Reportage: A Nandi Warrior Lion Hunt, British East Africa, November 20, 1909: As witnessed and described by Theodore Roosevelt
Reportage as defined by the Merriam-Webster dictionary as: "writing intended to give an account of observed or documented events".
For no other reason than the book was present on my parents' shelves, I read African Game Trails by Theodore Roosevelt, when I was 12 or 13 years old. I was fascinated with the story of Roosevelt's 1909 - 1910 Safari through Africa. I was astonished by his exploits, detailed in graphic description, of shooting scores -- no -- hundreds of animals, braving dangers of the wild, and (at least to me) the unforgettable highlight of his safari -- his first-hand eyewitness account of a native lion hunt, staged in his honor by the Nandi warriors of what was, at that time, British East Africa.
The idea of including a long-past, foreign and brutally savage experience comes to me from reading The Faber Book of Reportage, edited by John Kerry, Merton Professor of English at Oxford university. In Mr. Kerry's introduction, he notes several characteristics of good reportage. These include first-hand eyewitness account of a specific, dateable, real life event, typically written in the heat of the moment, and often about life and death circumstances. Mr. Kerry notes that "Reportage ~ lays claim directly to the power of the real, which imaginative literature can approach only through make-believe. ~ the absolutely vital ingredient of reportage ~ is the simple fact that the reader knows all this actually happened. ~ reportage may change its readers, may educate their sympathies, may extend -- in both directions -- their ideas about what it is to be a human being, may limit their capacity for the inhuman. ~ since reportage, unlike literature, lifts the screen from reality, it's lessons are -- and ought to be -- more telling ~"
Please read this, remembering the context of the time in which it was originally written -- It is not for the faint of heart.
Quoted from African Game Trails:
"At Sergoi Lake there is a store kept by Mr. Kirke, a South African of Scotch blood. With a kind courtesy which I cannot too highly appreciate he, with the equally cordial help of another settler, Mr. Skally -- also a South African, but of Irish birth -- and of the district commissioner, Mr. Corbett, had arranged for a party of Nandi warriors to come over and show me how they hunted the lion.
"The Nandi are a warlike pastoral tribe, close kin to the Masai in blood and tongue, in weapons and manner of life. They have long been accustomed to kill with the spear lions which become man-eaters or which molest their cattle overmuch; and the peace which British rule has imposed upon them -- a peace so welcome to the weaker, so irksome to the predatory, tribes, -- has left lion killing one of the few pursuits in which glory can be won by a young warrior. When it was told them that if they wished they could come to hunt lions at Sergoi eight-hundred warriors volunteered, and much heart-burning was caused in choosing the sixty or seventy who were allowed the privilege. They stipulated, however, that they should not be used merely as beaters, but should kill the lion themselves, and refused to come unless with this understanding.
"The day after our arrival there was mist and cold rain, and we found no lions. Next day, November 20th, we were successful.
"We started immediately after breakfast. Kirke, Skally, Mouton, Jordaan, Mr. and Mrs. Corbett, Captain Chapman, and our party, were on horseback; of course we carried our rifles, but our duty was merely to round up the lion and hold him, if he went off so far in advance that even the Nandi runners could not overtake him. We intended to beat the country toward some shallow, swampy valleys twelve miles distant.
"In an hour we overtook the Nandi warriors, who were advancing across the rolling, grassy plains in a long line, with intervals of six to eight yards between the men. They were splendid savages, stark naked, lithe as panthers, the muscles rippling under their smooth dark skin; all their lives they have lived on nothing but animal food, milk, blood, and flesh, and they were fit for any fatigue or danger. Their faces were proud, cruel, fearless; as they ran they moved with long springy strides. Their head-dresses were fantastic; they carried ox-hide shields painted with strange devices; and each bore in his right hand the formidable war spear, used both for stabbing and for throwing at close quarters. The narrow spearheads of soft iron were burnished till they shone like silver; they were 4 feet long, and the point and edges were razor-sharp. The wooden haft appeared for but a few inches; the long butt was also of iron, ending in a spike, so that the spear looked almost solid metal. Yet each sinewy warrior carried his heavy weapon as if it were a toy, twirling it till it glinted in the sun-rays. Herds of game, red hartebeests and striped zebra and wild swine, fled right and left before the advance of the line.
