of reels, all of the very liveliest kind. The boy and the girl
gravitated towards each other. But conversation was difficult; they
were full of embarrassment. They wandered together for a short distance
along the hillside. He told her of his life on the gold and diamond
fields and of those far-off towns she had heard rumours of. The ocean
and the great ships were to her the most wonderful of all things. Had
such not been mentioned in the Bible, she would not have believed their
existence possible. She had been taught to read, but the Bible was her
only book. With her large, lustrous eyes fixed on the boy's face she
listened, gravely interested, to all he told her.
Of herself and her experiences the girl could hardly be induced to say a
word. Her ignorance of the world beyond the farm and the scenes of her
father's different hunting trips was almost fathomless. They returned
to the wagon, and soon afterwards the Reefer arrived, carrying a
haversack full of quartz.
"I think we'll stay and see what's to be found about here," he said.
Next morning the Reefer disappeared on his endless quest of the rainbow.
Fourie and the boy went for a tramp after game. The somewhat vague and
unpractical mien of the Boer disappeared when on the hunting spoor; he
became cool, alert and capable. The lore of the wilderness was to him
as an open book. The boy had somewhat prided himself on his skill as a
hunter, but he soon saw that compared with Fourie he was the merest
novice. Signs and tokens invisible to him before were pointed out and
deduced from unerringly. Fourie was generous, giving his companion
opportunity after opportunity to lay low koodoo, sable and tsessabi.
The spoil was handed over to the "Baiala"--"the people who are dead"--
wretched outlaws or waifs of annihilated clans, who wandered, weaponless
and without clothing, over the veldt. As a rule they lived on roots,
grubs, snakes and other unspeakable things. Like wine-flies when one
opens a bottle of wine, the Baiala would suddenly materialise from the
void whenever meat was in evidence. They would be given the bulk of the
carcase for their own use, and told to convey the choicer portions, with
the skin, to the camp. This they never failed honestly to do.
The abject submissiveness of these people was pathetic in the extreme;
it must have been the result of a terrible course of hopeless suffering.
They never spoke unless first addressed; then they answered in
low-toned monosyllables. A weird deftness and intelligence
characterised all they did. At the camp they would silently set down
whatever had been given into their charge, and as silently vanish. As
an instance of their honesty it may be mentioned that once, when the boy
lost his hunting-knife, it was found by the Baiala and returned to him.
It was sticking in the ground, close to his head, when he awoke one
morning. And what a priceless possession the implement would have been
to the finder!
Evidences of a once-teeming human population abounded over the whole
countryside, which was covered with groups of low, circular stone walls,
indicating where thousands of kraals once stood. But the exterminating
raids of Tshaka had swept it bare. Now its only human dwellers were a
few creatures so wretched and so reduced that the very beasts of prey
were said to despise them.
Thus passed many halcyon days. The boy had now become almost a member
of the little family to whose hearth in the wilderness he had drifted
through so strange a chance. The Reefer was hardly in evidence; he had
struck a small leader which bore gold, and was endeavouring, with
infinite pains, to trace this to its connection with the parent reef.
The spot where he was working was about half-an-hour's walk distant.
Thither he went every morning early; thence he returned at dusk every
evening. When hot on the scent of gold the Reefer was not a man to be
lightly interfered with. He had made it clear to the boy from the
beginning that his help was not required, or even desired, except
towards filling the pot with meat. Thus the two had little or no
intercourse.
The boy was more and more struck by the individuality of his new
friends; they were so utterly unlike any others of their class that he
had foregathered with. As the intimacy grew, Fourie told more of the
details of his history. It appeared he was not quite orthodox in his
religious views, and had had in consequence a serious quarrel with the
pastor of his church. This had happened years back. One result was
that Fourie was under a kind of ban among his own people. His wife had
shared his views. The children, or at all events the two elder ones,
having natural strength of character, and being cut off from intercourse
with other young humans, developed on lines of their own.
