"Yes," agreed Grosvenor, "I suppose you are right, Dick. Put as you put it, it certainly does seem an absurd and fantastic distortion of our sense of fairness that in the ceaseless struggle between good and evil the latter should be helped and the former handicapped as much as possible; and at all events in the present case I think you have successfully demonstrated your right to act as you did. Now, having settled that point, I propose that we have dinner, which seems to be ready, if one may judge by the looks and actions of Ramoo Samee."

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The sun had barely risen on the following morning when Dick and Grosvenor received an invitation from the king to present themselves forthwith in the Great Place, where the conspirators were to be brought up for judgment to be pronounced upon them; and as such an invitation was tantamount to a command they hastily finished the breakfast upon which they were engaged when the message reached them, ordered their horses, and rode away toward the appointed spot.

Upon their arrival they found the chiefs who had been summoned, like themselves, to hear sentence pronounced, already assembling, while the king's bodyguard, motionless as statues, were ranged in a semicircle round the throne that had been placed in position for the accommodation of the king. A stool stood on either side of the throne, and upon their arrival Dick and Grosvenor were at once conducted to these. Almost immediately afterward the king made his appearance, and approaching the throne seated himself thereon, while those present accorded him the royal salute, Dick and Grosvenor standing and saluting in military fashion. Then, at a sign from His Majesty, all who were entitled to sit did so, and the order was given to lead forward the prisoners.

Conducted by their guards, the eight prisoners, their faces set and expressionless as masks, ranged themselves in line before the king; then, for a full minute, there ensued a profound and impressive silence, which was at length broken by Lobelalatutu, who commanded, in a calm, stern voice:

"Sekosini, chief Witch Doctor, and you Mapela, Amakosa, N'Ampata, and Sekukuni, chiefs of the Makolo, stand forward and listen to your doom. Out of your own mouths have ye been convicted of conspiracy against me and the peace of the nation. You, Sekosini, Mapela, N'Ampata, and Amakosa, yesterday boldly and defiantly acknowledged your guilt, and had nothing to plead in extenuation of it; but you, Sekukuni, in addition to being a conspirator, have proved yourself liar [and] coward; for at your public trial, in the presence of those now assembled, you declared yourself to be, like Ingona, Lambati, and Moroosi, the victim of Sekosini's wiles and serpent tongue; whereas afterward, when you were brought before me privately, and compelled by the Healer's magic to speak the truth, you acknowledged that your former statement was false, made only in the hope of mitigation of your punishment, and that in your foul, guilty heart you thought as Sekosini, and would have fought against me to your last man in the attempt to overthrow and destroy me. To satisfy your unlawful ambition and greed of gain, you five men, all holding positions of high authority and trust, would have set callously tribe against tribe, regiment against regiment, and man against man, until the people had fallen and strewed the ground like leaves of autumn and the land was drenched in their blood. It is enough; you are a menace and danger to the nation, and you must die. In the old days of the reign of M'Bongwele—those days which you were so anxious to restore—your dying would have been a lingering, long-drawn-out, excruciating torment; but under the teaching of those who put me on this throne I have learned to be merciful, and my sentence is that you be led forth and hanged by the neck from the bough of the tree that ended M'Bongwele's cruel and iniquitous life, and there left as an example and a warning to all who think such evil thoughts as yours. Bind them and take them away."

In an instant the guards who had charge of the doomed men seized them, and proceeded to bind their hands behind them with thongs of hide, prior to leading them away to the place of execution. With one exception they submitted silently and without protest; Sekosini, however, the Witch Doctor, seemed determined not to go without firing a Parthian shot, for, fixing his eyes on Dick, he shouted in a high, piercing voice:

"Listen, O 'mlungu! It is through you and your accursed magic that I go forth this day to die the death of shame and ignominy; for, but for you, we should have kept our secret, our plans would have succeeded, and ours would have been the triumph. But though your magic triumphs now, it shall not always be so. I too have a potent magic, by means of which mine eyes can pierce the veil of the future and see many things that are to be. I see you and the other 'mlungu going hence through many dangers to a far country, where other dangers await you; and, mark you this, though both go, only one of you shall return! It is enough; I have said, and I am ready."

So heavily charged with bitter hate and malignity were the tones of the witch doctors voice and the expression of his burning eyes that, despite his sober common sense, Dick could scarcely repress a shudder at the veiled threat conveyed by the man's parting words; but his attention was quickly diverted by the voice of the king commanding Ingona, Lambati, and Moroosi to listen to him while he announced his decision concerning them.

"Attend to my words, O chiefs of the Makolo nation!" said Lobelalatutu, raising his voice so that all present might distinctly hear. "Ye were present yesterday when I summoned the eight conspirators before me to defend themselves; and ye heard Ingona, Lambati, Moroosi, and Sekukuni declare that there was no treason in their hearts, but that they had been bewitched and led astray by Sekosini. I was inclined to believe them, as doubtless ye all were, and it grieved me that I should be obliged to condemn to death those who had served me well in the past, and might perchance, if they spoke the truth, serve me well again in the future. Yet how was I to know that their words were in very deed the truth? I was perplexed and troubled, and in my perplexity I sought counsel from my friend the Healer. And the counsel that he gave me was good. He said: 'Behold now, O Great One, thou shalt summon those men again before thee, and by the power of my magic I will cause them to speak the very truth to thee; thou shalt read the inmost secrets of their hearts, and thus shalt thou gauge the exact measure of their guilt in this matter.' And as the Healer spoke, so was it; the three who stand before us had indeed been beguiled and led astray for a time from their fidelity by the wiles of Sekosini, but there was no treachery in their hearts; and they confessed that, had the conspiracy ripened, they would have arrayed themselves on my side, while Sekukuni confessed that he was indeed guilty of all that he had been charged with. Therefore, although they have sinned in conspiring against me, and must consequently be punished, yet their punishment shall not be death. My sentence upon you, O Ingona, Lambati, and Moroosi! is that ye be banished hence to the farthest confines of my kingdom, and be stationed at those points where the neighbouring nations are most aggressive. There ye shall be placed in command of the troops who guard the land; there ye shall find ample outlet for your warlike propensities; and there, if ye will, ye may atone for your fault by rendering me as good service in the future as ye have rendered in the past. I have said!"

As the last words passed the king's lips a shout of irrepressible triumph and rejoicing went up from those present; for the three chiefs most intimately concerned had many friends, and were regarded by all with esteem and respect almost amounting to veneration. There is little doubt, therefore, that the king's clemency in punishing their crime by banishment to points where their duties would not only be arduous, but also honourable, did much to strengthen his position and increase his popularity.

For several days following the conspiracy trial nothing of moment happened; the excitement which had been aroused by the somewhat sensational discovery of the plot and its sequel gradually subsided, until at length everybody was once more going about his business as calmly and quietly as though nothing abnormal had ever happened. Meanwhile Dick and Grosvenor diligently applied themselves to a systematic exploration of the ruins and the taking of many photographs; they were both highly skilled amateur photographers, and were also endowed with a considerable amount of artistic taste. Moreover, Grosvenor had devoted a considerable amount of time to the perfecting of himself in the science of photography in natural colours, and had provided himself with all the requisite apparatus needed. Consequently, by the time that they had completed their labours, they found themselves possessors not only of a large number of negatives of the highest value from the archaeologist's point of view, but also of several exquisitely beautiful pictures in natural colours of the ruins as seen under various atmospheric effects, such as early morning, sunrise, and sunset, the latter being exceptionally fine because of the gorgeous hues of the sunsets which were characteristic of the place.

It was about a week after the trial of the conspirators, and the execution of the sentences passed upon them, that King Lobelalatutu sent for them both, and tendered his hearty thanks for the important service which Dick had rendered him in unravelling the details of the plot and bringing the plotters to trial, as well as for saving the life of the chief, 'Nkuni, who, under the Healer's sedulous ministrations, was already up and about again. The king took some pains to make it perfectly clear that his gratitude was both deep and absolutely sincere, even going to the length of proposing that they should take up their permanent residence in the country, and promising that if they would do so he would make them chiefs. The offer was made in perfect good faith, and had of course to be treated with the utmost—apparent—seriousness; but Dick explained that, highly as they both appreciated His Majesty's generosity, it was impossible for them to avail themselves of it for the simple reason that they had long ago made other arrangements to which they must adhere.

"Then," said the king, "if ye will not remain with me and help me by your wisdom to govern this great people, say now in what way I may reward you for the great service that ye have done me."

"There is a way," answered Dick. "Ye may remember, O Great One, that on the day when we first came to you I said that I was a seeker of gold and the stones that glitter and shine, even such stones as those that shine red in the necklace which you wear; and you said that maybe you could help me in my search. If you will cause to be shown us the place where such stones are to be found, and will give us leave to take as many as we may desire, it will be reward enough."

"Surely if that will content ye it is easily done," answered the king. "I will give orders that men shall go to the place and dig up as many of the stones as ye desire, and ye shall take them away with you whither ye will. But that is a small thing, and it pleases me not that ye shall take so little; therefore, since your journey hence is to be a far one, I will give you out of mine own herd forty picked oxen, young and strong, to draw your wagon and to make good such loss as may happen through sickness or the attack of savage beasts; and I will also give orders that so long as your way lies within my borders ye shall be supplied with all that ye may require. Is it enough?"

"It is enough, O King, and we thank you," answered Dick. "And now, behold, our work here is done; give us therefore a guide to the place of red stones, and send the diggers after us that we may be gone, for, as you have said, our journey is long, and we must hasten."

"It shall be even as ye have said," agreed the king. "When desire ye to leave me?"

"As soon as ye shall be able to provide us with a guide," answered Dick.

