104 THE BONDS OF AFRICA 



Sphinx-like in their solemnity, the last rose-red 

 farewell blush of sunset seemed to kiss their 

 colossal outlines and bathe sky and mountain 

 top in a flare of crimson. And then the majesty 

 of the whole thing dimmed, died, and the dismal 

 mantle of dusk robbed the Muchingas of their 

 glory. 



While my eyes had feasted on this masterpiece 

 of transformation my mind had mused on the 

 eternal vigil of the mountain crests, which 

 stood up against the sky like giant sentinels. 

 What war and rapine they had gazed on ! 

 What ages of life's unending turmoil of tragedy 

 and transition they had known ! And they had 

 watched it all with never a gesture; just a grim, 

 disdainful smile. They stood on the mountain 

 road that led from the fertile Luangwa, where 

 the agricultural Awisa tilled their crops, to the 

 land of the warlike Awemba, blood-loving and 

 cruel, the terror of all this vast tract of Central 

 Africa. They put a barrier between Mars and 

 Ceres, and Mars had leaped their hurdles and 

 plunged the land in crimson. For this is an 

 African Aceldama. The chronicles of the Arab 

 slave raiders, which were recorded in vulture- 

 picked skeletons, slave-sticks and bleached bones 

 from Lake Mweru to Zanzibar, hold no such 

 awful chapters as the tale the mountain sentinels 

 might tell. The days have not long gone by 

 when the broad blades of the Awemba spears 

 cried loud for quivering flesh, when blood filled 

 the rivers, and the breasts of women withered 

 on the thatch of many a hut. 



Visions of Rider Haggard's romance. King 

 SolomorCs Mines, flashed before me that evening 

 as I watched night fall on the Muchingas. Might 



