In a moment I recovered from my amaze and looked about at them, saying, “Are ye all such Judases, that you would elect me to this fate without a second thought?”
“It is only for two months,” said Coelho mildly.
“Indeed. And if it befalls that you never return, what will become of me?”
“We would not be such traitors as to forget you,” Pinto Dourado said, and in his oily face I saw only contempt. “But if one of us must stay, why, I tell you that it must be you, for you are a foreigner and a Lutheran, and a slave under prison sentence, but we are all free Portugals who cannot be handed off in this way. I would have much to answer for at São Paulo de Loanda, if I left any other of my men here than you. Do you understand?”
“I understand that I am betrayed,” I answered him. “God’s wounds, will you cast me off?”
“It must be.”
“Swear, then, by your cross or something else holy, that you will return for me!”
“Ah, it would be unlawful to swear such oath,” said Pinto Dourado, “you being heretical. We may not pledge upon the Lord’s word to such as you.”
“Never have I heard that argued before.”
“You have heard it now, Englishman. Go you now to Mofarigosat, and tell him that you are our chosen pawn, and that we pledge to come back and aid him, and claim you, so he must keep you in safety. For we would not have you harmed, since that you are one of our company.”
8
With those words Diogo Pinto Dourado did dismiss me, and once again I found myself abandoned, and the victim of perfidy.
For I knew I would not be redeemed out of this place, Pinto Dourado having observed that there was nothing here that Portugals desired. Yet said to him most quietly in parting that I had done no wrong that merited me this fate, and so therefore I did hope he would not forget me, even if he had refused to swear it. And also I said, quietly and in such a way as might sink deep into his soul, that I knew the Lord God Almighty would exact a terrible revenge, upon the last day of the world, against those who broke faith with their fellow men.
Then the whoreson Portugals did hurry out of the city of Mofarigosat, not even troubling to get themselves the guide they had desired, so impatient were they of leaving. For this cunning Mofarigosat had frighted them in a way that Imbe Calandola himself had not done. To them, I think, Calandola was so hugely monstrous that they could not begin to understand him; but this lean and stringy old Mofarigosat was truly of their own kind, subtle and merciless and capable of any sort of betrayal, the only differences between him and them being that he was a pagan and his skin was a few shades darker. So they meant to flee him, before he made them all captives.
And I alone remained behind, thinking I might spend the rest of my life in Mofarigosat his town, and that that might be no very long span.
At least for the first the blacks did treat me kindly. I had a little cottage for myself, out of poles and brush, and they brought me palm-wine and meat whenever I clapped my hands, and each night when I retired there were three or four women waiting by my door, young naked hard-breasted slave-wenches with thick lips and filed teeth hiding behind those lips, from amongst whom I could take my pick. This was captivity, aye, but it was not the most woeful of durance.
By day I was free to wander about in the town, which was a place of close moist heat and of shining heavy foliage pressing close, and I could observe the customs of the tribe as I wished. And many strange things did I see among these folk.
They were idolaters, like all these blacks except the ones that live in the cities that are under the thumb of the Jesuits. For their gods the heathen Africans do choose divers snakes, and adders, and beasts, and birds, and herbs, and trees, and they make figures out of all these things graven in wood and in stone. Neither do they only content themselves with worshipping the said creatures when they are quick and alive, but also the very skins of them when they were dead, being stuffed with straw. I have heard that there are nations that carry a devotion to dragons with wings, which they nourish and feed in their own private houses, giving unto them for their food, the best and most costly viands that they had. Others keep serpents of horrible figures; some worship the greatest goats they could get; some, lions, and other most monstrous creatures: yea, the more uncouth and deformed the beasts are, the more they are honored.
I find it not easy to comprehend the holding in veneration of unclean fowls and night-birds, as bats, owls, and screech-owls, and the like, and to proclaim such things to be the incarnation of God Almighty: but yet I think I begin to understand their reasoning, which is, that God Almighty enters into all created things, even the most loathly, and to worship Him in His darker forms is nevertheless to worship Him. But this is hard for a Christian mind to encompass.
In the city of Mofarigosat, which was entirely pagan, the Gospel of Jesus never having yet come this far into the land, they did have holy houses for their mokissos, or idols, which the Portugals do call feitissos or fetishes. On their holy days, one of which befell very soon after my abandonment in that place, the people clothed themselves all in white, and were themselves smeared with white earth in token of purity. I saw them kill cocks and goats to offer to their mokissos, but as soon as it was killed, they tore the animal in pieces with their hands, and the owner had the smallest share of it, his friends and acquaintances falling on and every one seizing a piece. This they broiled and ate very greedily. They cleaned the guts into small bits, and, squeezing out the dung with their fingers, boiled them with other entrails, a little salt and the pepper known to the Portugals as malagueta, and ate it without washing off the blood, regarding it as most delicious food, and holy also.
They did solemnize their holy day in a wide open place, in the midst of which they erected a sort of table, or altar, about four feet square, supported by four pillars of clay, adorned with green boughs and leaves of reeds. This altar was set up at the foot of some tree, which is consecrated to their deities, and on it they did lay Guinea wheat, millet, and rice-ears, palm-wine, water, flesh, fish, beynonas, and other fruit, for the entertainment of their idols. I think they were persuaded that their gods do eat those things, though they daily saw them devoured by birds of prey.
A priest seated in a wooden chair before the altar made a discourse of many minutes, with some vehemence, in a secret language I did not understand. I suppose it is like the way Latin is preached by Popish priests before folk who understand only Spanish or German or such. The assembly were very attentive. The priest did sprinkle the faces of the congregation with liquor from a pot, and then they all began to sing and dance about the tree and altar, and play on their musical instruments, until the priest stood up and sprinkled the altar with the consecrated liquor. After which they all cried, Lou, Lou, which I took to mean “Amen,” and they all went home.
I confess I was of two minds about these ceremonies, whether they were as evil as the worship of the golden calf against which Moses did inveigh, or whether they were only another form of honor to the true God of Heaven. For surely there is only one God, who made Papists and Protestants and pagans alike, and He does not refuse homage from any of His creatures, no matter how they choose to frame their phrases of devotion. I know this is blasphemy, for which I could be burned alive in any country of Europe, including, I am sure, my own. Yet do I say it freely here, since I am old and do not fear burning half so much as I fear hiding the truth of what I have felt and believed.
I saw the mokisso named Nkondi, like a man the size of a child, that protects against thieves. Mavena, a dog with slavering fangs, guards against seducers. Ntadi, a dwarfish monster with a human face, speaks in dreams to warn of danger. And there were others that brought fertility or prosperity or success in warfare or safety against sorcerers. The harvest and rainfall were in the command of Mbumba, a snake that was also a rainbow, and do not beg me to explain how a snake and a rainbow may be one.