"Then that is even now," answered Lobelalatutu. "I grieve that ye are leaving me; but since I cannot persuade you to stay, I say: 'Go in peace, and may the Spirits watch over you that your journey be prosperous. The Place of Red Stones is distant one day's ox trek from here, therefore send forward your wagon at once with the guide whom I will give you, and ye shall follow on your horses. I know not whether we shall meet again, O Healer of Sickness and Mighty Hunter! but if ye return, the whole Makolo nation shall give you welcome. Farewell!'"

An hour later Dick and Grosvenor, having dispatched the wagon on ahead, and then gone round to bid farewell to the various chiefs, swung themselves into the saddle and, turning their backs regretfully upon the village and the ruins of Ophir, cantered off upon two magnificent horses which the king had, at the last moment, added to his gift of oxen. The animals were superb specimens of their kind, jet black without a white hair upon them, standing about fifteen-two in height, perfectly shaped, with fine, clean, sinewy legs not too long, splendid shoulders and haunches, skins like satin, perfect in temper, courageous as lions, speedy, easy-paced. They jumped like cats, and were tough as whipcord, as they found to their great satisfaction before many days were past; they were, in fact, perfect specimens of the exceptionally fine breed of horses peculiar to the Makolo country. Mounted on these magnificent animals, which seemed to carry them absolutely without effort, although neither of them was a light weight, the two riders soon overtook the slow-moving wagon, and then, carefully noting the instructions of the guide who was piloting the vehicle, passed on toward the sea that gleamed softly in the extreme distance.

A quiet, steady canter of some three hours' duration, which left their new mounts apparently as fresh as they had been at the start, brought the horsemen out upon a long stretch of sandy beach upon which the swell of the Indian Ocean broke in long lines of diamond spray, with a never- ceasing roar of deep-toned thunder; and, with a sigh of relief at the grateful coolness of the sea breeze after the stifling heat of the plain which they had just crossed, they gladly swung themselves out of the saddle and, passing their arms through their bridles, proceeded to look about them.

The beach upon which they found themselves was a very ordinary, unpicturesque-looking stretch of brown sand running practically straight, and also practically north and south, as far as the eye could see in both directions. It averaged about one hundred and twenty yards in width, was very flat, and on its landward side was bounded by a bank of red earth ranging from ten to about fifty feet in height, cut into here and there by "dongas", through one of which they had descended from the plain to the level of the sand. The ordinary high-water mark seemed nowhere to reach within less than thirty yards of the toe of the bank, but there were indications—in the shape of little patches of dry and crumbling seaweed and other ocean debris—that in stormy weather the breakers occasionally reached to the foot of the bank and in some places actually undermined it. At a distance of about half a mile to seaward a long line of white water betrayed the position of a reef.

"Um!" exclaimed Grosvenor, after he had allowed his gaze to travel over the prospect for several minutes; "this is a pretty desolate-looking spot, and no mistake; not at all the sort of place where you would expect to find precious stones, is it?"

"Why not?" retorted Dick, laughingly. "Gems are sometimes found in the most unlikely looking places. I did not expect the landscape to be distinguished by any unusual characteristics; did you?"

"'Pon my word I don't know," replied Grosvenor; "but somehow I expected it to look very different from this. After all, however, what does the beauty or otherwise of the landscape matter, so long as the rubies are really here? And I suppose they are here, somewhere, eh? We haven't made a mistake and come out at the wrong spot, do you think?"

"Well," admitted Dick, "we may not have hit the precise spot perhaps, but I think we cannot be more than half a mile from it. Perhaps the quickest way of finding it will be to search for it. Now, just let me think for a moment. Those Flying-Fish people started by searching the beach. The Professor, possessing superior knowledge to the others, searched the face of the cliff; and finally, when the precise locality of the mine had been discovered, they went to work with pickaxe and shovel and dug their way down to the level of the 'pocket'. I think our best plan would be to search for that hole, which must still be conspicuous enough to admit of identification. Let us return, by way of the donga, to the top of the cliff, and, starting from there, ride along close to the cliff edge, you taking one direction and I the other. We ought to come across it within half a mile, or a mile at most."

"Right you are, old chappie, come along," answered Grosvenor, preparing to mount. As, however, he placed his left foot in the stirrup, and was about to spring into the saddle, Dick checked him.

"Hold on a moment, Phil," he exclaimed, his eyes intently searching a certain part of the cliff about a quarter of a mile distant. "Do you see that notch in the line of the cliff, over there? From here it looks something like a 'breakdown', but it may be the very spot we want to find. Anyhow it is quite worth examining; and if it should prove not to be the mine we can at all events reach the top of the cliff by means of it, and can start our search from there. Come along." The next moment the pair were up and cantering toward the spot.

At the point toward which they were riding the cliff was quite low, its crest being not more than some fifteen feet above the level of the beach; therefore, although the notch or gap was of but insignificant width, it reached from top to bottom of the cliff face, and offered a way, of sorts, from the beach to the level of the plain above; but as the horsemen drew near they saw that although it was a 'breakdown' or collapse of the cliff face, it was undoubtedly caused by an artificial excavation which had had its origin a few yards inland from the line of the crest. They rode right into it, and found themselves in a sort of basin-shaped pit, one side of which having broken away had left the gap through which they had entered. A single glance around sufficed to assure them that they had reached the place of which they were in search, and dismounting they flung their bridles over their horses' heads to the ground, leaving them to stand, as they had been trained to do, while they proceeded at once to search the place for its precious contents.

They had not to look far. It was evident that time and weather had wrought some slight changes in the place since it had last been worked, the changes consisting chiefly of falls of earth from the sides, here and there; but pebbles, singly and in little groups of half a dozen or so, were plentifully strewed about the surface of the soil, and the very first one examined proved to be exactly similar in character to those of which the king's necklace was composed. Such, however, was not invariably the case, many of the stones which the searchers picked up turning out to be quite worthless; nevertheless ten minutes sufficed to satisfy the prospectors that the source of boundless wealth lay practically within reach of their hands, for during that short period each of them had secured a dozen rubies of varying size, from that of a pea up to pebbles as large as a pigeon's egg, while Grosvenor had been lucky enough to find a specimen as large as a duck's egg. By the end of an hour they had more than doubled the amount of their find, and had filled their jacket pockets as full as it was prudent to load them; but it was evident that, profitable as this desultory, haphazard method of search had proved to be, much better results might be hoped for from systematic pick-and-shovel work; accordingly they agreed to suspend further operations until the arrival of the wagon, and the party of labourers which had been placed at their disposal by Lobelalatutu; they, therefore, scrambled out of the pit and set about searching for a suitable site for their camp, eventually pitching upon a spot about a quarter of a mile distant from the mine.

By the time that the wagon arrived and the tent had been pitched the day was too far advanced to make it worth while for work to be started. It was, therefore, decided to give the workers a good long night's rest after their wearisome tramp from the king's village, and an hour after sunset saw the entire party wrapped in profound sleep.

But with the appearance of the sun above the sea's rim, on the following morning, everybody was once more astir; and after an early breakfast a general adjournment was made to the mine, where, under Dick Maitland's superintendence, a dozen parties of the Makolo were soon actively engaged with their native mattocks and shovels in excavating the soil in search of the precious stones, one-half of each party being employed upon the work of digging, while the other half turned over the excavated soil and extracted from it all the stones which it happened to contain, Dick and Grosvenor employing themselves meanwhile in passing from party to party and sorting out the rubies from the worthless stones upturned. In this way considerable progress was made, and by midday a very handsome pile of rubies had been accumulated, consisting, however, for the most part of relatively small stones.

It was not, however, until late in the afternoon that their real good luck came to them, and then it came all in a moment. A party of the natives who had for some time been left to themselves had excavated quite a little cavern in the side of the pit, and, as might have been expected, this mode of working ultimately resulted in a "cave-in". Fortunately for them, the workers who were responsible for it detected the signs of the approaching fall in time to avoid being buried by it; and when the dust-cloud occasioned by it presently subsided, and the new face thus laid bare came to be examined, it was discovered that a veritable "pocket" of rubies had been exposed, the stones—every one of them of large size and especially fine fire and colour—being so numerous that almost every shovelful of earth turned over contained one or more! They were all, without exception, so very much finer than the finest that had hitherto been found that the latter were there and then incontinently discarded, and a fresh collection was at once begun, the whole body of natives being concentrated upon this one spot. So enormously rich did this "pocket" prove to be that when at length the declining sun gave warning that the moment to cease work had arrived, Dick and Grosvenor were fain to acknowledge to each other that, eager as the former was to make his fortune, they had now collected sufficient rubies to constitute not one but two exceedingly handsome fortunes, and that in any case the quantity acquired was as great as it would be at all prudent to cumber themselves with in view of the long and arduous journey that still lay before them.



CHAPTER TWELVE.

LIFE IN THE WILD.

Dawn of the following morning, which in that latitude preceded the rising of the sun by but a bare quarter of an hour, witnessed the awakening of the white men's camp to a scene of brisk activity; for the after-dinner conversation of the previous evening between Dick and Grosvenor had resulted in their arrival at a decision to make an immediate start on the long trek which they hoped would end in their discovery of the mysterious white race, which rumour persistently asserted to exist somewhere in the far interior of the great Dark Continent, and the approximate situation of which they had gleaned from their friend Mitchell, the Natal sugar planter.

