"Bones": Being Further Adventures in Mr. Commissioner Sanders' CountryWallace, Edgar
History
"Bones": Being Further Adventures in Mr. Commissioner Sanders' Country
Wallace, Edgar
Africa -- History -- 1884-1918 -- Fiction; Great Britain -- Colonies -- Africa -- Administration -- Fiction; Short stories, English
Here a little river, easily fordable, and not more than a dozen spear
lengths across flows from one wood into another. Between the two woods
is a clear space of thick grass and shrub. In the spring of the year the
banks of the stream are white with arum-lilies, and the field beyond,
at a later period, is red with wild anemone.
The dour fugitives on the other side of the stream have a legend that
those who safely cross the "Field of Blood"--so they call the
anemone-sprinkled land beyond--without so much as crushing a flower may
claim sanctuary under the British flag.
So that when Bizaro sighted the stream, and the two tall trees that
flanked the ford, from afar off and said: "To-day we will walk between
the flowers," he was signifying the definite character of his plans.
"Master," said one of the more timid of his muster, when they had halted
for a rest in sight of the promised land, "what shall we do when we come
to these strange places?"
"We shall defeat all manner of men," said Bizaro optimistically.
"Afterwards they shall come and sue for peace, and they shall give us a
wide land where we may build us huts and sow our corn. And they also
will give us women, and we shall settle in comfort, and I will be chief
over you. And, growing with the moons, in time I shall make you a great
nation."
They might have crossed the stream that evening and committed themselves
irrevocably to their invasion. Bizaro was a criminal, and a lazy man,
and he decided to sleep where he was--an act fatal to the smooth
performance of his enterprise, for when in the early hours of the
morning he marched his horde to the N'glili river he found two thousand
spears lining the opposite bank, and they were under a chief who was at
once insolent and unmoved by argument.
"O chief," said Bosambo pleasantly, "you do not cross my beautiful
flowers to-day."
"Lord," said Bizaro humbly, "we are poor men who desire a new land."
"That you shall have," said Bosambo grimly, "for I have sent my warriors
to dig big holes wherein you may take your rest in this land you
desire."
An unhappy Bizaro carried his six hundred spears slowly back to the land
from whence he had come and found on return to the mixed tribes that he
had unconsciously achieved a miracle. For the news of armed men by the
N'glili river carried terror to these evil men--they found themselves
between two enemies and chose the force which they feared least.
On the fourth day following his interview with Bosambo, Bizaro led five
thousand desperate men to the ford and there was a sanguinary battle
which lasted for the greater part of the morning and was repeated at
sundown.
Hamilton brought his Houssas up in the nick of time, when one wing of
Bosambo's force was being thrust back and when Bizaro's desperate
adventurers had gained the Ochori bank. Hamilton came through the
clearing, and formed his men rapidly.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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