LITMIR.BIZ

       To-morrow unregarded, clean effaced

       The lesson of unhallowed yesterday,

       We rail against each other; interlaced

       Albeit are our fortunes. So we stray,

       Blind to the lurid writing on the wall,

       Deaf to the words Fate’s warning lips let fall.

      (1899)

Chapter One.

       Table of Contents

      The Lepers.

      “All the days wherein the plague shall be in him he shall be defiled; he is unclean: he shall dwell alone; without the camp shall his habitation be.”—Leviticus XIII. 46.

      One

      The Magistrate sat in his office, deep in thought. Before him, on his desk, lay a pile of documents of foolscap size—clinical reports as to some forty odd natives in the district, who had been cursed by God with the most bitter of all curses—the disease of leprosy. The Magistrate noted that the documents were livid white in colour—a variation from the orthodox blue of the ordinary printed form, and even this trivial circumstance seemed to have an unpleasant significance.

      It was a month since the receipt of the circular from the Government, directing that the long-dormant “Leprosy Repression Act” be put in force, and the District Surgeon had, in the interval, been busy riding from kraal to kraal in these locations where the disease existed, obtaining the voluminous data required in each individual case. This data had now been transferred to the fateful livid forms, the imposing pile of which the Magistrate was regarding with troubled eyes.

      In response to a touch upon the bell a smart-looking native constable entered the room, and a message sent through him brought Galada, sergeant of the native police, and four of his men, who stood before the desk in an attentive line. After the Magistrate’s order had been explained to them, Galada and his men left the room, went to where their horses stood, ready saddled, and rode forth respectively in five different directions. The sun was shining brightly. The season was early summer, but a light, refreshing breeze was making glad the land. The previous day had been hot, but a short thunderstorm at sunset had cleared the atmosphere and lowered the temperature, so the morning was sweet, as only a South African morning can be when cool, sea-born wind and gently ardent sunbeams flatter and caress.

      Galada, the sergeant, took his course along the footpath which leads over the bush-covered “Black-water” Ridge. To his right arose, in precipitous terraces, the noble mass of the Umgano Mountain. The valleys were full of long lush grass, on which the sleek-limbed kine were greedily browsing. The long-tailed finches lilted over the reeds in anxious pursuit of their short-tailed, and therefore more nimble, mates; the crested lories called hoarsely from the mysterious depths of the jungle.

      As the Sergeant reached the higher slopes of the ridge, the late flowers of retreating spring became more and more plentiful. The pink shields clustering around the orchid stems were full of struggling bees half-smothered in yellow pollen, while over each golden mass of mountain-broom a small cloud of butterflies hovered. Around the towering crags wheeled the chanting falcons, whose wild cries seemed to voice the very spirit of the mountain wilderness.

      But Galada had neither eye nor ear for these things; his thoughts were almost wholly engrossed by the “beer-drink” which he knew was that day being held at the kraal of Headman Rolobèlè—an hour’s ride away—among the foothills of the Drakensberg Range. He knew that there he would find all the headmen to whom he had to convey the Magistrate’s message, as well as other good company, and an excellent brew of beer. Thus would be afforded a most fortunate opportunity of combining business and pleasure.

      When Galada arrived at his destination he found the “beer-drink” in full swing. The men were all sitting in a circle before the main entrance to the cattle kraal, which was half-surrounded by a crescent of beehive-shaped huts. In the centre stood several immense earthenware pots full of the pink liquor, while several smaller pots, each with a cleft-calabash spoon floating in it, were circulating among the guests. Galada removed the saddle from his horse, let the animal loose to join the horses of the other visitors—which were being herded by a couple of boys. Then, after greeting the giver of the feast, he joined the circle of drinkers.

      But the Sergeant was far too sensible a man to allow pleasure to interfere with duty to his own disadvantage, so after quenching his immediate thirst by emptying one of the largest of the secondary pots, he drew Rolobèlè and the other headmen aside for the purpose of communicating to them the Magistrate’s message, while all were yet in a state of sobriety.

      “This, then, is the word of Government,” said he. “The people who have ‘the sickness’ (the Kaffirs have no name for the disease of leprosy) are to be gathered together at Izolo. From there they will be sent on in wagons to Emjanyana, where they will henceforth dwell. The Magistrate tells me to warn you that this word is a word which must be listened to and obeyed.”

      The four headmen looked at each other in silence for awhile. Then Rolobèlè spoke—

      “Yes, we knew of the coming of the word and we will obey. With the old men and women there will be no difficulty, but with the young men—the son of Makanda, for instance—he will be a difficult bull to drive into the Emjanyana kraal.”

      “What! Makanda’s son, Mangèlè,” exclaimed Galada in a tone of surprise; “he that I saw among the drinkers; has he got it?”

      “Oh, yes,” replied Rolobèlè. “The doctor was here last week and found ‘the sickness’ in his hand and his knee. But you knew, surely,

Скачать книгу