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"Hapana shauri yangu," replied the man indifferently, uttering the fatalistic phrase that rises to the lips of the savage African almost automatically, unless his personal loyalty has been won "that is not my affair." He brooded on the ground for a space then looked up. "It is the business of porters to carry loads; it is the business of the white man to take care of the porters."
They squatted comfortably on their heels, roasting meat. Behind each man was planted his glittering long-bladed spear. The old man held the place of honour, as befitted his flirtation with death that morning. Everybody was absolutely happy a good fire, plenty of meat, and strangers with whom to have a grand "shauri."
As the quintette came to halt, the villagers fell silent and our shauri began. We drew up and dismounted. We all expectorated as gentlemen. "These," said he proudly, "are my beebees." We replied that they seemed like excellent beebees and politely inquired the price of wives thereabout, and also the market for totos.
These shenzis eat what?" "Food is ready, bwana." "I will eat. Then we must make shauri with these people to get our loads. My men must rest to-day." "Come, bwana," said Cazi Moto. Kingozi stooped to pass through the door. When he straightened outside, he paused in amazement. Before him stood his camp, intact.
We called the Masai and Wanderobo before us. They squatted in a row, their spears planted before them. We sat in canvas chairs. Leyeye standing, translated. The affair was naturally of the greatest deliberation. In the indirect African manner we began our shauri. We asked one simple question at a time, dealing with one simple phase of the subject.
Other natives hurry up, and then you stand around and talk about it for an hour or so. If you want to buy a chicken or a cluster of eggs there must first be a prolonged shauri with much interchange of views and conversation and aërated persiflage. The native loves his shauri, and if he asks you a certain price for a chicken and you give the price without haggling he is greatly disappointed.
She stood motionless, aghast at her inability to remember why she was here. Hamoud's voice came to her from beyond the curtain: "There is going to be a shauri, a talk with these porters of yours." "Ah, my God! What is it now?" Hamoud cast back at her through the curtain, in a tone of bitterness: "Rebellion." She wrapped herself in her robe and cowered on the bed. Half an hour passed.
It was built for arctic regions, but the sultan of all the Ketoshians wore it right straight through the ardent hours when the sun kisses one with the fiery passion of a mustard plaster. He was slowly being cremated and it was fascinating to watch him sizzle. Everything that you do in Africa has to be preceded by a shauri. You have a shauri if you ask a native which road to take.
And in that he voiced the philosophy of this human relation. The porters had done their job: not one inch beyond it would they go. The white woman had brought them here: it was now her shauri to get them out. "You see!" cried the Leopard Woman bitterly. "What can you do with such idiots!" Kingozi directed toward her his slow smile. "Yes, I see.
For a language that has only a few words like shauri, backsheesh, apana, and chukula the native lingo is a most elastic one. There were two or three things that we had come to Mount Elgon for and about which we desired information. The first was "elephants," and we found, after hours of talk, that there was none in the vicinity.
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