The White Shield. Mitford Bertram

      To the first shout of rage now succeeded a deafening yell of exasperation as the people caught the gist of these proud words. There was a swift rush and the ranks tightened around us. Spears were shaken towards us, and eyes glared with angry menace. But my little band made scarcely a movement; a hand here and there would shift nearer to the head of the deadly stabbing assegai, or a shield would quiver in sinewy grip. That was all, yet upon every face there glowed the light of battle. A moment and we should be hewing our way through those broad ranks to the inspiration of our fiercely maddening war-cry.

      But the chief’s command availed to arrest the rush of his exasperated fighting men, which was well for him; else had he fallen that moment—for I had marked him as first victim, nor could he have escaped me.

      “What is thy name, leader of this band of strangers?” he said.

      “Untúswa, son of Ntelani, of the tribe of Umtetwa, of the nation of Zulu, is my name. Ponder it well, O Chief of the Blue Cattle, for in truth thou shalt hear it again.”

      Once more, a loud and angry shout arose from the warriors. Once more the words of the chief stayed the tumult.

      “Look around, Untúswa, son of Ntelani,” he said, rising for the first time. “Yonder is our town—one of many. Behind it rises a hill, which is flat on the top, whereon grows abundant grass, and springs flow. It could carry the cattle of a nation and the fighting men of a nation, and the force who would climb it might just as well think to climb the Heavens themselves, for it is fortified from base to summit. Behold these,” designating the armed warriors; “these are but a handful among the fighting-men who obey my word. Yet I would quarrel with none, wherefore I will not suffer that violence should overtake you—even though you have offered insult to a mighty nation in the person of its chief. Depart now, ye strangers, in peace, while ye may. Farewell!”

      “How is it called, this great and mighty town, my father?” I said, somewhat mockingly.

      “It is called ‘The Queen of the World,’” he answered proudly.

      “Ha! That is good,” I replied. “When the tread of the Elephant—Umzilikazi, the Great Great One, the Founder of Nations—shaketh yonder town, then the King and the Queen of the World will be mated? Till then, farewell, O Chief of the Blue Cattle!”

      Then we departed even as we had come—slaves and all—no man hindering us. Yes, the name of Zulu was mighty indeed in those days.

Chapter Two.

       Table of Contents

      Treason in the Air.

      Strong as we felt in the might of our name and nation, we were too well skilled in the game of war to allow ourselves to be lulled into a blind security. Day after day, night after night, we kept a sharp look-out, expecting the forces of the Bakoni and their allies to fall upon us in overwhelming numbers. But they did not; which went to show that something of the terror of our name had travelled to the Chief of the Blue Cattle; nor, indeed, did I doubt but that messengers would follow shortly after us with gifts, and desiring to konza to Umzilikazi, even as had done all other nations within our reach.

      At length we drew near to Ekupumuleni, and our hearts were light, for the thoughts of all of us were full of the richness of the country which lay awaiting our possession; and as we returned to the home of our wandering nation, the dryness of the land struck us as quite cheerless—not that it was so really, but only by comparison with the green, well-watered region we had just left.

      Having sent messengers on to announce our arrival, we entered the great kraal, singing lustily the praises of the King. Umzilikazi was seated in his wonted place, at the upper end of the great open circle, and as we flung our weapons to the ground and, tossing our right hands aloft, roared the Bayéte, I could see that pleased expression I knew so well steal over his face.

      “Greeting, son of Ntelani,” he said, as bending low, I drew near. “Seat thyself, and tell me what thou hast seen and done.”

      This I did, and the Great Great One took snuff and listened. Then he ordered those women and boys whom he had taken as bearers to be brought before him.

      Crouching low to the earth they came, those poor slaves, their eyes starting from their heads in fear. They had never seen anything like this—the splendour of our huge kraal and its shapeliness and strength; so different to their own town, which, though far larger, was utterly without shape or design—the stature and strength, and fierce bearing of our warriors, who had mustered in crowds to witness our return, and above all, the proud majesty of our King, and the roaring volume of praises which went up from every throat to hail his appearance. They bent low to the very earth, trembling with fear.

      “It is good, it is good,” said the King, eyeing them between pinches of snuff. “These are right well-made specimens, albeit somewhat light of skin. I ordered thee to take no captives, Untúswa, yet the impi needed bearers for its goods, and thou hast chosen the pick and flower of the girls. Ah! ah! Untúswa; thou hast ever an eye for all that is best in that way.”

      “Yeh-bo Nkulu ’nkulu!” I cried, delighted that I had pleased the King.

      “I will choose the best, Untúswa. After that thou canst take the two that will suit thee; the remainder I will otherwise dispose of.”

      Then the King dismissed us, ordering cattle to be slain for us to feast on, and we departed from his presence uttering shouts of bonga.

      When I gained my hut I found Nangeza, my principal wife, awaiting me with ill-concealed impatience.

      “Welcome, Untúswa,” she said. “And so upon the news you bring it depends whether we move onward or no?”

      “Who am I, to seek to interpret the mind of the King?” I answered darkly, for Nangeza was ever trying to wring out of me what went on in the secret councils of the izinduna, and even in my private conferences with the Great Great One himself. This was all very well while I was unringed and a thoughtless boy, but now things were different. The less women had to say to such matters the better; but although I could see this now, Nangeza never could be brought to do so. She would show an evil temper at such times, and hint that she had been the making of me—that I had been ready enough to take counsel of her in times past, but that now I was somebody I thought I could do without her. Then she would bid me beware, saying that, even as she had made me, it might still be within her power to unmake me. Now of this sort of talk, Nkose, I began to have more than enough. Nangeza might be the inkosikazi—she deserved that—but she should not be the chief, too.

      (Inkosikazi means Chieftainess. The principal wife of a man of rank.)

      She was now a tall, fine, commanding woman, and as fearless and ready of wit as she had been when a girl, yet with the lapse of time she had become too commanding—had developed an expression of hardness which does not become a woman. She had slaves to wait on her, and had little or no hard work to do herself. Moreover, by this time, I had two other wives, those two girls whom I had promised to lobola for when they had surprised me and Nangeza together; and I had kept my word. They were soft-hearted, merry, laughing girls, who never dreamed that the second fighting induna of the King’s army ought to take his commands from women; wherefore it not unfrequently befell that I preferred their huts to that of Nangeza, my inkosikazi.

      (Note: It is customary for each wife of a Zulu of rank to have a hut to herself.)

      A woman of Nangeza’s disposition could not be other than a jealous woman. She hated my other two wives. She had borne me one child, a daughter, whereas the other two had each borne me a son, and she feared lest I should name one of these as my successor, and as chief son, thus conferring precedence over any she might hereafter bear me. You white people, Nkose, think that we Zulus keep our women in the lowest subjection. Well, we do not allow them to rule us, yet