The horses had now begun to show signs of having been bitten by the tsetse fly, the chestnut and grey displaying roughened skins and a general uneasiness; while the bay, though slightly roughened about the coat, still held out.
They lost no time then in getting on with their journey southwards, meeting with plenty of vicissitudes in the shape of hunger, heat, and thirst, but taking these calmly, along with the good things; and at last the Limpopo was once more reached.
The reader of this, who knows how easily a person may have his tea in London and his breakfast the next morning in Scotland—400 miles—may be surprised to hear that to get over such a distance in South Africa with a heavy waggon and an ox-team takes over a month; and a driver and foreloper would consider that they had done well if they had achieved so much.
For hurrying means losing ground. The oxen must be kept well-fed with good pasture, and not overworked, or in a few hours sores will be produced by the harsh yokes that will take a month to cure, if they ever heal at all.
But the country was grand, and the weather exceptionally lovely, as they made their way southward, crossing the Limpopo without accident, in spite of the crocodiles, Dinny managing to get a place on the top of the waggon-tilt just before they started to ford the stream.
“Why, what are you doing there, Dinny?” cried Dick, who was the first to see him.
“Shure, Masther Dick, dear, I was feared for these valuable skins that lie stretched out here, for I says to meself, ‘Dinny,’ I says, ‘if the masther was to have thim skins slip off into the dirthy river, he’d never forgive himself.’”
So amidst a good deal of laughter Dinny crossed over the crocodile river on the top of the tilt; while, as much alarmed as he, the dogs, taught by experience, kept close behind the aftermost oxen’s heels, swimming with the protection of the waggon-wheels on either side.
Mr Rogers proposed that they should go back by way of the district where there were some curious caves, saying that it would be a pity to be within reach and not to see them. So with the intent of making a halt near them, the General announcing his intention of finding the place, though he had never been there before, the return journey was continued.
This return journey was, as maybe supposed, one of months, but it was not uneventful. The constant demands of the larder rendered hunting necessary almost every day; and in these hunting expeditions beautiful skins, and horns of great size and peculiarity, were obtained. Every day, too, added to the collection of gorgeously-plumaged birds and bright beetles; several times over, too, they were able to add a goodly bundle of ostrich plumes to the store.