CHAPTER 3

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MOSTLY KISUBI
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Lutembe, A Tame Crocodile—Wild One—Kisubi—Father Védrines
The Wonder Of Kisubi—St Mary’s College—Native Teaching Brothers
Lake Flies—Another Entebbe Night—It Is Good To Be Here

1st March, 1935
My superior said to-day “Not very far from Entebbe, on the road to Kampala, one touches the Lake, and if you go down a narrow lane, and watch the springs of your car, but better walk, you might see a tame crocodile.”

I found several Europeans and a crowd of natives watching the waters. For a few cents, one of the natives went to a high rock and began to call the crocodile by its name, “Lutembe.” Fish had been hung on a tree overhanging the water, and I was told that the reptile would surely swim to the shore and show himself fond of fish and friendly to men. Our native, however, used all the coaxing and threatening words to be found in the Uganda language, but Lutembe did not come that day. But it does come as everyone in Uganda knows. Disappointed, we turned to go home, when a shout brought back hope. Running to the shore I saw not a tame crocodile but two untamed ones, swimming like huge, smoothly gliding trees towards me; at the same time two hippos stood up in the water and waddled. I did not wait upon the manner of my going. I ran, and ran, too, all the natives and Europeans present. From the safety of a high rock we cheered and saw all four African beasties go off into the deep.

Lake Victoria swarms with hippos and crocs; hence no bathing in its lovely waters. Many a child paddling on the lake shore while mother washed the clothes has been snaffled away by crocs, and to-day a native told me of a woman's bracelets being found in the interior of a crocodile, shot by a European.

2nd March, 1935
A terrific thunderstorm woke me at three o'clock this morning just when sleep seemed a joy, but the rains cooled the air to make meditation almost a human exercise.

After breakfast I was taken by car through fourteen miles of red dust-clouds, most of which are still in my clothes, nostrils, ears and teeth, to Kisubi. The Fathers ran from the verandah to greet us and I recognised an old friend in Father Védrines, the Superior, whom I had met in Algiers twelve years ago. He was then about to undergo an operation and was said to be "done for."' Well, here he is at the Equator again, certainly with the appearance of a corpse but managing with amazing efficiency the biggest missionary establishment in Uganda. As I walked the miles of ground, listening to his lucid explanations, I grew more and more astonished that any one man, in one lifetime, could obtain the grasp of detail of so complex an organisation, and at the same time know, as he knew, every man, woman and child of that large mission as well as the history of each one. He rattled out figures by the dozen
of the number of shoes soled, tables turned, snakes skinned, bricks made, tiles turned out . . . and . . . But what did I see?

*Fr Védrines worked on to the end. He was found dead dead in his bed in 1936.

A fully organised mission with ten thousand souls, an elementary school for boys and for girls, a first-class college for boys, a preparatory school for boys, and a domestic science school for girls. A hospital and a dispensary; an enormous technical school fully equipped, where I saw boots and shoes being made, tailors at work, motor-cars and bicycles being repaired and iron-work in full swing. I saw bricks and tiles being baked by the thousand, crocodiles and snakes being skinned, skins being cured and made into objets d'art, and wood being transformed into a multitude of useful things. I saw White Sisters and Native Sisters as busy as bees, and an army of women cultivating miles of bananas and cooking miles more for the men and boys employed and being taught in these schools. I saw the buildings which house the pupils, the villages which hold the employees and their families the swimming pool in which they bathe and the football fields on which they play, and I saw a python fifteen feet long, and had no fear. It was dead. Kisubi sends out hundreds of skilled tradesmen all over Uganda and beyond, and it is difficult to imagine anything more practical than this Catholic Training School of Kisubi.

There is hardly a European at Entebbe who is not proud to have in his house some article of furniture made at Kisubi, and one hears nothing but praise for the Fathers and the Brothers who run this place, giving lavishly of their excellent best that in this life the Baganda may be happier, and in the next be with God.

We went through a gate in a high brick wall to visit St Mary's College, arid Brother Charles the capable and genial Superior of the Brothers of Christian Doctrine of Ploermel in East Africa hailed me also a an old friend. He had once stayed with us at Heston; he has now the "Equator colour," is older in appearance but ever as young and gay.
A hundred students in spotless white shirts and shorts were wearing European school-caps. I do not like these caps on natives’ heads. They are the wrong shape and everybody, except the boys, agree that the ideal “school-cap” would be the Fez. The march past was smart, and the college band-surpassed themselves.

There is one fine two-storied (so rare in this part of Africa) building, with a splendid Hall and class-rooms in which are taught all the normal subjects of a secondary education. From this college flow the Catholic élite of Uganda. Some of the students go on to higher Education at the Government College at Makerere (soon to be a University) others take jobs as clerks, telegraphists, or Railway officials or policemen.

There are lovely lawns leading down to the Brothers' own establishment for the formation of Native Brothers in their own Order. The first of these Native Brothers were professed in 1938, and I preached the retreat preceding their profession. I was well impressed by these young men, who after sixteen years' training had become professed religious in a European Congregation. They now live with the European Brothers, teach in their secondary schools and are without any doubt a valuable asset to the Church in Uganda and to the cause of Education in East Africa. It is an interesting experiment, the result of which only the years can show, but the Brothers have every reason to be proud of the first fruits.

On our very tired and dusty way home we ran into an immense cloud of lakeflies. In the distance over the lake they appeared to be just a black cloud; in reality the flies are white. Entebbe was lost in them. They entered in—everywhere. Nostrils, and mouth and clothes and eyes and hats. Fortunately they don't bite. They are a great nuisance and that is all. The natives welcome them. I saw our "boys" place empty petrol tins on the verandah as it grew dark. They placed a lighted candle on a piece of wood over the top of the tins, and in a very short time the flies flew to the lights, fell into the tins and were eaten by the people. I cannot say I like them—they are surprisingly full of grease.

It is very late, and a hot, sultry, damp night; there no nights like these of Entebbe. My window and door are wide open, and the mosquitoes are hopeful. They come in hundreds but bump their noses against the wire-netting and hiss their fury. There is no silence in the African night. Whistles and buzzes, croaks and flutters, whizzes and hisses and hummings tell of its prodigious insect life, and from the lake shore come the snorts of hippopotami. It is fascinating, and although my skin is scorched by a day in the burning sun, and my body drooping with fatigue, and although sleep seems out of the question, it is good to be here. I am still deeply under the impression of the missionary marvels which passed under my eyes this blessed day.

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