Odyssey From Africa 6e 7a

CHAPTER 6 (e, continued) Though without communication  Spoken in symbolic language  Their gorilla hosts perceived it And made ready for the parting   In a solemn mood of sadness All the hominids assembled In the clearing in the jungle  Where they had repulsed the python   Several of the leading females  Stepped up to the human family  Brought to Han a towering armful Gifts of ripening fruits and berries   Kwona then herself came forward  To the silverback gorilla  Handed him two wooden carvings One gorilla, one a human   In their likeness. Her twin children  Had produced these wooden sculptures  With their father Han's assistance; And the boomerang was given   Also as a leaving present All the male gorillas watching  Murmured in appreciation; Then the human guests departed   Hiking downhill through the jungle  Keeping on a northward bearing With the hope that in a few days They would leave behind the forest    Whose close enveloping greenness Was unnerving and oppressive  To the people of the coastland Used to openness and sunlight    CHAPTER 7 (a) Ipiki   Many days still lay before them Navigating hills and valleys Of this wide and close-knit forest; On they journeyed till the evening    Halting as the shadows lengthened  Han and Matto set to working  To erect a simple tree-house In the way of the gorillas    While the ladies looked for supper Shiny tubers were uprooted  Bulbous rhizomes from the dark soil,   With some tender leafy plantains   These were baked above the embers Of a fire that Han had kindled Then came Rosy to the fireside  Bringing her own contribution    Held between now well grown canines By the head, a snake was coiling Weakly as the life ebbed from it; Han dispatched it with his hatchet   Thus they dined on fulsome menu Then ascending to the tree-house After some short conversation  All slept peacefully till morning    On awaking Han was startled  By the strangest sight above him All around the leafy foliage Changed from green to black in colour!   Could this be a dreamed illusion? Han was thinking; then a movement Crossed the corner of his vision As a snake crept through the branches   "Am I seeing" Han thought darkly "Ghost return of last night's supper!?" And the serpent, at that instant Sprang into the leafy blackness   Han's half-sleeping baleful visions Were dispelled by sudden movement  All the air was filled with bat-wings Of the thousand tiny creatures