Breakfast was soon over; and while Jantje and 'Nkuku were away, rounding-up the cattle and driving them in, preparatory to inspanning, Dick and Grosvenor opened a case and proceeded to reward munificently the gang of Makolo labourers who had helped them in the acquisition of the rubies, with a generous distribution of beads, brass wire, empty tobacco tins, lengths of coloured print, and toys, finally dismissing them happy in the possession of what, to these simple savages, was wealth beyond anything that they had ever ventured to dream of. Then, the cattle being inspanned, the little party headed away inland, in a north-westerly direction, striking a small stream by which they outspanned, three hours later. On that day week they struck a river of some importance flowing through an exceedingly fertile country abounding in game, and the upward course of this river they followed for the next eight days, although it led them somewhat out of their way; for they found, upon scouting in the direction which they wished to pursue, that their direct course would soon carry them into an arid, waterless district, infested, moreover, by tsetse fly, to enter which would infallibly result in a serious loss of cattle. And the preservation of their cattle was now, or very soon would be, a matter of vital importance to them.

At length the two leaders of the expedition, industriously scouting daily toward the direction in which they wished to travel, found that they had reached a point where it would be safe for them to leave the river and strike away toward the west and north-west, and they immediately did so, the country in that direction being free from fly, and consisting of wide-rolling plateaux, rising one beyond another, somewhat like broad, shallow steps, with a solitary, lofty hill rising in the extreme distance. This district was well watered by a number of tiny rivulets, and was clothed with rich young grass thickly dotted with clumps of mimosa, palmetto, and other tropical growth, amid which game of various kinds could be seen moving, including a small herd of giraffes.

This was much too good an opportunity to be missed. The friends therefore, after taking careful note of the spot where the immense animals were feeding, returned to the wagon and, having provided themselves with an abundant supply of ammunition, changed their saddles from the horses that they had hitherto been riding to the two which had been presented to them by King Lobelalatutu, and cantered off, after giving Mafuta—whom they left in charge of the wagon and stock—strict injunctions to make for a certain indicated spot, and there outspan and await them.

The light breeze which was blowing happened to be favourable to their approach, and they had arrived within a hundred yards of the large clump of mimosa in which they had last seen the giraffes feeding, when a heavy swishing and crashing of branches caused them to draw rein; and the next moment an enormous elephant emerged from the thicket, and stood looking about him as he flourished a great branch of foliage in his trunk, with which he seemed to be keeping the flies at bay. For a few seconds he seemed to be unaware of the presence of the hunters, and stood angrily switching the branch about his head and back, grunting and grumbling to himself, as though he was not in precisely the best of tempers. He was an immense tusker, by far the biggest that the travellers had thus far encountered, and that he was the hero of many battles seemed evident, for both his tusks were broken off short, leaving only about a foot of jagged ivory protruding from each jaw. The first impulse of the two hunters was to swing themselves gently out of their saddles and take a shot at him, for the huge beast was standing in a very favourable position, nearly broadside on; but Grosvenor, happening to notice the broken tusks, settled back into his seat again, murmuring, as he did so:

"Let's leave the poor beggar alone, Dick; he's not worth shooting. See his tusks?"

It was practically impossible for the animal to have heard Grosvenor's voice, for he purposely spoke in low tones, in order to avoid attracting the elephant's attention; yet as the words were spoken the huge brute faced sharply round toward the two horsemen, and stood attentively regarding them for a moment. Then, tossing aside the branch with which he had been whisking himself, he threw up his trunk, and, trumpeting savagely, charged straight toward them.

"No use waiting; let's scatter!" shouted Grosvenor, and, obedient to a touch of the heel and bridle, the two magnificent horses which the friends bestrode swerved round as though upon pivots, and dashed off in a direction at right angles to each other. For an instant the great beast seemed disconcerted at this manoeuvre, and appeared unable to make up his mind which enemy he would pursue, first following one of them for a yard or two, and then turning in pursuit of the other; but presently it seemed to dawn upon him that he could not possibly hope to overtake both, and his final choice was Grosvenor, whom he settled down to chase in grim earnest, his long trunk outstretched to its utmost limit, his immense ears flapping furiously, and his small eyes sombre with concentrated hatred. As soon as Dick saw that the brute had definitely marked down Grosvenor as his prey he turned his bridle and rode in a direction parallel with that which was being followed by pursued and pursuer, and began to shout loudly, in the hope of again causing the elephant to hesitate, even if he could not altogether divert him from his pursuit of Grosvenor; but the ruse was vain, the monster glanced viciously once in Dick's direction, but refused to be diverted from his fell purpose.

At the beginning of this singular race there had not been the slightest doubt in Dick's mind as to its ultimate result; he felt absolutely confident that, suberbly mounted as they were, they would be able to gallop away from their pursuer and elude him with the utmost ease; but now, to his consternation, he began to realise that, so far at least as Grosvenor was concerned, escape was distinctly doubtful, unless something could be done toward altering the existing conditions. For, strong and speedy as were the horses, they were frightfully handicapped in the race by the grass, which at this particular spot happened to be unusually long—reaching as high as the horses' shoulders—tough, and tangled, rendering it exceedingly difficult for them to force a passage through it, while to the huge bulk and momentum of the elephant it seemed to offer no obstacle at all. The great beast was rapidly gaining upon Grosvenor, and as rapidly forging ahead of Dick, upon whom it began to dawn that, unless something were speedily done to prevent it, a tragedy must inevitably ensue.

He looked anxiously about him, and saw that, at a distance of about a mile, the patch of long rank grass came to an end and was succeeded by short smooth turf, over which the going would be everything that could be desired; but it was much too distant to be of any service in the present emergency. For the elephant was gaining at every stride and must inevitably overtake the fugitive long before he could reach it, while the horses were already beginning to show signs of distress as they plunged panting through the obstructing tangle, in the midst of which they were constantly stumbling as their outflung feet encountered, and were caught in, some especially tough patch of the knotted vegetation.

What was to be done? Something; and that right quickly if— As the thought was flashing through Dick's brain he saw his friend's horse stumble heavily, make a desperate effort to recover himself, and finally roll over and disappear completely with his rider in the dense ocean of greenish-grey vegetation, while the elephant, a bare fifty yards in the rear, threw up his outstretched trunk and trumpeted a loud blast of savage exultation. There was now but one thing to be done, and the only question in Dick's mind was whether there was time enough left and, excited as he was, whether he had the necessary steadiness of hand to do it. But it must be attempted, at any rate, so, unslinging his rifle, he set it at full cock as he galloped, held it pistol-wise in his hand, pointed it full at the huge bulk of the elephant, and pulled the trigger. The jar of the recoil nearly dislocated his elbow, and for a fraction of a second he feared that all was lost. But even as the fear gripped his heart, turning him sick and faint, the enormous beast suddenly halted, swayed unsteadily for a moment on his great pillar-like legs, and then collapsed in a heap. As he did so Dick, to his intense relief, saw the prostrate horse and rider scramble to their feet almost within arm's length of the fallen monster.

"Mount and ride, you duffer!" shrieked Dick, as he saw Grosvenor stand, apparently stupefied, staring at the prostrate beast; "he may be only stunned; and if he gets up again nothing can save you. Or, better still, empty your magazine into his skull as he lies."

"There is no need, my dear chap," answered Grosvenor calmly; "it would only be a sinful waste of valuable cartridges. The brute is as dead as mutton; your bullet caught him behind the ear all right, and is no doubt deeply embedded in his brain. It was a splendid shot, especially considering that it was fired from the saddle, and at full gallop too. I congratulate you on it, old man. And, before I forget it, let me thank you for saving my life. If you had not fired as promptly as you did he would have had me, sure as fate, and I should have been a goner— eh, what?"

Although Grosvenor spoke in a tone of light raillery it but thinly disguised the depth of feeling that stirred him, as Dick fully realised when he pulled up alongside his friend and they exchanged hand-grips. Lightly as he spoke of the incident, Phil knew right well that he was on the very edge of disaster at the moment that Dick pulled trigger, and though he would fain have treated the whole adventure as a joke he was none the less grateful to Dick for his timely intervention, and the pressure of his hand was quite as eloquent as much outpouring of words.

"By Jove," exclaimed Dick, as he swung out of his saddle and loosened the girths, to enable his horse the more readily to recover his wind, "what a monster! He is far and away the biggest elephant that I have ever seen; and if his tusks had been unbroken they would have been a prize worth having, if only as curiosities. As it is, I don't think it will be worth while to waste time in cutting out the stumps; do you? Poor beggar, he must have been suffering pretty badly from toothache; see how tremendously that left gum is swollen. That means an abscess at the root of the tusk that must have been dreadfully painful. No wonder that he was in such a dickens of a bad temper! Well, he is of no value to us, except as a contribution to our larder, so we may as well be going. We will mark the spot where he lies, and send Mafuta and Jantje for one of his feet, which will furnish us with an epicurean dinner to- night. And now I suppose we may as well go and look for the wagon, for of course the giraffes cleared out directly the rumpus began."

They camped that night in the midst of a wide plateau dotted here and there with low kopjes of outcropping granite, and clothed for the most part with melkboom interspersed with patches of low thornbush and sun- dried grass; and, from the fact that they had met with no water since noon, they greeted with much satisfaction the discovery of a shallow water-hole of some two acres in extent, within about half a mile of which they outspanned for the night, an hour before sunset. They did not care to approach nearer to the water than this, for upon inspecting the place they became aware, from the spoor in the mud all round the margin, that it was the favourite if not the only drinking place for all the animals in the neighbourhood, and past experienced had taught them that the nocturnal sounds emanating from such a spot were the reverse of favourable to sleep. Moreover, they had detected among the most recent spoor that of lions; and for the sake of their cattle they preferred to keep at a respectful distance from a place frequented by such formidable animals.

