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we think of your plight, we pity you, we weep for you
and drip at the nostrils, but instead of earning your affection,
instead of you dancing to greet us and fussing
over us, you find even our mats a cause to despise us,
our running nostrils become your favourite target, you
speak of our solicitude as a punishment, our existence
as beneath contempt—even to the extent that you have
now coined the belittling expression, “Tears in the eye
of a gnom.”’
Let me not lie to you, I was somewhat ashamed
listening to the words of this creature, for all his insults
on mankind were well observed. However, inasmuch
as I did not want him to realise how his words had
hurt me deep inside, I burst out laughing and assured
him that I was only teasing him anyway. He thereupon
resumed his lamentations and went on his way. He had
taken a few steps when I thought to myself,
‘A man mends his fate with his own hands, why do I not crave
a boon from this creature?’ So I called him back, prostrated
myself full length on the ground and begged him
to grant me a boon. He was very pleased that I had
acted in this manner and he gave me four pods of alligator
pepper; he gave them to me in two pairs and instructed
me that in time of danger I should eat a single
pepper from one of the first pair of pods, whereupon I
would grow wings and fly like a bird.
And the moment I wished to retract the wings, one pepper from the other
two pods would produce the desired result. When I
tried out this formula, it proved a sure-fire treatment.
After he had passed on this gift, he went his way
and I turned into the forest, seeking game. I walked
some distance and the animals leapt about while I
sought my chance to take careful aim. And yet again I
came upon another abbreviated creature driving away
the game. He was shorter still than the one I had met
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before and his entire body was uncompromisingly
black. Once again I grew infuriated and spoke fiery
words to him: ‘You are wicked creatures, you ghommids,
pitiless as well, and that is probably why your
growth is stunted since you are occupied with nothing
but pointless acts. Game there is and in abundance
but you do not hunt it, yet you will not let others alone
to hunt.’
When I had thus berated him, he levelled me to
the dust with one long look, hissed in contempt and
began to speak:
‘I am the Crown Prince of Forests, the bog-troll
who lives in crevices of the mahogany. Have you never
heard of me? Know you not that earthly beings dare
not disrespect my person? That a mere son of man
dare not affront my presence? It is lucky for you that
I take pity on you or I would assuredly reveal to you
that this forest in which you hunt is indeed the Forest
of a Thousand Daemons. Diminutive though I appear,
I pursue the task which my Creator has assigned to
me: I walk the walk of the wise, I act with the nature
of the discerning. I never reach for that which my hand
cannot encompass, nor do I embark upon that which
is beyond my power; I do not act in the manner of the
thoughtless, nor do I complete an action which I then
regret. I proceed along the course which I have set for
myself, and pursue the task I have set my hand upon
since the day of my creation by God the King.
You arrogant creatures, you who throw good money into the
gutter, you tell yourselves that you are buying clothes
and waste your money because of the superficial pleasures
of life. You want to live up to worldly expectations,
so you attempt things which are beyond your
powers, you forget that the tongue of men is merely
slick, that a man they malign today they are quite likely
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to praise tomorrow. When a man makes an effort at
something, the sons of men sneer at him, but when success
has crowned his efforts they turn round and hail
him. There is no one immune from their calumny. They
malign the poor and malign the rich; they malign the
common man and malign the famous: when they feel
like it they malign their king also. Therefore, continue
on your way, and I also will follow mine. I merely go
where my Creator has sent me.’
And thus he had his say and went his way. I was
now thoroughly fed up with the whole business; every
ghommid alike appeared to use me ill. After this one
had gone, I began to sense the approach of game, leaping
from tree to tree. Investigating, I found it was a
brown and white-patch monkey. A shot bagged me the
monkey, I tucked it in my bag, tossed it onto my head,
and, gun on shoulder, directed my legs to my rude
hunting-lodge at the base of the palm tree.
On arriving there, I took up my knife and skinned
it, built a little truss no higher than my knee, stacked a
fire beneath, piled my venison on top of it and fired it.
That which I did not pile on the truss, the scraps and
tit-bits, I began to roast in the fire, eating them on the
spot. Highly enjoyable they were too for the meat of
the monkey oozes delicious juices.
Not long afterwards, it darkened, and towards the
eighth hour of the evening I lit my hunting-lamp and
began to seek game. I did not search very far before
my eyes fastened on another pair of eyes belonging to
some creature, gleaming a short way from me. I shot
and killed it and it turned out to be a civet. I took it
to my camp, skinned and carved it, piled the pieces
beside the monkey and cracked the fire up at them. I
did not trouble to hunt any more that night, and when
I had tended the civet, I lowered my back to the earth
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and dropped off to sleep, and it was not till the cooing
of the cuckoo that I awoke the following morning.
On the dawning of the next day therefore—and
this was the third day of my sojourn in the Forest of
Irunmale—I ate, filled up properly so that my belly
protruberated most roundly. I reached for my gun,
primed it diligently, seized my hunting-bag, slung it
over my shoulder and so into the forest. It grieves me
to admit that I had out-eaten remembrance of those
charms which I should have taken with me. I left them
at the foot of the palm and took nothing but the shot
for my gun, and my cutlass.
