Why should they not try towing? Just the idea that occurred to baas Van Dorn; to be acted upon without an instant’s delay. Quick as it could be done, the old waggon trek-trouws were spliced together, one end made fast to the raft, and the other carried ashore, with a score of Hottentots and Caffres to do the towing. Which commenced amid a chorus of encouraging cries; and soon the huge, heavy craft, with constantly increasing speed, was “walking the water like a thing of life.”
Note 1. If a wide river, mosquitoes are rarely found far from the bank. Along the water’s edge is their favourite haunt, especially where wooded.
Note 2. The “Wattled” crane (Grus carunculata). The “Blue” crane of the South African colonists is that better known to naturalists as the Stanley crane (Anthropoides Stanleyanus). The “Caffre” crane is the beautiful species with coronetted head (Balearica Regulorum); called also “Crowned” crane, and sometimes “Balearic” from its being an inhabitant of the Balearic Isles.
Note 3. The Adjutant, or, as more commonly called, “Adjutant bird” (Ciconia Argali), belongs to the family of storks, of which South Africa possesses no less than seven distinct species. The species of Ardeinae or Herons, are there even much more numerous, there being fifteen of them including true herons, egrets, and bitterns.
Chapter Twenty Two.
Legs Easily Broken.
The towers had advanced but a very short way when an incident arose, illustrating a strange ornithological fact—indeed, so strange as to seem apocryphal. While pulling onward with shouts and laughter, they saw before them two large birds, which all knew to be Slangvreters (Note 1),—easily recognisable as such by their slender bodies, thick aquiline beaks, and long stilt-like legs. But still more, by the spike of plumelets growing out of their crowns with a backward slant; which, from a fancied resemblance to the old-fashioned quill-pen stuck behind the ear of clerk or scrivener, has earned for them the more common title of “Secretary birds.” When first observed, they were out on the open veldt serpent-hunting. One had even seized a large green snake, borne it aloft into the air, and was in the act of dashing it to the ground, where the other, with outstretched neck and vibrating wings, was waiting to pounce upon it. They were but a little out of the way of the towers, who expected to see them drop the snake, and retreat further, or carry it away. They did drop the snake, but instead of making off, drew nearer with a rush, half running, half flying; nor stopped they till close up, and direct on the path the towing party must take. Not to remain at rest there, but with continued fluttering around a mimosa-bush that grew upon the bank—all the while screaming affrightedly.