At one spot this miniature lake was bordered by a patch of reeds of considerable extent, which looked as though it might harbour a few wild duck; therefore, as soon as the wagon was outspanned, the two friends took their shot guns and a couple of dogs which had manifested some talent at retrieving, and made their way toward the reeds, warning Jantje to be careful to water the cattle as far as possible from the spot toward which they were making. Leo, the lion cub, by this time very nearly half-grown, would fain have accompanied the sportsmen, for he had developed an extraordinary attachment to both of his white masters. He loved nothing better than to accompany them on their rambles, and was as obedient as any of the dogs, with whom he was on the best of terms; but it was deemed best on this occasion that he should be taken to water on a leash, with the cattle, and return with them to the wagon. He was therefore left behind, much to his disgust.

Choosing what seemed to be advantageous positions, the two sportsmen, each accompanied by a dog, carefully ambushed themselves among the reeds at a distance of about a hundred yards from each other and, crouching low, patiently awaited the course of events. They had not long to wait for proof of the soundness of their judgment, for they had not been in position more than half an hour—by which time the sun, magnified to twice his size by the evening vapours through which he glowed, palpitating like a ball of white-hot steel, hung upon the very edge of the horizon—when a whirring of wings warned them to be on the alert, and a moment later a flock of some fifty teal, which must have been feeding on some far-off marsh during the day, settled down upon the surface of the water, with much splashing and loud quacks of satisfaction at having once more reached what they doubtless believed to be a haven of safety. But if they really entertained any such belief they were most deplorably mistaken, for that fate which rules the destiny of wild duck ordained that they should settle on the precise patch of water that was fully commanded by both sportsmen, and some three seconds later both guns spoke practically at the same instant, and up went the teal again with a great whir of wings and loud cries of consternation, leaving behind them a round dozen or more of dead and wounded floating upon the rippled surface of the water.

By the time that the whole of the "bag" had been retrieved the dusk was deepening into darkness, and star after star was twinkling into view from the vast, cloudless, purple dome above. The two friends, therefore, scrambled forth from their hiding places and, perfectly satisfied with themselves and all things else, prepared to make their way back to the wagon.

They had not progressed above two dozen paces beyond the margin of the reeds, however, when Grosvenor, who was leading the way along a narrow track through the coarse grass, uttered a sharp ejaculation, and halted suddenly in his tracks, the next moment stamping violently on something just before him.

"What is the matter, old chap?" demanded Dick, stepping quickly to his friend's side.

"Snake!" replied Grosvenor briefly, and in a rather tremulous tone of voice; "trod on him—unintentionally of course—and the beggar turned sand bit me. Take that—and that—and that, you brute—"

"Where is the thing?" demanded Dick anxiously.

"There," responded Grosvenor, pointing to a writhing, twisting something that squirmed on the grass as he ground the heel of his heavy boot on it.

"Take your foot away, man, and let me have a look at it," commanded Dick; and as the other did as he was ordered Maitland bent down and directed a quick, keen glance at the reptile, about six inches of whose body was crushed almost to a jelly. Then, quickly pinning the flat, heart-shaped head to the ground with the muzzle of his gun, he pulled the trigger, and thus effectually put an end to the creature's existence. With the barrel of his weapon he deftly whisked the still writhing body half a dozen yards away into the long grass, and then turned sharply to his friend.

"Sit down, old chap, quick," he said, "and show me where you were bitten."

Somewhat startled by his companion's abrupt manner, Grosvenor seated himself on the ground and drew up his left trouser leg, pulled down his sock, and revealed two small punctures close together in the lower part of the calf of the leg, barely visible in the fast-decreasing light.

"I see," ejaculated Dick, fumbling in his waistcoat pocket as he spoke. "Take your pocket handkerchief, quick; tie it round your leg below the knee, and with the barrel of your revolver twist it as tight as you possibly can, tourniquet fashion, so as to stop the passage of the blood into your body. Now," as he drew forth and opened a penknife, the blade of which he made a point of always keeping razor-keen, "I am going to hurt you a little bit, so set your teeth and bear it, old man."

"All right; go ahead," responded Grosvenor. "Was the brute venomous, then?"

"Can't say," responded Dick evasively, as he quickly slashed the flesh across and across over the two punctures; "but we are not taking any more chances to-day, my boy."

The blood, instead of spurting from the knife wounds, oozed forth thick and sluggishly; whereupon Dick, without a second's hesitation, applied his lips to the gashes, which were close together, and sucked strongly for about a quarter of an hour, spitting out the blood which gradually began to flow a little more freely. Finally, when the flow had ceased, he groped in his pocket and produced a small case containing a stick of lunar caustic; then from another pocket he drew forth a box of matches, which he handed to Grosvenor.

"I'll relieve you of this," he said, laying his hand upon the revolver, the barrel of which Phil had twisted in the handkerchief and had been holding in place all this while, "and you can start striking matches, so that I may see what I am doing." Then, giving the revolver an extra twist or two, he pulled out his own handkerchief and deftly secured the weapon in place, after which he proceeded, by the light of the matches which Grosvenor struck, one after the other, carefully and thoroughly to cauterize the wounds.

"There," he remarked cheerfully, with a sigh of relief as he finished his task, "that is as much as we can do here. The next thing is to get you back to the camp as soon as possible."

"All right," assented Grosvenor. "But," he added, as he attempted to rise, "I'm afraid I shall have to get you to help me, old chap; I couldn't possibly—"

"Of course you couldn't," responded Dick, "and I don't mean that you shall try. Just sit where you are for a little while longer, and leave me to arrange things." Therewith he drew a whistle from the pocket of his hunting shirt, and upon it blew three piercing blasts in quick succession that, in the breathless stillness of the night, might have been heard at least a mile away. He repeated the signal at brief intervals for about ten minutes, when answering shouts were heard, whereupon he drew three or four matches from the box, bunched them together, ignited them, and held the tiny torch aloft to guide Mafuta and Jantje, whose voices he recognised. A minute later they both arrived upon the scene, anxious to know what was amiss, and received Dick's hurried explanation with many Au's! of surprise and apprehension. Then, in obedience to his brief but concise instruction, they hurried away again at a run, to return with very commendable celerity, bearing Grosvenor's hammock and a long pole, hacked from the nearest tree they could find. The hammock having been spread upon the ground, the patient was, under Dick's anxious supervision, laid very carefully upon it, so that there might be as little movement of his body as possible; and finally, the hammock having been securely lashed to the pole, the whole was raised upon the shoulders of the two blacks and by them borne to the camp. Arrived there, the hammock was, still with the utmost gentleness and care, slung inside the tent, the lamp was lighted, and Dick proceeded to examine his patient afresh.

By this time the wounded limb had become terribly swollen, and Grosvenor complained of severe pain about the injured region. This, of course, was not to be wondered at, considering the rather heroic treatment to which the leg had been subjected, and Dick was not very greatly concerned about it. But what caused him to look very grave was the fact that his patient also complained of feeling cold, and manifested symptoms of approaching delirium, while his whole body was now beginning to be convulsed, at rapidly shortening intervals, by spasms of violent and uncontrollable twitching. Without wasting a moment Dick now had recourse to alcohol, freely dosing his patient with neat brandy, in the hope of inducing a condition of intoxication—for he knew that if he could succeed in this the excess of alcohol in the system would neutralise the venom, and his patient would be saved. But it was not until he had administered nearly a quart of the spirit that the desired symptoms began to appear; and it was long past midnight before the twitching convulsions entirely ceased and the patient sank into a deathlike sleep; by this time also the swelling of the limb was perceptibly subsiding; and when at length Dick turned down the lamp and disposed himself to take such rest as he might be able to snatch in a folding chair by the side of his friend's hammock, he had the satisfaction of knowing that the crisis was past and Phil would live.

Up to this moment the young doctor had been far too busy and altogether too deeply preoccupied in attending upon his patient to give any attention to, or indeed be more than vaguely aware of, what was happening outside the tent, although there certainly had been moments when sounds of a more than usually alarming character had reached his ears so distinctly and obtrusively as partially to distract his attention for the fraction of a second or so; but now that Grosvenor was asleep and safe, and Dick began to feel that he also would be the better for a little rest, outside sounds began to obtrude themselves upon him with a force and persistency that would not be denied, and he awoke to a consciousness of the fact that something quite out of his ordinary experience was happening.

At first he was disposed to attribute the babel of sound that reached his ears to the fact that the party were outspanned in close—almost too close—proximity to the only water that, so far as he knew, existed for many miles round, and which was consequently the regular drinking place for every living creature in the neighbourhood, as he and his chum had already ascertained. Indeed the incessant bellowing, snorting, trumpeting, roaring, splashing, and squealing that, slightly mellowed by distance, penetrated to the interior of the tent, was quite enough to justify such an idea. But he had scarcely settled himself in his chair beside Grosvenor's hammock, and closed his eyes in the hope of wooing sleep to them, than he became aware of other and nearer sounds, dominating the first, the sound of crackling flames, frequent low, muttered ejaculations, the occasional soft thud and swish of feet running through long grass, followed by a shout or two which was almost invariably responded to by a low, angry snarl, while the clashing of horns, the rattling of the trek chain, the almost continuous lowing and moaning of the oxen, the stamping of the horses tethered to the wagon, and the whining of the dogs, indicated the extreme restlessness and uneasiness of the animals. The disturbance was so much greater than usual that Dick finally felt called upon to investigate. So, rising from his chair, he cast a quick glance at his patient which assured him that all was well there, and then, raising the flap of the tent, stepped forth into the open air.

