“Something over a fortnight had passed since the night when I lost
half-a-sovereign and found twelve hundred and fifty pounds in looking
for it, and instead of that horrid hole, for which, after all, Eldorado
was hardly a misnomer, a very different scene stretched away before us
clad in the silver robe of the moonlight. We were camped--Harry and
I, two Kaffirs, a Scotch cart, and six oxen--on the swelling side of a
great wave of bushclad land. Just where we had made our camp, however,
the bush was very sparse, and only grew about in clumps, while here
and there were single flat-topped mimosa-trees. To our right a little
stream, which had cut a deep channel for itself in the bosom of the
slope, flowed musically on between banks green with maidenhair, wild
asparagus, and many beautiful grasses. The bed-rock here was red
granite, and in the course of centuries of patient washing the water had
hollowed out some of the huge slabs in its path into great troughs and
cups, and these we used for bathing-places. No Roman lady, with her
baths of porphyry or alabaster, could have had a more delicious spot to
bathe herself than we found within fifty yards of our skerm, or rough
inclosure of mimosa thorn, that we had dragged together round the cart
to protect us from the attacks of lions. That there were several of
these brutes about, I knew from their spoor, though we had neither heard
nor seen them.
“Our bath was a little nook where the eddy of the stream had washed away
a mass of soil, and on the edge of it there grew a most beautiful old
mimosa thorn. Beneath the thorn was a large smooth slab of granite
fringed all round with maidenhair and other ferns, that sloped gently
down to a pool of the clearest sparkling water, which lay in a bowl of
granite about ten feet wide by five feet deep in the centre. Here to
this slab we went every morning to bathe, and that delightful bath is
among the most pleasant of my hunting reminiscences, as it is also, for
reasons which will presently appear, among the most painful.
“It was a lovely night. Harry and I sat to the windward of the fire,
where the two Kaffirs were busily employed in cooking some impala steaks
off a buck which Harry, to his great joy, had shot that morning, and
were as perfectly contented with ourselves and the world at large as two
people could possibly be. The night was beautiful, and it would require
somebody with more words on the tip of his tongue than I have to
describe properly the chastened majesty of those moonlit wilds. Away for
ever and for ever, away to the mysterious north, rolled the great bush
ocean over which the silence brooded. There beneath us a mile or more to
the right ran the wide Oliphant, and mirror-like flashed back the moon,
whose silver spears were shivered on its breast, and then tossed in
twisted lines of light far and wide about the mountains and the plain.
Down upon the river-banks grew great timber-trees that through the
stillness pointed solemnly to Heaven, and the beauty of the night lay
upon them like a cloud. Everywhere was silence--silence in the starred
depths, silence on the bosom of the sleeping earth. Now, if ever, great
thoughts might rise in a man’s mind, and for a space he might forget his
littleness in the sense that he partook of the pure immensity about him.
“‘Hark! what was that?’
“From far away down by the river there comes a mighty rolling sound,
then another, and another. It is the lion seeking his meat.
“I saw Harry shiver and turn a little pale. He was a plucky boy enough,
but the roar of a lion heard for the first time in the solemn bush veldt
at night is apt to shake the nerves of any lad.
“‘Lions, my boy,’ I said; ‘they are hunting down by the river there;
but I don’t think that you need make yourself uneasy. We have been here
three nights now, and if they were going to pay us a visit I think that
they would have done so before this. However, we will make up the fire.’
“‘Here, Pharaoh, do you and Jim-Jim get some more wood before we go to
sleep, else the cats will be purring round you before morning.’