Fourie had strains of idealism and even of philosophy. He loved his
violin, but his musical ambition never, alas! soared beyond reels. Like
a child in everything appertaining to social mankind, this Boer was
almost supernaturally wise in interpreting the laws governing forest,
field and sky. He had a naturally kind heart and a deep love for
nature. Thus he only killed ordinary game when meat was required.
Solitude and the spiteful usage of his fellow-men had not soured his
disposition. His only foe was the lion; and the lion, which he pursued
constantly and implacably, he met and vanquished in fair, open
encounter.
As time passed, the girl and the boy became more unconstrained towards
each other. The girl had much innate refinement, and was very
intelligent. Between her and the boy there was little articulate
speech; the silence of the wilderness had invaded their souls. When the
wilderness unveils the fulness of its beauty to a human being speech
becomes largely superfluous. For although the wilderness is full of
clear indications, it is mostly inarticulate, and those who dwell there
must interpret its dumb alphabet or perish. Between these two human
creatures signs gradually took the place of words; glances became
eloquent; a gesture often conveyed more than a sentence.
The girl could hold a rifle straighter than most men; her frame was
tireless; she could endure hunger and thirst without wilting. She had
often been her father's hunting companion. When Fourie now planned a
more than usually extended expedition she decided to take part in it.
The Boer absolutely lusted after lions to slay, but no spoor was to be
found anywhere within a day's walk of the camp. However, away down near
the junction of the Olifant and the Letaba was a locality which he had
previously visited with satisfactory results. So thither it was decided
to go. The Reefer remained behind, with him Fourie's little son.
So one still, cool morning, when a transparent haze filled the valley
and hung like the shadow of a dream over the forested plains that
stretch from the foot of the mighty mountains to the far-off Lebombo,
the boy, the girl and the Boer started on their adventure. Their course
led along the southern bank of the Olifant. The mountains were soon
left behind, and then, on the plains, the boy--for the first time in his
life--saw large game in true profusion. All day long as they advanced
could be seen the varied population of the wild melting before them into
the gloom; for the forest, although continuous, was not dense except in
the immediate vicinity of the river. Thus the eye could range for a
couple of hundred yards on every side.
Owing to the late local rains the pasturage was good, so all the game
from the surrounding arid spaces had flocked in. Occasionally the
landscape resembled a kaleidoscope, so dense and varied were the
manifestations of animal life. Buffaloes would hurtle through the
undergrowth, swerving to avoid the tree-trunks with the agility of cats.
A black rhinoceros, its wicked-looking head low near the ground, would
dash fiercely away, its horn dividing the tangled brushwood after the
manner of the cutwater of a boat. Families of wild pigs, their tufted
tails held straight up, trotted off with swift quaintness. Herds of
gentle giraffes, disturbed at their browsing on the high branches,
swayed out of sight, their long necks undulating from side to side.
Quaggas, sleeping in the glades, sprang up at their sentinel's warning
stamp, and fled, waking thunders with their hoofs. Fierce-eyed gnus
swiftly ambled away. Antelopes, from the hartebeeste, big, awkward and
ungainly, to the little russet impala, the very embodiment of sylvan
grace, crowded the ever-opening vistas.
All day long they tramped without firing a shot, for ammunition had to
be husbanded. Just before camping at sundown the boy shot a tsessabi,
the flesh of which is among the very best the wilderness affords. To
their astonishment several of the Baiala appeared on the scene. One of
these was a little, elderly man who appeared to be a sort of leader, and
who seemed to have attached himself to the boy.
They camped on the river bank amid scenery more lovely than any pen
could describe. The clear stream, eddying and whirling among great grey
rocks, was nearly three hundred yards wide. Groves of splendid trees,
dark green and luxuriant, lay in an almost continuous chain along the
water's edge, only separated from each other by little spaces of green
sward. On one of these they camped. Across the river a long, even wall
of sheer cliff hung like a rampart over the flood. It was about a
hundred feet high. Along its summit giant trees were silhouetted
against the sky; masses of variegated creeper fell like cataracts over
its face.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_Three_.
Day passed swiftly after day, each like a cup full to the brim of joy.
