lady whom I will call Miss Margaret Manners,
though that was not her name.</p>
<p>It seems that these two were engaged to be married, and really attached to
each other. Unfortunately, however, they quarrelled violently about
another gentleman with whom Miss Manners danced four consecutive dances,
including two that were promised to her <i>fiancé</i> at a Hunt ball in Essex,
where they all lived. Explanations, or rather argument, followed. Mr.
Scroope said that he would not tolerate such conduct. Miss Manners replied
that she would not be dictated to; she was her own mistress and meant to
remain so. Mr. Scroope exclaimed that she might so far as he was
concerned. She answered that she never wished to see his face again. He
declared with emphasis that she never should and that he was going to
Africa to shoot elephants.</p>
<p>What is more, he went, starting from his Essex home the next day without
leaving any address. As it transpired afterwards, long afterwards, had he
waited till the post came in he would have received a letter that might
have changed his plans. But they were high-spirited young people, both of
them, and played the fool after the fashion of those in love.</p>
<p>Well, Charles Scroope turned up in Durban, which was but a poor place
then, and there we met in the bar of the Royal Hotel.</p>
<p>“If you want to kill big game,” I heard some one say, who it was I really
forget, “there’s the man to show you how to do it—Hunter Quatermain;
the best shot in Africa and one of the finest fellows, too.”</p>
<p>I sat still, smoking my pipe and pretending to hear nothing. It is awkward
to listen to oneself being praised, and I was always a shy man.</p>
<p>Then after a whispered colloquy Mr. Scroope was brought forward and
introduced to me. I bowed as nicely as I could and ran my eye over him. He
was a tall young man with dark eyes and a rather romantic aspect (that was
due to his love affair), but I came to the conclusion that I liked the cut
of his jib. When he spoke, that conclusion was affirmed. I always think
there is a great deal in a voice; personally, I judge by it almost as much
as by the face. This voice was particularly pleasant and sympathetic,
though there was nothing very original or striking in the words by which
it was, so to speak, introduced to me. These were:</p>
<p>“How do you do, sir. Will you have a split?”</p>
<p>I answered that I never drank spirits in the daytime, or at least not
often, but that I should be pleased to take a small bottle of beer.</p>
<p>When the beer was consumed we walked up together to my little house on
what is now called the Berea, the same in which, amongst others, I
received my friends, Curtis and Good, in after days, and there we dined.
Indeed, Charlie Scroope never left that house until we started on our
shooting expedition.</p>
<p>Now I must cut all this story short, since it is only incidentally that it
has to do with the tale I am going to tell. Mr. Scroope was a rich man and
as he offered to pay all the expenses of the expedition while I was to
take all the profit in the shape of ivory or anything else that might
accrue, of course I did not decline his proposal.</p>
<p>Everything went well with us on that trip until its unfortunate end. We
only killed two elephants, but of other game we found plenty. It was when
we were near Delagoa Bay on our return that the accident happened.</p>
<p>We were out one evening trying to shoot something for our dinner, when
between the trees I caught sight of a small buck. It vanished round a
little promontory of rock which projected from the side of the kloof,
walking quietly, not running in alarm. We followed after it. I was the
first, and had just wriggled round these rocks and perceived the buck
standing about ten paces away (it was a bush-bok), when I heard a rustle
among the bushes on the top of the rock not a dozen feet above my head,
and Charlie Scroope’s voice calling:</p>
<p>“Look out, Quatermain! He’s coming.”</p>
<p>“Who’s coming?” I answered in an irritated tone, for the noise had made
the buck run away.</p>
<p>Then it occurred to me, all in an instant of course, that a man would not
begin to shout like that for nothing; at any rate when his supper was
concerned. So I glanced up above and behind me. To this moment I can
remember exactly what I saw. There was the granite water-worn boulder, or
rather several boulders, with ferns growing in their cracks of the
maiden-hair tribe, most of them, but some had a silver sheen on the under
side of their leaves. On one of these leaves, bending it down, sat a large
