Morning,--and the cool west wind, laden with refreshment, hastened over
the desert's rim to where I lay, still on the border-land of sleep. The
sweeping garments of the air-spirit were fragrant with the ichor of the
sea on whose breast it had slept. Its sandals whispered through the
swaying tussocks, its tresses trailed over the bending plumes of the
"toa" shocks. It gently tried to draw me back to the mistress I loved
and longed for, but was deserting because she would have slain me had I
lingered at her unpitying feet.
At sunrise I gazed around for one ecstatic moment and again sank to
sleep--to a zone too deep for dreams to haunt. The long trampings of
the previous two nights had made further slumber an almost absolute
necessity. Andries might go hang; I would not move.
The grateful aroma of coffee wakened me. I decided to breakfast in bed;
that is without emerging from my kaross. Andries determined to go on
with the wagon. Hendrick and the horses were to remain with me; also
Piet Noona's nephew who would, later, trot on and overtake the wagon
with my kaross and pannikin. After another hour's sleep the sun became
insupportable, for the wind had somewhat died down, so I ordered my
faithful Hun to saddle up. He had already located a herd of springbuck.
It had been settled that we were to try and drive these near enough to
the track to afford Andries some shooting. No one but Hendrick had seen
the game; he said they were too far off--away, ahead,--on the left-hand
side of the track,--for us to see. Andries was to lie in ambush at a
certain knoll, while the wagon went on to Kanxas,--there to be
outspanned.
Hendrick's powers of vision were phenomenal; when objects at a distance
were in question, no one dreamt of disputing his verdict. His eyes were
equal, if not superior to the best prismatic binoculars ever turned out
by Dollond or Zeiss, and Nature had apparently corrected them for
chromatic and all other aberrations.
The western hills could now be distinctly seen; we might even recognise
the contours of the ridge beyond the northern end of which Gamoep lay.
Soon we should pass from the kingdom of ancient silence to where the
squalid tents of nomadic men were temporarily pitched,--to where the
fat-tailed sheep crowded, with anxious eyes, around the creaking derrick
and the scanty trough. But to us, intruders as we were, the desert had
still to pay tribute.
We started, Hendrick and I, riding quietly forth on a course a little to
the east of south, for we had a wide detour to make. I knew the
vicinity well; it was, literally speaking, a part of the desert, but I
found it hard to acknowledge it as such, for the reason that the western
hills were in sight. These seemed to link us with the conventional
world.
We passed over a tract studded with small, dense patches of low scrub;
it looked like a miniature archipelago in the boundless ocean of "toa."
Here brown "duiker" antelopes were numerous. So far as I knew this was
the only part of Bushmanland where such were to be found. As we rode on
the little creatures sprang out, right and left, from the patches of
cover and bounded gracefully away.
Far to the south-west the herd of springbuck was now clearly visible.
Most of them were quietly grazing in the mild sunshine. Now and then a
few detached themselves from the main body and, one behind the other,
bounded away for a few hundred yards on a course curved like the blade
of a scimitar--"pronking" with the sheer joy of unspoilt life. After
such an excursion they would rejoin the others and go on feeding. And I
had come to... But if I had let Jekyll climb to my crupper Andries
would have got no shooting. The herd was a small one; it did not number
more than about six hundred. It was curious that these bucks had not
joined in the general migration eastward towards where the lightning had
flashed its message of rain a few nights previously.
The springbucks had not seen us as yet, for we were still about two
miles distant from them. The eyes of these animals seem to be
specialised to a definite range as the ear is tuned to a certain gamut
of sound. I will endeavour to explain what is meant by this. They do
not seem to notice anything at a greater distance than about fifteen
hundred yards. Conversely, should you be lying in ambush and the bucks
come to within fifty yards of you, they would evince far less alarm if
you shewed yourself than on seeing you at a distance of from two to
three hundred yards.