“Pharaoh, a great brawny Swazi, who had been working for me at Pilgrims’
Rest, laughed, rose, and stretched himself, then calling to Jim-Jim to
bring the axe and a reim, started off in the moonlight towards a clump
of sugar-bush where we cut our fuel from some dead trees. He was a
fine fellow in his way, was Pharaoh, and I think that he had been named
Pharaoh because he had an Egyptian cast of countenance and a royal
sort of swagger about him. But his way was a somewhat peculiar way, on
account of the uncertainty of his temper, and very few people could get
on with him; also if he could find liquor he would drink like a fish,
and when he drank he became shockingly bloodthirsty. These were his bad
points; his good ones were that, like most people of the Zulu blood,
he became exceedingly attached if he took to you at all; he was a
hard-working and intelligent man, and about as dare-devil and plucky
a fellow at a pinch as I have ever had to do with. He was about
five-and-thirty years of age or so, but not a ‘keshla’ or ringed man. I
believe that he had got into trouble in some way in Swaziland, and the
authorities of his tribe would not allow him to assume the ring, and
that is why he came to work at the gold-fields. The other man, or rather
lad, Jim-Jim, was a Mapoch Kaffir, or Knobnose, and even in the light of
subsequent events I fear I cannot speak very well of him. He was an
idle and careless young rascal, and only that very morning I had to tell
Pharaoh to give him a beating for letting the oxen stray, which Pharaoh
did with the greatest gusto, although he was by way of being very fond
of Jim-Jim. Indeed, I saw him consoling Jim-Jim afterwards with a pinch
of snuff from his own ear-box, whilst he explained to him that the next
time it came in the way of duty to flog him, he meant to thrash him with
the other hand, so as to cross the old cuts and make a “pretty pattern”
on his back.
“Well, off they went, though Jim-Jim did not at all like leaving the
camp at that hour, even when the moonlight was so bright, and in due
course returned safely enough with a great bundle of wood. I laughed at
Jim-Jim, and asked him if he had seen anything, and he said yes, he had;
he had seen two large yellow eyes staring at him from behind a bush, and
heard something snore.
“As, however, on further investigation the yellow eyes and the snore
appeared to have existed only in Jim-Jim’s lively imagination, I was
not greatly disturbed by this alarming report; but having seen to the
making-up of the fire, got into the skerm and went quietly to sleep with
Harry by my side.
“Some hours afterwards I woke up with a start. I don’t know what woke
me. The moon had gone down, or at least was almost hidden behind the
soft horizon of bush, only her red rim being visible. Also a wind had
sprung up and was driving long hurrying lines of cloud across the starry
sky, and altogether a great change had come over the mood of the night.
By the look of the sky I judged that we must be about two hours from
day-break.
“The oxen, which were as usual tied to the disselboom of the Scotch
cart, were very restless--they kept snuffling and blowing, and rising
up and lying down again, so I at once suspected that they must wind
something. Presently I knew what it was that they winded, for within
fifty yards of us a lion roared, not very loud, but quite loud enough to
make my heart come into my mouth.
“Pharaoh was sleeping on the other side of the cart, and, looking
beneath it, I saw him raise his head and listen.
“‘Lion, Inkoos,’ he whispered, ‘lion!’
“Jim-Jim also jumped up, and by the faint light I could see that he was
in a very great fright indeed.
“Thinking that it was as well to be prepared for emergencies, I told
Pharaoh to throw wood upon the fire, and woke up Harry, who I verily
believe was capable of sleeping happily through the crack of doom.
He was a little scared at first, but presently the excitement of the
position came home to him, and he grew quite anxious to see his majesty
face to face. I got my rifle handy and gave Harry his--a Westley
Richards falling block, which is a very useful gun for a youth, being
light and yet a good killing rifle, and then we waited.
“For a long time nothing happened, and I began to think that the best
thing we could do would be to go to sleep again, when suddenly I heard
a sound more like a cough than a roar within about twenty yards of
the skerm. We all looked out, but could see nothing; and then followed
another period of suspense. It was very trying to the nerves, this
waiting for an attack that might be developed from any quarter or might
not be developed at all; and though I was an old hand at this sort of
business I was anxious about Harry, for it is wonderful how the presence
of anybody to whom one is attached unnerves a man in moments of danger.
I know, although it was now chilly enough, I could feel the perspiration
running down my nose, and in order to relieve the strain on my attention
employed myself in watching a beetle which appeared to be attracted
by the firelight, and was sitting before it thoughtfully rubbing his
antennæ against each other.
“Suddenly, the beetle gave such a jump that he nearly pitched headlong
into the fire, and so did we all--gave jumps, I mean, and no wonder,
for from right under the skerm fence there came a most frightful roar--a
roar that literally made the Scotch cart shake and took the breath out
of me.
“Harry made an exclamation, Jim-Jim howled outright, while the poor
oxen, who were terrified almost out of their hides, shivered and lowed
piteously.
“The night was almost entirely dark now, for the moon had quite set, and
the clouds had covered up the stars, so that the only light we had came
from the fire, which by this time was burning up brightly again. But,
as you know, firelight is absolutely useless to shoot by, it is so
uncertain, and besides, it penetrates but a very little way into the
darkness, although if one is in the dark outside, one can see it from
far away.
