Camp Fire Yarns of the Lost Legion Part 19

I had plenty of old hands among my men, both black and white, and on reaching the junction of the river and creek I was certain the work had been done thoroughly, although nothing had been found. At the junction I found a lot of Dutchmen, some twenty in number, who were outspanned there. They were trek riders, who, after delivering their loads in Salisbury, had hauled off the road and camped for the purpose of resting their oxen and shooting big game to make biltong. They had heard nothing of the lost man, but insisted on helping me to look for him. That afternoon we searched the new line of country back to the road, the right-hand man blazing the trees _en route_, but found nothing except game and lion spoor. The next day we started from where we had left off and took a new line, the left-hand man blazing the trees, while the right-flank man worked down the line of the previous afternoon. I did not rush the men, as I had no hopes of finding the poor fellow alive, but yet I hoped to find his rifle--a lion could not eat that--or some trace of him, so I told the men to search carefully and not hurry. I had two bugles with me, and the men shouting to one another, so as to keep in touch, made plenty of noise, that the poor chap must have heard if alive. The bush was an open one, with little undergrowth, so we had a good chance of finding anything out of the common.

We kept up this search ten days, until I was convinced every bit of ground in the triangle had been prospected; but we found absolutely nothing. Then we said good-bye to the Dutchmen and continued our journey. Some weeks afterwards a post cart pa.s.sed me going to Salisbury and the corporal in charge of it told me a wonderful tale.

The Dutchmen had remained at their camp some time after my departure, and the day before they moved off one of them, while out shooting, had found a white man concealed in an ant-bear hole. He was stark naked, and in a dreadfully emaciated condition, the nails torn off his hands and his teeth actually worn down to his gums. He was quite mad, but the Dutchman carried him to his waggon, and trekked into Tuli; where he was taken into the hospital, and with careful nursing restored to reason and health.

He afterwards came up to Salisbury, where I was staff officer. I knew him well, and held frequent conversations with him regarding his woeful experiences. His story is a very short one. He had left the waggons after breakfast for a stroll, with his rifle, three cartridges and no matches. All at once it dawned on him he was lost, so he started running (_a fatal mistake_), and remembers no more. Up to the time he was found, quite close to the Dutchman's camp, over forty days had elapsed. How he had lived he had no idea. The state of his hands and teeth showed he must have grubbed roots and gnawed them; but he must have obtained water from either the creek or river, and, mad as he was, one of them should have guided him to safety.

Again, how did he escape my search and that of other parties who had looked for him? What became of his rifle, boots and clothes? And, above all, why did not a lion skoff him? To these and heaps of other queries I can only say that truth is stranger than fiction, that I have told the yarn as it happened, and can't answer conundrums. In the above yarn I have told you that the lost man began to run, and have noted it was a fatal mistake. Yes, it is a fatal mistake to begin to run when you discover you are lost, for I can a.s.sure you that it is not a difficult matter for even an old and experienced scout to lose himself, if he lets his mind and attention wander. But now I will spin you a yarn about one of my men who was lost on the same trek to Mashonaland.

This man was a fine, strapping fellow about thirty years of age. He was a well-educated mechanic, a good athlete and football-player, but a new chum in the bush and at frontier work. We were at the time trekking along the Limpopo River, a very bad bit of country indeed, and I had given my men warning not to leave the waggons.

I had also tried to teach the new chums some simple facts in bushcraft. The country here swarmed with feathered game: partridges, pheasants, and guinea-fowls. It was my custom to walk on before the train of waggons, on the trek, with my gun, and shoot plenty of these birds sunning themselves on the road. One evening when the men were inspanning, a very noisy job when you have eighteen waggons, I took my gun and strolled along as usual. The road was about thirty yards broad, and well-defined, the wide river running some one hundred yards on the right-hand side of it. I had progressed about two hundred yards from the outspan, but was still well within earshot and sight of it, when I saw the man I have mentioned come rus.h.i.+ng through the trees and thorn bushes, down the slope on the left-hand side of the road. At first I thought he had gone mad, and so, for a time, he was. He had lost his hat, his khaki clothes were torn to rags, his face worked convulsively, with his eyes bulging out of his head, while the perspiration ran down him in streams. He reached the road within a yard or two of me; but he neither saw me, the road, nor the river in front of him. I jumped forward and seized him, saying: "What's the matter with you? What are you doing here?"

He struggled for a moment, as if to try and break away; then some expression came into his face, and he gasped out: "Oh, thank G.o.d, major, you have found me. I knew you would look for me."

