Game of every kind swarmed in the grass and among the reeds along the banks; bustards, grouse, partridges and quails. If Jack had sent his dogs foraging along the banks and in the adjacent country, they could not have gone fifty yards without putting up rabbits, hares, agoutis, peccaries, and water-cavies. In this respect this district equalled that round Falconhurst, and the farmsteads—even in regard to the monkey tribe, which capered from tree to tree. A little way off, herds of antelope raced by, of the same species as that which was penned on Shark's Island. Herds of buffalo, too, were seen in more than one spot in the direction of the range, and sometimes distant glimpses were caught of herds of ostriches, half running, half flying as they sped away. On this occasion, M. Zermatt and his two sons did not mistake them for Arabs, as they had mistaken the first ostriches they saw from the heights above the hermitage at Eberfurt.
Jack was impatient at being pinned to the Elizabeth's deck and unable to jump ashore, at having to watch all these birds and animals going by without being able to speed them with a shot. Yet there would have been no good in bringing down any of the game, since it was not required.
"We are not hunters to-day," his father reminded him; "we are explorers, and, more particularly, geographers on a mission in this part of New Switzerland."
The young Nimrod did not see the matter in that light, and made up his mind to beat the country with his dogs as soon as the pinnace reached her first anchorage. He would further the cause of geography in his own fashion; that is, he would survey partridges and hares instead of the points of the compass. This last was the job for the learned Ernest who was so anxious to add to his map the new territory that lay to the south of the Promised Land.
Of carnivorous animals and of those wild beasts which, as has been said, were so numerous in the woods and plains at the end of Pearl Bay and at the entrance to the Green Valley, not a trace was seen along the banks of the Montrose during the course of this voyage. By great good fortune no lions or tigers, panthers or leopards, showed themselves. Jackals could be heard, indeed, howling in the outskirts of the nearest woods. The conclusion was that these beasts, which belong to a subgenus of the Canidæ family, between the wolf and the fox, constituted the majority of the fauna of the island.
It would be an oversight not to make mention of the many waterfowl seen, duck, teal, and snipe, which flew from one bank to another or took cover among the reeds. Jack would never willingly have thrown away such opportunities of exercising his skill. So he fired a few successful shots, and no one found fault with him for doing so, unless, perhaps, it was Hannah, who always begged quarter for these inoffensive creatures.
"Inoffensive, perhaps, but excellent—when they are cooked to a turn!" Jack retorted.
And it really was matter for congratulation that at luncheon and dinner the bill of fare was supplemented by the wild fowl which Fawn retrieved from the stream of the Montrose.
It was a little after eleven o'clock that the Elizabeth reached a second bend in the river which turned further to the west, according to Ernest's expectation. From its general direction it could be deduced with sufficient certainty that it came down from the range, still some fifteen miles or more away, from which it was manifestly fed largely.
"It is annoying that the tide has almost finished running," said Ernest, "and that we cannot go any farther."