beetle with red wings and a black body engaged in rubbing its antennæ with
its front paws. And above, just appearing over the top of the rock, was
the head of an extremely fine leopard. As I write, I seem to perceive its
square jowl outlined against the arc of the quiet evening sky with the
saliva dropping from its lips.</p>
<p>This was the last thing which I did perceive for a little while, since at
that moment the leopard—we call them tigers in South Africa—dropped
upon my back and knocked me flat as a pancake. I presume that it also had
been stalking the buck and was angry at my appearance on the scene. Down I
went, luckily for me, into a patch of mossy soil.</p>
<p>“All up!” I said to myself, for I felt the brute’s weight upon my back
pressing me down among the moss, and what was worse, its hot breath upon
my neck as it dropped its jaws to bite me in the head. Then I heard the
report of Scroope’s rifle, followed by furious snarling from the leopard,
which evidently had been hit. Also it seemed to think that I had caused
its injuries, for it seized me by the shoulder. I felt its teeth slip
along my skin, but happily they only fastened in the shooting coat of
tough corduroy that I was wearing. It began to shake me, then let go to
get a better grip. Now, remembering that Scroope only carried a light,
single-barrelled rifle, and therefore could not fire again, I knew, or
thought I knew, that my time had come. I was not exactly afraid, but the
sense of some great, impending change became very vivid. I remembered—not
my whole life, but one or two odd little things connected with my infancy.
For instance, I seemed to see myself seated on my mother’s knee, playing
with a little jointed gold-fish which she wore upon her watch-chain.</p>
<p>After this I muttered a word or two of supplication, and, I think, lost
consciousness. If so, it can only have been for a few seconds. Then my
mind returned to me and I saw a strange sight. The leopard and Scroope
were fighting each other. The leopard, standing on one hind leg, for the
other was broken, seemed to be boxing Scroope, whilst Scroope was driving
his big hunting knife into the brute’s carcase. They went down, Scroope
undermost, the leopard tearing at him. I gave a wriggle and came out of
that mossy bed—I recall the sucking sound my body made as it left
the ooze.</p>
<p>Close by was my rifle, uninjured and at full cock as it had fallen from my
hand. I seized it, and in another second had shot the leopard through the
head just as it was about to seize Scroope’s throat.</p>
<p>It fell stone dead on the top of him. One quiver, one contraction of the
claws (in poor Scroope’s leg) and all was over. There it lay as though it
were asleep, and underneath was Scroope.</p>
<p>The difficulty was to get it off him, for the beast was very heavy, but I
managed this at last with the help of a thorn bough I found which some
elephant had torn from a tree. This I used as a lever. There beneath lay
Scroope, literally covered with blood, though whether his own or the
leopard’s I could not tell. At first I thought that he was dead, but after
I had poured some water over him from the little stream that trickled down
the rock, he sat up and asked inconsequently:</p>
<p>“What am I now?”</p>
<p>“A hero,” I answered. (I have always been proud of that repartee.)</p>
<p>Then, discouraging further conversation, I set to work to get him back to
the camp, which fortunately was close at hand.</p>
<p>When we had proceeded a couple of hundred yards, he still making
inconsequent remarks, his right arm round my neck and my left arm round
his middle, suddenly he collapsed in a dead faint, and as his weight was
more than I could carry, I had to leave him and fetch help.</p>
<p>In the end I got him to the tents by aid of the Kaffirs and a blanket, and
there made an examination. He was scratched all over, but the only serious
wounds were a bite through the muscles of the left upper arm and three
deep cuts in the right thigh just where it joins the body, caused by a
stroke of the leopard’s claws. I gave him a dose of laudanum to send him
to sleep and dressed these hurts as best I could. For three days he went
on quite well. Indeed, the wounds had begun to heal healthily when
suddenly some kind of fever took him, caused, I suppose, by the poison of
the leopard’s fangs or claws.</p>
<p>Oh! what a terrible week was that which followed! He became delirious,
raving continually of all sorts of things, and especially of Miss Margaret
Manners. I kept up his strength as well as was possible with soup made