The hunters went to sleep soon after dusk, leaving the tending of the
fire in the hands of the Baiala. Every morning in the grey dawn the
girl would steal away to bathe in one of the secluded reaches of the
river. The boy would watch for her going and then set about preparing
coffee. This would be ready by the time she returned, with her waved,
glossy hair drying on her shoulders and the brightness of the morning
shining from her face. Then he would go to bathe and the girl would
prepare breakfast.
Silence, more eloquent than speech, enmeshed these two more and more in
mutual comprehension. An idea took root and grew in the mind of the boy
that he had found the environment best suited to him; that a life spent
in this teeming wilderness, with the girl at his side, would be good.
What part had he in civilisation--in that society of conventional men
and women which had lured him on, almost to his ruin, and flung him
contemptuously aside when he ceased to amuse?
Before being an agriculturist, man was a hunter. This explains the
circumstance that for many the hunting instinct--the lust to kill for
the sake of killing--when once indulged in becomes so haunting and
dominant that all other pursuits pall. Atavism is a curious and an
awful thing; an influence may rise through the dark detritus of
inconceivably remote time, take our lives in its shadowy hands, and
shape them to strange ends. Under the spell of the wild, the boy
reverted to the stage of primeval man.
Here, then, was his paradise. Why not, therefore, take this
deep-bosomed Eve to mate, and enter into his inheritance. But at this
stage was it love that he felt for her? He was not sure. She attracted
him strongly, but there was also an occasional feeling of slight
repulsion. He had always been moody and changeable. Little,
undefinable contraventions on her part of that code of conventionality
which he affected to despise, but which is always ineradicable in those
whose childhood has passed in a refined home, jarred on his
sensibilities.
The present--yes--but what of the future? The girl was innocent and
modest. A spice of coquetry in her would have completed his
subjugation; but she was absolutely direct and natural. The forces of
love held all the approaches to his heart; the outworks had fallen, one
by one, but the citadel was still held by a few obstinate doubts.
As a lion-hunt the expedition had so far not been a success. Every
night the low rumbling, occasionally changing to a snarl, of the great
beasts of prey could be heard in various directions. Fourie and the
Baiala, who were now in good condition and equal to any amount of work,
went out indefatigably on the spoor day by day. Many lions were thus
followed to their lairs in dense patches of reeds and grass, but they
always managed to escape unseen. The vegetation was too green to
kindle. The full-fed lion is usually a coward; it is when hungry that
his courage rises and he becomes terrible.
They were but three days' easy walk from the wagon when it was decided
to return. On the morning they started the first lion fell. Just
before dawn they heard the unmistakable sound of a kill, so when day
broke they stole to the spot where it took place, which was about a mile
away. They found four lions eating the carcase of a quagga. Three fled
at once; the other, a magnificent brute with a great coal-black mane,
would not surrender his meat, so he dropped on his belly and faced the
intruders.
The underbrush was scanty; nevertheless the lion, for all his size,
could scarcely be seen. Just the top of his head and the ridge of his
back were visible. Fourie stepped forward to within forty paces and
took careful aim. The great tail began to wave from side to side,
striking the ground with the force of a flail. With the shot the
hindquarters of the lion heaved mightily into the air, and fell forward
towards the hunter. After a few convulsive struggles the limbs
loosened; then the great helpless creature rolled over on its side and
lay still. The bullet had grazed the top of the head and buried itself
in the spine, between the shoulders.
That night they camped just below the enormous gates through which the
Olifant breaks to reach the low country. The mighty, sheer,
table-formed masses, arising from dense forest, bulked huge against the
stars. The cataract-speech of the river filled the sounding gorge with
softened thunder. To the boy it seemed as though Immensity stretched
forth a finger to touch his brain and counteract the spell of sleep. He
tried vainly to rest. The rich, slow, beauty-burthened hours went by.
Canopus wheeled high over the Cross. A sense of the imminence of
something strange thrilled him; his soul seemed to stand tiptoe upon the
summit of expectation and stretch forth its hands.
