Klaas and Jan had long since ridden their ponies back to camp, and
having off-saddled, remained by the wagons.
For all that they were not idle--that is, they were not without
something to interest and amuse them. Swartboy was the genius
worshipped by Klaas and Jan, for there was no bird in all Africa that
Swartboy could not either snare or trap; and in his hours of leisure,
when the oxen were kraaled and off his hands, he was in the habit of
showing the two young "mynheers" how to construct many a sort of decoy
and trap for the fowls of the air.
Upon this day in particular, however, they were more than usually
interested in the Bushman's proceedings, as his attention was turned to
capturing,--not a fowl of the air, but of the earth,--an ostrich.
Swartboy had resolved to pluck the plumes out of the old cock that had
been seen, and whose dwelling had been so rudely approached and
plundered in the morning.
But how was Swartboy to capture the cock?
It was not his intention to take him alive. That is a difficult matter,
and can only be managed by men mounted upon fleet horses, and then after
a very long and troublesome chase.
Swartboy had no wish to take the ostrich alive. The bird would be of no
use to him in that way, as the skin and plume-feathers were the spoils
upon which the Bushman's thoughts were bent, or rather the rix-dollars
which these would yield on Swartboy's return to Graaf Reinet. Therefore
he did not intend to _catch_ the old cock, but _kill_ him, if he could.
But how was the Bushman to accomplish this? Would he borrow the rifle
from Hendrik, or the great elephant-gun--the "roer"--from Groot Willem,
and shoot the ostrich? Not likely. Swartboy was no shot, that is, with
fire-arms. He knew nothing about them; and with either rifle or roer he
could scarcely have hit an elephant, much less an ostrich!
But if Swartboy knew not how to manage a gun, he had a weapon of his own
that he did know how to manage,--his bow. With that tiny bow,--scarce a
yard in length,--and those small slender arrows, the Bushman could send
a missile as deadly as the leaden bullet of either rifle or roer.
Looking at the light reed, with its little barbed head and feathered
shaft, you would scarcely believe it possible that such a weapon could
bring down the big strong ostrich; and yet with a similar shaft had
Swartboy often levelled the great camelopard in the dust. A deadly and
dangerous weapon was the Bushman's arrow.
But what rendered it so? Not its size, and surely not the force with
which it could be projected from that tiny bow? Neither. There was
something besides the strength of the bow and the weight of the arrow to
make it a "deadly and dangerous weapon." There was _poison_.
Swartboy's arrows were true Bushman weapons,--they were poisoned. No
wonder they were deadly.
The use of the bow among savage nations all over the earth, and the
great similarity of its form and construction everywhere, may be
regarded as one of the most curious facts in the history of our race.
Tribes and nations that appear to have been isolated beyond all possible
communication with the rest of the world, are found in possession of
this universal weapon, constructed on the same principle, and only
differing slightly in details--these details usually having reference to
surrounding circumstances. When all else between two tribes or nations
of savages may differ, both will be found carrying a common instrument
of destruction,--the bow and arrows.
Can it be mere coincidence, like necessities in different parts of the
world producing like results, or is this possession of a similar weapon
among distant and remote peoples a proof of unity or communication
between them in early times?
These inquiries would lead to a long train of reflections, which,
however interesting, would here be out of place.
But an equally or still more curious fact is that of _poisoned_ arrows.
We find here and there, in almost every quarter of the globe, tribes of
savages who poison their arrows; and the mode of preparing and using
this poison is almost exactly the same among all of them. Where there
is a difference, it arises from the different circumstances by which the
tribe may be surrounded.
Now the knowledge of arrow-poison, as well as the mode of preparing it
and the habit of using it, belong to tribes of savages so completely
isolated, that it is not probable--hardly possible, in fact--that either
they or their ancestors could ever have communicated it to one another.