This can easily be accounted for. The springbuck has always spent its
life in an environment of menace, but as conditions change the nature of
the menace changes with them. Formerly the danger-zone for these
creatures was that from which the lion, the leopard or the wild dog
could spring; it was only surprise at close quarters that the springbuck
had to guard against. Given a few seconds' notice of the approach of an
enemy, this creature's unsurpassed fleetness enabled it to laugh at
danger. This laughter is still expressed in the manner in which a small
herd of springbuck will circle round and round a pursuing dog that is
not especially swift--as porpoises sometimes circle around a moving
ship.
We know from accounts left by the very old hunters that in early days,
when the killing range of a bullet was little more than a hundred yards,
springbuck would graze with apparent unconcern until approached to
within about that distance. But with the disappearance of the larger
carnivora before firearms, and the increase in the range of the rifle, a
wider danger-zone has been created, while the danger of an enemy at
close quarters has practically disappeared. The width of the
danger-zone has gone on increasing with the longer range of the rifle.
Wild animals are quick to learn and to unlearn--which is not quite the
same as to forget. Thus the springbuck has ceased to dread the
springing enemy, the creature of teeth and claws that used to lie in
ambush; in fact he never contemplates the contingency of any enemy at
close quarters, and on the rare occasions when he meets one, the
experience appears to fill him with surprise rather than alarm.
The distance between us and the herd had decreased to a little over two
thousand yards, so I detached Hendrick and instructed him to alter his
course to the left and endeavour to edge round the still unsuspecting
animals. The object was to stampede the herd so that it would pass me
on my right and head towards where Andries lay in ambush. Bucephalus
and Hendrick loomed immense and black against the background of yellow
shocks, but they were apparently unobserved by the game, for the latter
still grazed and "pronked" about as though they had the whole desert to
themselves,--as though no entangling web were being drawn about them.
Hendrick had reached the limit of his arc; then the springbuck marked
him and evidently realised that there was danger. Apprehension touched
them; a quiver ran through the herd; they lifted their heads and gazed;
they moved to and fro. So far it was not fear that they felt; for they
knew their own fleetness and had trust in it. Then, suddenly, terror
seemed to strike them like a blast, for as dead leaves are caught by a
wind-eddy and whirled in a spiral, these imponderable-seeming, ethereal
desert creatures swerved over an area resembling in form the sweep of a
fan, and then streamed forth like a handful of white rose-petals before
a gale.
Why is it, I wonder, that during the forenoon springbuck in the desert
appear to be white? For this is literally the case; these animals
seemed to be as white as snow, as imponderable as thistledown. The
fawn-tint of their necks and flanks, the broad, brown patches on their
sides, the black, lyre-formed horns,--all were drowned in the milky foam
of the dorsal manes. These were expanded laterally to their fullest
extent; each long silvery hair stood erect and quivering.
The creatures' heads were depressed almost to the level of their feet.
With backs deeply arched they bounded over the face of the desert like
so many alabaster discs--mingling, separating and re-combining in a
tracery of flying arabesques. They had adopted the attitude and
movement usual to their kind in moments of sudden terror or delight.
Surely their flight was the highest expression of grace revealed by
animated nature in motion. It was a soundless melody; a symphony for
the eye.
The torrent was streaming to my right, straight for Andries. Hendrick
thundered behind,--a black Centaur-monstrosity. How terrible he must
have appeared to the fugitives. I wished Hendrick then would trend to
_his_ right, for if the springbuck had swerved towards Kanxas and caught
sight of the wagon, they would have doubled on their tracks and made for
the depths of the desert. My object was to hold them on the course they
were following for as long as possible. Ha! they must have sighted the
wagon, for they wheeled to their right and attempted to escape past me,
about three thousand yards on my side of where Andries lay waiting for
his shot. The terror of death was upon them; their manes were down--
hidden in the constricted dorsal tract. The eye could hardly follow the
movement of their limbs; distance died beneath the lightning of their
feet.
The reins fell upon my horse's neck, I pressed my spurless heels to his
sides; he knew what was required of him. We dashed forward to cut the
herd off. While we had to cover a thousand yards the springbuck had to
cover nearly two--yet it was clear that they must win the race. When
the springbuck runs his best the speed he attains is almost incredible.
There remained but one thing to be done.