[Ill.u.s.tration: BUSH TRACK.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: PUNGA (TREE FERN).]

"Look for you?" I said. "Why, what's gone wrong with you?"

"Oh, sir," he cried--and, strong man as he was, he shook with fear--"I'm lost in the bush."

"Lost in the bush?" I said. "What do you mean? Don't you see you are on the road? Don't you see the waggons? Don't you hear the row the boys are making inspanning, or see the river in front of you?"

"I do now, sir; but I saw nothing, and heard nothing, when you caught hold of me. Oh, thank G.o.d you found me."

As he was quite unnerved, I took him back to my waggon, and gave him a tot, at the same time making inquiries as to the time he had left the camp; and I found out he had not been absent more than an hour. So much for the rapidity with which bush fear unnerves a new chum, no matter how strong he is, unless he has the will-power to fight against it. On questioning this man, subsequently, he told me he had only strolled into the bush for a few minutes, then tried to find the waggons, had failed to do so, started running, and remembered no more.

Fortunately he had run in a circle that crossed the road; had he circled in the other direction, nothing could have saved him, and another case of the bush having claimed a white man's life would have been registered. Now anyone would think that one experience of that sort would have been enough for that man, but it was not, for, some time afterwards, he again went off by himself, and again got lost. At this time we were trekking through very rough country, full of steep, high granite kopjes, and, notwithstanding my strict orders to the contrary, he left the waggons, and went into the bush alone. On his absence that night being reported to me, I took a party of colonial blacks with a couple of Mashonas and ascended a big kopje, at the foot of which we were outspanned, and from that height examined the country. It was not long before I spotted a fire, about two miles away, that was evidently a white man's fire; so I at once had an answering fire lit, and carefully took the bearings of the one I saw.

At daybreak I sent a party of men, under an experienced old hand, to bring in the straggler. They reached the place and found the remains of the fire, but he had gone. Not content with his first folly, the stupid fellow had evidently tried to find his way back to us, and lost himself again. For two days we looked for him, and on the third the late Mr Alfred Beit, who was travelling up to Mashonaland, brought him into my camp, having come across him, in a dazed condition, quite by chance, some miles back on the road. You may depend that the reception he got from me was a very warm one, and that I took most effectual precautions to prevent him leaving the waggons again.

CHAPTER VII

THE NON-COM.'S REVENGE, OR THE CURATE AND THE SNAKE

I was proceeding up-country in South Africa with a small party of troopers and led horses. The day before I was to start the bishop came to me and said: "One of my young men has to go up to headquarters. Do you mind taking him with you? He is quite new to the country and, as he is not well off, he can't afford the heavy coach fare. You are taking up led horses. He tells me he can ride a little, and you would be doing a very great kindness if you would take him."

Now the bishop and myself were rather pals in our way; for although, as a rule, I did not trouble the Church much, yet I have always had the greatest respect for the cloth, and perhaps, as this youngster might be a varsity or public school man, he would be company for me on my 500-mile ride. So I said: "All right, bishop; trot him round to the lines to-morrow morning with his traps, an hour before sunrise, and he will find us ready to start. Remember, it is a hard ride, roads bad, rivers full, horses only half broken, and warn him to be punctual."

Next morning the two light mule waggons that were to accompany us were inspanned and ready to load, the horses saddled, early coffee drank, but no curate. Now this was bad. Nothing ever goes quite right the first trek. Mules are new to their places in the span; men, with their last night's heads on them, are sulky; the officer a bit sharp, so as to knock them into shape; the half-broken horses restive; while the non-com. in charge of the waggons is anxious to pack them, and can't do so, to his satisfaction, until he has all the baggage to his hand. Consequently the curate, or, as the men profanely termed him, the bally sky-pilot, not having turned up to time, he was being growled at and cursed. At last he came, his kit consisting of paper bags, parcels and band-boxes.

How he ever expected them to stand the rough usage of the road the Lord only knows. Then he paraded in a field kit composed of a long black coat, short black trousers, low shoes and white socks. Such a get-up to ride 500 miles in I had never seen, and my men eyed him with wonder and astonishment. He came up to me and introduced himself, though he evidently did not think it worth while to apologise for keeping us waiting, but trusted we were going to have fine weather, that he would have a quiet horse, that the men did not swear, that we should meet no wild animals, above all, snakes. In fact he was so full of trust that I had to cut him short, and when he suggested the advisability of saying a few prayers before we started on this very dangerous journey I told him sharply to get on his horse, as smart as he could, and then he could pray there as long as he liked.