I had not walked very far before I began to encounter
game, but they would not be patient and persisted
in running pointlessly about. And just when an
opportunity presented itself for a shot, I heard a rumble
as of six hefty men approaching; indeed, it was no
less a monster than the sixteen-eyed dewild; often had
I listened to hunters recount tales of him—Agbako,
that is his name.
When I set eyes on him, I was—unless I lie in this
matter—smitten with terror. He wore a cap of iron,
a coat of brass, and on his loins were leather shorts.
His knees right down to his feet appeared to be palm
leaves; from his navel to the bulge of his buttocks,
metal network; and there was no creature on earth
which had not found a home in this netting which even
embraced a live snake among its links, darting out its
tongue as Agbako trod the earth.
His head was long and large, the sixteen eyes being
arranged around the base of his head, and there
was no living man who could stare into those eyes
without trembling, they rolled endlessly round like the
face of a clock. His head was matted with hair, black as
the hearth and very long. Often swishing his hips as he
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swung his legs, Agbako held two clubs in his hand and
three swords reposed in his sheath. A very evil spirit
was Agbako.
As soon as he spied me, he made my person his
goal, treading the earth with purpose. And when I felt
that he had come close enough, I ordered the road to
seize him and it seized him and cast him in the bush.
But even as the road obeyed me, so did it heave me
also, and I found myself right in front of Agbako.
I was terrified and conjured earth to return me to the
road, and so it did. But even as I emerged on the road,
who should await me there but Agbako! This time I
invoked ogede and commanded the road to return him
to the bush where the ropes of the forest would bind
him.
And the road obeyed and the forest bound him.
But just as he was flung into the bush even so I
was served, and I found myself face to face with him
and the ropes began to bind me. When the thongs
began to strangle, I yelled on the forest to release me
and set me back on the road. It obeyed.
Needless to say, Agbako was there to welcome me. So, seeing how
things stood, I prepared for fight and we joined in a
death grapple. We fought for long but neither toppled
the other. We were smothered wholly in sweat, my
eyes were reddened and, as for Agbako, his eye-balls
were as blood-drops. The ground on which we fought
shone like glazing.
Later, I tired, but not he. I untwined my arms
but he held fast to me. But when he perceived himself
that I was too exhausted, he released me. Dipping
into his pouch, he brought forth a gourdlet, and when
he had walloped it hard, it turned into a keg of palmwine.
Agbako sat him down and began to serve me,
and he refreshed himself also. When the keg of palmwine
was depleted by half and I had rested somewhat,
‘I bulled into Agbako and seized him by the neck.’
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he suggested that we had drunk enough and that we
should resume our strife. This we did forthwith.
We had been wrestling awhile when I retreated
a little and drew my cutlass and, even as he began to
draw his, I slipped behind him and slammed him one
on the back of his head. But it was my cutlass which
broke in two, one half flirriting off, while he wasn’t
dented one bit. Then he turned from me, picked up the
truant part of my weapon and, taking the stump from
me, joined them together so that the break vanished
completely and the cutlass was as before. And he said
we should continue with the fight. And now I was truly
exhausted; my breath came and went in rapid bloats
like the hawing of a toad. Just the same I continued
the fight and, lifting my cutlass, brought it down hard
on his side. Before I could retract the blow, he in turn
slashed me on the sword-hand, cutting it off cutlass
and all. I followed my buttocks to the ground, wallowing
in the throes of death.
Even while I groaned in pain, Agbako again took
my missing arm, fitted it on the stump, spat on his
hand, and when he had rubbed the spittle on the join,
my arm returned to normal and I could not believe that
anything had happened to it. Then he looked at me
and, bursting into laughter, declared that we must continue
the contest. My terror was now complete and I
said to myself, E-ya! Is this not the certain approach
of the end? So I cried aloud: ‘Spirits of the woods! Pilgrims
of the road!—hasten to my rescue!’
And shortly after, every being in the Forest of
Irunmale came, the ghommids on one side, the birds
on one side, the animals separately, but Agbako gave
no sign that he saw anyone. He pulled me from the
ground and we grappled anew. If I swayed him he
swayed me, if I threw him he threw me. The fight was
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long and fierce. Every leaf was stilled and the forest
lulled in silence.
The ghommids had been watching us for a while
when I saw one of them detach himself from the rest
and come to the scene of struggle. He signed to Agbako
to release me, and Agbako complied. Then he offered
me a slice of kola-nut which I took and ate. And instantly
a new vitality flooded me and my strength became
the strength of sixteen men. I bulled into Agbako and
seized him by the neck, when I had squeezed it hard
he bellowed like a beast and all the ghommids cheered.
But when I tried to lift him from the ground and
smash him in the fatal throw, his foot did not even turn
aside; firm
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