After having altered my course so as to reach some slightly higher
ground, I rolled from the saddle on to the soft sand and began firing--
not at the bucks, but so that my bullets would strike some twenty or
thirty yards in front of the leaders of the herd. Bullet after bullet
scarred the ground, sending up spouts of red sand--now here, now there.
The herd faltered in bewilderment, whirled round in a half-circle to the
left, and headed straight for the ambush.
A distant shot--another; several in rapid succession. It was the rifle
of Andries speaking. It was Man taking toll of Nature, imposing his
age-long tribute of blood and pain. It was Death eliminating Beauty
become obsolete. It was like Autumn shedding the petals of a flower
that had lived its allotted day.
The hunted creatures, in their dismay, completed the circle of frantic
effort; they sped back to the spot where they had been disturbed. They
passed it; they grew smaller and smaller until they melted into the
infinite mystery of the desert.
Three bucks had fallen to Andries' rifle. I dismounted, and we piled
the carcases on Prince's patient back. Bucephalus, as usual, grew
frantic on being brought within smelling-distance of the slain game.
Then we strolled to where the wagon was waiting for us, at a spot some
three miles away, close to the head of the Kanxas Gorge. There we dined
sumptuously on roasted springbuck liver,--one of the best of desert
delicacies.
Once more I explored the gorge--that deserted city which once teemed
with human life. It was narrow, it was neither long nor deep; a mere
scar it was on the desert's flank. The greatest depth was not more than
fifty feet; it was possibly a mile long and the width varied. The sides
contained caves, on the walls of which could still be seen traces of
fires lit long, long ago. And there, thickly traced on the ledges was
the mysterious, black-pigmented script--the groups of short, diagonal
lines crossing each other at various angles. What did they indicate;
was nothing to be read from them even by those who deciphered the graven
edict, five-and-twenty centuries old, of Mesha the Sheepmaster?
Why was it that one did not find at Kanxas pictures of the eland, the
oryx and the rhinoceros; why were there no perspectiveless battle-pieces
depicting the successful defence of some cave-stronghold, with the
baffled invaders being hurled down precipices? Such pictures are found
distributed over vast areas of South Eastern Africa; it seemed
remarkable that none exist, so far as I am aware, in Bushmanland.
Perhaps the plants from which the necessary pigments had to be extracted
do not grow on that side of South Africa. But, deep in the Orange River
gorge is a continuous strip of rich and varied woodland, in which most
of the South African forest flora is represented. Moreover, on the
islands which gem the river's course near its mouth are to be found
myriads of eastern plants, the progeny of seeds carried down by the
annual flood from far-off Basutoland and its environs,--and it is
precisely in that vicinity that Bushman paintings are most plentiful.
The thing remains a puzzle.
And the strange, highly-evolved dramatic art of that vanished race,--a
drama in which human beings took the parts of animals,--how often had it
not found expression there in days of bygone plenty; days when the
baskets of dried-locust cakes crowded every ledge and the children went
pot-bellied and sleek.
There was the stage; there the auditorium; yonder the ledge along which,
no doubt, the actors made their exits and their entrances. Was the
audience a critical one; did it generously applaud a nervous new actor
of evident talent; did it hurl stones, at one who bungled his part or
tried to make up in pretentiousness what he lacked in ability? Did the
author of a successful play advance to the proscenium and enjoy the
tribute of plaudits paid to a successful playwright?
I fancy there must have been a chorus; possibly a semi-chorus as well.
Thespis and Aeschylus probably adopted those obvious aids to rudimentary
drama from the shepherd,--who is first-cousin to the savage. And the
more one sees of various savages, belong they to Bushmanland or to the
Bowery, the more astonishing is the kinship revealed between them. I
could find no box-office--no gallery from which the gods could have
jibed. The auditorium must have been all pit.
And what dramas of real life must have been enacted in that rocky
valley; what rudimentary idylls had not the moon looked upon as her
slanting beams searched slowly down among the rocks on summer nights.
There men and women loved; there jealousy, cruel as the grave, had
brooded. There vengeance had stalked abroad and taken toll for Fate.
