Hunters three: Sport and adventure in South Africa

by Thomas Wallace Knox

So the order was given for inspanning. Jack suggested that we had better send down to the river and save the boat which he had constructed. "We needn't bother about the frame," said he, "as I can get up another one. I'll go down with the Kafirs, take the boat to pieces, and bring away the skins; the skin covering is all we want; it can be folded up and carried in a small space."

Away went Jack with three or four of the Kafirs, and in an hour or so he was back at the camp with the essential portion of his boat. The work of inspanning was rather slow; it is always much slower when you have been in camp for several or many days than when you are moving steadily day after day. We had two wagons, and nine pairs of oxen to each wagon. To yoke up eighteen pairs of oxen is no small job, even when the animals are under thorough discipline; when they are in a condition bordering on wildness it is a great deal worse.

I remember, in my younger days, on the American plains, I used to wonder why the teamsters with the prairie-schooners of those times were so fearfully profane in their talk. I did not wonder any more when I had seen them at work yoking up their teams. A man was pointed out to me once in Leavenworth, Kan., as a prodigy of goodness, because he had driven a five-yoke team from Leavenworth to Salt Lake City and back without uttering a single oath. But there was a sequel to the story: the man was deaf and dumb!

It was noon, and a little after, before we got under way. We made about six miles that afternoon, and then outspanned at the edge of the river's valley, where there was a good supply of water for the cattle, and fairly good grazing-ground. Next morning we were under way in good season; and just before the wagons started we three hunters rode on ahead, partly to spy out the land and partly to see if we could pick up any game. We found two straggling buffaloes, and managed to shoot both of them. They were small, but welcome, and Jack rode back to the wagons to show the party the route they could take in order to pass near where the buffaloes were, and gather up the meat and the hides. We made about fifteen miles that day, outspanning again near the river's valley, and in a very good location.

Soon after going into camp we discovered a herd of half a dozen elands a mile or so to the westward. We spread out in different directions, so as to encircle them, and thereby increase our chances of bringing down at least one of the number. Harry secured one of them, and Jack another; I returned empty-handed from the chase, but I did not care much for that, as the two elands, added to the two buffaloes, gave us a plentiful supply of meat. We saw nothing of our lady friends or their wagons, and concluded that they must have gone farther to the west before crossing the river. Harry and Jack seemed to be a good deal exercised as to the direction they had taken, and I exercised them a good deal more by suggesting that after sending the note to us they had possibly changed their minds and traveled south instead of north. "You know," I added, "that it is a woman's privilege to change her mind, and what better opportunity could they have than now?"

I watched their faces as I spoke, and could distinctly see that both of them turned decidedly pale. The idea that Miss Boland could have been so deceitful as all that was something to drive the poor fellows wild with indignation. They were speechless for two or three minutes, but at last Jack broke the silence by declaring that my idea was an absurd one. He did not believe a word of it for a moment, and would not believe it until he had positive proof. "They said distinctly," he added, "that they were going to cross the river and proceed northward, and I don't believe they would tell a lie."

"It isn't a question of lying," I said; "it is simply that of a change of mind. People don't generally call that a falsehood. Why, you yourself, Jack, the night before we received the note from them, believed in staying where we were, and said so emphatically; the next morning you changed your mind. It wouldn't be right for me to accuse you of falsehood in so doing."

Gradually the conversation took a chaffing tone, and my companions became better-tempered. We slept well, after a hearty supper, and the next morning the three of us went out to find a good place for fording the river. We found one—a place where the river was quite broad and shallow, with a good sandy bottom, and the water about four feet in depth. The manager was doubtful as to the ability of the teams to pull the wagons through; so, by way of precaution, before the first wagon entered he took five yokes of oxen from the other wagon and hitched them on in front of the nine pairs that constituted the team; then, with a great deal of shouting, swearing in half a dozen languages, and a vigorous use of whips and sticks, the team entered the water. It was no small matter to keep the leaders in the way they should go, but the fore-looper, with three or four Kafirs to assist him, managed to do so. It was a pretty hard pull, but they got through all right; the oxen wanted to stop and breathe in midstream, but that could not be allowed, as the wheels would sink in the sand, and it would be a matter of extreme difficulty to start again.

The second wagon was brought over in the same way as the first, with five yokes of oxen taken from the team of the first wagon, making fourteen yokes in all. This practice is a very common one in South African travel, just as it used to be on the American plains. Sometimes the crossings of the rivers here are so bad that it is necessary to unload everything out of the wagons, and carry it across on men's heads or in boats. In many of the rivers the bottom is rocky, being filled with boulders of all sizes. They make a very bad crossing, because they offer miserable foothold to the oxen, and are equally bad footing to men. In crossing one of these stony rivers in my first trip up-country, I slipped and fell at full length in the middle of a swift current, in consequence of having stepped on a boulder which turned under my feet. I was carrying a gun and my suit of clothes at the time; gun and clothes went into the water; but happily I saved both.

After getting safely over the river and putting everything in order, we took a course about due north, uncertain how long we would continue it. Harry, Jack, and I scoured the country ahead of the wagons in order to pick up whatever game might be in our way, and we managed to keep the party well supplied with meat.