The fire had dwindled; he built it anew, and the crackling flames shot
up high through the windless dark. The boy glanced to where the girl
lay, near her father. Her eyes were open. The boy beckoned to her.
She sat up and hesitated for an instant; then she arose and came to his
side.
He took her hand and led her away into the gloom. He kissed her on the
lips and the kiss was returned. The voices of the gorge swelled to a
warning dissonance as a breeze from the west gathered their thunders
into a sheaf and hurled it to the plains below, but the lovers heard it
not. The roar of a killing lion and the scream of its stricken prey
startled the forest creatures for miles around, but the sound of the
tragedy passed over these two, unheeding. The mystery and the wonder of
the desert, the lust of the spoiler, the terror and anguish of the
victim--each blindly following the awful law of its being--was around
them, but Love lent wings of flame that bore them to the stars, and
stayed with his wonder-working hand the running of the sands of Time.
Dawn stole, virginal, from the sea and sought their transfigured faces.
The splendour of morning, which had its habitation for a space on the
mountain crags, found its counterpart in their eyes. The cataracts
shouted with their joy; the falcons chanted it as they soared into the
sunshine.
They had no thought for the future; the present was all-sufficient. The
wilderness was theirs, and the fulness thereof. Here was a fair kingdom
in which they reigned as victorious king and gracious queen, without the
tiresome superfluity of subjects.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
That day, for the first time, they planned to be alone together on the
march. With feet made languid by excess of joy they lingered whenever a
locality of more than usual beauty was reached. At midday Fourie, who
had got somewhat far ahead, was wondering at their laggardness.
A distant shot, followed by two others in quick succession, recalled
them to practical realities, so they hurried forward on the spoor. When
they reached Fourie he was sitting under a tree regarding with
satisfaction a large lion he had shot, and which three Baiala were
engaged in skinning. Tied to a shrub close by were two young lion-cubs.
"See, Anna, what I have caught," cried he; "have a look at the little
brutes before I kill them."
"No, no," said the girl, "they are too young to kill. Let them go.
Where is their mother?"
"That is what I cannot understand; I have never heard of such young cubs
being left behind by their mother. But I'm not going to let them go,
perhaps to kill some one, as my father was killed."
The girls soul revolted from the idea of slaughtering these innocents.
So full of new-found happiness was she that the taking of life or the
infliction of pain was abhorrent. But she knew her father's implacable
hatred of the whole lion race.
"Let me take them back to the camp," she begged; "I will tame them."
After advancing many objections Fourie gave a grudging consent. The
little animals could be fed on soup until the camp was reached, then on
meal and water. They were evidently only a week or ten days old, and
resembled yellow cats with abnormally large, solemn faces. They showed
no vice when handled, and seemed quite contented with their lot. The
girl carried one and the boy the other, the three Baiala being unable to
do more than carry the skin of the animal just killed.
The halting-place for the night was an open, circular space surrounded
by high trees. The boughs met overhead; it looked like a green-domed
temple. The ground was almost clear of brushwood. In the centre the
fire was lit. The river was only about two hundred yards distant.
Supper was over, and the cubs, being hungry, were complaining in queer,
guttural tones. They had been coupled together by means of a rein, the
loop of which was fastened to a protruding root.
The boy took the only cooking utensil and started, a live firebrand in
one hand and his rifle in the other, for the river to fetch water for
the soup. When he reached the fringe of low bushes which surrounded the
camping-place he stopped for an instant and looked back. Fourie had
removed the block from his rifle and sat oiling it near the fire. The
girl was bending over the cubs, trying to soothe their impatience. She
looked after the boy with a smile. His last sight of her face showed it
lit by the flickering flame and radiant with an aura of love and
happiness.
When the boy, returning, got within about fifty yards of the fire, his
desert-tuned ear caught a sinister sound of low growling. He dropped
the vessel of water and the firebrand, and rushed forward, bursting
through the fringe of bushes. There, full in the firelight, crouched a
great, tawny lioness, roughly pawing the cubs. In an instant his rifle
was at his shoulder; the lioness sprang into the air and fell back dead,
shot through the heart.
