Hair-Breadth Escapes: The Adventures of Three Boys in South Africa

by H. C. Adams

“Omatoko no untie till get back to kraal—then untie quick.”

He chuckled as he spoke. There was some sinister meaning in his words, which the prisoners could not fathom, but which it was not pleasant to hear. But they had little time for reflection. The thongs had no sooner been securely fastened, and the guns distributed among the leaders of the Hottentots, than they set out on their way home. It appeared that the Englishmen must have followed a very circuitous path, for less than four hours’ journey brought them to the spot where the encounter with the Bushmen had taken place; and there the party rested for a couple of hours before proceeding further.

It was a horrid and revolting spectacle which met the eyes of the captives as the halt was made. The bodies of the Bushmen, as well as those of their women and children, were scattered about in all directions, the corpses having already begun to decompose in the scorching sun. Most of the men had been shot down by arrows from a distance, or pierced by assegais. But the weaker portion of the enemy (if they could be so called), had been killed by blows from clubs, or stabs delivered at close quarters; and the lads gazed with sickening disgust at the helpless and mangled figures, with which the plain for a long way round was overspread. But the slayers did not appear to feel the smallest compunction, and Lavie gathered from their conversation, that a considerable proportion of the men had effected their escape—a circumstance which had greatly provoked Umboo’s anger.

Travelling early and late, the kraal was reached about nightfall on the following day; when the prisoners were consigned to the custody of Omatoko and Leshoo; who took effectual measures to prevent their escape. Their arms and legs were secured by thongs, and a belt was passed round the waist of each, to which was attached a chain riveted to a strong post Omatoko could not be induced to answer any questions, not even the eager inquiries made after Lion. But Toboo, who was of a gentler disposition than his uncle, told them that the dog had greatly improved during the two or three days of their absence, and could now walk about tolerably well.

On the following morning a debate was held in the chief’s apartment, to which Lavie and the boys were, of course, not admitted; but the substance of which they learned afterwards. There was a considerable difference of opinion among the counsellors. Kalambo and some others were for requiring the white men to take an oath that they would make no attempt to recover their property, or punish those who had deprived them of it; and then to let them depart. Others, Omatoko among them, were for keeping them in close custody, until their friends at the Cape agreed to ransom them for a quantity of valuable goods, which were to be specified; while one or two were for allowing them to go altogether free, and take their guns with them; urging that the goodwill of the English was of more value to them than any number of guns.

This last argument was especially urged by Maroro, an old warrior, held in much esteem in the village; and his opinion might have prevailed with Umboo, if it had not been for Leshoo. The latter craftily urged that the white men would never forgive the injury already done them; and though they might take the oath proposed, they would disregard it, as soon as they were in safety. There was nothing to be hoped, he said, from the favour of the English, and nothing to be feared from their enmity. Even if they were again to become the owners of the Cape Colony, they would know nothing about these English travellers. As for ransom, they would never get anything better, they might rest assured, than the four guns, the watches, and clothes of the prisoners, which might be regarded as already their own, and which they must be fools indeed to give up.

His speech was well calculated to work on the pride and the avarice of Umboo, as well as on the fears of the others. It was resolved, by a large majority, that the strangers should not be set at liberty, either with, or without, conditions; but the danger that might arise from them should be averted by their immediate death. This point having been disposed of, the manner of their execution was the next considered, and Leshoo’s counsel was again adopted. He proposed that the white man’s presumption, in entering on a contest of skill with the chief, should be properly punished by each one of them affording, in their several persons, an evidence of the chiefs unrivalled skill in the use of arms. One of the four, he suggested, should be shot to death by an arrow, a second brained by a club, a third pierced by an assegai, while the fourth—the white medicine-man himself—should die by his own weapon; Umboo, in every instance, being the executioner.

The suggestion was too nattering to the chief’s vanity, and too well adapted to efface the mortification of his recent defeat, to be rejected. All concurred in it; and it was resolved that it should be carried out that very day. The posts had not yet been removed from the places where they had been fixed on the day of the trial of skill, and it was agreed that no fitter scene could be chosen for the execution. Omatoko, accompanied by Leshoo, was sent to announce to the prisoners their approaching doom—an office which the latter, at least, undertook con amore.

It was a terrible shock, even to Lavie, whose forebodings had been of the darkest ever since their capture. But he had not anticipated anything so barbarous, or so sudden. The tidings were communicated to him in Dutch by Omatoko, and it was his office to break it to his younger friends.

“Lads,” he said, after a few moments of inward prayer for support and counsel; “lads, I have something very grave and trying to announce to you. We have all known that our peril, ever since we left the Hooghly, has been imminent, and that we might be called upon at any moment to yield up our lives—”