from the flesh of game, mixed with a little brandy which I had. But he
grew weaker and weaker. Also the wounds in the thigh began to suppurate.</p>
<p>The Kaffirs whom we had with us were of little use in such a case, so that
all the nursing fell on me. Luckily, beyond a shaking, the leopard had
done me no hurt, and I was very strong in those days. Still the lack of
rest told on me, since I dared not sleep for more than half an hour or so
at a time. At length came a morning when I was quite worn out. There lay
poor Scroope turning and muttering in the little tent, and there I sat by
his side, wondering whether he would live to see another dawn, or if he
did, for how long I should be able to tend him. I called to a Kaffir to
bring me my coffee, and just as I was lifting the pannikin to my lips
with a shaking hand, help came.</p>
<p>It arrived in a very strange shape. In front of our camp were two thorn
trees, and from between these trees, the rays from the rising sun falling
full on him, I saw a curious figure walking towards me in a slow,
purposeful fashion. It was that of a man of uncertain age, for though the
beard and long hair were white, the face was comparatively youthful, save
for the wrinkles round the mouth, and the dark eyes were full of life and
vigour. Tattered garments, surmounted by a torn kaross or skin rug, hung
awkwardly upon his tall, thin frame. On his feet were veld-schoen of
untanned hide, on his back a battered tin case was strapped, and in his
bony, nervous hand he clasped a long staff made of the black and white
wood the natives call <i>unzimbiti</i>, on the top of which was fixed a
butterfly net. Behind him were some Kaffirs who carried cases on their
heads.</p>
<p>I knew him at once, since we had met before, especially on a certain
occasion in Zululand, when he calmly appeared out of the ranks of a
hostile native <i>impi</i>. He was one of the strangest characters in all
South Africa. Evidently a gentleman in the true sense of the word, none
knew his history (although I know it now, and a strange story it is),
except that he was an American by birth, for in this matter at times his
speech betrayed him. Also he was a doctor by profession, and to judge from
his extraordinary skill, one who must have seen much practice both in
medicine and in surgery. For the rest he had means, though where they came
from was a mystery, and for many years past had wandered about South and
Eastern Africa, collecting butterflies and flowers.</p>
<p>By the natives, and I might add by white people also, he was universally
supposed to be mad. This reputation, coupled with his medical skill,
enabled him to travel wherever he would without the slightest fear of
molestation, since the Kaffirs look upon the mad as inspired by God. Their
name for him was “Dogeetah,” a ludicrous corruption of the English word
“doctor,” whereas white folk called him indifferently “Brother John,”
“Uncle Jonathan,” or “Saint John.” The second appellation he got from his
extraordinary likeness (when cleaned up and nicely dressed) to the figure
by which the great American nation is typified in comic papers, as England
is typified by John Bull. The first and third arose in the well-known
goodness of his character and a taste he was supposed to possess for
living on locusts and wild honey, or their local equivalents. Personally,
however, he preferred to be addressed as “Brother John.”</p>
<p>Oh! who can tell the relief with which I saw him; an angel from heaven
could scarcely have been more welcome. As he came I poured out a second
jorum of coffee, and remembering that he liked it sweet, put in plenty of
sugar.</p>
<p>“How do you do, Brother John?” I said, proffering him the coffee.</p>
<p>“Greeting, Brother Allan,” he answered—in those days he affected a
kind of old Roman way of speaking, as I imagine it. Then he took the
coffee, put his long finger into it to test the temperature and stir up
the sugar, drank it off as though it were a dose of medicine, and handed
back the tin to be refilled.</p>
<p>“Bug-hunting?” I queried.</p>
<p>He nodded. “That and flowers and observing human nature and the wonderful
works of God. Wandering around generally.”</p>
<p>“Where from last?” I asked.</p>
<p>“Those hills nearly twenty miles away. Left them at eight in the evening;
walked all night.”</p>
<p>“Why?” I said, looking at him.</p>
<p>“Because it seemed as though someone were calling me. To be plain, you,
Allan.”</p>
<p>“Oh! you heard about my being here and the trouble?”</p>
