Page:Travels in West Africa, Congo Français, Corisco and Cameroons (IA travelsinwestafr00kingrich).pdf/662

 iniquities. All household work would be suspended for the next hour or so, and finally, after giving good sport, the pig would be brought back squealing by triumphant and heated stewards.

When I got back to Victoria one of my first inquiries was after that Bobia pig. I instantly saw I had aroused sad memories, and learnt that the cook—its most responsible custodian—was under arrest, though out on bail—on its behalf It seems it got adrift as usual, and when the hunt was started no pig was to be found, so cook, fearing the ire of Germany, posts off into the town and gets hold of the first pig there he can lay hands on. Now this pig was the property of a lady—a woman of spirit, and she clouted cook and swore cook clouted her. But anyhow cook bore off his prize, and tied it up in place of the Bobia pig, trusting that his busy master would not notice the difference in the two pigs, and would not hear of his raid. His hopes were vain. Herr von Lucke saw that this succulent little porker was not the offering from Bobia, and with a truly Roman sense of duty, handed his own cook over to be tried by the native court, presided over by the Baptist minister and two local chiefs. The case took nearly all day, and all the Government House staff had to be absent from their work, giving evidence as to the character of the cook, and the pig, and so on. The case went against cook in the end, and he had to pay damages to the injured lady and return his capture. What became of the original Bobia pig I do not know, for it had not been found up to the time of my leaving Victoria.

The problem why so many people choose to reside on this isolated rock is quite as great as the problem of the whereabouts of that pig. Their own explanation is that the people on the mainland were too bad for respectable people to live among; in short, as Mr, Micawber would say, they were driven on to the island; but then you can very rarely believe what people say about themselves in West Africa. Then the people on the mainland say that they, the mainlanders, are injured innocents, and that the men of Bobia live on that island so as to carry on to greater advantage piratical practices: hence the name Pirate Island that Bobia hears, and that—but then again