CHAPTER IX
Child Life
Child life! How immediately our minds linger over happy scenes of mirth and innocent laughter, romping, rollicking games of mischief or of fun. Bright, happy childhood! No cloud of care and trouble has arisen on life’s horizon, and sin has not yet tainted the atmosphere of Heaven that still lingers round its offspring.
But where can memory rest upon such a picture as that in darkest Africa? Look upon a tree, the tender buds of which half fearfully peep through the bare branches just to catch a glimpse of the outer world, when a cold frost blast of winter strikes across the frail young life and withers it for ever. That is child life in Africa. Innocence and purity were withered just as they dared to step from infancy. Happy, careless mirth was crushed with the weight of the burdens laid upon the shoulders of childhood. Their mother’s home, as has been described, was their earliest environment, their language was learned from her, and then lovelessness was the children’s portion, as they were sent away as servants or slaves to neighbouring chiefs. Parents scorned the idea of bringing up their own children; they affirmed that a child would never listen to its parent and would refuse to work, so they exchanged their children at the age of four or five years for others who would be as slaves to them. Even at this tender age they were taught to gather the sticks and twigs, and then sit by and feed the fire while the food was cooking, or they carried the gourds or pots on their little woolly pates down to the river to draw the daily supply of water. They were generally fearfully neglected and underfed; their dislike to water was accounted for by the fact that they possessed no clothing and the dirt kept them warm. If anyone had been born with a leaning towards cleanliness his mother would have effectually crushed this by the cold water treatment administered during infantile ablutions. It was the custom every morning between 4.0 and 5.0 a.m., when the cold night air still clung in damp mists to the land, to hold the babies naked out in the courtyards, throw cold water over them, and then leave them out to dry.
Their little insides were treated with no greater consideration. One morning a woman brought down to the dispensary a wee morsel of three weeks: it was a pitiful little object of mere skin and bone. The mother explained that it had either been poisoned out of spite, or it was possessed of an evil spirit. “See,” said she, “I have done all I could to let out the poison or devil.” Looking at its body I saw it was covered with a number of small, deep cuts, and the blood had been left to dry. Low moans and a tired cry came from the poor little helpless mite as the flies tortured its mutilated body. After questioning the mother the “evil spirit” took the form of bananas and mushrooms that she had been bringing the three weeks’ infant up on! Feeding bottles were an unknown luxury, and as no equivalent had been invented, babies were compelled to lap from the hand, an art they never properly learned and thrived very poorly on. Some three dozen india rubber “comforters” were sent out to me, and these I managed to fix on empty ink bottles or medicine bottles, and so a new-fashioned “Allenbury” feeder was introduced. The demand far exceeded the supply, so they could only be lent out by the month. “Stephens’ Ink” would have been immensely pleased could it have snapshotted the babies being solemnly fed in church with its bottles held to their mouths.
Certainly it was a case of the survival of the fittest with the Toro infants, and as the “fittest” were few and far between, mortality was very great among them.
The first two dolls that arrived in Toro met with a very mixed welcome; the children howled and fled in terror, but their mothers showed a most profound admiration for them. At first they held the doll very gingerly and at a distance, as if in fear of being bewitched, but finding that nothing happened to either one or the other, and the doll still smiled at them like the Cheshire cat, they became great friends and begged that they might borrow it for a few days to play with.
Whether it was the large circulation that those two dolls got, or the gradually increasing confidence of the Toro children in the white ladies, the fact remains that in a few months all childish prejudice had disappeared, and often a little voice was heard asking for “a child that causes play.” When this was known in England over 100 dolls were sent to me from two working parties. I never saw such a wonderful doll show as they made. They were all displayed on our verandah, and the house was literally besieged with men, women, and children for some days.
A bride, beautifully dressed in white satin and kid shoes, who, even in her wedding attire, cried “Mama” and “Papa,” was sent to little Princess Ruth, but the report reached me that King Kasagama had constituted himself guardian, and kept it locked up in his study for slack moments! The Mother Queen wrote an imploring letter to me for a dainty little Parisienne who arrived with her travelling trunk; and Apolo, our faithful native deacon—confirmed bachelor—asked me in secret if men ever played with dolls, and beamed with satisfaction as he most triumphantly carried one off, peacefully sleeping.
The others were given out to the little girls who had been most regular at the school, and were noted for having come with clean faces and bodies.
When the boys saw that the dolls were only given to girls, some borrowed their sisters’ garments to try and appear eligible! I did not know till then they were versed in such cunning! It was so pretty to watch the joy and even playfulness that those dolls brought into the lives of so many little ones who had scarcely known what this meant till then. Christianity has completely revolutionized child-life in Toro. No longer are the new-born babes given over to the Devil by causing their blood to flow as a dedicatory offering; the teeth are not now extracted to propitiate the Evil One, and happy family circles are seen in place of slavery.
I am sure in no Sunday School in England is there brighter singing than among the Toro infants when about 200 of them, with very lusty lungs, open their rather prominent mouths and sing “There’s a Friend for little children above the bright blue sky.”
Certainly the girls and boys make very clever little domestics. I have sometimes wondered whether the problem of the over-taxed English market could not be solved by exporting some of these small people. I had a little maid named Keturah, who was 12 years of age, and she could almost manage the work of a housemaid and parlourmaid. She kept my room in perfect order, carefully putting away anything left about, and cleaned it regularly every Saturday. On Mondays she carried off the soiled linen, washing, starching, and ironing it as well as I had been able to teach her; and she could wait at table like a Gatti’s waiter! Was that not splendid for a little girl who had come to us without ever having seen an English bed, garment, knife, fork, or iron?
Of course, one has occasionally to put up with small inconveniences. One day a pair of boots were sent out to be dried by the fire, with strict injunctions not to leave or scorch them. In a few minutes they were brought in with a big hole burnt out of the leather, and the sole shrivelled up beyond repair—and these were a last pair! Pocket handkerchiefs frequently find their way into the boiled starch, a white muslin blouse sometimes loses its identity completely by a strong dose of the blue-bag; if it is needed for a special occasion the quantity is increased! A flannel nightgown was boiled for three hours on one occasion; fortunately it was a very unattractive Jaeger, but even then it did not surrender its colour. That shade of flannel is like the Ethiopian’s skin—I could never even get it to fade. Take my advice, and try white instead.
But, after all, these are mere details. They are faithful little people, and would never refuse to follow their master as he travels up and down the country, though they scarcely ever escape malaria when marching through fever districts, in spite of strong doses of quinine. Often concealing a high temperature from the European, they hurry on in front to see that his tent and a refreshing cup of tea are ready when he comes into camp. As we travelled down to Uganda, on our way home to England, our staff of six boys started out with us; one after another knocked over, and had to be carried back, till we were left with only two to do everything for us, and in spite of their being ill, they insisted on coming as far as Victoria Nyanza. As the big lake steamer weighed anchor and cut through the water, two little white caps were waving at the end of the pier until we disappeared from sight.