This was not perhaps quite polite; but no officer likes to be kept waiting when he is on the point of starting on a journey, and, as I said before, tempers are crisp for the first trek. I had selected for him a quiet old troop horse; and it was well I had done so, as when he started to mount he tumbled over on the other side, and when at last we got him into his saddle he gave endless trouble: first of all his stirrup leathers were too long, then too short, and he was such a noodle, unable to do anything for himself, that a man had to keep on dismounting every few minutes to render him a.s.sistance.

Now there is no cla.s.s of men in the world more respectful to clergy, of any denomination, than the up-country man, be he miner, farmer or trooper. A parson or priest is always made welcome at any camp he may choose to call at, and the best in that camp is placed at his disposal. The men, no matter how wild and G.o.dless, will listen to him with attention, so long as the time is fit and the homily straight; but the minister must have tact.

It is by no means wise for a pastor to preach a sermon against bad language when the waggon is stuck in a drift, or when the cook's mate upsets the bucket of tea into the fire; no, it is better for him, under these circ.u.mstances, to bide his time, close his ears, retire a short distance and commune with himself.

Now this Johnny had not the tact of an ostrich. He had already made a bad impression on us by being late, his wonderful get-up, and by his utter helplessness. This would have been looked over, and the men, thoroughly good-natured, would have done their best for him, and have taken all the care in the world of him, provided he would have left their souls alone, at least during the trek. Leading unbroken horses, for the first day or two, is no joke. They try to break away, and sometimes do so, when they at once head back for their old feed-grounds, have to be rounded-up and recaught; and it does not improve men's tempers when this occurs, and they drop a big D, to have a useless new chum, who, sitting like a monkey on his horse, with his trousers rucked up to his knees, raises his hands and says: "Oh, my dear, dear man, where do you expect to go if you use such horrid language? Oh, how can you say that? Please don't be so profane," etc., etc.

Likewise at the first drift, a very bad one, with a rotten bottom, a very steep pull-out, mules jibbing and waggons sticking, it is not pleasant to have an ignorant josser interfering and making himself more objectionable every minute, by praying out loud that evil should not happen to him for being in the company of such G.o.dless men. This he did, and before we reached the first outspan he had made himself decidedly unpopular; and he did not improve matters there.

I have always made it a rule, when I am trekking with a small party, to take my food in company and at the same camp fire with the men, who will never take a liberty with an officer doing this--it draws the feeling of comrades.h.i.+p tighter, and also only one man is required to do the cooking. Now the new chum objected to this, and that in an audible voice. He informed me he did not care to sit at the same fire as troopers, most of whom were low fellows. By the same token, most of them were gentlemen by birth, while some of them were varsity and public school men to boot, and all of them thorough good fellows. I lost my temper with the a.s.s, and told him he could light a fire for himself, or, if he preferred it, could sit with the Kafirs, but if he required food he had better come and have it. This he did with a very bad grace, and noticing the old waggon non-com. (a strict Roman Catholic) cross himself before beginning his food, had the worse taste to attack the old fellow's religion and preach at him for his bad language at the drift.

The grizzled old warrior said nothing, but I could see a grin come over his face that I knew predicted danger to the new chum; and presently he began to talk about snakes and lions.

The curate opened his ears wide, taking in all that was said, and by the time we were ready to inspan for the evening trek he had become very nervous.

That afternoon he rode with two or three of the troopers, who filled him up to the chin with wonderful and awful yarns about snake bites and lion stories; so that when we halted for the night he dare not move out of the light thrown by the camp fire.

He did not object to sharing the evening meal with the men, but again made himself very offensive to the non-com., and, on the latter serving out the evening ration of rum, made most uncalled-for remarks, and preached us a sermon on temperance, and the evils of strong drink.

Well, the ration was drunk, the last pipe smoked, the sentry posted and the blankets laid down. Again he started to fuss. Where was he to sleep? He had never slept out in the open before. He could not sleep without undressing. Was there not great danger from wild animals and snakes? And he had no blankets in his kit to begin with.

The old non-com. looked after him like a mother, the men gave up blankets for his use, and at last all turned in; but as I fell off to sleep I saw the non-com. go to a thorn-tree and select, with much care, a branch. The new chum had undressed, said most voluminous prayers and, tired out by the journey, fallen asleep.

