But my forebodings proved to be mere vapor. Pinto Dourado indeed hastened to come ashore with all his crew, and heaps of beads and gibcracks to trade with: if he had any much fear of Jaqqas, his love of profit altogether eclipsed that fear. We went into the Jaqqa camp, which was very orderly, entrenched with piles of wood; and we had houses provided for us that night, and many loads of palm-wine, and cows and goats and flour for our use.
There was after darkness a mighty feast, and here I expected to see human flesh upon the banquet. But no: the Jaqqas dined that night as we did, on roasted goat, and beef, and copious draughts of the palm-wine. With this was much loud harsh music of a very barbaric kind, made on drums and fifes and mpungas and a thing called a tavale, which is a board rising on two wooden sticks that they beat with their fingers. And there was dancing by the women, who wore nothing but masses of beads about their necks and arms and legs. They leaped across the fire like prancing witches, grinning widely to show their gap-toothed mouths, and laughing and screaming. And in the midst of all sat the king-demon Calandola on his stool, his oiled body glittering by firelight, his huge legs thrown far apart, his head back as he roared out his great cries of pleasure. And at all times there were three or four women about him, doing foul things to him, rubbing him and tonguing him and taking his giant yard into their straining mouths, whilst he idly stroked their woolly hair.
I felt the powerful presence of that man as a real and heavy pressure on me. Waves of force and might rolled from him like the booming of drums, like the crash of the tempest. There was no escaping him, no hiding from him.
I saw him as a giant mouth bestriding the breast of the world, and feeding, feeding, feeding.
We slept but little that night, for the festivities went on almost to dawn. And when the first early light came, and sleeping Jaqqas lay sprawled like ninepins everywhere, sleeping Portugals, too, there was a conference among Imbe Calandola and his interpreter-Jaqqa and Captain Pinto Dourado and me, and I discovered then why the king of the Jaqqas had been so glad of letting us come on shore.
Through the interpreter, whose name was Kinguri, we were told that Calandola was determined to overrun the realm of Benguela, which was on the north side of the River Kuvu. That is, he did not intend to menace the small Portugal settlement there, but he would have his way of conquest with the Benguela folk, who were ruled by a prince named Hom-biangymbe (or so it sounded to me.) For this he did want our help, in bringing his men over to the other side of the river with our boat. “If you will aid us,” said Kinguri, “the Imbe-Jaqqa will let you have all the captives to take as slaves, for we know you are hungry for many slaves for selling.”
This astounded me, that we should go in league with man-eaters to subjugate a native tribe already giving tribute to Portugal. I did not think we would do such a thing, and was forming in my mind the words of refusal, when Pinto Dourado said unto me, with his eyes gleaming with money-lust, “Aye, it will be worth fortunes to us! We will do it!”
“Can that be so?”
“We will do it,” said he sternly. “Tell him. Give him our warm pledge!”
And so it was agreed. All that day long, preparations for the war went forth briskly among the Jaqqas, and by night there was another great feast, as wild as the one before.
The women danced to the drums, and some young ones performed an obscene rite, dancing in pairs, one following behind the other and the second one aping the gestures and movements of a man pursuing a woman. At a certain moment, when the pounding of the drum came to its most envigored moment, the girl who played the man’s part did grasp hold of the other and turn her around. Then they held one another by the shoulders and in a fierce and frenzied way did mime out the sexual act, with a thrusting of loins and a grinding of bellies and a rubbing together of the dark hairy zone of womanhood in high mock and counterfeit of copulation, until they fell exhausted to the ground. Then a second such couple did the like, and a third, and when everyone was suitably inflamed the chieftains of the tribe did select women from the dance and drag them aside, and spread their legs and have them in the open, all the while making hard growling sounds more suited to the coupling of savage dogs or hyaenas. But I noticed that the Jaqqas took care to pull out and spill their seed on the bellies of these girls, and not to plant it in their wombs: which I learned afterward was a feature of this rite, and not the general Jaqqa custom of coupling.
This festival ended by midnight and there was sudden silence, like a falling curtain, and everyone slept. I lay on my rough pallet a long while, listening to the soft breathing of the cannibals everywhere about, and through my mind tumbled the spectacle of the day: the naked women miming copulation, the huge Jaqqa warriors spurting their seed onto them, the Jaqqa smile with the missing teeth, the fires blazing high, and always Calandola, Calandola, Calandola, presiding over these hellish games in broad delectation, singing and shouting among his playfellows with a wondrous roar.
In the morning, before break of day, Calandola did arise and strike his ngongo, which is an instrument of war that has the shape of a double bell, and presently made an oration with a loud voice, that all the camp might hear. I had already in a single day learned enough of the Jaqqa tongue so that I knew something of what he was saying, which was that he would destroy the Benguelas utterly. This he cried with such vehemence as to shake the earth.
And presently they were all in arms, and marched to the river side, where they had built jangadas or rafts out of a light wood that grows abundantly on the swampy banks of the rivers. Owing to the strength of the current, poling these jangadas across the rivermouth was an awful task, that would strip the warriors of their vigor before they reached the other side; which was why they wanted the use of our boat. They swarmed about us, every one eager to have the credit of being first into the campaign, and Calandola was fain to beat them back to keep them from overflowing us. He picked his prime men and we took a load across, the bravest of the cannibals, and then another group.
On the second trip some warriors of the Benguelas appeared, and took up into a warlike position to menace the first party of the Jaqqas, who were sore outnumbered. But Pinto Dourado said, “Fire upon them,” and we did shoot off our muskets, which slew many of the Benguelas and drove the others off.
By twelve of the clock all of the Jaqqas were over on the other side. Then Calandola commanded all his drums, tavales, mpungas, and other screeching and thumping instruments of warlike music to strike up, and give the onset, which began a bloody day for the Benguelas.
We took no part in the slaughter, but watched from afar, and I saw the troops of Calandola sweep down upon that helpless village the way the voracious army of ants had invaded my sleeping hut in that other village by Lake Kasanza. There was no holding back the Jaqqas, nor slowing them. With terrible wailing shrieking devil-cries did they rush upon the Benguelas, who staunchly stood fast a little while, and then, knowing the dread nature of their enemy, gave way to fright. They broke ranks and turned their backs to flee, and a very great number of them were slain, and were taken captives; man, woman, and child. These Jaqqas are mainly men of very great stature and power, and they fight with such frenzy and such energetic wielding of their swords and lances that there is no checking of them once they are fully aroused in martial fervor.