The boy and the fire were the only living things in the firelit circle.
Fourie was lying, his neck terribly lacerated, in a pool of blood. The
girl lay on her face, absolutely still. The cubs had been mangled to
death through the efforts of the mother to set them free.
He could not believe the girl to be dead. Thinking she had fainted from
terror, he lifted her in his arms. Her head fell back, horribly limp.
Her neck had been broken by a stroke from the lioness's paw.
When the boy awakened from his swoon a figure was standing near him. It
was that of the old man of the Baiala. The boy sat up and tried to
think. Then, with a lamentable cry, he sprang up and lifted the corpse
of the girl in his arms. The head again fell back, the loosened wealth
of burnished hair flowing like a cataract to the ground. The old waif
of the desert stole silently away.
Later the old man returned, this time accompanied by two others. He
touched the boy, who sat stupidly gazing at his dead, on the shoulder.
The boy looked up with haggard, deathlike face, and the wholesome human
sympathy of the old man's regard loosened the frightful tension of his
soul. He fell into a paroxysm of tears.
After a while the old man again touched him on the shoulder and pointed
westward, in the direction of the camp. Then, with a sweep of the hand
to indicate that he would return, he melted into the darkness. The two
other Baiala remained behind, close at hand, and tended the fire.
It was noon when the Reefer arrived. The ground was soft, so it did not
take his practised arm long to dig a deep grave. In this they
reverently laid the bodies of the girl and her father. At their feet
were placed the dead cubs, for showing mercy to which such dire requital
was dealt by that inscrutable power which so often chastises men for
their virtuous deeds, and rewards them lavishly for their sins. Heavy
stones were carried from the river terrace close by and placed in such a
way that the resting-place could not be disturbed.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
A few days afterwards the oxen returned, so the wagon, with its sad
passengers, went back to the dead man's farm. The boy accompanied it
and, after relating what had happened (which was regarded by all in the
neighbourhood as the direct and unmistakable judgment of Heaven upon
irreligion), he wandered forth once more, this time to be for ever a
stranger among the sons and daughters of men.
CHAPTER ELEVEN.
BY THE WATERS OF MARAH.
"And when they came to Marah, they could not drink of the waters of
Marah, for they were bitter."--Exodus XV. 23.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
_One_.
It was in the old and, by some at least, ever-to-be-regretted days of
the ox-wagon that the following strange experience befell me. These
were days when the Boers were invariably hospitable to strangers (who
did not arrive on foot), when the natives had still some respect for the
white man, and when game was still to be had for the hunting on the high
plains of South Africa.
We had left our wagons at Shoshong, in what is now Kama's country, and
struck out with three pack oxen and six "boys" towards the north-west,
vaguely hoping to reach Lake Ngami. At that time, a quarter of a
century ago, little was known of that interior which has now become a
sort of Cook's Tourist Route, and consequently the traveller had always
the vague charm of the unknown around him, whilst the fluttering hem of
the garment of the fascinating nymph, whose name is Adventure, gleamed
in every thicket. Maps, it is true, existed, but were a distinct
disadvantage to the wanderer, for the reason that all those extant were
fearfully and ingeniously incorrect. We had once nearly lost our lives
through trusting to an indication of a supposed water-place upon a brand
new chart prepared by a distinguished traveller, who believed every yarn
told him, and who, it is now well known, did not visit half the places
he described from alleged personal observation.
Dick Wharton, Sam Logan and I formed the party. We were all young, in
good health, and keen shots. We hardly expected to reach the lake, but
we knew that there was plenty of shooting to be had in the direction in
which it lay, and that was all that we particularly cared about.
The country, usually a grim desert, was now a smiling garden. For two
seasons rain had fallen in phenomenal abundance, and the wayward bounty
of Heaven had caused the long-dormant vegetation to spring up over the
length and breadth of the land. The flowers were scattered everywhere
in bewildering beauty, and the insects held constant revel in the mild
sunshine. Water was to be found by digging, hardly a foot deep, in
every donga, and all the game in Africa seemed to have collected in the
northern zone of the Kalihari.