TRANSPORTING A YOUNG RHINOCEROS--HARRY AND JACK IN
LOVE--ANIMAL INTELLIGENCE--JACK'S BOAT.
"Well," said Miss Boland, after a moment's pause, "I'll accept him,
with many thanks, and use him as the basis of a menagerie. We'll
keep him as long as we can around the kraal, and it is possible that
we'll be able to take him to Walvisch Bay on our return. It will
give him a chance to see something of the world; I judge from his
youthful appearance that he has never traveled far away from home,
and he may yet have an opportunity to visit the Tower of London."
"Or, more likely, the Zoological Garden," said Jack. "He will feel
more at home there than in the Tower, as no wild animals have been
kept there for many and many a year."
"Oh, I may get up a show of my own; and should I do so, it will be
pleasant to remember its origin. This young rhinoceros will be an
excellent beginning; but I think you're going to have a hard time to
get him to our camp."
"Oh, not at all," said I; "we'll show you how it will be done."
While the conversation was going on I spied a troop of hartbeest
about a mile away from us, toward the east. Accompanied by Mirogo
and Kalil, I made a circuit in their direction, coming in under the
cover of some bushes, and then stalking up to the herd to single out
one of the largest. I got close up to him, and finished him with a
single shot. Then I had Mirogo remove his skin, while I went slowly
back to where the young rhinoceros was still surrounded by the group.
Meantime the Kafirs had arrived. Under my directions the after-rider
tied the feet of the young rhino--tied them firmly, so that he could
not move; then he laid him, with his back downward, in the skin of
the hartbeest, and finally slung the skin, by means of holes cut
along its edge, on a stout pole. Three Kafirs took each end of this
pole on their shoulders; they were six in all, and thus had a weight
of only fifty pounds each to carry, which is a mere trifle for a
Kafir. Raising the pole to their shoulders, they went off at a
swinging pace; and thus we demonstrated to our friends how a young
rhinoceros could be transported. The fellow kept up a tremendous
squealing all the time, and evidently did not like that mode of
travel; yet it was not a question of his like or dislike, but of
finding him a suitable home after his unfortunate bereavement.
We accompanied the ladies until we were in sight of their camp.
Then, as the hour was getting late, we turned in the direction of our
own wagons, and rode for them at a smart canter, reaching home just
about dusk.
I had expected Jack and Harry would be enthusiastic and loquacious
over the experiences of the day; on the contrary, they were decidedly
moody and silent, and I came to the conclusion that both were in love
and unwilling to admit it. What made the case a little awkward was
that they were both in love with one woman. Had they respectively
been in love with the two women they would undoubtedly have been more
talkative; but when their devotion was fastened upon one and the same
individual it gave a fine chance for that verdant-eyed monster known
as Jealousy. They were jealous up to the eyes--jealous all over; and
from being the best of friends, they seemed to have developed, all in
a day, a very pronounced feeling of hatred. Their silence toward
each other drove me into a condition of taciturnity, and as we sat
down to supper we were as sociable as mourners at a funeral feast
where each expects that he has been left out in the will of the
deceased, and the rest have got it all.
After we had eaten awhile in such profound quiet, I suggested that
the method of stalking with oxen might be followed with other game
than giraffes.
Silence prevailed for half a minute or more, when Harry spoke,
saying, "Do you think so?"
Jack uttered not a word.
"Yes," I replied, "I certainly think so; it might be a good way to
get close up to buffaloes or rhinoceroces, and possibly to elephants."
"Yes," said Jack, suddenly, "and lions too!"
"No trouble about that," I answered; "you wouldn't have to get up to
the lions; the lions would get up to you very quickly, and the ox
would make off as fast as he could. I am afraid it would be a bad
business, both for the ox and the hunter, so far as lions are
concerned."
"That reminds me," I remarked, "of the last time before this when I
came on a hunting-expedition up-country. We were trekking, one day,
through an open sort of plain, where there were sufficient trees to
afford cover up to within a hundred yards of the road. We had nine
yoke of oxen hauling the wagon, and about twelve extra oxen driven
along behind the wagon--the way, in fact, that most expeditions come
up from the coast. I was on my best horse, and the other horses were
ridden by the fore-looper, after-rider, manager, and others of our
party. Everybody was in his place; and as we had not seen any large
game, I was carrying my small rifle, ready to pick off any ordinary
thing that came in our way.
"We were not very far from the settlements, and not a lion had been
seen, nor the spoor of one. Suddenly a big lion came bounding out of
the forest, making straight for the loose bunch of oxen at the rear
of the wagon. He started from the cover of a bush which may have
been fifty yards from the trail; I don't think it was more than that.
You know in what a short time a lion can go fifty yards when he gives
his whole mind to it; it didn't seem to me ten seconds from the time
we saw the brute till he sprang on one of the oxen, killing him by a
single stroke of his enormous paw, and setting his teeth in the neck
of the unfortunate beast. It was all the work of a few seconds. The
men ran in all directions except toward the lion; I brought my small
rifle to bear, and gave the fellow a shot. It was enough to anger
him, and nothing more. He gave a fierce growl, and seemed half
inclined to come at me; and my only salvation was that he was very
hungry and fell at once to devouring the ox."
