Once upon the back of my horse, or rather pony—for in Java there are no horses worthy of the name—I felt that we were safe: at the time, however, I but little imagined the labor we should have to urge the beasts through the brushwood and jungle; indeed, after an hour or two’s coaxing, whipping, kicking with spurless heels, I became of Martin’s opinion, who—wet through with perspiration, engendered by his endeavors to make his animal go at a little more than a sharp walking pace—exclaimed,—
“Oh, bother! an English donkey would be worth a dozen of these brutes! I tell you what, Claud, I believe we should save time by reversing our positions, and carrying these animals on our shoulders;” at which, by the way, Prabu administered a very proper rebuke.
“These horses,” said he, “know their business better than the Sahib Martin. They know that they have to traverse mountain and valley—through brushwood and jungle—and meet with tigers or snakes, therefore they are slow; but they are cautious and sure-footed.”
“Ah!” replied my brother, “the old story of ‘the tortoise and the hare.’ Well, we must make the best of it.”
But then his “making the best of it” consisted in goading his pony till, becoming restive, it literally “bolted,” and, in its rage, regardless of the character Prabu had given him for sure-footedness, went, head foremost, into the ruins of a huge tank, some twelve feet deep.
“My brother is killed!” I exclaimed, half-frightened out of my wits, as horse and rider suddenly disappeared into an abyss, which, for what I then knew, might be as deep as the chasm down which I had fallen in the caves.
“Not kill! tank all full of grass and brushwood,” said the guide; and, to my great satisfaction, so it proved, for by the time we had reached the edge of the tank Martin had clambered up its sides, and stood before us rubbing his limbs.
“The ill-tempered brute!” he exclaimed, as we came up to him. “But I hope he is not killed.”
“No, sahib; horse not kill!” replied our guide; and, dismounting, he jumped into the tank, and in less than half-an-hour we saw him leading the animal up a slope.
Onward again along the side of this great tank, which once supplied the inhabitants of Mojopahit; through the vast ruins of palaces and magnificent temples, overgrown with forest trees and jungle, where once had stood the classic city of Java—the seat of her ancient kings.