Part 4 (2/2)
”By Jove, how hot it is! I must have been doing the sluggard trick to some purpose, for the cliff was full in the sun when first I p.r.i.c.ked for the softest plank here, and now it's throwing out a shadow as long as an attorney's bill of costs. Past four!” looking at his watch. ”Now for a pipe; then a start.”
He picks himself up out of the pa.s.s, yawns and stretches. The tortoise, which had already stood motionless, its bright eye dilated with alarm, now subsides into its sh.e.l.l, hoping to pa.s.s for one of the surrounding stones; its scarabean compet.i.tor likewise is equal to the occasion, after its own manner, and falling over on its side, with legs stiff and extended, feigns death industriously. Meanwhile the aloe-dotted steep overhead is alive with the loud warning cries of the disturbed baboons, whose ungainly but nimble shapes--some fifty in number--may be seen making off helter-skelter up the hill, to disappear with all possible despatch over the brow of the same.
”Noisy brutes!” grumbles the wayfarer, shading his eyes to watch them.
”But for your unprincipled s.h.i.+ndy I could have done a good hour's more snooze with all the pleasure in life. If only I had a rifle here--even a Government Snider--it would go hard but that one or two of you would learn the golden art of silence.”
Look at him as he stands there just six foot high in his boots-- well-proportioned, broad-shouldered, straight as a dart. The face is of a very uncommon type, with character and determination in its regular, clear-cut features; but a look of _insouciance_ in the eyes--which are neither grey nor blue, but sometimes one, sometimes the other-- neutralises what would otherwise be an energetic and restless expression. The mouth is nearly hidden by a drooping, golden-brown moustache. In the matter of age the man would have satisfied a census collector by the casual reply, ”Rising nine-and-twenty.”
Colonial born you would certainly not p.r.o.nounce him. Yet not a touch of the ”rawness” of the greenhorn or ”new chum” would you descry, even if the serviceable suit of tancord and the quality of the saddle and riding gear lying on the ground did not betoken a certain amount of acquaintance with colonial life on the part of their owner.
He draws a rough cherrywood pipe from his pocket, fills and lights it, sending forth vigorous blue puffs which hang upon the drowsy air. He stands for a moment looking at the sun, and decides that it is time to start.
”Now, I wonder what has become of Sticks. The old scamp is given to erring and straying afar just when wanted. When I don't require his services he'll fool about the camp by the hour.”
Sticks was his horse. That estimable quadruped had at one time been addicted to ”sticking,” an inconvenient vice of which his present owner had thoroughly cured him.
Our wayfarer strolls leisurely to the ridge which shuts in the hollow, and looks around. Then a reddish object amid the green bush, some hundreds of yards further down, catches his eye. It is the object of his search; and, with one hand thrust carelessly into a pocket, he makes for the errant nag and returns leading his steed to the waterhole, where clouds of yellow finks scatter right and left, vociferously giving vent to their indignation at being thus invaded.
And now, having saddled up, he is on his way. Steeper and steeper grows the ascent; the bush meets here and there over the narrow path, nearly sweeping the rider from his saddle, and the horse, blinded now and then by a thick branch of spekboem flying back in his eyes, makes an approach to a stumble, for which he is not to blame, for the track is rugged enough in all conscience. At length the narrow path comes to an end, merging into a broad but stony waggon road.
But--excelsior! The bay steps out at a brisk walk, ascending ever the rough road which winds round the abrupt spurs of the hills like a ledge, mounting higher and higher above the long sweep of bush-covered slope, where, among the recesses of many a dark ravine, thickets of ”wait-a-bit” thorn, and mimosa, and tangled underwood, afford retreat to the more retiring denizens of the waste--the sharp-horned bushbuck and the tusked wild pig, the hooded cobra, and the deadly puff-adder. And beneath those shades, too, in the still gloom, the spotted leopard creeps stealthily upon its prey, and the howl of the hyena and the shrill yelping bay of the jackal resound weirdly through the night.
”It's waxing chilly. Up, old Sticks!” e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.es the traveller, with a light tap of his riding-crop. The horse picks up his head and scrambles along with new zest. A few minutes more and he is standing on the top of the _randt_ [the high ground or ridge overlooking the valley of a river] for a brief blow after his exertions, which his heaving flanks proclaim to have been of no mean order, while his rider is contemplating the fresh scene which opens out before his gaze. For the wooded country has been left, and now before him lies spread a panorama of broad and rolling plains, dotted capriciously here and there with clumps of bush.
A lovely sweep of country stretches away in many undulations to the wooded foothills of a beautiful mountain range which forms a background to the whole view, extending, crescent-like, far as the eye can travel.
The snow-cap yet resting on the lofty peak of the Great Winterberg flushes first with a delicate tinge and then blood-red; many a jutting spur and grey cliff starts forth wondrously distinct, while the forest trees upon a score of distant heights stand soft and feathery, touched with a s.h.i.+mmer of green and gold from the long beams of the sinking sun as he dips down and down to the purpling west.
