"Before I go on any hippopotamus-hunt," said Jack, "I'm going to have a boat! Without a boat you can't do much."
"As to that," replied Harry, "there isn't a boat that one of us would trust himself in in all this part of South Africa. Do you propose to send back to the settlements for a boat?"
"No, I don't propose anything of the kind," said Jack; "I'll make a boat, and I'll do it to-morrow morning, so that it will be ready for use by noon!"
We laughed at his suggestion, but Jack said quietly, "Just you wait and see."
Before going to bed that night, Jack got out four of our largest buffalo-hides, and put them to soak in a tub, so that they would be soft and pliable by morning. He was up bright and early, and before breakfast he went out to the nearest bush and cut some poles about ten feet long and an inch and a half in diameter. He took along two of our Kafirs, who brought the poles into camp; and by the time they did so, and Jack was back from his tour, breakfast was ready.
After breakfast he marked out on the ground a space which represented the size of his boat at the gunwales. Then he split the sticks he had cut, just as a "hoop-pole" is split for its uses. Then each hoop was sharpened at the ends, and the ends were stuck in the ground at equal distances marked along the curves indicating the gunwales of the boat. When the hoops or sticks were all in place they resembled the framework of a very low and oblong Eskimo hut. Harry suggested that Jack was making a hen-coop to keep the dogs in, to which Jack replied, as before, "Wait and see."
The next move was to take the now softened buffalo-hides and spread them over the framework, straightening the places where they met by means of a sharp knife. When the hides had been properly trimmed they were sewn together, and then stretched over the framework, which they fitted, as Harry said, "like paper on the wall." I should have remarked that the series of hoops which formed the framework were braced longitudinally by longer and stronger pieces of wood, one taking the place of the keel and two others forming the gunwales, all of them firmly tied in place by a strong cord. When the hide covering was stretched over the woodwork and securely fastened at the gunwales, the boat was complete. It was lifted from its inverted position and turned right side up, the points of the sticks were cut away, and odd pieces of the hide were bound around the edge to strengthen it.
"I told you to wait and see," said Jack, "and now you see it!"