The first sight that greeted him was that of about a dozen fires arranged in a circle round about the tiny camp, in the ruddy-yellow, flickering glare of which he saw Mafuta, Jantje, and 'Nkuku flitting hither and thither, tending the fires and feeding them from an enormous stack of thorns and branches piled up near the wagon, while Ramoo Samee, the Indian groom, stood with the horses, talking to them, caressing them, and soothing their excitement by every means in his power. Most of the oxen, instead of lying down, were on their feet, their tails swishing agitatedly from side to side, their heads turning quickly this way and that, their ears twitching, their nostrils distended, sniffing the air, their hoofs stamping the earth impatiently, while their eyes glowed and shone in the light of the fires, and ever and anon one or another of them would throw up his head and give vent to a low, moaning bellow, which told, as eloquently as words, their state of terror. As for the dogs, they were all huddled together beneath the wagon, shivering with fear, their tails between their legs, and their lips drawn back, revealing their fangs, in a sort of snarling grin. Leo was the only animal who did not seem very greatly perturbed, but even he was awake, and lay crouching at the extreme end of his tether, his eyes lambently aglow, and his tail softly beating the earth now and then.

"Ho there, Mafuta!" called Dick, as he stood taking in the scene and admiring the generally romantic effect of it all—the glowing fires, the wavering columns of smoke, the uneasy animals, the flitting figures, the great bulk of the wagon with its white canvas tent aglow with the firelight, and the mellow stars raining down their soft radiance; "what is all the disturbance about?"

"Lions, baas," answered the Kafir as he paused for a moment, his arms filled with a great bundle of branches which he was carrying to the fires, and his great bronze body shining with perspiration; "we are beset by them; and if the fires were allowed to die down they would rush in upon us, and kill or stampede the whole of the oxen and horses. See there—and there—and there," he added, pointing into the darkness beyond the glow of the fires.

Dick looked, but could at first see nothing, his eyes as yet being dazzled by the light of the flames, but presently, looking in the direction toward which Mafuta pointed, he caught sight of first one pair of greenishyellow orbs, and then another, and another, gleaming out of the darkness, until finally he counted no less than seven pairs of eyes, all intently staring inward. By the flitting to and fro of some of these pairs of eyes Dick perceived that certain of the lions were regularly making the circuit of the camp, some in one direction, some in the other, apparently searching for an unguarded spot at which they might venture to make a dash; but there were three pairs of eyes that remained stationary, as though their owners were patiently awaiting a signal of some sort. These, Dick decided, were the most dangerous of their foes, and at the same time the most easy to deal with, because of their immovability; so, returning to the tent he first cast a quick glance at the still soundly sleeping form of Grosvenor. Then he took up his bandolier, threw it over his shoulder and adjusted it in position, seized his rifle and satisfied himself that it was fully loaded, and again made his way outside.

It took a minute or two for his eyes again to adjust themselves to the peculiar conditions of the light, but presently he again caught sight of one of the motionless pairs of eyes, and, sinking upon one knee, he raised his rifle to his shoulder, carefully brought its two sights accurately in line with a point midway between the two glowing orbs, and pressed the trigger. The sharp, whip-like crack of the weapon was answered by several low, snarling growls, and a swishing of the grass suggestive of several heavy bodies bounding away through it, while the stationary and moving pairs of eyes vanished, as if by magic; and a minute or two later some four or five of the oxen lay down where they were tethered to the trek chain, with a sigh of obvious relief.

"They are gone, baas," remarked Mafuta, as he again passed with more fuel; "but we must keep up the fires; for they are almost certain to come back again. They are young lions who have been driven away from the pool, and not allowed to hunt there by the old ones, and they are hungry. Yes, they will come back again; and you will perhaps have to kill two or three more before they will go away and leave us alone."

"Do you think, then, that I got the fellow I fired at?" demanded Dick.

"Yes, baas," answered Mafuta with confidence. "I heard the bullet strike. You will find the beast, dead, out there, when the day breaks. But see, yonder, baas, they are slinking back; there is one pair of eyes over there, and I saw another in that direction—yes, there they are again. Ah! now they are gone—but, look there, baas, see you those two pairs? No, no, do not shoot yet; wait until they come quite close; then—shoot and kill. Where is that schelm, Jantje, and why is he not feeding the fires? If they are not kept up we shall yet lose half our oxen!"



CHAPTER THIRTEEN.

THE MYSTERIOUS WHITE RACE.

Two more lions fell to Dick's rifle that night, before the brutes were finally scared out of their projected attack upon the camp; but it was not until the first signs of dawn were paling the eastern sky, and all the multitudinous sounds in the neighbourhood of the water-hole had long subsided into complete silence, that the watchers felt at liberty to cease their vigil and snatch an hour or two of much-needed rest. Meanwhile, Grosvenor remained completely sunk in the lethargic sleep which had resulted from the saturation of his system with alcohol.

Although the blacks had been up and working hard all night, they were astir again very soon after sunrise; and the first thing they did was to go out and bring into camp the carcasses of the three dead lions, in order that Dick's eyes might be gladdened by the sight of them upon his emergence from the tent. Then, while Jantje and 'Nkuku loosed the oxen and drove them to the water-hole, Ramoo Samee prepared a couple of cups of strong black coffee, which Mafuta carried into the tent; and as the Kafir looped back the flaps of the entrance, giving admission to a flood of brilliant sunlight and a brisk gush of cool, invigorating air, Dick stirred uneasily in his hammock, sat up, rubbed his eyes, and exclaimed, sleepily:

"Hillo, Mafuta, surely it is not yet time to turn out, is it? I don't seem to have been asleep more than half a minute." Then his glance fell upon Grosvenor's hammock, and memory instantly returned to him; he sprang to his feet and laid his finger upon his patient's pulse, and as he did so Grosvenor uttered a low groan and, opening his eyes, looked dazedly up into the eyes of the friend who bent over him.

"Hullo, Dick," he murmured, "that you? I say, old chap," endeavouring to rise, "what the dickens is the matter with me? I feel like a—a— boiled owl; my head is aching as though it would split, and my mouth is as dry as a limekiln. And—look here, old man, why are you holding me down in my hammock like this? Am I not to get up to-day, eh, or—"

"Certainly not, at least not just yet," answered Dick firmly. "And never mind about your head, or your mouth; what does your leg feel like? Here, just let me have a look at it." And, gently lifting the limb and pushing up the leg of the trousers, in which Grosvenor had lain all night, he laid bare the injury. The swelling, although it had not quite disappeared, had subsided so greatly that the limb had once more come to bear some semblance to a human leg, and the livid purple tint had almost faded out, while the cauterised wounds were perfectly dry and healthy in appearance. But when Dick began to gently pinch and prod the injured member, and to ask: "Does that hurt at all?" it became evident that there was a distinct numbness in the limb, as far up as the knee. But this did not very greatly distress Dick; all the signs were indicative of the fact that the venom in the blood had been effectually neutralised; and as for the numbness, that would probably pass off in the course of the day.

"Well, Doctor," said Grosvenor whimsically, "what is your verdict— favourable, or otherwise? I remember now that I was bitten by a beastly snake, last night, and that you did several things to me that made me feel horribly queer, but I don't quite remember how I got to the tent. Was the brute venomous?"

"About as venomous as it could well be," answered Dick. "But you need have no fear," he added, seeing a look of anxiety spring into his patient's eyes; "the danger is quite over; now all that we have to think about is how to cure that headache of yours. And here, just in the nick of time, Mafuta has brought us our coffee. Take your cup and drink it at once; and if in the course of the next half-hour you feel no better, I will mix you a draught. Stop a moment; just look me straight in the eye; yes, that is right; now drink your coffee; it will completely cure your headache, and you will immediately fall asleep, waking again in time for breakfast."

Grosvenor obediently took the cup, drained it, and lay back on his pillow.

"Thanks, old chap," he murmured; "that's good; I—I—feel—" and was asleep.

"That's all right," murmured Dick meditatively, as his eyes rested upon the other's placid countenance. "Why did not I remember to try that kind of thing last night! It might have helped matters a good deal. Ah well! I'll not forget next time. Now, Mafuta," he continued, turning to the Kafir; "what about the lions? How many did I kill last night?"

"Three, baas," answered Mafuta; "that is to say, two lions and one lioness, all full-grown, but quite young, and in grand condition, their teeth and claws quite perfect."

"Is that so?" queried Dick. "Then I suppose you have been out to have a look at them?"

"Yes, baas," answered the black; "we went out and brought them in. They are now just outside the tent."

"Very well," said Dick, draining his coffee. "I will have a look at them. And—what about my bath? I suppose there is no chance of one this morning, eh?"

"Ramoo Samee and I have each brought two buckets of water from the hole, and the Inkose's bath is ready for him when he will," answered Mafuta.

Grosvenor's sleep appeared to have been extraordinarily beneficial, for when he awoke to the rattle of crockery as Mafuta busied himself in the arrangement of the breakfast table, not only was he absolutely free from headache, and all the other unpleasant symptoms of which he had complained two hours earlier, but his general condition was also greatly improved, the swelling of the injured limb had subsided, the flesh had recovered its natural colour, the numb feeling had almost disappeared, and now all that remained to remind him of his disagreeable and perilous adventure of the previous night was the smarting and burning sensation of the cauterised wound itself, which he endured with stoical composure, and indeed laughed at as a trifle not worth wasting words about. But he was fully alive to the frightful nature of the peril from which he had so narrowly escaped, and was so earnest and profuse in his thanks to Dick for having twice saved his life in the course of a few hours that at length the young medico laughingly threatened to gag him if he did not instantly change the topic of conversation. One of the best signs of his progress towards complete recovery, perhaps, was the voracious appetite which he developed when breakfast was placed upon the table. But it was not until late in the afternoon that Dick allowed him to rise from his hammock; then it was only permitted in order that the camp might be moved somewhat farther from the water-hole, with the object of avoiding a recurrence of the annoyances of the preceding night.

