Yes, such things of beauty are indeed a joy for ever, and I can
well understand what little Flossie meant when she talked of
Kenia as her companion. As Umslopogaas, savage old Zulu that
he was, said when I pointed out to him the peak hanging in the
glittering air: 'A man might look thereon for a thousand years
and yet be hungry to see.' But he gave rather another colour
to his poetical idea when he added in a sort of chant, and with
a touch of that weird imagination for which the man was remarkable,
that when he was dead he should like his spirit to sit upon that
snow-clad peak for ever, and to rush down the steep white sides
in the breath of the whirlwind, or on the flash of the lightning,
and 'slay, and slay, and slay'.
'Slay what, you old bloodhound?' I asked.
This rather puzzled him, but at length he answered --
'The other shadows.'
'So thou wouldst continue thy murdering even after death?' I said.
'I murder not,' he answered hotly; 'I kill in fair fight. Man
is born to kill. He who kills not when his blood is hot is a
woman, and no man. The people who kill not are slaves. I say
I kill in fair fight; and when I am "in the shadow", as you white
men say, I hope to go on killing in fair fight.
Pages:
57
58
59
60
61
62
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81