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But two years ago war broke out, for some bold act of its people upon caravans, and the Arabs came from Unyanyembe with their Wangwana servants, attacked them, burnt the villages, and laid waste the work of years. Since that time Mgongo Tembo has been but blackened wrecks of houses, and the fields a sprouting jungle.
A cluster of date palm-trees, overtopping a dense grove close to the mtoni of Mgongo Tembo, revived my recollections of Egypt. The banks of the stream, with their verdant foliage, presented a strange contrast to the brown and dry appearance of the jungle which lay on either side.
I was more than half glad that I had not shot and that he had got away unharmed. That night we camped in a little circular clearing which the Akeleys called "Tembo Circus," for it was near this same clearing that one of their large elephants had been killed three years before, and in the clearing the skin had been prepared for preservation.
At the end of an hour the sultani gave up the contest and appeared, smiling, unconcerned. The men greeted each other, exchanged a few words. Women emerged from the house carrying tembo in gourd bottles, and smaller half-gourds from which to drink it. Their eyes were large with curiosity as to this man and woman of a new species. Kingozi touched his lips to the tembo.
The majority was of the opinion that the next day would be the best for a terekeza; but I, being the "bana," consulting my own interests, insisted, not without a flourish or two of my whip, that the terekeza should be made on this day. Mgongo Tembo, when Burton and Speke passed by, was a promising settlement, cultivating many a fair acre of ground.
He passed the knife on to the dignitary who stood behind his chair. "This," said Kingozi, taking one of the steaming balauris from Cazi Moto, "is the white man's tembo." The sultani tasted doubtfully. He was pleased. He gave back the balauri at last with a final smack of the lips. "Good!" said he. Another full five minutes of silence ensued. Then the sultani arose.
"Great is the magic of this bone, which is mine. It has brought us a long journey; it has won us the friendship of the great chief; it has revealed to us much riches in the teeth of tembo, the elephant, though that must not be spoken aside from us three; it has restored the light to Bwana Kingozi, our master; it has captured for us a great bwana and a rich safari; it has brought to us Bwana Bunduki and many bwanas and askaris; it has brought to our master a woman for his own though to be sure there are many women.
A little before noon we halted at the Khambi of Mgongo Tembo, or the Elephant's Back so called from a wave of rock whose back, stained into dark brownness by atmospheric influences, is supposed by the natives to resemble the blue-brown back of this monster of the forest. My caravan had quite an argument with me here, as to whether we should make the terekeza on this day or on the next.
But whether it did not proceed from my imagination or No; I believe it proceeded from Kalulu, who must have shouted, "Tembo, tembo! bana yango!" "Lo! an elephant! an elephant, my master!" For the young rascal had fled as soon as he had witnessed the awful colossus in such close vicinage.
The tattoo or tembo of the Matambwé and Upper Makondé very much resembles the drawings of the old Egyptians; wavy lines, such as the ancients made to signify water, trees and gardens enclosed in squares, seem to have been meant of old for the inhabitants who lived on the Rovuma, and cultivated also, the son takes the tattoo of his father, and thus it has been perpetuated, though the meaning now appears lost.
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