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Show '.tiR. already he was engulfed up to his WK middle and going down so rapidly .BRthat in another minute ho would vi;1Mr have vanished altogether. Well, VK tve got him out, but not with ease, B.'for that mud dung to him like the tentacles of an octopus. After this we were more careful. . ;R Nor did thl road run straight; V:Jflfeon the contrary, it curved about and : ' jf sometimes turned at right angles. Hv Thc f,ifr,c,,Itifis of tIiat horrible ' jju P'ac0 arc beyond description, and .-. IK Indeed can scarcely bo imagined. t En First' tlierc was that of a kiud o 'mm grass which grew among the roots 2iM'of "le rccfIs nm 1,a(1 ectecs- like aR'knlvps As Robertson and I wore . ; JHp. gaiters, we did not suffer so much iR from It, but the poor Zulus with . ";ihPir bare legs were terrlblv cut I3an(1 some cases lamed. T,lcn thcrc v-'ere the mosquitoes, 'il K wmcl1 Iivod licre bv t,lc million, and f jK-all seemed anxious for a bite; also '- w '1C snakes of a Peculiarly horrible yjf Hlkim! that were numerous. A Zulu K"was bitten by one of them of so "ijfWfpoisonous a nature that- lie died '4lMt within three minutes. We threw ..JRln bodv into the swamp, whereit JaH vanished at once. .Jail Lastlj, there were the allpervad- ..iJIIlng stench and the. intolerable heat In of the place, since no breath of air ilslf could penetrate that forest of reeds. ''"Am: vnne a minor irouoie was llie mul-Tjttitude mul-Tjttitude of leeclies that kept fasten-Ing fasten-Ing on our bodies. By looking one hk ,. could see the creatures sitting on s a .the under side of leaves with their a ea(ls stretched out. waiting to at- tack anything that wont "by. m m During the day, except for the vf IM O.ccas,onal rush of some great igu-4 igu-4 wana 01" other reptile and the sound J BijOf the wings of the Mocks of wild Hfoffl passing over us from time to i Hhinie' the march was deathly silent. ;5 But at night It was different, for "3 11 then the bullfrogs boomed inces-;J inces-;J Ksantly, as did the bitterns, while 2 Wgreat swamp owls and other night-Hilylng night-Hilylng fowls uttered their weird 0 cres so there were mysterious tc Wg sucking noises caused, no doubt, by ill Btlie sl,lkinS of areas of swamp, with at those of bursting bubbles of foul, 'wrup-rushing gas. Strange lights, too, mfi Ptayed about, will-o'-the-wisps) or gfltjf St Elmo fires, as I believe they are Hb called, that frightened the Zulus 1 very much, since they believed 1 j them to be spirits of the dead. I In short, of all the journeys I l I have made, I think, with the excep-aif excep-aif tion of the passage of the desert on af four way to King Solomon's Minos, wit that through this enormous swamp ijrlwas the most miserable. Heartily M Jdld I curse myself for ever having M ;rundcrtaken such a quest in a wild 1 attempt to allay that sickness, or m ratnei" t0 Qiieuch that thirst of the fl ssoul which I imagine at times as-Urn as-Urn as most of those who have hearts M Saml lhink- 3f Well. I was in for the business r; aud must follow it to thc finish, ,f iwhatover that might be. After all, 9 tt was very interestng, and if there 'i Hfwere anything in what Zlkali said, Wit might become more Interesting 0 tjlstni. For, being pretty well fever--5 ERproof, I did not think I should die "i IJlin that morass, as of course nine 1 Kwhite men out of ten would have jWdone, and, beyond it lay the huge Kmounlain .which day by day grew Wlarger and clearer. M, Xor did Hans, who, with a chlld-Kliko chlld-Kliko trust, pinned his faith to the Great redlcine. This, he remarked, was the worst veld through which he had ever travelled,- but as the Great Medicine would never consent to be burled in that stinking stink-ing mud,- he had no doubt that we should conio safely through It some time. I replied that this wonderful wonder-ful medicine of. his had not saved one of our companions, who had now made a grave in tho same mud.' "No. Baas," he said, '"but those Zulus have nothing to do wiih the medicine which was given to you and to me who accompanied you when we saw the Opener of Roads. Therefore perhaps they will all die, except Umslopogaas, whom you, were told to take with you. If so, what does It matter, since there arG plenty of Zulus, although there be but one Macuiuazahn and one Hans? Also the Baas may remember that he began by offending a snake, and therefore it is quite natural that tho snake's brother should have bitten the Zulu." "If you are right, he should have bitten me, Hans." "Yes. Baas, and so no doubt he would have done had you not been protected by the Great Medicine, and me too had not my grandfather been a snake-charmer, to say nothing noth-ing of the smell of the medicine being on me as well. The snakeg .w... i.ij ouuiliu UILU. llHilS. At last the swamp bottom began to slope upwards a little, with the result that as thc land dried through natural drainage, the reeds grew thinner by degrees, until finally they ceased, and w found ourselves on firmer ground; indeed, upon the low est slopes of