CHAPTER XXX

ANECDOTES

Steve and William returned home to find the rest of the party gathered in consultation. Keith had strayed from his companion and guide, and could nowhere be found.

He had gone in chase of a lot of guinea-fowl, and had disappeared in the bush, and could not be found again. He was searched for, and shouted for, but in vain.

The present consultation was to arrange plans to go in search of him. Steve and William, on their arrival, were told of the situation, and immediate preparation was made for a search-party, composed of all the males in the encampment. They started westward, and after half-an-hour’s brisk walking, and continued shouting and bell-ringing, they heard a gun fired to the north. It was agreed among all present that it was a signal of distress from Keith. A reply shot was fired to let him know they were near. The result was a continuous fire of shots from the direction in which the first shot had been heard.

‘Oh, he is all right,’ said Harrison; ‘he is having a grand old time amongst the guinea-fowl. He is not lost after all, he has only been following the guinea-fowl up, and, I suppose, he has succeeded in driving them into a corner at last, and is killing them one by one at his leisure; at least, that seems to be the case from the number of shots he is firing.’

All laughed, for they understood this to be a joke at Keith’s expense, for, of course all knew those shots were meant to guide them to the lost man, and were by no means fired at guinea-fowl.

Although a reply shot was fired now and again to let Keith know that help was coming, he seemed to be determined to let them know where he was, for he kept on firing, apparently as fast as he could pull out empty cartridge cases and put full ones in again.

Guided in this way, they soon came up to the place where Keith was standing. When they came up he looked thoroughly disgusted with himself and everybody else. But he felt _awfully_ glad, as he afterwards expressed it, to see them. He confessed to having really been afraid to spend the night in the bush; nameless terrors came before his mental vision, and, said he, ‘If I felt so dreadfully lonely and afraid, when I knew I could not be far away from the camp, what must one’s feeling be to be really _lost_ in the bush? It must be awful--ugh!’

‘But how did you manage to lose yourself?’ asked someone.

‘Well, you can’t understand it before you get lost yourself; I always thought I would never lose my bearings, wherever and however situated I might find myself. But when I had given up the chase of the guinea-fowl, and I wanted to retrace my steps, I could not for the life of me determine which way I had come. I was not sure which way the camp lay, and as the sun had gone down, I could not say which side was north or south. I climbed a confounded thorn tree, and after I had perforated myself with thorns, and got as high as I could, I was rewarded for my pains by seeing the tops of other thorn trees, and nothing else. I got down and ran in the direction in which I thought the camp might lie, and after running a distance I thought it must lie in another direction, so I kept running in one direction and another. I was so excited that the sweat was pouring off me in streams. At last I was so tired that I thought I had better sit down and rest, and on a little calm reflection, I saw that I was a fool for running about in this way, and that I was only tiring myself, and probably running farther and farther away from the tents, so I sat down and waited.’

‘But I say, Keith,’ chimed in Harrison, ‘how many cartridges have you left in your belt?’

‘Not one; why do you ask?’

‘And how many guinea-fowl have you killed?’

‘You go and bury yourself!’ retorted Keith, who saw whither Harrison was leading him, and that he was trying to raise the laugh against him.

The party returned to the camps, and after a hearty supper of venison, _storm jagers_ (dough nuts) and fresh butter, Keith got his spirits back, and joined in the laugh against himself for losing himself so easily; it was considered a good joke by the Boers, who could find their way in the darkest night in the bush and never get lost.

After supper, pipes were lighted, and all the men folks (as well as some of the younger women folks) of the whole encampment gathered around the large fire in one of the largest enclosures to indulge in chat and anecdote. The fire was glorious. Timber was plentiful. Once the fire was burning well, two or three tree stumps were put on, and the fire would keep burning on this solid mass of fuel till next day.

This gathering just suited Steve. He had been in such gatherings before, and loved to hear the anecdotes of the hunting field, as well as the battlefield, told by grey-headed men around the fire of an evening.

After one tale and another had been told by individuals of the junior members, Steve turned to one of the seniors, who was known to be on intimate terms with President Kruger, and said,--

‘I suppose even the President was fond of hunting in his younger days, Oom Simon?’

‘Yes, he was a noted lion hunter; I have heard a story or two of his doings as a lion hunter, but I have never asked him about the truth of it, so you need not believe it, but I will relate it to you.