Everything was quite quiet, when suddenly we were all roused by the most piercing yells. A frontier man is awake and on the alert in a moment, and I at once demanded what the row was about.

The parson, nearly mad with terror, screamed out he had been bitten by a serpent and must die; he also held out to me his naked arm, on which I saw two small punctures with drops of blood oozing out of them.

To tie a piece of rhimpie round his arm above the wound, and twist it tight with a cleaning rod, jab a penknife into the punctures, and suck them, at the same time ordering the patient to hold his bally row, and the non-com. to bring a pannikin of rum, did not take long, and I at once administered a tot that would have made an old bos'n cough and splutter. Then I had him walked about and in a few minutes gave him another quartermaster's nip, which got well home on him, and he became very drunk indeed. Of course as soon as I saw him drunk I knew he was safe, and told him to stop whimpering, get into his blankets and go to sleep. He did certainly stop whimpering, but he refused to go to bed, or go to sleep. No, he declared he would not go home till morning. His holiness sloughed off him like a serpent's skin, and in a few minutes, to the huge delight of my G.o.dless troopers, he began to tell very naughty stories and to sing very ribald songs. He likewise, in his nightgown (a garment never before seen in that part of the world), began to show us some can-can steps, and at last behaved in such a manner that I was forced to tell him I would have him pegged out and gagged if he did not hold his row.

On this he consigned us all to the place it was his duty to guide us away from, got into bed, burst into tears, and sobbed himself to sleep.

I saw by the chuckling of the men, and the unholy grin of the non-com., some joke had been perpetrated; but as I could see I was not to be informed of it I gave the order "Lights out," turned over and went to sleep.

Next morning, an hour before daybreak, the rouse went, blankets were bundled up, horses were quickly rubbed over, saddled, and while they were eating their half-ration of mealies the waggons were packed and early coffee served out. But oh! the wretched new chum! He was stiff from the ride of the previous day, yet, sore as his body was from the unaccustomed saddle, his head was much worse. He groaned when he was roused up and told to turn out. Could he not be allowed to sleep longer? What had happened? Was there no soda water? Oh dear, oh dear.

The non-com. proffered a pannikin of hot coffee and recommended a tot in it. The curate took the coffee but refused the tot, although the non-com. swore it was the best medicine in the world for anyone who had been on the bust the night before, and a.s.sured the poor wretch that he himself always doctored himself with one, after he had had a wet night. Anyhow he must get up, as the waggons had to be packed, and we should move off the moment the horses and mules had finished their feed. He could not or would not, so I was called, and went to him. I saw in a moment the miserable wretch was unable to ride, so ordered the non-com. to make a place for him on one of the waggons, which was done, and, making him dress, we put him on to it. At the midday halt he was better, and at the night outspan he was so well that he began to get aggressive again. The men stood it for a bit, and then one of them repeated one of his own stories, and another started to sing one of his songs. He rushed to me and complained; but I pointed out to him that the song and story were his own, which he had favoured us with the night before, and therefore he could not grumble.

This sort of thing went on all night, and when the rum ration was served out, and he indignantly refused to share it, he was politely requested to favour the men with a discourse on the evils of drink, and bad company.

Of course the men treated him with the greatest respect in my presence, but when they could get him alone he caught it, and even at the camp fire sly shots were fired at him, such as low fellows, get drunk, shocking language, filthy songs, etc., etc., until the poor wretch was nearly driven mad with shame and contrition, and hung on to me so much that he became a perfect nuisance.

This went on for a couple of days, when at a wayside house where the mail coach stopped I had become so sick of him, and also, I must confess, sorry for him, that I paid his coach fare and persuaded him to continue his journey by it, an offer he thankfully accepted. And so I got rid of him, with equal pleasure.

It was after he had left us I was let into the joke that had so amused the men on the night of the catastrophe.

The old non-com., incensed by the new chum's tactless interference with his mules, his language and his religion, and knowing full well the course I should pursue in counteracting a case of snake bite, had taken advantage of the camp being asleep to jam into his victim's arm the thorns I had seen him go to the tree to get, and then on the alarm being given had declared he had seen a snake, so in this crafty way had gained his revenge.

The new chum proved no good up-country, and in a few months was sent back to England, where it is to be hoped he has found a better sphere for his talents than in trying to convert members of the Lost Legion.

And now this skein is ended it is the profound hope of an old Lost Legionary that the perusal of them has not bored you, and he only wishes he had been in better form to do justice to the kind support he has received from the Press and public.