tho great mountain that I have mentioned, that now towered 4 above us, forbidding and majestic. I made a little map in my pocket-book pocket-book of the various twists and turns of tho road through that vast Slough of Despond, marking them from hour to hour as we followed its devious wanderings. On studying study-ing it at tho end of that part of our journey I realized afresh how utterly ut-terly impossible it would have been for us to thread this misty maze, where a few false steps would always al-ways have meant death by suffocation, suffoca-tion, had it not been for the spoor of those. Amahagger travelling immediately im-mediately ahead of us, who were acquainted with its secrets. Had they been friendly guides they could not have done us a better bet-ter turn. What I wondered was why they had not tried to nmbush us in the reeds, since our fires must have shown them that wo wero close upon their heels. That they did try to burn us up was clear from certain evidences that I found, but fortunately at this season of the year in the absence of a strong wind the reeds were too green to catch fire. For the rest I was soon to learn the reason of their neglect to attack us in that dense cover. They were waiting for a better opportunity. CHARTER X. The Attack. 7y7E won out of the reeds at XjU last, for which I fervently V thanked God. We had emerged from them late in the afternoon, and being wearied out, 1 stopped for a while to rest and eat of the flesh of a buck that I had been fortunate enough to shoot upon "At length all was ' v . ready and there Wi'Mf& ffw came that long vJp IPflltf 'n&f; trying: wait, . BKB the most v' : mW$$r disagreeable part. of-. . , ZJmMit w a fight." ' f "" their fringe. Then we pushed forward for-ward up the slope, proposing to camp for the night on the crest of it a mile or so away, where I thought avc should escapo from the deadly mist in which we had been enveloped envel-oped so long, and obtain a clear view of the country ahead. Following the bank of a stream which here ran down Into the marsh, we came at length to this crest just as the sun was sinking. Below us lay a deep valley, a fold, as it wore, in the skin of the mountain, well, but not densely wooded. The woods of this valley climbed up the mountain moun-tain Hank for some distance above it and then gave way to grassy slopes that ended in steep sides of rock, which were crowned by a black and frowning precipice of unknown height. There was, I remember, re-member, something very impressive about this towering natural wall. Indeed, the aspect of it thrilled me, I knew not why. I observed, however, that at one point in thc mighty cli'f there seemed to be a narrow cleft down which, no doubt, lava had flowed in a remote age, and it occurred to mo that up this cleft ran a roadway, road-way, probably a continuation of that by which we had threaded tho swamp. Thc fact that through my glasses I could see herds of cattle grazing on the slopes of the mountains went to confirm this view, since cattle imply owners and herdsmen, and search as I would I could find no native villages vil-lages on the slopes. The inference infer-ence seemed to be that those own-ers own-ers dwelt beyond or within the mountains. , All of those things I saw and pointed out to Robertson in the light of the setting sun. Meanwhile Umslopogaas ; had been engaged in selecting' se-lecting' the spot where we were to camp for tho y$k AST nil '" My m- Lyr,'7 . night. Some soldierlike Instinct, or perchance some prescience of danger, caused him to choose a place particularly suitablo to defence. de-fence. It was on a steep-sided mound that more or less resembled a gigantic ant-heap. Upon one side this mound was protected by the stream which, because of a pool, was here rather deep, while at tho back of it was a collection of curious, curi-ous, piled-up water-worn rocks, which, lying one upon another, curved round the western side of the mound, so that practically It was only open for a narrow space, say, thirty or forty feet, upon that face of it which looked onto tho mountain. "Umslopogaas expect battle," remarked re-marked Hans to me with a grin. "Otherwise, with all this nice plain round us, he would not have chosen to camp In a place which a few men could hold against many. Yes, Baas, he thinks that those cannibals canni-bals are going to attack us." "Stranger things have happened," I answered, indifferently, and hav-ing hav-ing seen to the rifles went to lie down, observing, as I did so, that tho tired Zulus seemed already to be asleep. Only Umslopogaas did not sleep. On the contrary, ho stood leaning on hl3 axe, (staring at tho dim outlines of the opposing precipice. "A, strange mountain, Macuma-zahn," Macuma-zahn," ho said, "compared to It lhat of tho Witch beneath which my kraal lies Is but a little baby. I wonder what we shall find within it. I have always loved mountains, Macumazahn, ever since a dead brother of mine and I lived with tho wolves in the Witch's lap, for on them I have had tho best of my fighting." "Perhaps it is not done with yet," I answered, weari- jy "I hope not, Ma- ' cumazahn, since some is due to us &r after all these days jfc of mud aud stench. jgT Sleep a while now, r Macumazahn, for that head of yours, which you use so much, must need W'.;-: 'jn, So I lay down SZ&&$&& anc 8Iept as sound-.fy sound-.fy 1' as ever I fla(I '" 'f. ...i done in my life, for ,V T'.