Читать книгу Great Zimbabwe, Mashonaland, Rhodesia. An account of two years' examination work in 1902-4 on behalf of the government of Rhodesia онлайн

93 страница из 98

Even those who are in many other respects the most hopeful young men equally delight in getting absolutely intoxicated. The lads from eight years of age imbibe doro most copiously, while boys of twelve get as drunk as their seniors. The brains of the natives are so small that the doro acts upon them speedily, and two hours’ drinking will undo all the benefit of two years’ contact with civilisation. Then all their innate savage nature reasserts itself in every violent form, and their swaggering insolence, inspired by doro, is intolerable. But the evils of I’daha smoking and doro drinking are not of modern origin, but are ingrained in their blood and bone by many past centuries of devotion to these practices.

The rarefied air of these highlands conducts sound over long distances, and triangular conversations are constantly in progress between the villagers at Mogabe’s kraal, our boys at the camp, and those working on the Hill Ruins, though each point is at least a third of a mile distant from the others. These conversations are carried on without the slightest straining of the voice or even shouting, the secret apparently being the slight raising of the voice and speaking very distinctly and very slowly. From their vantage position on the hill the boys are always on the look-out for natives passing and repassing between the villages. While the passing natives are, as one would believe, outside the hearing limit a conversation with the boys has for some time been in progress. Our boys will give the usual salutation, and if this be replied to all well and good. But should it not be replied to, or not promptly, the boys will at once start in chorus to slang the passer-by and all his relatives, commencing with his mother. So long as the passer-by is within earshot, so long do these slanging matches continue. Each boy endeavours to cap each previous remark with something more pungent, and as he succeeds the rest cheer him. Natives state that the sound of their voices travels quickest and furthest in the early mornings.