<p>“No, heard nothing. Meant to strike out for the coast this morning. Just
as I was turning in, at 8.5 exactly, got your message and started. That’s
all.”</p>
<p>“My message——” I began, then stopped, and asking to see his
watch, compared it with mine. Oddly enough, they showed the same time to
within two minutes.</p>
<p>“It is a strange thing,” I said slowly, “but at 8.5 last night I did try
to send a message for some help because I thought my mate was dying,” and
I jerked my thumb towards the tent. “Only it wasn’t to you or any other
man, Brother John. Understand?”</p>
<p>“Quite. Message was expressed on, that’s all. Expressed and I guess
registered as well.”</p>
<p>I looked at Brother John and Brother John looked at me, but at the time we
made no further remark. The thing was too curious, that is, unless he
lied. But nobody had ever known him to lie. He was a truthful person,
painfully truthful at times. And yet there are people who do not believe
in prayer.</p>
<p>“What is it?” he asked.</p>
<p>“Mauled by leopard. Wounds won’t heal, and fever. I don’t think he can
last long.”</p>
<p>“What do you know about it? Let me see him.”</p>
<p>Well, he saw him and did wonderful things. That tin box of his was full of
medicines and surgical instruments, which latter he boiled before he used
them. Also he washed his hands till I thought the skin would come off
them, using up more soap than I could spare. First he gave poor Charlie a
dose of something that seemed to kill him; he said he had that drug from
the Kaffirs. Then he opened up those wounds upon his thigh and cleaned
them out and bandaged them with boiled herbs. Afterwards, when Scroope
came to again, he gave him a drink that threw him into a sweat and took
away the fever. The end of it was that in two days’ time his patient sat
up and asked for a square meal, and in a week we were able to begin to
carry him to the coast.</p>
<p>“Guess that message of yours saved Brother Scroope’s life,” said old John,
as he watched him start.</p>
<p>I made no answer. Here I may state, however, that through my own men I
inquired a little as to Brother John’s movements at the time of what he
called the message. It seemed that he <i>had</i> arranged to march towards
the coast on the next morning, but that about two hours after sunset
suddenly he ordered them to pack up everything and follow him. This they
did and to their intense disgust those Kaffirs were forced to trudge all
night at the heels of Dogeetah, as they called him. Indeed, so weary did
they become, that had they not been afraid of being left alone in an
unknown country in the darkness, they said they would have thrown down
their loads and refused to go any further.</p>
<p>That is as far as I was able to take the matter, which may be explained by
telepathy, inspiration, instinct, or coincidence. It is one as to which
the reader must form his own opinion.</p>
<p>During our week together in camp and our subsequent journey to Delagoa Bay
and thence by ship to Durban, Brother John and I grew very intimate, with
limitations. Of his past, as I have said, he never talked, or of the real
object of his wanderings which I learned afterwards, but of his natural
history and ethnological (I believe that is the word) studies he spoke a
good deal. As, in my humble way, I also am an observer of such matters and
know something about African natives and their habits from practical
experience, these subjects interested me.</p>
<p>Amongst other things, he showed me many of the specimens that he had
collected during his recent journey; insects and beautiful butterflies
neatly pinned into boxes, also a quantity of dried flowers pressed between
sheets of blotting paper, amongst them some which he told me were orchids.
Observing that these attracted me, he asked me if I would like to see the
most wonderful orchid in the whole world. Of course I said yes, whereon he
produced out of one of his cases a flat package about two feet six square.
He undid the grass mats in which it was wrapped, striped, delicately woven
mats such as they make in the neighbourhood of Zanzibar. Within these was
the lid of a packing-case. Then came more mats and some copies of <i>The
Cape Journal</i> spread out flat. Then sheets of blotting paper, and last
of all between two pieces of cardboard, a flower and one leaf of the plant
on which it grew.</p>
<p>Even in its dried state it was a wondrous thing, measuring twenty-four
inches from the tip of one wing or petal to the tip of the other, by
twenty inches from the top of the back sheath to the bottom of the pouch.
