NIGERIA: The Queen's Durbar

Beside the Kaduna River one day last week, a gaudy explosion of sound and color broke over Britain's largest colony. Spearmen whooped and saddlery creaked. Drums bongity-bongity-bongitied. Reed pipes wailed, wooden kafo horns growled out Louis Armstrong blue notes. The Emir of Kano's jester wore his best blue-dyed sheepskin wig and beard. Some of the warriors wore chain mail, wide-bladed swords or helmets of Crusader descent.

They had come over mountains, through jungles, across the tsetse-fly belt, by foot, on horses and camels or in shiny new American cars to pay homage to their Queen, Elizabeth II. It was the first durbar (gathering of the princes) since India's turnout for George V in 1911, and the first ever in Africa. Doing her best to match the expectations of her audience, the guest of honor wore an evening dress, bejeweled Garter sash, diamond tiara and an ermine stole. It was a narrow question whether her costume or the excited plumage of her subjects was more incongruous in the noontime tropical heat. But both parties plainly enjoyed each other's getup.

All in all, 2,500 caparisoned horsemen and another 5,000 on foot flowed out to Kaduna's racecourse and polo field to parade and maneuver before the Queen. In wave after wave, each gaudier and more dashing than the one before, they marched and charged before the royal box, where their leaders paused to salute, then move on. From a raised pavilion, the Queen accepted the homage of, among others, the Rwang Pam of Birom, the Atta of Igala, the Tor of Tiv, the Och of Idoma and the Etsu Nupe.