The Feather of Glory ( a Novella)
By David Aoloch Bion
Chapter Five
Before the dry season came, Kuol Madut last born daughter was eloped by a young man called Pac. Kuol, his son Madut and the whole Riet clan followed the girl. It was found that the husband of their daughter Acueu was a poor man who had no single cow. His relatives refused to get bride price through contribution.
“You guests of my daughter, can’t you help your son’ Kuol asked.
“You start with your goat so that other should follow you with their cattle as bride price” the uncle of Pac said.
“ is this your position all the guests of my daughter’ Kuol asked again.
“yes we have no cattle to give”
“Okay, I will take my daughter, I will let her be married by another man, but tell your son, don’t, don’t and don’t let him come to my home again. If he comes I will let him be killed” Kuol said angrily and he told his clan that they should leave and they left immediately.
After sometimes, Pac started lobbying for his uncle to support that his marriage. His uncle should go to his father-in-law kuol and make a marriage agreement.
“How are we going to make it?” one of the elders asked
“You just go” Pac argued to them.
“Should we go and make it with our tongue?” one man asked.
“Yes, just your tongue please” Pac said
The daughter of kuol can not be married by cunning eyes and flattering tongues.
“You just go and make your alone with your tongue and we shall see if you will real have a wife with your red tongue without a cow support”. One of the elders explained to Pac.
Pac went to his father-in-law’s home alone. When his brother-in-law Madut saw him, ha attacked him but his father stopped him. “Let him come and say why he came to our home” Kuol said.
“Pac, why have you come here?” Pac started crying, when his wife Acueu saw him crying, she started crying also. Madut insisted and he wanted to beat him but his father said “look he is in your home and the community will blame you if you harm him, it will give a bad proverb to you if you kill him.
Why did you say last time if he come he would be killed
“I was just threatening him”
“Why have you come to my home Pac?” His father-in-law asked. Pac didn’t talk but howled like a dog without saying any word. His wife Acueu was also crying. Kuol called his son Madut and said “My son, there is hunger that will kill us if we give Pac your sister” you see your sister is crying because she loves him.
At that time, the dry season had just come and Madut took cattle to toc. Kuol was now with his wife Akur at home. They were to spend the dry season at their homestead. The homestead had Luak the largest circular grass-thatched hut for cows, mainly the milked cows for elderly people and children who couldn’t bear the harsh condition of hotness in dry season and coldness in rain season; luak is divided up into cows, calves, goats and sheep. Fire places parts by ropes and poles. Upon the poles, swings the calabashes of fried sorghum, butter, and dried powder of meat mixed with fat for gods to eat from and bundles of root and bucks for treating cattle.
At the entrance, it is a bed, where the herdsman and his dog sleep in order to detect early the in-coming enemy and near it is the dung hearth; where it is set on fire to give out smoke, smoke is the eye-biting and throat-shocking air for all dangerous insects like mosquitoes at night. A cow dung ash is powder for grooming the cows to remove tick.
In front at Luak is a circle of poles with small trunk on them. Around them are clubs for tying down the cows and calves in the morning to get sunshine. In the centre of the pole is the fire place.
Next to Luak is hotdit, the second largest grass-thatched hut with a small hut attached to it, from where the mother cook and keeps pots, calabashes for serving food and milking cows. The large part is for daughters and their men who come to engage them. There is Kuduk, where the father and the mother sleep, the granaries and the small plot of land for sowing maize, sorghum, simsim, and ground nuts.
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