Finally, from there--after an age-long struggle--Death had evicted Life.
It was, after all, only appropriate that the Kanxas fountain should
have ceased to flow.
How often had not some old lion--some gaunt, lonely brute with blunted
teeth and claws worn to the quick, crouched among those rocks, bent on
spoil of the cave-men? During how many nights of livid fear must not
the horrible purring of the man-eater, as he quested up the gorge, have
sunk to the deadlier horror of silence. For then every member of the
little community would have known that the prowler had at length
selected a dwelling from which presently to drag a shrieking victim.
And later, the arch-enemy, the more cruel spoiler, man. Man--the
spoiler to-day,--to-morrow the spoiled. The European revenged the
Bushman on the Hottentot; who would revenge the Hottentot on the
European? "For that which hath been is, and that which will be hath
been, and there is no new thing." The thought made "a goblin of the
sun." "O stars that sway our fate; O orbs that should be very wise, for
you have circled the heavens and regarded the earth from the most
ancient days,--you who, impassively, have seen an endless succession of
civilisations arise, decline and die,--when, and at whose hand, will our
nemesis come?"
A spirit of laziness had overcome us all. Andries lay fast asleep under
the wagon; his large frame was loosened, his placid, handsome,
weather-beaten face relaxed. He would have looked just as he did then,
had he been dead, for his days had been days of quietness and all his
pathways peaceful. Yet in that man's deliberate arteries flowed the
blood of those who withstood Alva in the Netherlands, and of others who
abandoned France, with all that seemed to make life worth the living,
rather than bend the knee at the shrine of a false god. I wondered
whether that large-boned, contented, easy-going farmer were capable of
standing on the ramparts of another Leyden and, from hunger-bitten,
indomitable lips roaring heroic and vitriolic defiance at a
seemingly-unconquerable foe. Would he have abandoned honour, riches,
comfort, roof-tree and friends for the sake of conscience,--that
discipliner whose whip-lash does not, unfortunately, bite as severely as
it once was wont to do? I wondered, and in wondering breathed one of
those wishes which are the essence of prayer, that he might never be put
to the test.
The afternoon was young. I decided to stroll on, ahead. I found
Danster and Piet Noona's nephew just above the krantz--preventing, with
some difficulty, the oxen from stampeding to Gamoep, which was now only
about ten miles distant. I sent them back to the wagon with
instructions to do the thing my heart had failed of,--to waken a human
being from that highest condition of well-being--perfect sleep. But it
was now time to inspan; for the first time since they had last drunk the
oxen were really suffering from thirst. They, too, had their rights.
Andries, moreover, was one of those fortunate beings who could slumber
at will.
So I again strolled on. I left the track and climbed to the top of the
Koeberg, the hill from which the big beacon--that farthest outpost of
the trigonometrical survey on this side--springs like a startled finger.
This was one of the actual portals of the desert. I was now, alas!
once more within sight of the dwellings of men. Several tents had been
pitched, and quite a number of mat-houses set up at Gamoep since we had
left it, a little more than a week previously.
I turned eastward and cast mournful eyes back over the sun-bathed
immensity from which I had emerged, and from the deepest depths of which
sounded a call that I knew would for ever echo in my soul. What a
strange regret it was that tugged at my aching heartstrings...
The wind had here died down. The morrow would be torrid,--perhaps with
a tornado from the north. As the last skirts of the sea-cooled breeze
trailed away into the infinite east, their track was marked by a line of
towering sand-spouts. So gently did these move across the plains that
it seemed as though they stood like a row of lofty columns sustaining
the temple-dome of the sky. Yet a careful eye might detect their
rhythmic and concerted movement. What was the stately measure they were
treading,--to what sphere-music did their gliding feet keep time?
And then, O desert--O steadfast face that I loved--I had to bid you
farewell. These eyes would gaze upon you again, but the day was swiftly
coming when I should have to take leave of you for ever. But if when
the body dies the spirit still lives, this soul which was nourished by
your hand until it grew to a stature sufficient to enable it to realise
its own littleness, will return and merge itself in your immensity.