Three spare cots were rigged in the Commander’s cabin, and in every way they were made as comfortable as could be.
Half a gale of wind was what they had to start with, up the Mozambique; next day it had increased to nearly hurricane force. They saw many ships lying-to, but the Dodo did nothing of that sort; wet enough though, she was in all conscience, in fact she seemed to spend most of her time under instead of over the waves; very wet she was, and likewise very lively, but she made a good passage, and in little over a week, she had cast anchor in a beautiful wooded hay on the African coast, where white-roofed houses, close by the shore, peeped out through the greenery of trees.
“There is a bit of fun to be got not far from here,” said Captain Lyell, “for a day’s journey beyond the little Portuguese village there, the antelope swarm, and horses, too, are procurable, by paying for them.”
Frank was a splendid horseman, and his delight at the prospect of a hunt was unbounded.
Horses they could and did procure, and wild and unmanageable brutes they proved at first, but after the third day they became quiet enough. Their way led through a most beautiful well-timbered undulating country, and travelling was far from difficult, but as they journeyed more inland, and bore more to the north, not only their difficulties, but their dangers too, increased; the land got more rugged and mountainous, the jungles more dense and impenetrable, and the forests grew darker and deeper. They found themselves, too, bordering on a country, the inhabitants of which were far from friendly, and it was then they found their Portuguese guides of the greatest of use; they could speak the language of these savages, and their relations with them were the relations of trade. Portuguese the natives could bear with. Englishmen they both feared and hated. But little cared our heroes; in fact they treated the blacks with the coolest indifference, and probably that was the best way they could have treated them.
Many a lordly antelope fell to their guns, they had days on days of good sport, and the very dangers that surrounded them, seemed only to make their life in the bush all the more enjoyable. A glorious hunt Frank had one day all to himself. It was a ride he is never likely to forget, either, for it came nigh costing him dear life itself. Out on the open plain one morning, though but a little way from the camp, he started a fine buck. It seemed positively to invite him to the chase; well, his horse was fresh, he was fresh himself, a ten miles’ run he thought would do them both good, and yonder was the deer, so off he went. Off went man and horse, and buck, but the latter seemed never to tire, and the plain over which he rode seemed interminable. Hours flew by; then Frank’s horse began to flag, for he must have ridden thirty miles in a bee line; so the buck won the day, he took to cover in a small bit of scrub, and from that he would not be moved. If he had, Frank thought, but one good hound, he could rest his horse, then start the chase, and probably turn him again towards the camp, and thus finish a day that would make the roaster of Her Majesty’s Staghounds envy him even to read of it. But no, he must mount his horse again and ride back. Back? Yes, it seemed about the easiest thing in the world to find his way back; but when, after journeying on and on all the day, without seeing a sign or token of the camp he had left, when, faint and weary, he saw the sun dipping slowly downwards to the western horizon, then his heart sank within him, and for the first time he realised the terribleness of his situation—he was lost! Lost! and it mattered little to him now which way he rode; he allowed the bridle to hang loose on the neck of his jaded horse, his own chin to fall on his breast; a sense of weariness crept over him that almost induced sleep, and more than once he nearly slipped from the saddle. Presently it was night, and big bright stars shone over him, which he did not care even to glance at. He only felt tired, cold, sleepy.
“Coo—oo—ee!” Hark! does he dream? No, for list! once again that long unearthly yell. The horse pricks up his ears and neighs. Frank seizes the bridle, and once more listens himself, for well he knows what he hears is the night-shout of the outpost African sentinels. In ten minutes more he is beside the camp-fire. Thanks to the sagacity of that good horse.