Thinking black; 22 years without a break in the long grass of Central ...

134 THINKING BLACK
revolting mortification is going apace, and weeks after it
is all over, debts paid, " white chalk acquittal," he emerges
to the sunlight. Semi-starved, too, all the time, only-
water and gruel his allowance. So very sad, bad, and
mad is it all that every tiny detail is clutched at to make
delay : " We bury only bones," is their phrase {Natu
mbila vifuhwa kaha).
This bereaved husband, for instance, had a long pre-
liminary wrangle with his kinsman in the mere notifying
of his wife's death. For, be it known, *' to notify " means
that you send a personable bit of live-stock, a goat but
preferably an ox, and only thus can the news of such an
unlikely thing as this death get home to the man's intelli-
gence. Sent a big goat in the first instance, this kinsman
looked askance at the animal and said that its very small-
ness told him his cousin had not much wrong with her
dead she certainly could not be with only a goat to
announce it. People don't notify deaths per post-card
even in Luvaleland, and to send a huge ox is the African
equivalent to sending a black-edged mourning letter. A
goat is a mere post-card. Here, then, is his chance to
make vexatious delays, the preliminary trouble being how
to get the relatives even to believe there is a death at all.
A full week has run its course before they even dream of
gathering for the Chipeshi (wake ?), the initial fees of
notification being now paid. Then, one by one, the
bereaved kinsmen trickle in, all armed to the teeth, all
vulpine in greed, and all resolved at besting each other in
their demands. A mere cousin though he be, the long