Chapter XVIII How we buried ourselves alive for the Love of Science
“Talk of returning to one’s mutton!” said Jack; “here’s our venison!”
I confess I was uncommonly glad to see that eland; for since breakfast I had scarcely tasted food, and the prospect of camping out for the night upon a little tinned meat and a couple of biscuits had not presented itself to my imagination in the brightest of colours.
Under the soothing influence of roast venison, however, and a comfortable fire, our prospects for the night brightened very considerably, our only source of anxiety for the present being the want of a “long drink.” We had our brandy-flasks still nearly full, for we were resolved to keep the spirits for medicinal purposes only; but as the stuff was unmixed with water, we were unable to satisfy our thirst by means of a pull from the flask. We were lucky enough, however, to come across a kei-apple tree which provided us with a kind of dessert; not particularly luxurious certainly, but palatable enough to thirsty souls with nothing to drink.
That night passed without adventure. We heard wild animals in the distance, but none came very near us, and if they had we were growing accustomed to them by this time, and my spell of night-watching was passed without serious attacks of “creeps” and “horrors,” such as had rendered my first night or two in the bush periods of mental torture to me.
On the morrow we breakfasted upon more of our eland, and cut and cooked sundry slices to take away with us. Our Kaffir apples again served as substitutes for “drinkables,” but I think either Jack or I would have given pretty nearly all we were worth for a cup of tea or a drink of water.
“We must get out of this jungle to-day, Peter,” said Jack, “and find some water; kei-apples are not good enough.”
I quite agreed. We must get out of this jungle, if only for the sake of having a long drink.
Our horses, which had filled themselves with the cactus-like growths abounding at our feet—elephant’s-foot, or Hottentot bread, and other delicacies of a like nature—were presumably as anxious to find water as we were. They carried us in whatsoever direction we urged them, but went listlessly, as though by no means in love with our enterprise.
When we had wandered thus for a few hours, and were growing somewhat depressed by reason of our continued failure to find a way out of the jungle, I proposed to Jack to allow the horses to go where they liked.
“They can’t make a worse business of it than we have done,” I added; “and they may possibly be guided by instincts which we don’t possess.”
“Good idea,” said Jack; “we’ll try it.”
The result was rather astonishing.
Those two sagacious creatures, feeling their bridles loose upon their necks, and recognising that they were to be permitted to go where they pleased, pricked up their ears and started off at a quick walk.
“I wonder if they really know where they are going, or whether this is only a kind of ‘swagger’?” said Jack. It certainly seemed as though they knew all about it. Why should they not, after all, as well as any other animal that is wild and has a vested interest in the forest? Horses came originally from a wild stock, and doubtless possess the inheritance of their species—namely, the instinctive power to find their way unerringly from point to point as well through pathless jungle as over the easy open.
At any rate, our good steeds had scarcely travelled an hour without our interference when we saw to our delight that the forest grew thinner and the light stronger, and a few minutes later we were actually in the open, with the jungle behind us. We could see our conical hill in the distance, but on the other side of the belt of forest through which we had so laboriously passed. It was also clear to us that there existed a way to Ngami, skirting the forest, which would obviate for us the necessity to plunge again into those dangerous fastnesses; and this discovery was a great relief to our feelings, for it would have been a sore test, to my nerves at least, to re-enter those dark shades in order to get into the road for home.
Meanwhile our horses walked briskly onwards, as though determined to see through the matter which had been entrusted to their instinct; and whether my readers believe it or not, it is nevertheless the fact that they travelled as straight as the bee flies, never diverging by a yard from their line, until presently they brought us up on the banks of a wide stream, into whose cool current they promptly plunged their noses, and we ours, in very abandonment to the luxurious delight of thirst-quenching.
This little adventure, or misadventure, was a lesson to us, and a most useful one, throughout our wanderings in search of big game during the next month or more; and as at this time we passed through several “’scapes” and incidents of an interesting if alarming kind I now purpose to set down one or two of these for the benefit of those of my readers who have a taste for adventure and wild beasts. I do not mean to describe in detail the whole of our month of jungle life, but merely to pick out an incident or two as samples of the rest, for an average volume would not contain the narrative of all we saw and did during those momentous thirty days.
Jack and I slept that night by the river which the instinct of our horses (as I suppose) had discovered for us; and, it being a warm evening, we determined to do without a camp fire for once, and to conceal ourselves by means of deep holes dug in the ground, in which we would crouch with our heads and shoulders concealed in the scrub, or by boughs lopped from tree and bush. We had heard of hunters adopting this plan at spots by a river’s bank to which wild animals were in the habit of coming down to drink at night, in order to obtain easy shots from their ambush at the unsuspecting lion, leopard, antelope, elephant, or what not, that came to slake its thirst at the stream.
So Jack and I dug holes, being provided with spades brought for quite a different purpose, and lopped heaps of branches and scrub with our hunting-knives; and when darkness fell we got into our graves, a yard or two apart, within whispering distance, and piled branches and greenery around the mouths of each pit so that we might put our heads and shoulders out, if need be, and still not be seen; and then we waited for developments.
The night was full of a holy calm, warm and still, and instinct with a kind of sense of waiting for something to happen. One felt that the silence and peace were very delicious, but that this sort of thing could not continue long, and must not, for it would grow intolerable after a while.
Then, just as one began to weary of the strain of the stillness and utter noiselessness, a leopard, or some such creature, came to the rescue, far away, and roared half a dozen times on end.
I thought, and whispered my conviction to Jack in the next grave, that this habit of roaring when about to go a-hunting was a very foolish trait in leopards, tigers, and other beasts of prey. It amounted to calling out, “Now, then, all you fat deer and juicy antelopes, you’d better clear out or I’ll have you for supper!”
Jack said it reminded him of a master at school, who used to call out “Cave, gentlemen, cave!” before going the round of the studies, and was, in consequence, the favourite master in the school.
I was just beginning to propound my opinion as to which was the greater and which the lesser fool, the master or the leopard, when suddenly a sound as of a gust of wind broke in upon us, came nearer, disintegrated itself into the noise of the scurrying of many feet, and in a moment we were in the midst of a splendid squad of antelopes, plunging, bucking, kicking, boring, leaping, grunting, squeaking,—all intent upon the water, and each creature apparently in mortal fear lest its companions should drain the supply before it had its share.
One or two of the beautiful little animals actually leaped over my head as I ducked to avoid being kicked, and I put out my hand and patted another which stood close by, to its unspeakable surprise and terror, causing it to dive madly in among its fellows and raise a pandemonium in the ranks, for which, I am sure, the rest could have discerned no reason. Probably my friend obtained the character of being a mad antelope among his companions from that night forward.
All this—the confusion and the trampling of the mud at the water’s edge and the drinking—lasted about five minutes; then, as though they had suddenly realised that they were doing an exceedingly rash and foolish thing, the whole family, as with one accord, turned right about and galloped away into the darkness. A moment—and they were here; another—and they were gone thither whence they came, and where that was, no man knows.
What had startled them? The plunging of our horses, perhaps; for those poor picketed beasts were, for some reason or other, very nervous, and we could hear them stamping their hoofs and shaking their heads as though anxious to break away. A hyena or two were prowling about in the neighbourhood, disagreeably noisy as usual, but the horses could scarcely be nervous on their account.
Suddenly all is explained: the hasty “skedaddle” of the antelope herd; the agitation of our horses; the sudden hush of all voices of the forest. Somebody is arriving—a great and majestic and terrific personage, at whose coming my coward heart goes with a jump into my boots. It is a lion—and a hungry one!