By the following morning Grosvenor was practically well again, and, with his injured leg well protected by a bandage, was once more able to mount a horse; the march was therefore resumed, and came to an unadventurous end in a small valley, watered by a tiny brook, as the sun was sinking beneath the western horizon. Thenceforward their progress was steady, averaging about twenty miles a day, for six days a week, Sunday being always observed as a rest day, whenever possible, primarily for the sake of the cattle, it must be confessed, which it was found required at least one day's rest in every seven upon such a prolonged journey as that upon which they were now engaged. The journey was not altogether devoid of adventure, by any means; for upon one occasion they killed no less than five of their oxen through overwork during a hurried flight from the neighbourhood of a devastating grass fire; they lost three more at one fell swoop while crossing a flooded river; six succumbed to snake bites; four fell a prey to lions; and seven died of sickness believed to have been induced by the eating of some poisonous plant. But, after all, these were merely the ordinary accidents incidental to travel in the African wilderness, and would need too much space to be recorded in detail. The natives whom they encountered from time to time during their progress were by no means uniformly friendly, but tact and firmness, coupled with an occasional demonstration of the terribly destructive qualities of their firearms, and a judicious distribution of presents among the chiefs, secured them from actual molestation, though there were times when it seemed to be, figuratively speaking, a toss-up, whether they would or would not have to choose between being turned back or "wiped out."

Indeed now, when they had been continuously journeying for nearly three months since they had turned their backs upon the friendly Makolo nation, and were daily receiving fresh evidence that they were drawing very near to the goal of their long pilgrimage, it was by the merest chance, the most extraordinary caprice of the king into whose country they had penetrated, that they were permitted to live and accorded freedom to pursue their journey unmolested. For the savages among whom they now found themselves seemed to be possessed of an extraordinarily virulent animus, or prejudice—call it which you will—against whiteskins, due, as the travellers eventually discovered, to the fact that a nation of whites inhabited the adjacent territory, between whom and the blacks, who surrounded them on all sides, an implacable enmity had existed as far back as history or even legend extended. From whence those white people had come, or how long they had inhabited the land of which they held such stubborn possession, there was no record to tell; but the grievance of the blacks seemed to consist in the fact that the interlopers—as they chose to regard them—occupied the whole of a peculiarly rich and fertile tract of country from which, though they were relatively few in number, they resolutely refused to be dislodged; while the surrounding territory, occupied by the blacks, was comparatively poor, sterile, and ill-watered, affording an ever more scanty subsistence to the steadily growing population. Also there was a widespread belief, amounting to conviction among the blacks, that their white neighbours were wont to punish such attempts as were made from time to time to drive them out, by putting all prisoners to death in a variety of peculiarly hideous forms—although it was by no means clear how this belief arose, since no prisoners ever returned to throw any light upon the subject.

It is not, perhaps, greatly to be wondered at if, under such circumstances, the blacks had gradually come to regard the possessor of a white skin as the incarnation of everything that was superlatively detestable, and a person to be destroyed promptly with as little hesitation or compunction as one would destroy a particularly venomous snake; and such was the feeling which Grosvenor and Dick inspired in the breasts of those natives in whose hands they found themselves upon a certain memorable day. It was at first proposed to put them to the torture sans ceremonie; but a certain petty chief, anxious to curry favour with the king, intervened in the nick of time, and, having made prisoners of the entire party, sent the whole of them, including the wagon, oxen, horses, and animals generally, to the king's village, in order that His Majesty might have his full share of such sport as the torture of the white men might furnish. This journey, however, occupied five days, during the progress of which the two white men proved to be so different in every respect from the only other white men whom the blacks had ever encountered, to be possessed of such strange powers, and to be, generally, such "kittle cattle" to deal with, that the king, learning that these strangers were bent upon entering the territory of his white neighbours, ultimately came to the somewhat cynical conclusion that he could kill two birds with one stone, so to speak, by allowing the formidable strangers to go their way and inflict the maximum amount of annoyance and damage upon his especial enemies before those enemies in their turn destroyed the unwelcome visitors.

Thus it came to pass that, after spending close upon a fortnight in momentary expectation of a hideously protracted death by torture, Dick Maitland and Philip Grosvenor one day found themselves most unexpectedly released, their belongings returned to them, and permission accorded them to proceed upon their journey as soon as they would. They instantly availed themselves of this permission, lest peradventure it should be retracted; the result being that for five days they travelled under the protection of an armed escort until they arrived at the frontier, where the escort hurriedly left them, after jeeringly warning them of the many evil things that awaited them in the immediate future.

Scarcely ten minutes had elapsed after the departure of the guard before the travellers perceived a man intently watching them from the summit of a low kopje about a quarter of a mile ahead of them. For perhaps a minute he stood, motionless as a statue, gazing steadfastly at them under the shade of his hand, then he turned suddenly and disappeared. But during that minute Dick and Grosvenor had brought their powerful field glasses to bear upon him, and had distinctly seen that his skin was white, excepting in so far as it had become browned by the sun, that his hair was thick, black, and arranged in long, straight curls that reached to his shoulders, that he was naked save for a breech clout about his loins and a pair of sandals upon his feet, and that he was armed with a long, slender spear and a circular shield or target about two and a half feet in diameter. Three minutes later they saw him running with incredible speed toward another low elevation, distant about a mile from his starting-point, and which, as the travellers discovered, when they brought their glasses to bear upon it, was crowned by a low structure, so roughly constructed that it might easily have passed for a mere heap of stones and turf, but which, later on, proved to be a sort of blockhouse accommodating an outpost consisting of an officer and ten men. Two minutes later the man whom they had first seen, or another so exceedingly like him that it was impossible to distinguish any difference at a distance of two or three hundred yards, left the blockhouse—which they now perceived was only one of many in sight arranged in a somewhat irregularly curved line which probably conformed to the line of the frontier—and set off, at the same astonishing speed that the first had displayed, heading inward from the frontier line. They watched him for about five minutes, and then lost sight of him over the brow of a slight undulation. Beyond the roughly constructed blockhouses there was not a sign of inhabitants in any direction; the land was rough and uncultivated, there were neither cattle nor sheep to be seen; and if, as they strongly suspected, the blockhouses in sight accommodated a few men, none of their occupants revealed their presence nor made the slightest attempt to interfere with the uninvited visitors. It was a moot point between Dick and Grosvenor whether they should not take the bull by the horns, as it were, by riding up to the nearest blockhouse and attempting to get into communication with its occupants at once; but Grosvenor was very strongly opposed to any such step, upon the ground that, if they did so, they might be summarily turned back and ordered to quit the country forthwith, which, as Phil pointed out with some emphasis, would be an exceedingly tame and ignominious ending of their long and arduous journey. His policy was to let well enough alone, to get as far into the country as possible before attempting to open up communication with its inhabitants, and, meanwhile, to show in every possible manner by their sober behaviour that their mission was a peaceable one.

But if the borderland of this mysterious country presented a somewhat wild and uninviting appearance, it was not long before the travellers perceived that this state of things prevailed only over a very narrow belt of territory. For as they pressed on toward the interior they first sighted another line of blockhouses, considerably larger and more substantially constructed than the first, each perched upon a commanding knoll and completely surrounded by a stout, lofty, and practically unclimbable stockade; then they saw a few cattle dotted about, grazing, under the protection of quite a strong force of armed men, similar in all respects to the individual whom they had first sighted. These people took no notice of the strangers beyond removing themselves and their charges well out of the route which was being pursued by the wagon; it was evident that they had no desire to come into touch in any way whatever with their uninvited visitors. Then, a mile or so farther on, the herds became larger and their attendants more numerous; and, next, the intruders reached what seemed to be a belt of farms, each containing its own fortified farmhouse, a lofty and, apparently, immensely strong and solid structure of hewn stone, surrounded in many cases by a moat, either wet or dry, with a single narrow entrance high up in the wall and only accessible by means of a ladder; the unglazed window openings few in number and too narrow to permit the passage of a human being through them; the roof flat, and protected by a breast-high parapet; the structure, as a whole, constituting a very efficient miniature stronghold. The crops appeared to be of the most varied character, starting with sugar cane on the outside margin of what may be called the agricultural belt, and then gradually changing to various kinds of grain, which in its turn was succeeded by fruit orchards and vineyards. These last, however, were not met with until the detached farms had been left far behind, and had been succeeded in turn, first by tiny hamlets of half a dozen houses huddled together as if for mutual protection, and then by villages of ever-increasing importance, each dominated by a castle-like structure that looked as though it might serve the purpose of a keep or refuge for the inhabitants to retire to in times of stress or danger. These, however, were not reached by the travellers until quite late in the following day, and are only referred to now, in order that some idea may be conveyed of the manner in which the mysterious white race who inhabited the country met the problem of carrying on their agricultural pursuits, and at the same time affording protection to the farmers against sudden raids by their savage neighbours.

The region or belt of small hamlets still lay some two miles ahead of the travellers when, about half an hour before sunset, the word was given to outspan in the midst of a patch of rich pasture watered by a small, shallow stream of crystal-clear water. By the time that the sun was sinking behind a range of hills that rose gradually from the plain, and the summits of which were apparently about twenty miles distant, the oxen and other animals had been watered, the tent pitched, and the two leaders of the little expedition, having found a passable bathing place a short distance up the stream and taken their evening dip, were impatiently awaiting the last meal of the day, which by courtesy they named dinner, although it very inadequately represented the usual conception of what that meal ought to be.