We cannot believe that there ever existed intercourse between the
Bushman of Africa and the Chuncho of the Amazon, much less between the
former and the forest tribes of North America; yet all these use the
arrow-poison and prepare it in a similar manner! All make it by a
mixture of vegetable poison with the subtle fluid extracted from the
fang-glands of venomous serpents. In North America, the rattlesnake and
moccason, with several species of roots, furnish the material; in South
America, the "wourali," or "curare," as it is indifferently called, is a
mixture of a vegetable juice with the poison extracted from the glands
of the coral-snake, (_Echidna ocellata_), the "boiquira" or "diamond
rattlesnake," (_Crotalus horridus_), the lance-headed "viper,"
(_Trigonocephalus lanceolate_) the formidable "bushmaster," (_Lachesis
rhombeata_), and several other species. In South Africa, a similar
result is obtained by mixing the fluid from the poison-glands of the
puff-adder, or that of various species of _naja_, the "cobras" of that
country, with the juice from the root of an Amaryllis, called _gift-bol_
(poison-bulb) in the phraseology of the colonial Dutch. It is out of
such elements that the Bushman mixes his dangerous compound.
Now our Bushman, Swartboy, understood the process as well as any of his
race; and it was in watching him mixing the ingredients and poisoning
his arrows that Klaas and Jan spent the early portion of that day.
All the ingredients he carried with him; for whenever a "geel coppel,"
(_Naja haje_), or a "spuugh-slang," (_Naja nigra_), or the "puff-adder,"
(_Vipera arretans_), or the horned viper, (_Cerastes caudalis_,)--
whenever any of these was killed on the route--and many were--Swartboy
took care to open the poison-gland, situated behind their fangs, and
take therefrom the drop of venom, which he carefully preserved in a
small phial. He also carried another ingredient, a species of bitumen
obtained from certain caverns, where it exudes from the rocks. The
object of this is not, as supposed by some travellers, to render the
charm "more potent," but simply to make it glutinous, so that it would
stick securely to the barb of the arrow, and not brush off too easily.
A similar result is obtained by the South American Indians from a
vegetable gum.
The gift-bol, or poison-bulb, was easily obtained, as the species of
Amaryllis that yields it grew plentifully near. But Swartboy had not
trusted to this chance, as during past days he had plucked several of
the roots, and put them away in one of the side-chests of the wagon,
where many other little knick-knacks of his lay snugly stowed.
Klaas and Jan, therefore, had the rare chance of witnessing the
manufacture of the celebrated arrow-poison.
They saw Swartboy bruise the gift-bol, and simmer it over the fire in a
small tin pan which he had; they saw him drop in the precious
snake-venom; they saw him stir it round, until it became of a very dark
colour, and then, to their great astonishment, they saw him try its
strength _by tasting_!
This seemed odd to both, and so may it to you, boy reader,--that a drop
of poison, the smallest portion of which would have killed Swartboy as
dead as a herring, could be thus swallowed by him with impunity! But
you are to remember that poisons, both vegetable and mineral, are very
different in their nature. A small quantity of arsenic taken into the
stomach will produce death, and yet you might swallow the head of a
rattlesnake, fangs, poison-gland, and all, without the slightest danger.
On the contrary, if a single grain of the latter were to enter your
blood, even if it were only scratched in with a pin, its effects would
be fatal, while other poisons may be introduced into the blood without
any fatal result.
Swartboy knew there was no arsenic or any species of "stomach-poison,"
if I am allowed to use such a phrase, in his mixture. It was only
"blood-poison," which he might _taste_ with impunity.
The bitumen was the last thing put into the pan; and when Swartboy had
stirred it a while longer, and sufficiently thickened it, so that it
would adhere to the barbs, he took down a quiver of arrows already made,
and dipped each of them into the poison. As soon as the barbs had
cooled, and the poison became well dried, the arrows were ready for use,
and Swartboy intended that some of them should be used on that very day.
Before the sun should set, he designed sending one or more of them
through the skin of an ostrich.