'Merrily, lads, so ho!'
the chorus of which he had led when the 'trooper' came steaming out of Plymouth harbour.
He had now to traverse miles of a genuine South African karroo, a dreary, listless, and uniform plain, broken here and there by straggling kopjies, or small hills of schistus or slate, the colour of which was a dull ferruginous brown. No trace of animal nature was there—not even the Kaffir vulture; and the withered remains of the fig-marigold and other succulent plants scattered over the solitary waste crackled under his feet as he trod wearily on.
Night was closing again, when, weary and footsore, he began to feel a necessity for rest and sleep, and on reaching a little donga, through which flowed a stream where some indigo and cotton bushes were growing wild, he was thankful to find among them some melons and beans. Of these he ate sparingly; then, laying his loaded rifle beside him, he crept into a place where the shrubs grew thickest, and fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.
Laden with moisture, the mild air of the African night seemed to kiss his now hollow cheeks and lull his senses into soft repose.
Next day betimes he set out again, unseen by any human eye, and after traversing the karroo (far across which his shadow was thrown before him by the rising sun) for a few more miles, a cry of joy escaped him when he came suddenly upon a bend of the Buffalo River and knew that the opposite bank was British territory.
Slinging his rifle, he boldly swam across, and had not proceeded three miles when he struck upon a kind of beaten path that ran north and south; but, as a writer says, 'the worst by-way leading to a Cornish mine, the steepest ascent in the Cumberland hills which draught horses would never be faced at, is a right-royal Queen's highway compared with a Natal road.'
Great was his new joy when, after a time spent in some indecision, he saw a strange-looking vehicle approaching at a slow pace, though drawn by six Cape horses. This proved to be Her Majesty's post-cart proceeding from Greytown to Dundee, viâ Helpmakaar, the very point for which the escaped prisoner was making his way.
It overtook him after a time, and he got a seat in it among four or five men like Boers, who, however, proved to be Englishmen. It was a wretched conveyance, without springs, and covered with strips of old canvas, patched in fifty places, and fastened down by nails. No luggage is allowed for passengers in these post-carts, which carry the mail-bags alone.
A naked Kaffir running on foot, armed with a whip, cut away indefatigably at the two leaders; another on the box plied a long jambok or team-whip of raw ox-thong, urging the animals on the while in his own guttural language, and only used English when compelled to have recourse to abuse, and after ten miles' progress along a road—if it could be called so—encumbered by boulders in some places, deep with mud in others, Florian found himself in the village of Helpmakaar, and among the tents of the few survivors of the two battalions of the 24th Regiment.