He paused, I say, and, casting his eyes upon the valley, drew Ormsby’s attention to various species of smaller game, which, roused from their coverts by the crack of the rifles, were speeding in hot haste across the plain; gnoos, zebras, and bucks of manifold kind, all at once gave life to the green valley far below the travellers’ reach; and Frankfort had scarcely had time to point them out, when a noble lion, with eyeballs of flame and mane erect, sprung at a single bound from his covert in the cliff above, and, in silent majesty, placed his huge paw upon the neck of the slaughtered deer, his gleaming orbs fixed in steady gaze on the astonished countenance of Frankfort.
He uttered no sound—the lashing of his tail against his sides was the only proof this magnificent lord of the manor gave of his displeasure at the intrusion of poachers on his territory. His frown was terrific, and said plainly, “This is my property by royal right, and here I stand to defend it.”
How long this scene lasted was never computed by the sportsmen—Frankfort always admitted that they left the lion master of the field, and declared that Ormsby was as ready as he to dive into a bush and climb a path they would not have attempted “under ordinary circumstances.”
Not long after this adventure their plans and prospects assumed a totally different aspect to what they had anticipated; a simple incident proved the straw that turned the balance, and caused them to turn their backs upon an expedition to which one, at least, had looked forward with the prospect of a year’s sport and travel.
At dawn, one roseate morning, a yell from the dogs awoke May in time to discover a poor little porcupine scuffling back to his hole. Up jumped Ormsby, who would not wait for May’s attack with a short assegai, which he had at hand; lifting his foot, he laid the quarry sprawling on the ground, but not before the animal had driven one of his natural weapons into the thoughtless young man’s foot; darting the quill, sharp as a needle, with all his force, the creature left it two inches deep in the instep, and would have returned to the attack, but that May, with a stirrup-leather, laid the enemy dead.
Ormsby sat down upon a block of granite, in great agony, and the bushman, after a deliberate survey of the jeopardised limb, remarking, with a gravity that startled even Frankfort, that “the sir must lose either his leg or his boot,” opened his clasp-knife, and skilfully and deliberately cut the boot open, then applying his fine but useful teeth to the quill, he tugged at it bravely, and drew it out with a jerk. A clear jet of blood bubbled up from the wound, and Ormsby fainted with the pain.
The inflammation which followed was so great as to preclude the possibility of riding far, and as, fortunately, the wagons were only five miles in the rear, Frankfort deemed it wisest to return to them at once, as he well knew Piet would not move in haste.
Everything was as they had left it two days previously, although the obstinate old wagoner had been told to follow as soon as the sore-footed oxen had recovered, and they were now fit for their work. There sat Fitje, stitching at her patchwork petticoat; there lay the herd-boys beside the green-bordered vley; and there sat old Piet, in the glow of sunlight, smoking his pipe.