The measurement of the back sheath itself I forget, but it must have been
quite a foot across. In colour it was, or had been, bright golden, but the
back sheath was white, barred with lines of black, and in the exact centre
of the pouch was a single black spot shaped like the head of a great ape.
There were the overhanging brows, the deep recessed eyes, the surly mouth,
the massive jaws—everything.</p>
<p>Although at that time I had never seen a gorilla in the flesh, I had seen
a coloured picture of the brute, and if that picture had been photographed
on the flower the likeness could not have been more perfect.</p>
<p>“What is it?” I asked, amazed.</p>
<p>“Sir,” said Brother John, sometimes he used this formal term when excited,
“it is the most marvellous Cypripedium in the whole earth, and, sir, I
have discovered it. A healthy root of that plant will be worth £20,000.”</p>
<p>“That’s better than gold mining,” I said. “Well, have you got the root?”</p>
<p>Brother John shook his head sadly as he answered:</p>
<p>“No such luck.”</p>
<p>“How’s that as you have the flower?”</p>
<p>“I’ll tell you, Allan. For a year past and more I have been collecting in
the district back of Kilwa and found some wonderful things, yes,
wonderful. At last, about three hundred miles inland, I came to a tribe,
or rather, a people, that no white man had ever visited. They are called
the Mazitu, a numerous and warlike people of bastard Zulu blood.”</p>
<p>“I have heard of them,” I interrupted. “They broke north before the days
of Senzangakona, two hundred years or more ago.”</p>
<p>“Well, I could make myself understood among them because they still talk a
corrupt Zulu, as do all the tribes in those parts. At first they wanted to
kill me, but let me go because they thought that I was mad. Everyone
thinks that I am mad, Allan; it is a kind of public delusion, whereas I
think that I am sane and that most other people are mad.”</p>
<p>“A private delusion,” I suggested hurriedly, as I did not wish to discuss
Brother John’s sanity. “Well, go on about the Mazitu.”</p>
<p>“Later they discovered that I had skill in medicine, and their king,
Bausi, came to me to be treated for a great external tumour. I risked an
operation and cured him. It was anxious work, for if he had died I should
have died too, though that would not have troubled me very much,” and he
sighed. “Of course, from that moment I was supposed to be a great
magician. Also Bausi made a blood brotherhood with me, transfusing some of
his blood into my veins and some of mine into his. I only hope he has not
inoculated me with his tumours, which are congenital. So I became Bausi
and Bausi became me. In other words, I was as much chief of the Mazitu as
he was, and shall remain so all my life.”</p>
<p>“That might be useful,” I said, reflectively, “but go on.”</p>
<p>“I learned that on the western boundary of the Mazitu territory were great
swamps; that beyond these swamps was a lake called Kirua, and beyond that
a large and fertile land supposed to be an island, with a mountain in its
centre. This land is known as Pongo, and so are the people who live
there.”</p>
<p>“That is a native name for the gorilla, isn’t it?” I asked. “At least so a
fellow who had been on the West Coast told me.”</p>
<p>“Indeed, then that’s strange, as you will see. Now these Pongo are
supposed to be great magicians, and the god they worship is said to be a
gorilla, which, if you are right, accounts for their name. Or rather,” he
went on, “they have two gods. The other is that flower you see there.
