I saw an even stranger thing, that is, a white Negro, as white as any white man, but with curling hair and thick lips and a flat nose. This was in the marketplace, when I heard a great stir and a murmuring, and there he came, with the crowd giving way on all sides. Oliveira was with me, and he said, “Hsh! Keep care! That is a holy man!”
“God’s blood, what is it?”
“It is called a ndundu, which is born white and stays that color all its life. They are always brought up to be witches, and serve the king in witchcraft. He has four of them, they say, and no man dares meddle with them.”
Indeed, this ndundu was passing through the market sampling this food and that, taking a bite and a bite and tossing away, and all this while he was allowed to go as he pleased. He came within five yards of me and turned to stare, for I with my blond hair was as strange to him as he was to me. Our eyes met, and his were red, red where mine were blue, the red eyes of a demon from Hell, that I have never seen otherwise.
Toward me he did make certain holy gestures, that were like the writhing of a madman, with much waving of the arms and crooking of his fingers. And in a hissing voice he cried out, an evil croak, saying, “Jaqqa-ndundu! Ndundu-Jaqqa!” The meaning of that is “white Jaqqa,” which even then I understood, though I could not fathom the sense of the appellation. And he did say other things, just as mystical, which left me sore bewildered. We looked at one another a long while, and then I looked away, unable to meet that diabolical gaze any more; and I felt a chill even in so much smothering heat, as though the gates of the Inferno had opened before me and released a blast of the icy wind of Satan. White Jaqqa! What madness was that? Ah, and I would learn; but how did he know?
While we were thus becalmed at Loango there were three special prodigies, that is, things that were out of the ordinary even for the people of Loango.
The first of these was a miracle of the king, to make rain fall. It was the rainy season then, but all had been dry for some weeks and the people were suffering, for the crops could not thrive. So according to the custom and usage of the land they came to the king and begged him to bring the rain, and he did decree a great rain-making festival, which we all attended. On that day all the lords and armies of the surrounding districts came to Loango and held a tournament and display before the king, brandishing their spears, dancing and leaping about, and showing their skill with the bow and arrow. The best of these was an archer who would have put Robin Hood and all his men to shame, and did such wonders of splitting one arrow with another, and bringing down birds on the wing, that I did not think were possible except in storytellers’ tales. When he had done his feats he came forward and spoke with the king, who embraced him and gave him food and drink with his own hand.
Then the king took his place upon a carpet spread on the ground, some fifteen fathoms long and broad, made of the fine fabric nsaka, which is a stuff resembling velvet, and sat upon a high throne the height of a man, covered entirely in leopard-skin. He commanded his ndambas to strike up, these instruments being pieces of palm-tree stems, five feet long and split down one side: notches are carved on the edges of the split, and they rub these notches with a stick to make a weird and unearthly sound, like the rasping of gigantic crickets. Also they have an ivory trumpet made of elephanto tusk, called the mpunga, hollowed and scraped light. With these mpungas and ndambas they created a truly hellish noise. After they had sported and shown the king pleasure in this way, he rose and stood upon his throne, and beckoned to the great archer, and received from him his bow and arrows. I thought the king himself would shoot them, but no: he bestowed them on a high priest, or rain-witch, who stood by his side all daubed with paint and feathers. Also beside the king were the four albino monsters, albino being the word the Portugals use for these white blackamoors; and with them were various other witches and mages of the tribe, even the old Nganga Gomberi woman. There was a great awesome sounding of the drums and trumpets, that made me want to cover my ears with my hands, and set the Portugals to work crossing themselves furiously and muttering their Latin, and the high rain-witch aimed his bow toward the sky and fired his arrow with all his might, so that it went up in a great arc and vanished far off.
And then, you will say, nothing happened, and the dearth of rain did continue for another four months, and all the land was turned to desert. So I would myself have expected, from such pagan folly as this. But I must tell you that upon my mother’s soul I speak the truth when I report that within a few minutes a small white cloud did appear in the southeast, and then a darker cloud, and then the sky was thick with them, good black clouds of rain, and before an hour had passed we were having such a deluge as would have sent Noah to cover, for rivulets were running through the streets and dust was transformed instantly to gobs of mud. How does one explain it? One does not explain it. One ascribes it to the dark power of witchcraft. Or else one says that it was, after all, the rainy season, and rain must come sooner or later even in a dry year, and very likely the king had waited until signs of rain could be seen afar, and had chosen that day to hold his great rain-making festival. And was it witchcraft truly? I cannot rightly say. For it is the case that the king did not fire the arrow himself, but gave it to his priest. I think if the king was sure he could make rain, he would have drawn the bow with his own hand; but by giving the task to the priest, he protected himself against the chance that it would have no result. Priests can always be punished if they fail to bring rain; princes, in my experience, are not much interested in taking the responsibility for public failures.
That was the first of the three prodigies.
The second was but three days afterward, when light rains still hovered about the place. I was in the market exchanging a few of the cowrie shells that go for money here for a piece of the palm-cloth brocade, all done finely in green and red and yellow, from which I meant to make a mantle to shield me from the worst of the sun. Of a sudden I heard a shrill music from afar, a sound not unlike the bagpipery of the wild Scots, that punctured my ear in a painful way. At this piercing and frightful sound all activity ceased in the marketplace. Next I did hear men chanting, as men will do when they pull some heavy load or bear some great burden, a deep slow steady grunting song, I think made not of words but of mere sounds. All this came from the west, from the ocean side of the city.
Then there entered into view what seemed to be a coccodrillo of mighty dimension that floated in the air. But of course that was not the case: this coccodrillo, which was as large as any beast I hope to see, easily eight yards in length and perhaps more, was being borne on the shoulders of some eight or ten men. They struggled under its vast weight, chanting their stern rhythm to keep themselves moving forward, oom oom OOM oom oom, oom oom OOM oom oom, staggering and straining, their eyes all but popping out of their shining black faces, while about them danced and capered three or four musicians playing on their pipes and flutes. This uncouth procession came forward into the very center of the market; the black who was the commander of the carriers gave a cry, and thereupon all did kneel to their knees and roll aside, allowing the great coccodrillo to fall to the ground.