Litchfield enquirer., 1881-08-18
KING BEMBA,s POINT.
A WEST AFRICAN STORY.

| We are for the most part queer lot ouG on
 that desolate southwest African coast, "A
 charge of the various trading stations that
 were scattered along the coast from the Gal | boon River, past the mouth of the mighty Congo, to the Portuguese city of St. Paul de Loanda. A mixture of all sorts, especially of bad sorts-broken down clerks, meu who could not succeed anywhere else, sailors, | youths, and some whose characters would not have born any investigation; and we very nearly all drank hard, and those who didn't drink hard took more than was good for | them.
 don't know exactly what induced me to go out there. was young. for one thing the | country was unknown, the berth was vacant and the conditions of it easy.
 | Imagine high rocky point or headland, stretched out sideways into the sea, and at it's | base a small river winding into a country that was seemingly blank in regard to inhabit- ants or cultivation-a land continuing for miles and miles, as far as the eye could see, one expanse of long yellow grass. dotted here | and there with groups of bastard palms. h | front of the headland rolled the lonely South Atlantic and, as if such conditions were not dispiriting enough to existence upon the Point there was yet another feature which at times gave the place still more ghastly look. A long way of the shore, the heaving surfaceof the ocean began, In anything like bad weather, to break upon the shoals of the coast. Viewed from the top of the rock, the sea at such times | looked for at least two miles out, as if t
 were scored over with lines of white foam; | hut lower down, near the beach, each roller could be distinctly seen, and each roller had a curve of many feet and was an enormous mass of water that hurled itself shoreward until it curled and breke.
 l I Graf u,l hn ni,f thoro oxuo
 1 may say, only one house upon it, and that belonged to Messrs. Flint Brothers, of Liver pool. It was occupied by one solitary man | named Jackson; he had had an assistant, but the assistant had died of fever, and 1 was | sent to replace him. Jackson was man of | 50 at least, who had been sailor before he had become an African trader. His face bore l testimony tn the winds and weather it had encountered, and wore habitually grave, if not melancholy, expression. He was rough but kind to me, and, though strict, was just,
 which was DO common feature in an old Af-
 rican hand to one who had just arrived on the | coast.
 He kept the factOry-we call all houses on
 the coast factories-as neat and clean as if it
 had been ship. He had the floor of the
 portion we dwelt in holystoned every week,
 and numberless little racks and shelves were
 fitted up all over the house. The outside
 walls glittered with paint. and the yard was swept clean every morning. and every Sunday
 at eight o'clock and sunset the ensign was hoisted and lowered, and an old cannon at the
 word of command. Order and rule were with Jackson observed from habit, and were strict 1 lY enforced by him on all the natives employ ed in the factory.
 | Although have said the country looked as | if uninhabited, there were numerous villages | hidden away in the long grass and bushwood, | invisible at a distance, being huts of thatch or mud, and not so high as the grass among came a m6st a6sy JY JYeEe plseed; From these villages l dlemen, who acted as brokers between us, the l white men, and the negroes who brought ivory, and gum, and india rubber from the far interior for sale. Our trade was princi. pally in ivory, and when an unusually large number of elephants tusks arrived upon the Point for sale it would be crowded with bush- men, strange and uncouth, and hideously ng- ly, and armed, and then we would be vety busy; for sometimes as many as 200 tusks would be brought to us at the same time, and each of these had to be bargained for and paid for by exchange of cotton cloths guns, knives, powder. and a host of small wares.
 For some tune after my arrival our factory, along with the others On the coast belonging to Messrs Flint Brothers, was very we'll sup piled by them with goods for the trade; but by degrees their shipments became less fre- quent, and small when they did come In spite of repeated letters we could gain no req son from the firm for this fact, nor could the 1 other factories, and gradually we found our selves with an empty stOre-hOuse, and nearly all our goods gone. Then followed weary interval, during which we had nothing what ever to do and day succeeded day through the long hot season. It was now that began to feel that Jackson had become of late more silent and reserved with me than ever he had been. 1 noticed, too, that he had contracted habit of wandering out to the extreme end of the Point, where he would sit for hours gazing upon the ocean before hlm. In addi- ton to this he grew morose and uncertain in his. temper toward the natives, and sometimes he would fall asleep in the evening on sofa, and talk to himself at such rate while asleep that would grow frightened and wake him, when he would stare about him for little until he gathered consciousness, and then he would stagger off to bed to fall asleep again almost immediately. Also his hands trembled much, and he began to lose flesh. All this troubled me, for his own sake as we'll as my own, and resolved to ask him to see the doc tor of the next mail-steamer that came. With this idea l went one day to the end of the Point, and found him in his usual attitude, seated on the long grass looking seaward He, >-->- -->s l he started to his feet and demanded fierceIy why disturbed him. I replied, as mildly as 1 could, for was rather afraid of the glitter ing look that was in his eyes, that wished to ask him if he did not feel i'll.
 He regarded me with steady but softened glance for little, and then said
 My lad, thank you for your trouble but want no doctor. Do you think I'm looking in2" 5E. f1'7,E -
 'Indeed you are,"I answerd, ..il and thin; and, do you know, hear you talk to yourself in your sleep nearly every night"
 "What do 1 say ?" he asked, eagerly.
 'That cannot tell." replied .'It is all rambling talk-the same thing over and over again. and nearly all about one person. Lucy"
 ''Boy!" he cried out, as if in pain, or as if something hat touched him to the qnick, '.sit you down and I'll tell you why think of her -she was my wife,
 He moved nearer to the edge of the cliff, and we sat down, almost over the restless sea beneath us.
 "She lives in my memory" he continued, speaking more to himself than to me, and looking far out to the horizon beneath which the setting sun had begun to sink, ..in spite of all can do or think of to make her appear base in my eyes. For she left me to go with another mana scoundrel. This was how it was, he added, quickly: Il married her, thought her as pure as flower; but could not take her to sea with me because was only the mate of vessel, so left her among her own friends, in the village where she was born. In little cottage by herself settled her, comfortable and happy as thought. God how she hung round my neck aud sob bed when l went away the first timel and yet-yet-within year she left me-" And he stopped for several minutes. resting his head upon his hands. ''At first could get no trace of her" he resumed Her friends knew nothing more of her than that she had left the village suddenly. Gradually found out the name of the scoundrel who had SC. duced her away. He had bribed her friends so that they were silent; but I over-bribed them with the last money thai I had. and fol- lowed him and my wife on foot. I never found them, nor did ever know why she had deserted me for him. If I had only known the reason; if could have been told