Here I paused purposely, to compel one of my comrades to say
something. Harry broke the silence by asking me what I did.
"I rode to the wagon just as quickly as I could," said I, "and got
one of my large rifles; then I came out, and was accompanied, very
reluctantly, by one of my men. I dismounted, gave my horse to the
man, walked up to within twenty yards of the lion, who was busy
satisfying his hunger, and gave him a shot through the heart."
"Well," said Jack, "you lost an ox and made a lion."
"That's time," I replied; "but the loss was much greater than the
gain. A lion's skin doesn't equal the value of an ox, and I doubt if
you would find any hunter who would be willing to make trades of that
sort."
"No indeed," said Jack; "to lose one's traveling-equipment in an
expedition like this is virtually to lose everything."
In this way I managed to break the ice and get the two men more
amiable to each other. Perhaps I added a little fuel to the fire in
both cases by praising the skill which Miss Boland had shown in her
hunting-work that day. Then I changed to the subject of the young
rhinoceros, and speculated as to what use she would be able to make
of the beast. I remarked that I was afraid she would never be able
to teach him drawing-room manners, as he did not seem to be adapted
to a higher education. Harry said he could not see why the
rhinoceros could not be educated up to the same point as the
elephant, with the difference that he was not as large as the
elephant, and consequently not capable of holding as much knowledge.
"Hold on, Harry!" said Jack; "that doesn't make any difference at
all; it's a question of brain-capacity, and not of size. The dog is
the equal of the elephant in intelligence, and you could make a
hundred dogs out of one elephant--yes, a thousand of them--so far as
size is concerned."
This led them into a discussion as to the respective intelligence of
dogs and elephants. Harry took the side of the elephant, and Jack
that of the dog, each claiming that the animal he favored was more
intelligent than the other. I put in a word occasionally, the
fellows forgot their differences and their loves, and altogether we
had a very pleasant evening.
Our conversation would have been very enjoyable to a party of young
folks, and I wish I could repeat the instances that were narrated of
the display of unusual intelligence on the part of those two animals.
Each of the champions told stories of performances which certainly
bordered upon reason, and nearly every story was inexplicable on the
ground of instinct only. Jack claimed that the intelligence of both
beasts was distinctly human. Harry opposed him, and quoted the
argument of some distinguished naturalist, who said that the line
between human and animal intelligence was illustrated by means of
fire. No animal, however intelligent, has yet been known to light a
fire, or even to keep one going after it was lighted. On the other
hand, the lowest of savages can produce fire, and also can keep it
going.
Jack admitted the force of the point, and then conversation drifted
to our schemes for the next day.
After discussing the whereabouts of the various kinds of game, we
concluded that the best available place, with our present
information, was the hippopotamus-ground. The hippos had not been
disturbed very recently, and perhaps we could bag two or three
without much trouble.
"Before I go on any hippopotamus-hunt," said Jack, "I'm going to have
a boat! Without a boat you can't do much."
"As to that," replied Harry, "there isn't a boat that one of us would
trust himself in in all this part of South Africa. Do you propose to
send back to the settlements for a boat?"
"No, I don't propose anything of the kind," said Jack; "I'll make a
boat, and I'll do it to-morrow morning, so that it will be ready for
use by noon!"
We laughed at his suggestion, but Jack said quietly, "Just you wait
and see."
Before going to bed that night, Jack got out four of our largest
buffalo-hides, and put them to soak in a tub, so that they would be
soft and pliable by morning. He was up bright and early, and before
breakfast he went out to the nearest bush and cut some poles about
ten feet long and an inch and a half in diameter. He took along two
of our Kafirs, who brought the poles into camp; and by the time they
did so, and Jack was back from his tour, breakfast was ready.
After breakfast he marked out on the ground a space which represented
the size of his boat at the gunwales. Then he split the sticks he
had cut, just as a "hoop-pole" is split for its uses. Then each hoop
was sharpened at the ends, and the ends were stuck in the ground at
equal distances marked along the curves indicating the gunwales of
the boat. When the hoops or sticks were all in place they resembled
the framework of a very low and oblong Eskimo hut. Harry suggested
that Jack was making a hen-coop to keep the dogs in, to which Jack
replied, as before, "Wait and see."
The next move was to take the now softened buffalo-hides and spread
them over the framework, straightening the places where they met by
means of a sharp knife. When the hides had been properly trimmed
they were sewn together, and then stretched over the framework, which
they fitted, as Harry said, "like paper on the wall." I should have
remarked that the series of hoops which formed the framework were
braced longitudinally by longer and stronger pieces of wood, one
taking the place of the keel and two others forming the gunwales, all
of them firmly tied in place by a strong cord. When the hide
covering was stretched over the woodwork and securely fastened at the
gunwales, the boat was complete. It was lifted from its inverted
position and turned right side up, the points of the sticks were cut
away, and odd pieces of the hide were bound around the edge to
strengthen it.
"I told you to wait and see," said Jack, "and now you see it!"