Whether the flower with the monkey’s head on it was the first god and
suggested the worship of the beast itself, or <i>vice versa</i>, I don’t
know. Indeed I know very little, just what I was told by the Mazitu and a
man who called himself a Pongo chief, no more.”</p>
<p>“What did they say?”</p>
<p>“The Mazitu said that the Pongo people are devils who came by the secret
channels through the reeds in canoes and stole their children and women,
whom they sacrificed to their gods. Sometimes, too, they made raids upon
them at night, ‘howling like hyenas.’ The men they killed and the women
and children they took away. The Mazitu want to attack them but cannot do
so, because they are not water people and have no canoes, and therefore
are unable to reach the island, if it is an island. Also they told me
about the wonderful flower which grows in the place where the ape-god
lives, and is worshipped like the god. They had the story of it from some
of their people who had been enslaved and escaped.”</p>
<p>“Did you try to get to the island?” I asked.</p>
<p>“Yes, Allan. That is, I went to the edge of the reeds which lie at the end
of a long slope of plain, where the lake begins. Here I stopped for some
time catching butterflies and collecting plants. One night when I was
camped there by myself, for none of my men would remain so near the Pongo
country after sunset, I woke up with a sense that I was no longer alone. I
crept out of my tent and by the light of the moon, which was setting, for
dawn drew near, I saw a man who leant upon the handle of a very
wide-bladed spear which was taller than himself, a big man over six feet
two high, I should say, and broad in proportion. He wore a long, white
cloak reaching from his shoulders almost to the ground. On his head was a
tight-fitting cap with lappets, also white. In his ears were rings of
copper or gold, and on his wrists bracelets of the same metal. His skin
was intensely black, but the features were not at all negroid. They were
prominent and finely-cut, the nose being sharp and the lips quite thin;
indeed of an Arab type. His left hand was bandaged, and on his face was an
expression of great anxiety. Lastly, he appeared to be about fifty years
of age. So still did he stand that I began to wonder whether he were one
of those ghosts which the Mazitu swore the Pongo wizards send out to haunt
their country.</p>
<p>“For a long while we stared at each other, for I was determined that I
would not speak first or show any concern. At last he spoke in a low, deep
voice and in Mazitu, or a language so similar that I found it easy to
understand.</p>
<p>“‘Is not your name Dogeetah, O White Lord, and are you not a master of
medicine?’</p>
<p>“‘Yes,’ I answered, ‘but who are you who dare to wake me from my sleep?’</p>
<p>“‘Lord, I am the Kalubi, the Chief of the Pongo, a great man in my own
land yonder.’</p>
<p>“‘Then why do you come here alone at night, Kalubi, Chief of the Pongo?’</p>
<p>“‘Why do <i>you</i> come here alone, White Lord?’ he answered evasively.</p>
<p>“‘What do you want, anyway?’ I asked.</p>
<p>“‘O! Dogeetah, I have been hurt, I want you to cure me,’ and he looked at
his bandaged hand.</p>
<p>“‘Lay down that spear and open your robe that I may see you have no
knife.’</p>
<p>“He obeyed, throwing the spear to some distance.</p>
<p>“‘Now unwrap the hand.’</p>
<p>“He did so. I lit a match, the sight of which seemed to frighten him
greatly, although he asked no questions about it, and by its light
examined the hand. The first joint of the second finger was gone. From the
appearance of the stump which had been cauterized and was tied tightly
with a piece of flexible grass, I judged that it had been bitten off.</p>
<p>“‘What did this?’ I asked.</p>
<p>“‘Monkey,’ he answered, ‘poisonous monkey. Cut off the finger, O Dogeetah,
or tomorrow I die.’</p>
<p>“‘Why do you not tell your own doctors to cut off the finger, you who are
Kalubi, Chief of the Pongo?’</p>
<p>“‘No, no,’ he replied, shaking his head. ‘They cannot do it. It is not
lawful. And I, I cannot do it, for if the flesh is black the hand must
come off too, and if the flesh is black at the wrist, then the arm must be
cut off.’</p>
<p>“I sat down on my camp stool and reflected. Really I was waiting for the
sun to rise, since it was useless to attempt an operation in that light.
The man, Kalubi, thought that I had refused his petition and became
terribly agitated.</p>
<p>“‘Be merciful, White Lord,’ he prayed, ‘do not let me die. I am afraid to
die. Life is bad, but death is worse. O! If you refuse me, I will kill
myself here before you and then my ghost will haunt you till you die also
of fear and come to join me. What fee do you ask? Gold or ivory or slaves?