"It was noon before we reached a wide, shallow valley, with beds of rushes here and there in the middle, and on either side high grass and dwarfed and scattered thorn-trees. Down this we beat for a couple of miles. Then, suddenly, a maned lion rose a quarter of a mile ahead of the line and galloped off through the high grass to the right; and all of us on horseback tore after him.
"He was a magnificent beast, with a black and tawny mane; in his prime, teeth and claws perfect, with mighty thews, and savage heart. He was lying near a hartebeest on which he had been feasting; his life had been one unbroken career of rapine and violence; and now the maned master of the wilderness, the terror that stalked by night, the grim lord of slaughter, was to meet his doom at the hands of the only foes who dared molest him.
"It was a mile before we brought him to bay. Then the Dutch farmer, Mouton, who had not even a rifle, but who rode foremost, was almost on him; he halted and turned under a low thorn-tree, and we galloped past him to the opposite side, to hold him until the spearmen could come. It was a sore temptation to shoot him; of course we could not break faith with our Nandi friends. We were only some sixty yards from him, and we watched him with our rifles ready, lest he should charge either us, or the first two or three spearmen, before their companions arrived.
"One by one the spearmen came up, at a run, and gradually began to form a ring around him. Each, when he came near enough, crouched behind his shield, his spear in his right hand, his fierce, eager face peering over the shield rim. As man followed man, the lion rose to his feet. His mane bristled, his tail lashed, he held his head low, the upper lip now drooping over the jaws, now drawn up so as to show the gleam of the long fangs. He faced first one way and then another, and never ceased to utter his murderous grunting roars. It was a wild sight; the ring of spearmen, intent, silent, bent on blood, and in the centre the great man-killing beast, his thunderous wrath growing ever more dangerous.
"At last the tense ring was complete, and the spearmen rose and closed in. The lion looked quickly from side to side, saw where the line was thinnest, and charged at his topmost speed. The crowded moment began. With shields held steady, and quivering spears poised, the men in front braced themselves for the rush and the shock; and from either hand the warrior sprang forward to take their foe in flank. Bounding ahead of his fellows, the leader reached throwing distance; the long spear flickered and plunged; as the lion felt the wound he half turned, and then flung himself on the man in front. The warrior threw his spear; it drove deep into the life, for entering at one shoulder it came out the opposite flank, near the thigh, a yard of steel through the great body. Rearing, the lion struck the man, bearing down the shield, his back arched; and for a moment he slaked his fury with fang and talon. But on the instant I saw another spear driven clear through his body from side to side; and as the lion turned again the bright spear blades darting toward him were flashes of white flame. The end had come. He seized another man, who stabbed him and wrenched loose. As he fell he gripped a spear-head in his jaws with such tremendous force that he bent it double. Then the warriors were around and over him, stabbing and shouting, wild with furious exultation.
"From the moment when he charged until his death I doubt whether ten seconds had elapsed, perhaps less; but what a ten seconds! The first half dozen spears had done the work. Three of the spear blades had gone clear through the body, the points projecting several inches; and these, and one or two others, including the one he had seized in his jaws, had been twisted out of shape in the terrible death struggle.
"We at once attended to the two wounded men. Treating their wounds with antiseptic was painful, and so, while the operation was in progress, I told them, through Kirke, that I would give each a heifer. A Nandi prizes his cattle rather more than his wives; and each sufferer smiled broadly at the news, and forgot all about the pain of his wounds.
"Then the warriors, raising their shields above their heads, and chanting the deep-toned victory song, marched with a slow, dancing step around the dead body of the lion; and this savage dance of triumph ended a scene of as fierce interest and excitement as I ever hope to see.
"The Nandi marched back by themselves, carrying the two wounded men on their shields. We rode to camp by a roundabout way, on the chance that we might see another lion. The afternoon waned and we cast long shadows before us as we rode across the vast lonely plain. The game stared at us as we passed; a cold wind blew in our faces, and the tall grass waved ceaselessly; the sun set behind a sullen cloud bank; and then, just at nightfall, the tents glimmered white through the dusk."
~ Theodore Roosevelt; November 20th, 1909
