“True,” said Harold; “and had that tree not grown where it stands, and grown tough, too, I suspect he would have made short work of Antonio too.”
“Bah!” said the interpreter, with affected carelessness, “him was but a slow brute, after all.”
Disco looked at Jumbo, who was none the worse of his ducking, and shut his right eye smartly. Jumbo opened his cavernous mouth, and exploded so violently that his double row of brilliant teeth must have been blown out and scattered on the ground, had they not been miraculously strong.
“Come, now,” said Kambira, who had just given orders to some of his followers to remain behind and look after the carcase, “we go to find elephants.”
“Have we much chance of findin’ them?” inquired Disco.
Kambira thought they had, because fresh traces had been recently seen in the neighbourhood, whereupon Disco said that he would prefer to go after lions, but Kambira assured him that these animals were not so easy to find, and much more dangerous when attacked. Admitting the force of this, though still asserting his preference of lions to elephants, the bloodthirsty son of Neptune shouldered his rifle and followed his leader.
While the main party of hunters were thus successfully pushing along, the other bands were not idle, though, possessing no fire-arms, they were less noisy. In fact their proceedings were altogether of the cat-catty. One fellow, as black as a coal, as lithe as an eel, and as long—according to Disco’s standard—as a fathom of pump-water, having come upon a herd of buffalo unseen by them, and being armed with a small bow and quiver of arrows, suddenly dropped on all-fours and began to glide through the long grass.
Now there is a particular little bird in those regions which calls for special notice here. It is a very singular bird, inasmuch as it has constituted itself the guardian of the buffalo. It frequently sits upon that animal’s back, and, whenever it sees the approach of man, or any other danger, it flaps its wings and screams to such an extent, that the buffalo rushes off without waiting to inquire or see what is the matter; and the small guardian seems to think itself sufficiently rewarded with the pickings it finds on the back of its fat friend. So vigilant is this little creature, that it actually renders the approach of the hunter a matter of great difficulty in circumstances when, but for it, he might approach with ease. (See Livingstone’s Zambesi and its Tributaries, page 200.)
Our wary native was, however, aware of this little fellow’s propensities, and took precautions to outwit the bird rather than the beast. It may perhaps cause some surprise to be told that a small bow and arrows were a sufficiently powerful species of artillery to bring to bear against such noble game, but the surprise will vanish when we state that the arrows were poisoned.
Having crawled to within range, the fathom of black pump-water suddenly arose and let fly an arrow. The missile went deep into the side of a majestic bull. The little bird fluttered and screamed too late. The bull at once dashed away at full speed, starting off the whole herd in alarm. The black fathom followed at the top of his speed, and was joined by a number of other black fathoms, who were quite aware of what had been done. The buffaloes were soon out of sight, but the fathoms followed the trail with the unerring pertinacity of fate. After a long run they came up with the stricken bull, which had fallen behind its fellows, and waited patiently until the poison took full effect. In a short time the animal fell, and the successful hunters fell to work upon his carcase with their knives.