The stranger rides on, enjoying the glorious beauty of this fair landscape--never fairer than when seen thus, in the almost unearthly l.u.s.tre of a perfect evening. A steinbuck leaps out of the gra.s.s, and after a brief run halts and steadily surveys the intruder. Down in the hollow a pair of blue cranes utter their musical note of alarm, and stalk rapidly hither and thither, as though undecided about the quarter whence danger threatens, and the cooing of doves from yon clump of euphorbia blends in soft harmony with the peaceful surroundings as in a vesper chant of rest.
And now a strange group appears over the rise in front. It is a Kafir _trek_. Two men, three women, and some children, driving before them their modest possessions in live stock, consisting of three cows (one with a calf), and a few sheep and goats. The men wear an ample blanket apiece thrown loosely round their shoulders, but other clothing have they none, with the exception of a pair of boots, which however, each carries slung over his shoulder, preferring to walk barefoot. The women are somewhat less scantily clad, with nondescript draperies of blanketing and bead-work falling around them. Each has her baby slung on her back, and carries an enormous bundle on her head, containing pots and pans, blankets and matting--the household goods and chattels; for her lord disdains to bear anything but his kerries, or k.n.o.bsticks, and marches along in front looking as if the whole world belonged to him.
Some of the elder children are laden with smaller bundles, and even the cows are pressed into the service as porters, each having a long roll of mats fastened across her horns, and two or three mongrel curs slink behind the group. All Kafir garments are plentifully bedaubed with red ochre, an adornment frequently extended to their wearers, giving them the appearance of peripatetic flower-pots.
”Naand, Baas!” [Note 1] sing out the men as they meet the traveller, and then continue in their own tongue, ”Nxazela.” [Tobacco.]
No bad specimens of their hardy and supple race are these two fellows as they stand there, their well-knit, active figures glistening like bronze in the setting sun. They hold their heads well up, and each of their shrewd and rather good-looking countenances is lighted by a pair of clear, penetrating eyes. The stranger chucks them a bit of the coveted plant, and asks how much further it is to Seringa Vale.
”Over there,” replies one of the Kafirs, pointing with his stick to the second rise in the ground, about two miles off. With a brief good-night the horseman touches up his nag and breaks into a gentle canter, while the natives, collecting their stock--which has taken advantage of the halt to scatter over the _veldt_ and pick up a few mouthfuls of gra.s.s-- resume their way.
The sun has gone down, and the white peak of the Great Winterberg towers up cold and spectral to the liquid sky, as the horseman crests the ridge indicated, and lo--the broad roof of a substantial farmhouse lies beneath. Around, are several thatched outbuildings, and the whole is charmingly situated, nestling in a grove of seringas and orange trees.
There is a fruit-garden in front of the house, or rather on one side of it, though it may almost be said to have two fronts, for the verandah and the _stoep_ run round the two sides which command the best and widest view, while another and a larger garden, even more leafy and inviting-looking, lies down in the kloof. Close to the homestead are the sheep and cattle kraals, with their p.r.i.c.kly thorn-fences, into one of which a white, fleecy flock is already being counted, while another, preceded by its _voerbok_ [Note 2] is coming down the kloof, urged on by the shout and whistle of its Kafir shepherd. The cattle enclosure is already alive with the dappled hides of its denizens, moving about among whom are the bronzed forms of the cattle-herd and his small boys, who are busily employed in sorting out the calves and shutting them up in their pen for the night, away from their mothers, so that these may contribute their share towards filling the milk-pails in the morning.
Behind the kraals stand the abodes of the Kafir farm servants, eight or ten beehive-shaped huts to wit, and stepping along towards these, calabash on head, comes a file of native women and girls who have been to draw water from the spring. They sing, as they walk, a monotonous kind of savage chant, stopping now and then to bawl out some ”chaff” to the shepherd approaching with his flock as aforesaid, and going into shrill peals of laughter over his reply.
The traveller draws rein for a little while, till the counting-in process is accomplished, then rides down to the kraal gate and dismounts. A man turns away from giving some final directions to the Kafir who is tying up the gate--an old man, over whose head at least seventy summers must have pa.s.sed, but yet stalwart of body and handsome of feature, with hair and beard like silver. He is dressed in the rough cord suit and slouch hat of the ordinary frontier farmer, and in his hand he carries a whip of plaited raw-hide. His clothes have a timeworn appearance, and his hands are large and hard-looking; but, in spite of the roughness of his aspect and attire, you need only look once into Walter Brathwaite's face to know that you were confronting a man of gentle blood.
”Good evening,” he says, heartily, advancing with outstretched hand towards the stranger. But a curious smile upon the tatter's face causes him to pause with a half mystified, hesitating air, as if it were not unfamiliar to him. ”Why, no. It can't be. Bless my soul, it is, though. Why, Claverton, how are you, my boy? Glad to see you back again in Africa,” and he enclosed the younger man's hand in a strong grip. ”But come in; the wife'll be delighted. Here, Jacob,” he shouted, in stentorian tones which brought a young Hottentot upon the scene in a twinkling, ”take the Baas's horse and off-saddle him.”
Pa.s.sing through a hall, garnished with trophies of the chase, bushbuck horns, and tusks of the wild pig, and a couple of grinning panther-heads, they entered the dining-room, a large, homelike apartment, plainly but comfortably furnished.
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