Say and I will give it.’</p>
<p>“‘Be silent,’ I said, for I saw that if he went on thus he would throw
himself into a fever, which might cause the operation to prove fatal. For
the same reason I did not question him about many things I should have
liked to learn. I lit my fire and boiled the instruments—he thought
I was making magic. By the time that everything was ready the sun was up.</p>
<p>“‘Now,’ I said, ‘let me see how brave you are.’</p>
<p>“Well, Allan, I performed that operation, removing the finger at the base
where it joins the hand, as I thought there might be something in his
story of the poison. Indeed, as I found afterwards on dissection, and can
show you, for I have the thing in spirits, there was, for the blackness of
which he spoke—a kind of mortification, I presume—had crept almost to
the joint, though the flesh beyond was healthy enough. Certainly that
Kalubi was a plucky fellow. He sat like a rock and never even winced.
Indeed, when he saw that the flesh was sound he uttered a great sigh of
relief. After it was all over he turned a little faint, so I gave him some
spirits of wine mixed with water which revived him.</p>
<p>“‘O Lord Dogeetah,’ he said, as I was bandaging his hand, ‘while I live I
am your slave. Yet, do me one more service. In my land there is a terrible
wild beast, that which bit off my finger. It is a devil; it kills us and
we fear it. I have heard that you white men have magic weapons which slay
with a noise. Come to my land and kill me that wild beast with your magic
weapon. I say, Come, Come, for I am terribly afraid,’ and indeed he looked
it.</p>
<p>“‘No,’ I answered, ‘I shed no blood; I kill nothing except butterflies,
and of these only a few. But if you fear this brute why do you not poison
it? You black people have many drugs.’</p>
<p>“‘No use, no use,’ he replied in a kind of wail. ‘The beast knows poisons,
some it swallows and they do not harm it. Others it will not touch.
Moreover, no black man can do it hurt. It is white, and it has been known
from of old that if it dies at all, it must be by the hand of one who is
white.’</p>
<p>“‘A very strange animal,’ I began, suspiciously, for I felt sure that he
was lying to me. But just at that moment I heard the sound of my men’s
voices. They were advancing towards me through the giant grass, singing as
they came, but as yet a long way off. The Kalubi heard it also and sprang
up.</p>
<p>“‘I must be gone,’ he said. ‘None must see me here. What fee, O Lord of
medicine, what fee?’</p>
<p>“‘I take no payment for my medicine,’ I said. ‘Yet—stay. A wonderful
flower grows in your country, does it not? A flower with wings and a cup
beneath. I would have that flower.’</p>
<p>“‘Who told you of the Flower?’ he asked. ‘The Flower is holy. Still, O
White Lord, still for you it shall be risked. Oh, return and bring with
you one who can kill the beast and I will make you rich. Return and call
to the reeds for the Kalubi, and the Kalubi will hear and come to you.’</p>
<p>“Then he ran to his spear, snatched it from the ground and vanished among
the reeds. That was the last I saw, or am ever likely to see, of him.”</p>
<p>“But, Brother John, you got the flower somehow.”</p>
<p>“Yes, Allan. About a week later when I came out of my tent one morning,
there it was standing in a narrow-mouthed, earthenware pot filled with
water. Of course I meant that he was to send me the plant, roots and all,
but I suppose he understood that I wanted a bloom. Or perhaps he dared not
send the plant. Anyhow, it is better than nothing.”</p>
<p>“Why did you not go into the country and get it for yourself?”</p>
<p>“For several reasons, Allan, of which the best is that it was impossible.
The Mazitu swear that if anyone sees that flower he is put to death.
Indeed, when they found that I had a bloom of it, they forced me to move
to the other side of the country seventy miles away. So I thought that I
would wait till I met with some companions who would accompany me. Indeed,
to be frank, Allan, it occurred to me that you were the sort of man who
would like to interview this wonderful beast that bites off people’s
fingers and frightens them to death,” and Brother John stroked his long,
white beard and smiled, adding, “Odd that we should have met so soon
afterwards, isn’t it?”</p>
<p>“Did you?” I replied, “now did you indeed? Brother John, people say all
sorts of things about you, but I have come to the conclusion that there’s
nothing the matter with your wits.”</p>
<p>Again he smiled and stroked his long, white beard.</p>
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