ON A TROOP TRAIN

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 299, 18 December 1935, Page 9

ON A TROOP TRAIN

(By LAURENCE STALLINGS.)

ETHIOPIAN SAVAGES. THE BRIGADIER'S MAP. AND A DEMONSTRATION.

(Special.—By Air Mail.) (VI.) HAKRAR, November. The soldiers looked out uneasily when the train halted for the night above the Awash bridge. A plateau man, used to the softness of the morning air, always fruitful with the breath of verdure, for ever thin from the great heights, found his ears closing, his lungs flooding with the sandy winds which seem more foetid for having swept across the low marsh of the Alcaduga plains. The hearts of the Arussi men were heavy with homesickness, strangely beating in lowland air. Too, the types which stared atj them from the railway sides were unlike any they had known. Danakliils with wooden forks in their mahogany headdress, their slender reddish faces feline, their limbs those of effeminacy, stared at them: they were two sets of savages, completely alien, within an empire. Monlou Guetah prepared to retire for the night long before night had fallen. It was merely a Tiiatter of rearranging his arms and accoutrements, of swing- j ing the revolver nearer his right hand j after breaking the cylinder, inspecting it and then putting the hammer at halfcock. He placed his grizzled head on the arm of the long seat, drew the whipcord over his shoulders and closed his eyes. True to Their Salt. The soldiers remained in the train, j Whether there was an order forbidding I their mingling with the Somalis audi Danakils outside, there was no way of discovering. Had there been an interpreter along, one might have received informal, though nevertheless untrue, . cnsweLto suchra^qucstioru_At-any rate,

they remained in the blue boxes, their few women folk (smuggled along) busilybrewing coffee from coals burning upon pieces of iron sheeting within the cars. They were a smoky lot within the sutches, sprawling upon one naother, chammas and white shirts wrinkled in dirt and disorder. As a white man was not permitted to remain outside the restliouse at night in, Awash, one's bags and gear were carried into the station buffet, where there were Frenchmen and a Swiss commander of the Awash bridge guard. After supper one bought some Tricliinopoly cheroots and some bananas a-nd started up the tracks toward Moulou Guetali's car. It was hardly a quarter of a mile and there was a crescent moon for half-liglit, the stars not yet piercing the gathering night, with their wonderful African radiancy. The hot wind from the Danakil desert must have borne away the sound of footsteps; for when one neared the cars and flashed an electric lamp for identification lest there were patrols out, instantly the quiet air rang with a series of hasty cackles, like fowls make when a weasel nears a hen-roost. None of these soldiers was sleeping. It ! had not been the cry of a few sentries, but a full concert of alarmed chattering. There were two guards outside our coupe. It was not permitted to enter. They were firm, they were respectful, they were adamant. In vain one shone the torch on the bananas and the cigars and made signs as if to ascend the steps of the coach. Becoming impatient, one tried to thrust through anyway and lost a coat button for one's pains. Finally one of them accepted the gifts and j bowed low in obeisance. The other escorted the intruder back to the station. Within the cars the troops had picked up Moulou's own plaintive chant. The night seemed made for homesickness as tliey wailed their high spiritual. Rival Geographers. In the morning the general declined I a request that he submit to being photoi praphed. He took the camera in his j hands and looked through the finder I with great interest, examining all his weapons, and then, with some ingenuity, inspecting the image of himself in the train window. He placed his hand over his i£ to show that the cajnera,

if levelled at him, might rob that organ of some of its life and vitality. One then stole some shots of him when 110 gazed long at the Awasli chasm, and the fine steel bridge which spans it, and at the few stone platforms which, one surmised again, were for machine gunners to use as parapets. With a great deal of difficulty we went into a conference over military matters. As he was a general of brigade—there would be some 400 like him in Ethiopia now —his views were most welcome. With an interpreter trained in English, or French, the answers to questions never would have been genuine. They would have been as contrived and as dialectical as those of a Soviet guide. Accordingly, resolved to better things by the natural give-and-take of signs, gestures, facial grimaces one got out a good map of Abyssinia and began an interview. In the first place, the map had not the faintest impression upon him. He in turn got his map, a better one for him. It was a series of coloured cartoons, in two columns down the parchment, showing the various types of flora and fauna in Abyssinia. It was the backing of an Amharric calendar, and for the Ogaden it showed lions, for the Boran province it offered hippopotamus, for the Arussi there were coffee plants and antelope, etc. The Kernel in the Husk. It would have been easy to have dismissed the general as a man not worth a reporter's interview. But there were reaches in his mind, and a knowledge in his intelligence, which were not to bo scouted. Together we painstakingly matched provinces of the European map j with pictures of his own. In the end, [we had soundly arrived at an agree- ! ment that the Italians were to advance ! from three columns to the north, and j two from the south. So eager was he | to impress upon his interviewer that 1 Haile Selassie's forces would repel these ' invaders that the session, which ran ! until the noon halt, was frequently interrupted by the general's recourse to ! his sword, to his sporting rifle, to his ! Mauser, to his mitrailleuse. He would I grasp one of these in answer to anj; I query.— (N.A.N.A.) _ , _