“Presently the oxen, after standing still for a moment, suddenly winded
the lion and did what I feared they would do--began to ‘skrek,’ that is,
to try and break loose from the trektow to which they were tied, to rush
off madly into the wilderness. Lions know of this habit on the part of
oxen, which are, I do believe, the most foolish animals under the sun,
a sheep being a very Solomon compared to them; and it is by no means
uncommon for a lion to get in such a position that a herd or span of
oxen may wind him, skrek, break their reims, and rush off into the bush.
Of course, once there, they are helpless in the dark; and then the lion
chooses the one that he loves best and eats him at his leisure.
“Well, round and round went our six poor oxen, nearly trampling us to
death in their mad rush; indeed, had we not hastily tumbled out of the
way, we should have been trodden to death, or at the least seriously
injured. As it was, Harry was run over, and poor Jim-Jim being caught
by the trektow somewhere beneath the arm, was hurled right across the
skerm, landing by my side only some paces off.
“Snap went the disselboom of the cart beneath the transverse strain put
upon it. Had it not broken the cart would have overset; as it was,
in another minute, oxen, cart, trektow, reims, broken disselboom, and
everything were soon tied in one vast heaving, plunging, bellowing, and
seemingly inextricable knot.
“For a moment or two this state of affairs took my attention off from
the lion that had caused it, but whilst I was wondering what on earth
was to be done next, and how we should manage if the cattle broke loose
into the bush and were lost--for cattle frightened in this manner will
so straight away like mad things--my thoughts were suddenly recalled to
the lion in a very painful fashion.
“For at that moment I perceived by the light of the fire a kind of gleam
of yellow travelling through the air towards us.
“‘The lion! the lion!’ holloaed Pharaoh, and as he did so, he, or rather
she, for it was a great gaunt lioness, half wild no doubt with hunger,
lit right in the middle of the skerm, and stood there in the smoky gloom
lashing her tail and roaring. I seized my rifle and fired it at her,
but what between the confusion, my agitation, and the uncertain light,
I missed her, and nearly shot Pharaoh. The flash of the rifle, however,
threw the whole scene into strong relief, and a wild sight it was I can
tell you--with the seething mass of oxen twisted all round the cart, in
such a fashion that their heads looked as though they were growing out
of their rumps; and their horns seemed to protrude from their backs; the
smoking fire with just a blaze in the heart of the smoke; Jim-Jim in the
foreground, where the oxen had thrown him in their wild rush, stretched
out there in terror, and then as a centre to the picture the great gaunt
lioness glaring round with hungry yellow eyes, roaring and whining as
she made up her mind what to do.
“It did not take her long, however, just the time that it takes a flash
to die into darkness, for, before I could fire again or do anything,
with a most fiendish snort she sprang upon poor Jim-Jim.
“I heard the unfortunate lad shriek, and then almost instantly I saw his
legs thrown into the air. The lioness had seized him by the neck, and
with a sudden jerk thrown his body over her back so that his legs hung
down upon the further side.[*] Then, without the slightest hesitation,
and apparently without any difficulty, she cleared the skerm face at
a single bound, and bearing poor Jim-Jim with her vanished into the
darkness beyond, in the direction of the bathing-place that I have
already described. We jumped up perfectly mad with horror and fear, and
rushed wildly after her, firing shots at haphazard on the chance that
she would be frightened by them into dropping her prey, but nothing
could we see, and nothing could we hear. The lioness had vanished into
the darkness, taking Jim-Jim with her, and to attempt to follow her till
daylight was madness. We should only expose ourselves to the risk of a
like fate.
[*] I have known a lion carry a two-year-old ox over a stone
wall four feet high in this fashion, and a mile away into
the bush beyond. He was subsequently poisoned by strychnine
put into the carcass of the ox, and I still have his claws.
--Editor.
“So with scared and heavy hearts we crept back to the skerm, and sat
down to wait for the dawn, which now could not be much more than an hour
off. It was absolutely useless to try even to disentangle the oxen till
then, so all that was left for us to do was to sit and wonder how it
came to pass that the one should be taken and the other left, and to
hope against hope that our poor servant might have been mercifully
delivered from the lion’s jaws.