& a space of four or 'Jy &7 five hours, I sup-f) sup-f) pose. Then, by some .,y l mstinct' perhaps, 1 ' awoke suddenly, feeling much re-& re-& freshed in that Jj&f sweet mountain air, iij a new man, in- doed, and in the moonlight saw Umslopogaas striding toward me. "Arise, Macumazahn," he said. "I hear men stirring beneath us." At this moment Hans slipped past him, whispering: "The cannibals are coming, Baas, a good number of them. I think they mean to attack us before dawn." Then he passed behind me to warn the Zulus. As he wont by I said to him: "If so, Hans, now is the time for your Great Medicine to show what Jt can do." "The Great Medicine will look after you and mo, all right, Baas," he replied, pausing and speaking in Dutch, which Umslopogaas did noc undorstand, "but I expect there will be fewer of those Zulus to cook for before the sun grows hot. Their spirits will be turned into snakes and go back into the reeds from which they say they were 'torn out,' " he added over his shoulder. I should explain that Hans acted as cook to our party and it was a grievance with him that the Zulus ate so much of the meat which ho was called upon to prepare. Indeed, In-deed, there is never much sympathy sym-pathy between Hottentots and Zulus. "What is the little yellow man saying about us?" asked Umslopogaas, Umslopo-gaas, suspiciously. "He is saying that If it comes to battle, you and our men will make a great fight," I replied, diplomatically. diplomat-ically. "Yes, we will do that, Macuma- zahn, but I thought he said that we should be killed and that this jH pleased him." "Oh, dear, no!" I answered, hast ily. "How pould he be pleased if that happened. 3ince tHen he would bo left defenceless, if he were not IH killed, too. Now, Umslopogaas, let ns make a plan for this fight" So, together with Robertson, rap- 11 idlywo discussed the thing. As a result, with the help of the Zulus, we dragged together some loose 11 stones and the tops of three Bmall 11 thorn trees which we had cut down, and with them made a low breast- 11 work, sufficient give ua soma protection if we lay down to shoot. It wa3 the work of a few minutes since wo had prepared the material 11 when we camped in case an emerg- 11 ency should arise. 11 Behind this we gathered and 11 waited, Robertson and I being care- 11 ful to get a little to the rear of the Zulus, who, it will be remembered. fll had the rifles which tho Strathmulr bastards had left behind thorn 11 when they bolted, in addition to their axes and throwing assegais. 11 The question was ho these can- 11 nibals would fight. I knew that they were armed with long spears. and knives, but I did not know if JH they used those spears for thrust- jH ing or for throwing:. In the former l case it would be difficult to got at . 11 them with the axes, because they 11 must have tho longer reach. For-tunately, For-tunately, as it turned out, they did both. H At length all was ready and there . 11 came that long and trying wait, thc - 11 most disagreeable part of a fight, IH In which one grows nervous and begins to reflect earnestly upon jH one's sins. Clearly the Amahagger, , jH if they really intended business, jH did not mean to attack till just be- jH fore dawn, after the common na-tive na-tive fashion, thinking to rush us in the low and puzzling light. What perplexed me was that they should wish to attack us at all after hav- ing let so many opportunities of jH doing so go by. jfl Apparently these men were now in sight of their own home, where. no doubt, they had many friends, jH and by pushing on could reach Its jH shelter before us, especially as they knew the roads and we did not. They had come out for a secret purpose that seemed to have to do with thc abduction of a certain young white woman for reasons connected with their tribal state-craft state-craft or ritual, which is the kind of thing that happens not infre-. quently among obscure and ancient African tribes. Well, they had ab- 'H ducted their young woman and '1 were in sight of safety and success in their objects, whatever these '" might be. For what possible rea-son, rea-son, then, could they desire to risk a fight with the outraged friends and relatives of the young woman? It was true that they outnuui-bered outnuui-bered us and therefore had a good chance of victory, but on the othei hand they must know that it would be very dearly won, and if it were not won that we should retake their captive, so that all their troublo would have been for nothing. Fur- J ther, they must be as exhausted jH and travel-worn as we were our- jH selves, and in no condition to face a desperate battle. To Be Continued Copjrieht, 1020. br Sir H. Rider Hazard. |