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Sketches of the East Africa Campaign by Robert Valentine Dolbey
page 68 of 138 (49%)
attacked a German, and only his usefulness in the operating theatre
saved him from the prison. In spite of the disapproval of Elizabeth and
other Germans, I struck off the chains, feeling that he very probably
had good excuse for his offence. But the Germans never failed to point
out what a dangerous man he was. Once indeed he was slack and casual, so
I promptly ordered him to be "kibokoed," and thereafter I could find no
fault in his work and behaviour. Possessed of three wives, for he was
passing rich on sixteen rupees a month, he asked one day for leave to
celebrate the arrival of his first son. This I granted, only to be
assailed a fortnight later by requests for leave to attend his
grandmother's funeral, and to see a sick friend. But these had a
familiar ring about them, and were not successful in procuring the lazy
day that is so beloved by African humanity.

But Ali was of a different mould; small and slight and anxious to
please, he was nevertheless swift to leave his work when once my back
was turned. Forsaken in love--for he had been deserted by his wife--he
had forsworn the sex and buried his sorrows in "Pombe," the Kaffir beer
that effectually deprived him of what little intelligence he had. He was
a "fundi" at taking out jiggers, and sat for hours at the feet of our
foot-soldiers; quickly adopting an air of authority that occasionally
brought him swift blows from East African troopers, who do not tolerate
easily such airs in a native, he produced the unbroken jigger flea with
unfailing regularity and prescribed the pail of disinfectant in which
the tortured feet were soaked. Another long suit of his was the bandage
machine, and the hours he could steal away from real work were spent in
endless windings of washed though much stained bandages.

The German women hated us far more even than did the men; nor did those
who, like Elizabeth, knew England, fail to believe any the less the
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