The Bringers of Beef were divided into three categories: the children, the women, and the hunters. From the children I would get such things as palm spiders, great brown palm weevils, various types of chameleon, and the lovely silver and brown forest skinks. From the women I would get crabs, both land and river, frogs and toads, water-snakes, an occasional tortoise, a few fledgeling birds, and the great whiskered catfish from the muddy river. It was the hunters who brought the really exciting specimens: mongoose, brush-tailed porcupine, squirrels, and other rarer inhabitants of the deep forest. The children preferred to he paid in the big shiny West African penny, with a hole through its middle; the women preferred to be paid half in salt, and half in shillings; and the hunters would take nothing but cash payments. They fought shy of accepting paper money and would prefer to carry away a couple of pounds in pennies rather than accept a note. And so they came, from the tiny youngsters who could only just walk, to the oldest man or woman hobbling to the camp with the aid of a stick, each carrying some living creature, either in a calabash, or a sack, tied to a stick, or in a neat wicker basket. Some arrived stark naked and unembarrassed, their contribution wrapped in their loin cloth. Every box and basket was pressed into commission as a cage, every empty kerosene tin was washed and cleaned, and soon contained a mass of vacant-faced frogs, or a tangled knot of snakes. Bamboo cages full of birds hung everywhere, and monkeys and mongooses were tethered to every post and stump. The collection was really under way.
One morning, bright and early, I was shaving outside the tent, when a large and scowling man made his appearance carrying a palm-leaf bag on his back. He strode forward, dumped the bag at my feet, and stood back glowering silently at me. I called Pious, who was in the kitchen supervising the cooking of breakfast.
“Pious, what has this man brought?”
“Na what kind of beef you get dere?” Pious asked the man.
“Water-beef.”
“He say it water-beef, sah,” said Pious.
“What’s a water-beef? Have a look, Pious, while I finish shaving.”
Pious approached the bag and carefully cut the string round its mouth. He peered inside.
“Crocodile, sah. It very big one,” he said, “but I tink it dead!”
“Is it moving?” I inquired.
“No, sah, it no move at all,” said Pious, and proceeded to shake four and a half feet of crocodile out on to the ground. It lay there, limp as it is possible for a crocodile to be, with its eyes closed.
“It dead, sah,” said Pious, and then he turned to the man. “Why you go bring dead beef, eh? Why you no take care no wound um, eh? You tink sometime Masa go be foolish an’ he go pay you money for dead beef?”
“Water-beef no be dead,” said the hunter.
“No be dead, eh?” asked Pious in wrath. “Na whatee dis, eh?” He flicked the crocodile with the bag: it opened both eyes, and suddenly came to life with unbelievable speed. It fled through Pious’s legs, making him leap in the air with a wild yelp of fright, dashed past the hunter, who made an ineffectual grab at it, and scuttled off across the compound towards the kitchen. Pious, the hunter, and myself gave chase. The crocodile, seeing us rapidly closing in on him, decided that to waste time going round the kitchen would be asking for trouble, so he went straight through the palm-leaf wall. The cook and his helpers could not have been more surprised. When we entered the kitchen the crocodile was half through the opposite wall, and he had left havoc behind him. The cook’s helper had dropped the frying-pan with the breakfast in it all over the floor. The cook, who had been sitting on an empty kerosene tin, overbalanced into a basket containing eggs and some very ripe and soft pawpaw, and in his efforts to regain his feet and vacate the kitchen he had kicked over a large pot of cold curry. The crocodile was now heading for the forest proper, with bits of curry and wood ash adhering to his scaly back. Taking off my dressing-gown I launched myself in a flying tackle, throwing the gown over his head, and then winding it round so tight that he could not bite. I was only just in time, for in another few yards he would have reached the thick undergrowth at the edge of the camp. Sitting in the dust, clutching the crocodile to my bosom, I bargained with the man. At last we agreed to a price and the crocodile was placed in the small pond I had built for these reptiles. However, he refused to let go of my dressing-gown, of which he had got a good mouthful, and so I was forced to leave it in the pond with him until such time as he let it go. It was never quite the same again after its sojourn in the crocodile pool. Some weeks later another crocodile escaped and did precisely the same thing, horrifying the kitchen staff, and completely ruining my lunch. After this, all crocodiles were unpacked within the confines of the pool, and at least three people had to be on hand to head off any attempts at escape.
Some time after this another arrival created excitement of a different sort. I had been working late on cage building, and at length climbed into bed about twelve o’clock. About an hour later I was awakened by an uproar from the direction of the village. Shrill cries and screams, the clapping of hands, and ejaculations of “Eh . . . aehh!” came to me clearly. Thinking that it was the prelude to yet another dance, I turned over and tried to get to sleep again. But the noise persisted and steadily grew louder. Lights flickered among the trees, and I could see a great crowd of people approaching from the direction of the village. I scrambled out of bed and clothed myself, wondering what on earth could have brought such a mass of humanity to disturb me at that hour of night. The crowd poured into the compound and it seemed as though practically the whole village was there. In the centre of this milling, gesticulating crowd walked four men carrying on their backs an enormous wicker basket, shaped somewhat like a gigantic banana. They dropped this at my feet, and as if by magic the great crowd fell silent. A man stepped forward, a tall, ugly fellow clad in the tattered remains of a khaki tunic and an enormous dirty sola topee. He swept me a low bow. “Masa,” he began grandiloquently, “I done bring you fine beef. I bring Masa best beef Masa get for dis country. I be fine hunter, I no get fear, I go to bush and I de see dis beef for hole. Dis beef get plenty power, Masa, but ’e no get power pass me. . . . I be very strong man, I get plenty power, I . . ”
He was at a disadvantage. I disliked his pseudo-civilized garb, and I also disliked the lecture on himself he was delivering. Also I was tired and eager to see the specimen, strike a bargain, and get back to bed.
“Listen, my friend,” I interrupted him, “I see dat you be very fine hunter man, and that you get power pass bush cow. But I want to know what kind of beef you get first, you hear?”
“Yes, sah,” said the man abashed. He dragged the great basket into the lamplight so that I could see it.
“Na big big snake, sah,” he explained, “na boa.”
Inside the basket, completely filling the interior, was one of the biggest pythons I had ever seen. It was so large that they had been unable to fit all of it inside, and so about three feet of its tail was outside, strapped tightly with creepers to the side of the basket. It fixed me with its black and angry eyes through the wickerwork, and hissed loudly. I contemplated his great length, coiled in the basket, his glossy, coloured skin shining in the lamplight.
“Listen, my friend,” I said to his owner, “I no get chance for look dis fine beef to-night. You go leave de beef here, and you go come back for morning time. Den we go look de beef and we go make palaver for price. You hear?”
“Yes, sah,” said the hunter. With the aid of the spectators we carried the heavy basket into the animal house and laid it on the floor. I emptied two buckets of water over the snake, for I was sure it must be very thirsty. Then I cut the ropes that tied the tail to the basket. These had been pulled so tight that they had, in places, cut into the lovely skin. I rubbed the tail for a time to try and restore the circulation that must have been checked by these tight bonds. Then I shooed the villagers out of the compound and retired once more to bed.