‘The first was when he and another man were suddenly attacked by a lion one day. They were both unarmed, as they did not expect to find lions or dangerous beasts of prey in the vicinity. The President had his hunting-knife on his hip, and that was all. Suddenly they nearly stepped on a lion lying in the tall grass; the lion sprang up, and before he could get out of the way, the President’s companion found himself under the lion, with the teeth of the brute closing in his shoulder.

‘The President sprang to his companion’s assistance, drew his knife, seized the lion by the throat, and stabbed him in the heart two or three times. The lion then let go his hold, and fell dead.’

‘But, uncle, is not that almost an impossible thing to do, to seize a lion by the throat and stab him to death.’

‘Under ordinary circumstances it would be almost impossible, but you must know that when a lion bites into the flesh of his victim and feels the warm blood in his mouth, he seems to enjoy it so much that he always closes his eyes for a few moments, and lies perfectly quiet to enjoy himself. If you think _that_ impossible, you might think this still more so. The President had one day walked far ahead of his waggon in the hunting field. He had again left his heavy gun in the waggon. He was standing on a rise, waiting for the waggon--coming on far behind--and resting, when he saw two lions, a male and female, coming on full speed towards him from an opposite direction to the waggon. They were charging direct on him, the lion in front, the lioness some distance behind. The President saw it was no time to show funk and run. To run away on foot meant death. He did the best thing he could under the circumstances. He stood up and faced the charging lion, and looked him firmly and fiercely in the eyes. The lion came within a few paces of him, then stopped, looked him in the eyes for a moment or two, hesitated for a second, then turned and ran away with his tail between his legs. The lioness, who had by this time come up, looked after her flying mate in surprise, seemingly wondering at his giving his prey up so easily. Then she looked at the President in a searching way, as if she sought for the danger which had driven her mate away. She caught the menacing eye of the President, stood spell-bound for a moment as if mesmerised, then turned and followed her lord and master.’

‘Well, I can well believe that, for I have often heard that the President possessed the power of mesmerism in a natural way, although he only seems to exercise it in an unconscious way. And I believe that if a man does possess such a power, he ought to, with his wonderful firmness of will, amounting almost to obstinacy.’

‘No, I do not think he is obstinate,’ replied Oom Simon, ‘but he never determines upon anything unless he is firmly convinced that it is the right thing to do; and then, when once his mind is made up as to what is right or wrong, he stands by his opinions to the end, even if he falls by them.’

‘He must be a religious and serious old man,’ remarked Steve in a way, as if he wished to draw out old Simon. ‘He never jokes or laughs, it appears to me.’

‘That is because, I suppose, you only see him in public. If you see him in private amongst his friends, especially when travelling, he is very fond of his joke. He _is_ certainly very religious, he fears his God, and is a true Christian. But he loves a joke nevertheless.’

‘I remember once we were travelling together. We were amusing ourselves with conundrums; at last the President said,--

‘“I will give you a riddle now. There is a kraal built of high stone walls. A troop of asses wish to get into that kraal, for the lions are roaring around them, and safety is to be found in the kraal. How will they get in? Over the wall they cannot; and through the gate they may not go. How are they to get inside?” said he, turning to old Mijnheer van Heerden, a member of our party.

‘“I know not?” replied Mijnheer van Heerden.

‘“Then you are as stupid as the asses themselves, for they knew not how to get in either.” Of course Mijnheer van Heerden had to join in the laugh too. He was nicely caught, ha! ha! ha!’

‘Talking of being nicely caught?’ said Oom Hendrik, another senior of the party. ‘I once knew a wild fellow who always liked to play practical jokes. His name was Petrus. One day he met a minister, looking gentle, meek and mild, and also a little green, but looks are sometimes deceptive, as you will see. He went up to the minister and said to him, “Mijnheer, do you practice as well as preach the Bible?”’

‘“I hope so, my friend,”’ was the reply.

‘“The Bible says, ‘If a man should strike you on the left cheek, turn to him the right cheek, that he may strike that also.’” And he gave the minister a good slap on the left cheek. The minister quietly turned the right cheek to him; he was a little disconcerted at this, but struck it in a half-hearted sort of way, and said, “Yes, I see you do practice as well as preach.” But it was the turn of the minister now, who said,--

‘“Yes, but wait a bit, my friend, the Bible also says, ‘That by the same measure that ye shall measure others with shall ye also be measured by.’” And the minister took his coat off, and set to, and gave Petrus the best thrashing he ever had in his life.’