Then he chuckled from deep in his chest, the most
contagious laughter you can imagine. Often we, at the other end
of the camp, have laughed in sympathy, just at the sound of that
deep and hearty ho! ho! ho! of Memba Sasa. Even at something
genuinely amusing he never laughed much, nor without a very
definite restraint. In fact, about him was no slackness, no
sprawling abandon of the native in relaxation; but always a taut
efficiency and a never-failing self-respect.
Naturally, behind such a fixed moral fibre must always be some
moral idea. When a man lives up to a real, not a pompous, dignity
some ideal must inform it. Memba Sasa's ideal was that of the
Hunter.
He was a gunbearer; and he considered that a good gunbearer stood
quite a few notches above any other human being, save always the
white man, of course. And even among the latter Memba Sasa made
great differences. These differences he kept to himself, and
treated all with equal respect. Nevertheless, they existed, and
Memba Sasa very well knew that fact. In the white world were two
classes of masters: those who hunted well, and those who were
considered by them as their friends and equals. Why they should
be so considered Memba Sasa did not know, but he trusted the
Hunter's judgment. These were the bwanas, or masters. All the
rest were merely mazungos, or, "white men." To their faces he
called them bwana, but in his heart he considered them not.
Observe, I say those who hunted well. Memba Sasa, in his
profession as gunbearer, had to accompany those who hunted badly.
In them he took no pride; from them he held aloof in spirit; but
for them he did his conscientious best, upheld by the dignity of
his profession.
For to Mamba Sasa that profession was the proudest to which a
black man could aspire. He prided himself on mastering its every
detail, in accomplishing its every duty minutely and exactly. The
major virtues of a gunbearer are not to be despised by anybody;
for they comprise great physical courage, endurance, and loyalty:
the accomplishments of a gunbearer are worthy of a man's best
faculties, for they include the ability to see and track game, to
take and prepare properly any sort of a trophy, field taxidermy,
butchering game meat, wood and plainscraft, the knowledge of how
properly to care for firearms in all sorts of circumstances, and
a half hundred other like minutiae. Memba Sasa knew these things,
and he performed them with the artist's love for details; and his
keen eyes were always spying for new ways.
At a certain time I shot an egret, and prepared to take the skin.
Memba Sasa asked if he might watch me do it.