“At length the faint dawn came stealing like a ghost up the long slope
of bush, and glinted on the tangled oxen’s horns, and with white and
frightened faces we got up and set to the task of disentangling the
oxen, till such time as there should be light enough to enable us to
follow the trail of the lioness which had gone off with Jim-Jim.
And here a fresh trouble awaited us, for when at last with infinite
difficulty we had disentangled the great helpless brutes, it was only
to find that one of the best of them was very sick. There was no mistake
about the way he stood with his legs slightly apart and his head hanging
down. He had got the redwater, I was sure of it. Of all the difficulties
connected with life and travelling in South Africa those connected with
oxen are perhaps the worst. The ox is the most exasperating animal in
the world, a negro excepted. He has absolutely no constitution, and
never neglects an opportunity of falling sick of some mysterious
disease. He will get thin upon the slightest provocation, and from mere
maliciousness die of ‘poverty’; whereas it is his chief delight to turn
round and refuse to pull whenever he finds himself well in the centre of
a river, or the waggon-wheel nicely fast in a mud hole. Drive him a few
miles over rough roads and you will find that he is footsore; turn him
loose to feed and you will discover that he has run away, or if he has
not run away he has of malice aforethought eaten ‘tulip’ and poisoned
himself. There is always something with him. The ox is a brute. It was
of a piece with his accustomed behaviour for the one in question to
break out--on purpose probably--with redwater just when a lion had
walked off with his herd. It was exactly what I should have expected,
and I was therefore neither disappointed nor surprised.
“Well, it was no use crying as I should almost have liked to do, because
if this ox had redwater it was probable that the rest of them had it
too, although they had been sold to me as ‘salted,’ that is, proof
against such diseases as redwater and lungsick. One gets hardened to
this sort of thing in South Africa in course of time, for I suppose in
no other country in the world is the waste of animal life so great.
“So taking my rifle and telling Harry to follow me (for we had to leave
Pharaoh to look after the oxen--Pharaoh’s lean kine, I called them),
I started to see if anything could be found of or appertaining to the
unfortunate Jim-Jim. The ground round our little camp was hard and
rocky, and we could not hit off any spoor of the lioness, though just
outside the skerm was a drop or two of blood. About three hundred yards
from the camp, and a little to the right, was a patch of sugar bush
mixed up with the usual mimosa, and for this I made, thinking that the
lioness would have been sure to take her prey there to devour it. On we
pushed through the long grass that was bent down beneath the weight of
the soaking dew. In two minutes we were wet through up to the thighs,
as wet as though we had waded through water. In due course, however,
we reached the patch of bush, and by the grey light of the morning
cautiously and slowly pushed our way into it. It was very dark under the
trees, for the sun was not yet up, so we walked with the most extreme
care, half expecting every minute to come across the lioness licking the
bones of poor Jim-Jim. But no lioness could we see, and as for Jim-Jim
there was not even a finger-joint of him to be found. Evidently they had
not come here.
“So pushing through the bush we proceeded to hunt every other likely
spot, but with the same result.
“‘I suppose she must have taken him right away,’ I said at last, sadly
enough. ‘At any rate he will be dead by now, so God have mercy on him,
we can’t help him. What’s to be done now?’
“‘I suppose that we had better wash ourselves in the pool, and then go
back and get something to eat. I am filthy,’ said Harry.
“This was a practical if a somewhat unfeeling suggestion. At least it
struck me as unfeeling to talk of washing when poor Jim-Jim had been so
recently eaten. However, I did not let my sentiment carry me away, so
we went down to the beautiful spot that I have described, to wash. I was
the first to reach it, which I did by scrambling down the ferny bank.
Then I turned round, and started back with a yell--as well I might, for
almost from beneath my feet there came a most awful snarl.
“I had lit nearly upon the back of the lioness, that had been sleeping
on the slab where we always stood to dry ourselves after bathing. With a
snarl and a growl, before I could do anything, before I could even cock
my rifle, she had bounded right across the crystal pool, and vanished
over the opposite bank. It was all done in an instant, as quick as
thought.
“She had been sleeping on the slab, and oh, horror! what was that
sleeping beside her? It was the red remains of poor Jim-Jim, lying on a
patch of blood-stained rock.
“‘Oh! father, father!’ shrieked Harry, ‘look in the water!’
“I looked. There, floating in the centre of the lovely tranquil pool,
was Jim-Jim’s head. The lioness had bitten it right off, and it had
rolled down the sloping rock into the water.”