Presently the viands made their appearance—a haunch of venison, cut from a buck that Grosvenor had shot early that morning, served sparingly with red currant jelly, the last pot of which had been opened for the occasion, sweet potatoes, purchased from the savages a few days earlier, "flap-jacks"—so called because they could find no other name for them— made by Ramoo Samee of flour, mealie meal, and water, and baked over the embers of the cooking fire, a few wild guavas, and as much water from the stream as they cared to drink, followed by a very small cup of coffee each, for both coffee and sugar were now becoming exceedingly scarce commodities with them.

As they ate they talked, the burden of Dick's conversation being the remarkable behaviour of the inhabitants of this mysterious country in leaving them so severely alone, a course of action which was in direct opposition to all their past experiences of the African peoples, and which Dick regarded as sinister in the extreme. His settled policy in dealing with the savages had always been to approach them promptly, as soon as met with, and lose no time in making friendly overtures, his leading idea being that if one can but succeed in convincing a savage that no harm of any kind is intended him, he is just as likely to be amiable as the reverse. Up to now Grosvenor had held a similar opinion, and had always most ably seconded Dick's endeavours to create a friendly impression upon the natives encountered; but in the present case he was utterly opposed to their usual methods, the fact being that the idea of penetrating to the heart of the country inhabited by the mysterious white race had gradually come to be an obsession with him, and he would hear of nothing being done that might by any chance interfere with this project; his conviction being that if they adopted their usual methods they would inevitably be stopped and sent to the rightabout. Had he but known what was impending, his anxiety would probably have taken quite a different direction.

The two friends were seated in their tent, partaking of breakfast, on the following morning, when Mafuta hurriedly appeared, in a state of considerable perturbation, with the information that a strong body of armed men were approaching the camp; and upon turning out to investigate, they saw that this was indeed the case, the new arrivals being in number about a hundred, and apparently a party of soldiery, all being attired alike in a sort of uniform consisting of a sleeveless white tunic girt about the waist with a belt, and buskins reaching halfway to the knee; their heads were bare, save for a thick mop of black hair, arranged in curls which reached to the shoulders; and each man was armed with a long lance, or spear, and a shield, or target, similar to those seen on the previous day. They advanced in single file and close order, and appeared to be under the command of a man who wore a feather head-dress, whose tunic was adorned with a pattern round the hem and armholes, worked in what looked like crimson braid, upon which were sewn close together a large number of small circular disks of polished yellow metal which had the appearance of being made of brass, or, maybe, gold.

"Ah," ejaculated Grosvenor, as he stood watching their approach, "my fears have materialised, you see, Dick! Those fellows have undoubtedly been dispatched to conduct us back to the frontier and see us safely out of the country; and here ends my longcherished hope of making the acquaintance of this mysterious white race. It is horribly exasperating, especially after we have actually reached their country, and seen for ourselves that such a people really exists."

"Um!" retorted Dick. "Yes, it is undoubtedly provoking, as you say. But I hope nothing worse is going to happen than what you anticipate. I must confess that I do not altogether like the appearance of things in general, and the expression upon the countenances of those fellows in particular. I seem to detect indications of a cold-blooded, relentless ferocity that would cause them to convert our bodies into pincushions for those spears of theirs with as little compunction as you would impale a rare moth upon a cork with a pin. But whatever may be their intentions with regard to us, we must rigidly adhere to our usual principle of showing no fear and offering no resistance. Probably if we follow this plan they will not kill us on the spot; and while there is life there is hope and the possibility that chance may turn in our favour. Anyway, whatever may happen to us, I hope that they will spare the blacks. Possibly they may make slaves of us all. Well, we shall soon know the worst, for here they come—confound those dogs!—call them off, Phil; if they fly at any of those chaps and hurt them, there will be trouble at once! Here, Pincher, Juno, Pat, Kafoula, 'Mfan, come in, you silly duffers! Come in, I say! D'you hear me? Come in and lie down! And you too, Leo; how dare you, sir!"

Dick and Grosvenor rushed out, and with the aid of sjamboks soon quelled the disturbance and brought their motley pack into subjection, the animals having made a general dash at the intruders, when the latter arrived within some fifty yards of the wagon, while Leo, the lion cub, excited by the disturbance, had broken the rein which usually confined him to the wagon at nighttime, and had participated in the general onslaught.

At the charge of the snapping, snarling dogs the approaching body of soldiery had promptly levelled their spears, and the interference of Dick and Grosvenor had only just been in the nick of time to save the animals' lives. The little episode left the troops and their commander absolutely expressionless, save that the latter seemed just a trifle astonished when he saw Dick coolly seize the snarling lion cub by his incipient mane and rate him roundly for his insubordinate behaviour, before he ordered the brute to retire with the dogs to the wagon. The next moment, in obedience to a sign from the officer, six couples detached themselves from the main body of the soldiery; and in a trice the two young Englishmen and their four dark-skinned followers, Mafuta, Ramoo Samee, Jantje, and 'Nkuku—the latter absolutely shivering with fear—found themselves prisoners, with their arms tightly bound behind them with stout raw-hide thongs.

"Ah," ejaculated Dick, "this is just what I feared might happen! Still, it is perhaps better than being killed outright, and—"

"Hush!" interrupted Grosvenor, sharply. "Listen to that fellow giving orders to his men: I'll be shot if he isn't speaking Hebrew—or something that sounds uncommonly like it!"

"Hebrew?" echoed Dick. "Nonsense! Surely you don't mean it?"

"Indeed I do, then," retorted Grosvenor; "never was more serious in my life. Listen! Yes, I feel sure I was not mistaken; it is a sort of Hebrew patois that he is speaking, Hebrew, mixed up, it is true, with a number of words that I can make nothing of. Still, I can understand enough of what he is saying to make out that he is giving his fellows orders to drive in our oxen and yoke them to the wagon. You know I went in rather strongly for Hebrew when I was at Oxford, and did pretty well at it. And I don't know what you think about it, Dick, but when I come to look at those men's faces it seems to me that they are all of quite a distinct Jewish type—eh, what?"

"Well—yes—they certainly are," admitted Dick. "But—Hebrews! Where the dickens can they have come from?"

"Goodness knows!" returned Grosvenor; "unless—and by Jove there may be something in the idea—who is to say that they are not one or more of the lost tribes—eh, what?"

"Well, of course they may be," agreed Dick. "That is rather a brilliant idea of yours, old chap, and may be worth following up—if they give us the chance. But not just now; there are more pressing matters claiming our attention at this moment—these bonds of ours, for instance. I don't know how yours are, but mine have been drawn quite unnecessarily tight; my fingers already feel as though they are about to burst. Do you think you could make that fellow understand that there is no need at all to bind us, and that if he will release us we ask nothing better than to accompany him whithersoever he may be pleased to take us?"

"Yes, I think I can," replied Grosvenor. "At all events I'll try; my lashings are quite as uncomfortable as yours can be, I fancy."

And forthwith he shouted to the officer a lengthy if somewhat halting communication in the best Hebrew at his command, the result being that, after a long colloquy, the amazed officer, after considerable hesitation, somewhat reluctantly gave the order for the prisoners' bonds to be loosed, after cautioning them that the slightest sign of any attempt at escape would result in the instant death of the entire party. Then, having scored one success, Grosvenor attempted another by suggesting that Jantje and 'Nkuku should be entrusted with the inspanning and driving of the wagon, which could be accomplished with much greater facility if the oxen were handled by those to whom they were accustomed. This also the officer eventually conceded, after carefully considering the matter for about a quarter of an hour, meanwhile the oxen were driven very nearly mad by the vain efforts of the soldiers to round them up and drive them towards the wagon.



CHAPTER FOURTEEN.

PRISONERS.

At length, after a tremendous amount of unnecessary confusion and trouble, the oxen were inspanned, and with the usual unearthly yells and loud cracking of the long whip by Jantje, mounted upon the wagon box, the creaking, lumbering vehicle was got under way, Ramoo Samee following close behind and leading the horses, while the dogs and Leo came to heel and trotted along close behind Grosvenor and Dick, as was their wont when their masters chose to walk, which was not very often. As for the soldiers, they arranged themselves as a cordon round the entire cortege, the officer in command leading the way.

This order was maintained until the noon outspan, when the officer, after some pressing, laid aside his aloofness sufficiently to accept Grosvenor's invitation to join him and Dick at luncheon. This proved to be the thin end of the wedge, so to speak; for the man could scarcely sit at the same table with his two prisoners, partake of their fare, and still preserve his original attitude of silence toward them; indeed it soon became evident that he was consumed with curiosity concerning the two people who had travelled such a distance with such few retainers; who seemed to have absolutely no knowledge of what fear was; and who apparently numbered lions as well as dogs among their domestic animals. He began by making a few tentative remarks, to which Grosvenor responded at some length, and then suddenly demanded, with an air of astonishment that he made scarcely any effort to conceal, how it came about that he, Grosvenor, a total stranger, was able to communicate with a native of the country in what was practically his own language. Then Grosvenor entered into a long explanation, involving a brief history of the principal seats of learning in England, with the methods and subjects of study pursued therein, and including the interesting fact that Hebrew, being commonly regarded as one of the most ancient tongues in the world, was there regarded as especially worthy of attention.

This last statement seemed to be particularly gratifying to the young officer's vanity, and had a distinctly mollifying effect upon his original hauteur and coldness. He thawed visibly, and even condescended to laugh at some mild joke upon which Grosvenor ventured, and then sought to further satisfy his curiosity by making a number of personal enquiries as to where Phil and his friend came from, why they came, how long they had been upon the journey, and so on. To all these enquiries Grosvenor replied pretty fully, but when in his turn he attempted to elicit some information respecting their destination, and the treatment that they might expect to receive upon their arrival, the man at once shut up like a trap, and thenceforward for the remainder of the journey refused to hold any communication whatever with his prisoners.

