an instance of honourable feeling in this chief, with whom he had trafficked for cattle, which were intercepted by another horde, before he could reach the Colony, and from whom Duchany recovered and restored them.

66

"I have had many escapes among elephants," he added, "and among Kaffers, but I never felt as I did on the night in which my companion was killed. We were bringing a venture of cattle into the settlement, when we were surrounded by Kaffers; we fled different ways,and I wandered on foot, unarmed and alone; night was coming on, when, on suddenly turning a rock, I saw three armed Kaffers within twenty yards of me; they had seized some of the cattle, and the bleeding body of my companion lay by them. I turned, without a hope of escape, and almost felt, in thought, the assegai whizzing into my back. Some time after this escape I was taken, through the fool-hardiness of my companion; for we saw the Cape Corps patrol, and might have secured our safety by the speed of our horses, leaving our

cattle behind, had he not prevailed on me to stop and bribe the serjeant. Now, it is no easy thing," said D-, "to bribe a man who has twenty others watching him; so we were seized, taken to Graham's Town, brought to trial, the court was divided in opinion, and we got off."

The night was wearing away: stretched on the sheepskin carosses, and wrapped in my horseman's cloak, I felt drowsiness coming over me; the fire blazed fitfully before my eyes, the hunter's story became less intelligible, his words half mingled with my dream, and then ceased. After some hours I awoke; our night-fires had burnt low; I looked up, and saw a thousand stars shining through the dark, shadowy boughs; I looked around, my companions were fast asleep; and the dogs, after the fatigues of the day, were slumbering near the embers, which threw a gloomy light on their half-defined bony forms:-I listened, and heard but the river's rush, on whose banks we had bivouaked.

Our first day's search had been vain, but the morning found us ready and sanguine; and after breakfast we started off on foot, each bearing a large elephant-gun on his shoulder. The hunter had changed his dress, and now appeared in a dark-blue linen shirt, loose on the arms, and fastened closely round his bare and sinewy throat; trowsers of the same colour, supported by a waist-belt; a yellow silk handkerchief bound tightly round his head, in Malay fashion; his powder-horn and pouch hung at his side, suspended from his shoulder-belt. This dress was calculated to set off his spare form to advantage; and though plain-featured, there was in his keen worn look, a something that impressed-the expression that belongs to the wanderer over the mountains; to one whose life is a succession of dangers. The little boy, slightly but finely formed, with a fair face, and light curled hair, and a blue eye, that in woman would have been beautiful, struck me as a figure that Westall would have delighted

in, as he bounded lightly forward beneath the

weight of his

gun.

But Skipper, one of the Hottentots, was far the

most singular figure of the group; his large hat, with its round raised top, and strangely formed brim, throwing a dark shadow over his dusky visage; his deeply sunken eyes, his high cheekbones, his mustache large and black; then his dress,—his trowsers tucked up to the knee, showing bare legs that defied thorns; one shoulder-belt, from which the pouch and powder-horn were suspended, and another supporting his hatchet for cutting out the tusks, and his bag for holding the wild honey. His jacket too of many-coloured patches, "that seemed to show variety of wretchedness;" here, however, it was but seeming, for Skipper was one of the boldest and most successful shooters in the country; but his gains, while they lasted, went only to keep the canteen in a roar, for he never could be persuaded to purchase cattle or acquire property. Methinks I see the extraordinary old

man now before me, coolly shaking the ashes from the large pipe, while the elephants are feeding within a dozen yards of him:-another Hottentot, my companion, and myself, completed the party.

The country we were traversing was singularly wild,-savage nature unreclaimed,—no blue smoke amidst the dark-green hills and shadowy hollows told of an habitation; even the roads are the work of the elephant. Man has never appeared in those tremendous solitudes, save as a destroyer. All was still, yet at intervals there came upon the ear the distant sound of a passing bell, heavy and slow like the death-toll; all again was still, and again the bell-bird's note came borne upon the wind: we never seemed to approach it, but that low, melancholy, distant dreamlike sound, still continued at times to haunt us like an omen of evil.

We threaded the elephant paths with a swift silent pace, over hills and through ravines, until, from having been long unaccustomed to walking in this riding country, I began, greatly