ABOUT BOAR-SHOOTING.
Sleeman.--The Oued el Ahwena.--Its Scenery and its Dangers.--Beauty
of the Landscape on its Banks.
I started next day with the Umbra, who was remarkable for a long
scimitar, and spurs nearly as long. Each time I put my horse to a
gallop, he was under the impression that I wanted to ride a race with
him, and went on at full speed, till I restrained his ardour. We
arrived duly at Sleeman, where the Caid had everything prepared very
comfortably for us. My friends B---- and F---- arrived later, in a
carriage. We had a good Arab dinner, with the national kouskous,
followed by a chibouk.
There was a river about six miles off, where boars were rumoured to
make their abode. I rose early next morning, and, proceeding to this
stream, hid in the thicket on the banks, while the Arabs beat the
bushes. After waiting a long time, I managed to "pot" a wild boar,
which came rushing past me at full speed. After this, the Arabs
refused to beat the bushes any more, declaring that the dogs were
tired, though the real reason was that they wanted their own dinners,
so I was obliged to give up the sport and return. The wild boar was
dispatched as a present to the consul.
[Illustration: R. Pheney, lith.
M. & N. Hanhart, Impt.
HOG-SHOOTING ON THE BANKS OF THE OUED EL AHWENA, IN
TUNISIA.]
The river which we visited to-day is called the Oued el Ahwena. It
runs through a rich valley, bordered on both sides by mountains which
rise up gradually, and are covered to their very foot with trees of
various descriptions. The plain itself is fragrant with myrtles,
orange trees, and olives. The beauty of the scene amid which this
river falls into the sea is beyond description. Here the water is
hissing wildly among osiers and furze bushes; there it skips along
like a young goat over the small pebbles; and yonder, again, it winds
like a serpent among the sand hills on the sea-shore. The dark
olive-trees on the bank seem to look seriously on, like a father
watching the pranks of a favourite child. The large ash-trees shake
and quiver, like old aunts, all in a tremble at the dangerous hops and
vagaries of a lively niece; while the gay-plumaged birds of the air
ring out their wild applause, and the flowers on the bankside murmur
tenderly, "Oh, take us with you, dear sister!" But the joyous,
sparkling river rushes on like a coquette, bounding and skipping
towards its goal.
Such is the river Ahwena in the glorious month of April: fair without,
like many a gay flirt, she can yet inflict wounds incurable, if not
death, upon those whom her wiles entrap. Woe to the traveller or
hunter who, oppressed by thirst in this burning climate, ventures to
taste the sparkling water that bubbles up like champagne, invitingly
at his feet! Cholera and death would be the probable result. The
waters are redolent of cholera, and the banks of fever. No man may
pitch his tent in safety for a single night on the banks of this
death-dealing water; not even the Bedouins, who avoid the locality as
if it were plague-stricken, for fever is in the very air. Strange that
so fair an exterior should veil so baneful a mystery. Those bright,
sweet-smelling flowers conceal snakes and reptiles whose bite is
almost instantaneously fatal, and the place might be appropriately
termed the Valley of Death. Among yonder fair trees lurk the
treacherous panther and the slinking hyena.
Yet, in this world, amid present impressions of pleasure, we have
little time to think of the danger veiled beneath the smiling outward
shape. So, at least, it was with me, as I reclined on the carpet of
soft grass, after slaying the boar, placidly discussing my breakfast,
and enjoying the beauty of the scene around, with the azure-rippling
sea about two miles off, the magnificent mountains around me, the
sparkling river at my feet, and, across the bay in the far distance,
the ruins of the once mighty city of Carthage, with the birds singing
merrily overhead in the bright sunshine. There is exquisite pleasure
in the sensation of the external world thus melting away, as it were,
into a little world of our own, and when the green trees, the azure
sky, the perfumed plants, all take their places in an exquisite
picture of Nature's own painting. Women, perhaps, most indulge this
feeling; hence they often smile with an amiable incredulity when they
hear the "lords of the creation," proud of their scholastic lore,
discussing and settling everything, priding themselves upon having
divided all things so cleverly into _subjective_ and _objective_, and
boasting that they have furnished their wise heads with so many
drawers (like a chemist's shop, forsooth), with reason located in one,
good sense in another, understanding in a third, and so on to the end
of the chapter.