Their route lay in the direction of a range of distant hills, which they judged it was the intention of their captor to cross; and as they went they found the country gradually changing its character by subtle gradations, growing ever more fertile and more highly cultivated with every mile of progress, while the houses increased in number and clustered more thickly together. At length, after passing through one of these hamlets, they emerged upon a narrow field path, which widened somewhat when the next hamlet was passed, and so gradually became a more prominent feature until ultimately it developed into a full-blown road, which, rough and uneven at first, steadily improved in appearance and quality until it became a very excellent and much-used thoroughfare, shaded by trees on either hand. In short the country, which on its extreme frontier was a perfect wilderness, steadily improved with every mile of progress toward its interior, as regarded the evidences of a high state of civilisation. One of the strangest things, however, which came under the notice of the Englishmen was that, from the moment of their arrest, the inhabitants—whom they encountered in ever-increasing numbers as the day wore on—manifested the most absolute indifference with regard to them, not even deigning to cast a second glance upon what was clearly a most novel and unusual sight in that country.

At sunset the party encamped at the foot of the hills toward which they had been journeying all day, and which proved to be much more lofty, and at a much greater distance, than they had imagined them to be when they were first sighted; and the whole of the next day was consumed in climbing, by means of an excellent road, to the summit of a pass where, having safely negotiated a short length of exceedingly narrow and difficult roadway between two enormous vertical cliffs, they emerged upon a small plateau of rich grassland that afforded good camping ground for the night.

The spot where the travellers outspanned was the bottom of a miniature basin of some five or six acres in extent, and was surrounded on all sides by steep slopes terminating in a series of jagged peaks, some four or five hundred feet high, that bounded the view in every direction and limited it to a distance of about half a mile. But when, after inspanning on the following morning, they crossed the little plateau upon which they had spent the night, and passed round a bluff at its farther side, a wonderful prospect at once burst upon their astonished gaze. For they now found that the chain of hills, up the outer slope of which they had been laboriously climbing during the whole of the preceding day, formed an unbroken if somewhat irregular circle of something like forty miles in diameter, measuring across from ridge to ridge, the inner slopes of the encircling hills being from three to five miles wide, with a plain of from five to ten miles in width at their feet, this plain in turn encircling a lovely lake, measuring about twenty miles across, the very centre of which was occupied by an island of perhaps three or four miles in diameter, the whole rugged surface of which appeared to be covered with buildings embowered in leafy gardens.

Now at last the travellers began to really understand the wealth and importance of the people into whose country they had entered, uninvited; for, as far as the eye could reach, even with the aid of their exceedingly powerful field glasses, the mountain slopes and the plain that lay circling at their feet consisted of nothing but a practically unbroken sweep of highly cultivated land, dotted with snug farmhouses, and bearing ripening crops of various kinds, interspersed here and there with trim vineyards, or orchards of fruitbearing trees; while, at distances of from three to eight or ten miles apart, there nestled among groves of noble shade trees, villages which must have sheltered from a hundred-and-fifty to, perhaps, four or five hundred inhabitants. And through all there ran a perfect network of roads, carrying, as could be seen with the aid of their glasses, a considerable amount of traffic, among which could be distinguished a number of wheeled vehicles, the first they had seen since entering the country.

The officer, who was their custodian, was evidently intensely gratified at the surprise and admiration freely expressed by his two principal prisoners at the scene that lay spread out at their feet, and even halted the cortege for a few minutes to enable Dick and Grosvenor to take in its multudinous details conveniently, and examine them through their field glasses. It was noticed by the two Englishmen that he regarded these instruments with the most acute curiosity, but either pride or reserve deterred him from asking any question concerning them. When, however, Dick offered him a peep through them, he was wholly unable to resist the temptation, or to restrain his expressions of amazement as, glancing through the tubes at the island, some twenty miles distant, he was enabled to distinguish such details as the roofs, windows, and doors of houses built thereon, while of course the details of houses in the plain below, the character of the several vehicles on the roads, the numbers of oxen in the teams which drew them, were quite unmistakable. But when Grosvenor, seeking to avail himself of this temporary relaxation of manner, attempted once more to engage the man in conversation, he instantly relapsed into his former attitude of unresponsiveness; and his manner soon made it clear that he was determined to risk no complications of any kind by allowing anything in the nature of familiarity or friendliness between himself and his prisoners.

The descent from the crest of the encircling hills to the circular belt of plain below was of course quite an easy matter, compared with the ascent of the outer slope on the previous day, the gradient of the road being practically uniform all the way, and just steep enough to necessitate a slight application of the brakebar to the rear wheels of the wagon from the crest to the plain; and Dick noted with some surprise that their taciturn friend, the officer in command, appeared to be greatly interested in the working of this exceedingly simple piece of apparatus, as though it was something with which he was quite unfamiliar. The party effected the descent and reached the level plain in about an hour and a half from the moment of starting, and soon found themselves travelling along a broad, level, well-kept road among a large number of other people, most of whom looked at them with more or less curiosity, but steadfastly refrained from addressing a word of remark to any of the guard who had them in charge.

About half an hour after reaching the plain they debouched into another and much broader road than that by which they had been previously travelling, and it then became tolerably evident that their ultimate destination must be the island in the centre of the lake; for the road which they were now traversing was absolutely straight all the way to the margin of the lake, and pointed accurately toward the island.

They had been travelling along this road for nearly an hour, and were approaching a village of more importance than any which they had hitherto passed, when there suddenly arose a considerable commotion among the people on the road ahead of them, who were seen running confusedly hither and thither amid a great cloud of dust, while shouts, shrieks, and a sound of low, angry bellowing rose upon the stagnant air. Mechanically the whole party came to a halt to see what was the matter, while Jantje and 'Nkuku began shouting to each other in greatly excited tones, and the oxen which were drawing the wagon began to low, snort, sniff the air, stamp excitedly on the ground, and lunge at each other with their long horns. For perhaps a minute it was impossible to guess what was happening; then the shouts suddenly grew much louder and more excited, the crowd ahead parted right and left as though panic-stricken, there arose a shriek of terror, or pain, or perhaps both, a man's body was seen to go whirling some eight or ten feet into the air, and then a bulky something, which presently resolved itself into a huge buffalo bull, emerged from the dust-cloud and came charging along the road, striking out with its immense, curved, sharp-pointed horns at everybody in its way. The brute was then only about two hundred yards off, and was galloping straight toward the party, with tail high in the air, head low, eyes aflame with fury, and great gouts of froth dripping from its heavy muzzle. For a moment the soldiers seemed paralysed with terror, the next they all turned as with one accord, and, leaping an irrigation ditch that ran alongside the road, sought safety in flight across a field of young wheat. The buffalo paused a moment in mid-career, as though hesitating whether he should pursue them or charge the wagon and its team of oxen; but the next moment the brute had made up its mind, and, perhaps attracted by the crimson trimming and glittering ornaments of the officer's tunic, leaped the ditch and deliberately selected that unfortunate individual as the especial object of his pursuit. The position of the man at once became one of deadly peril, for, fast though he ran, the buffalo had the advantage in the matter of speed, and was rapidly gaining upon him when Dick and Grosvenor sprang to the wagon and, hastily seizing their rifles, prepared to act. Dick was the first on the ground again with his weapon, and, sinking on one knee to secure steadiness of aim, he brought the sights to bear exactly behind the animal's left shoulder, and fired. The spirt of flame and the little jet of filmy blue smoke extorted a sharp ejaculation of astonishment from those who were near enough to notice it, but it was as nothing compared with the shout of mingled amazement, terror, and relief that went up when the huge beast stumbled, fell forward on his head, turned a complete somersault, and lay still, slain at the very instant when, having overtaken the fugitive, he had lowered his head to impale the shrieking man upon his horns.

With such startling abruptness did the huge beast collapse that the pursued officer did not realise the fact until he had run a farther distance of some thirty yards or so, and even then, when at length he halted and looked back at the prostrate and motionless animal, he seemed quite unable to understand that it was dead and harmless; for he shouted an order to his men to close in round the buffalo and secure it with cords before it recovered itself and resumed the aggressive. It was not until a few of the bolder spirits, having cautiously approached the carcass, nearly enough to perceive the bullet hole and the blood flowing from it, had satisfied themselves that the brute was in very truth dead, and had borne emphatic testimony to the extraordinary fact, that he was able to screw up his own courage to the point of personal investigation. Then he calmly made his way back to the road and, approaching Grosvenor, demanded an explanation of the seeming miracle; but even after he had been told, and the rifle exhibited to him and its powers laboriously explained, he seemed quite unable to understand, and was at last fain to dismiss the mystery with an impatient shrug of the shoulders, and an order for the march to be resumed.

But Dick had seen a man tossed by the buffalo, and had judged, by the victim's shriek of agony, that he was badly hurt; he therefore kept his eyes open as they passed along the road, and sharply directed Grosvenor to call upon the officer to halt when presently they came upon a group of about a dozen persons standing by the side of the road surrounding a little group consisting of two persons, a man and a woman; the man bleeding profusely from a ghastly wound in the thigh, and already grey and sharp of feature under the shadow of death, while the woman crouched helplessly in the dust, supporting the wounded man's head upon her knees.

Without ceremony Dick forced his way through the little crowd of onlookers, gave one keen glance at the prostrate man, and then, turning, shouted to Grosvenor:

"This chap is bleeding to death, Phil—artery severed apparently. Just explain to our man, will you, and tell him that, with his permission, I propose to save the poor fellow's life. Mafuta, bring my medicine chest here, quick!"