Harry Milvaine Part 44

The sun went down, and gloaming and gloom settled down over the marsh.

The very stars seemed to give a feebler light than was their wont, for their rays were shorn by a rising haze.

It took quite a long time to-night to light the camp-fire, for the materials had got damp.

The process of making fire is very simple to appearance, but requires no little skill; it is, however, common among nearly all savage nations, and my readers may, if they please, try their hands at it. Suppose yourself a savage and have another savage to a.s.sist you. Well, you are possessed of a round piece of hard dry wood about the length but not nearly so thick as an ebony ruler, it is tapered to a point at one end.

Your companion savage sits in front of you holding firmly a bit of softer wood, flat at the bottom for steadiness' sake, and with a little hole in the top. Into this hole you insert the point of your hard wood drill, then you have only to roll it rapidly back and fore between your two palms, till sparks are emitted and smoke, then fanning or blowing with your breath, and partially surrounding the hole with dried meadow gra.s.s, or anything that will catch easily, will do the rest. If you try it, I hope you will be successful; I myself lack two important essentials to success--patience and dexterity.

But Jack and the guide "made fire" at last, and supper was cooked and eaten.

During the time it was being got ready Harry had taken a little walk in the dim starlight. He did not go far, for he soon got into a miry place. Here he almost trampled upon a gigantic eel creature--it could hardly have been a snake--it was slowly dragging its body through the slime.

While he was looking at it there was the sound of wings in the sky right above him. It was a great vulture of some kind: birds of this kind are scarcely ever a mile distant from a party of African travellers, and have the lion's share of all that is killed. The flapping of wings was very loud and accompanied by a rustling noise; so close overhead was it that he could hear it breathe hoa.r.s.ely--so at least he thought. But hardly had he turned away ere the great bird swooped down, and next moment it had re-ascended carrying the great eel with it. Seeing the latter, though but for a moment, wriggling in the talons of the unclean bird was quite enough for Harry. He walked no farther that way, but speedily returned to the camp.

The fire and his supper rendered him a shade more comfortable; his people went into the wood to collect dry material to make their master a bed. They beat the gra.s.s first with their spears before they ventured to put their hands down, for several deadly-looking, triangular-headed snakes had been seen before sunset, rustling through the undergrowth or hanging to the branches of the trees.

Harry lay down at last, but he slept but little. How could he in such a place, with the horrid bellowing of crocodiles ever and anon rising on the night air, the intervals being filled up with the continuous hoa.r.s.e snoring of some creatures in the marsh, probably gigantic frogs!

[Dactylathrae.]

Next morning there was no chance of proceeding so early as they had wished, for all the swamp was enveloped in a dark grey fog or mist, and it was nearly noon before the sun had succeeded in dispelling it.

On they journeyed now, happy to be able to start at last, for Harry shuddered to think what the consequences would be if the mist did not lift for days.

They had not gone above five miles ere a village came into view.

Harry made Raggy ask the guide why he had not mentioned the existence of this town.

The guide only shook his head and said--

"No good--no good."

The place was built among trees, palms there were of many strange kinds, and an undergrowth of broad-leaved plantains and gigantic feathery ferns, but some of the trees were so weirdly fantastic in shape that in his present depressed state of mind they pained Harry to look at.

The ground here was somewhat higher, but it certainly was no oasis in a desert.

If Harry expected his spirits to rise on entering this village he was soon undeceived. It was the abode _par excellence_ of gloom and misery.

The leaf-built huts were mere kennels, the people themselves were black, naked, decrepit, and puny, and the very children were paunchy and old-looking.

Not a sign of welcome did they make, not the slightest show of resistance; they but gazed on the expedition as it pa.s.sed along with the lack-l.u.s.tre eyes of chronic apathy.

It was evident that here was a tribe or people slowly but surely dying off the face of the earth. Harry soon found that they were cannibals, and that they actually ate their dead. They had no king, no law, no order; they were socialists, nihilists, and soon, doubtless, to be annihilated.

Harry sought out an open s.p.a.ce under the shelter of a splendid spreading tree.

This tree was really a thing of beauty. It was larger than any oak, and its branches were literally bathed in the beauty of trailing flowers, while colonies of bees and birds made sweet soft music in its foliage.

Harry thought if he was a bird, it would not be anywhere near this village he would build his nest and make his home.

Presently a native or two came round and stood up to stare, and after a time one with more alacrity than the rest brought some squash-apples and a chattee of beautiful honey.

There was something human after all even in this degraded race. Harry did not care to eat honey from the hands of a cannibal, so he gave it to his people.

The intelligent native soon squatted down beside Raggy, and from his rolling eyes and woebegone face it was evident he was telling the boy a dismal story.

"What is it, Raggy?" said Harry.

"Ebery night, sah, it is de same," replied Raggy. "He come now foh more'n tree week, and ebery night he take somebody."

"What are you driving at, boy?"

"De lion, sa! De lion what come here ebery night, gobble up some poor soul, den smack his lips and go away back to de jungle."

Now though much against his inclination, Harry had not the heart to go away and leave this wretched tribe to the mercy of a relentless man-eater.

This lion was evidently some very old and wily king of the forest, too old to stalk bigger game. In this village he had "struck oil," as the Yankees say, and was making the very best of it.

Harry determined to "spoil his game."

All day he wandered about this swamp-island, wondering at the beauty of the flowers and the richness of their perfume, and admiring the many strange birds and their nests.

When night began to fall he prepared to watch for the foe.

The lion invariably walked on to the stage at the same spot. When shown this, to his horror he found a poor boy there tied to a stake, agony depicted in his staring eyes, and the sweat standing in beads on his brow and draggling his curly hair.

The poor lad was a sop for Cerberus, and every night it seemed to be the custom thus to sacrifice one poor victim to save others in the village.

Whether they drew lots for it, or how it was arranged, Harry could not find out.

There was little fog here to-night, but it lay low down all over the marsh, which thus looked like one vast sheet of water glimmering in the starlight. Harry lay in concealment behind a tree, the two rifles loaded and ready, with Jack, Raggy, and the guide spear-armed and not far off.

He had released the boy, who looked quite bewildered on first gaining his freedom, but soon regained his presence of mind, and went off scampering and shouting into the village.

Hours and hours pa.s.sed by.

Harry was often startled by noises above him, and looking up saw gigantic bats flitting from tree to tree.

Would the lion never come?

Hark! a footstep deep down in the marsh; soft though it was, it could be heard distinctly enough creeping nearer and nearer, pausing often as if to listen, then coming on and on again through the rustling gra.s.s.

At last he is in sight.

A monster white-muzzled he-lion.

For a moment he stands 'twixt Harry and the starlight.

Our hero's hand is shaking. All his nerves are a-quiver, for truth is he is far from well, and the night air is damp and chilly.

Will he miss? The starlight is confusing.

He takes steady aim and fires.