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Page 105
"Come, come, my dear fellow," said Sir Henry, "you can't refuse to
oblige a lady."
"I won't," replied Good obstinately; "it is positively indecent."
However, in the end he consented to draw up his trousers to the knee,
amidst notes of rapturous admiration from all the women present,
especially the gratified young lady, and in this guise he had to walk
till we got clear of the town.
Good's legs, I fear, will never be so greatly admired again. Of his
melting teeth, and even of his "transparent eye," the Kukuanas wearied
more or less, but of his legs never.
As we travelled, Infadoos told us that there was another pass over the
mountains to the north of the one followed by Solomon's Great Road, or
rather that there was a place where it was possible to climb down the
wall of cliff which separates Kukuanaland from the desert, and is
broken by the towering shapes of Sheba's Breasts. It appeared, also,
that rather more than two years previously a party of Kukuana hunters
had descended this path into the desert in search of ostriches, whose
plumes are much prized among them for war head-dresses, and that in
the course of their hunt they had been led far from the mountains and
were much troubled by thirst. Seeing trees on the horizon, however,
they walked towards them, and discovered a large and fertile oasis
some miles in extent, and plentifully watered. It was by way of this
oasis that Infadoos suggested we should return, and the idea seemed to
us a good one, for it appeared that we should thus escape the rigours
of the mountain pass. Also some of the hunters were in attendance to
guide us to the oasis, from which, they stated, they could perceive
other fertile spots far away in the desert.[*]
[*] It often puzzled all of us to understand how it was possible that
Ignosi's mother, bearing the child with her, should have survived
the dangers of her journey across the mountains and the desert,
dangers which so nearly proved fatal to ourselves. It has since
occurred to me, and I give the idea to the reader for what it is
worth, that she must have taken this second route, and wandered
out like Hagar into the wilderness. If she did so, there is no
longer anything inexplicable about the story, since, as Ignosi
himself related, she may well have been picked up by some ostrich
hunters before she or the child was exhausted, was led by them to
the oasis, and thence by stages to the fertile country, and so on
by slow degrees southwards to Zululand.--A.Q.
Travelling easily, on the night of the fourth day's journey we found
ourselves once more on the crest of the mountains that separate
Kukuanaland from the desert, which rolled away in sandy billows at our
feet, and about twenty-five miles to the north of Sheba's Breasts.
At dawn on the following day, we were led to the edge of a very
precipitous chasm, by which we were to descend the precipice, and gain
the plain two thousand and more feet below.
Here we bade farewell to that true friend and sturdy old warrior,
Infadoos, who solemnly wished all good upon us, and nearly wept with
grief. "Never, my lords," he said, "shall mine old eyes see the like
of you again. Ah! the way that Incubu cut his men down in the battle!
Ah! for the sight of that stroke with which he swept off my brother
Twala's head! It was beautiful--beautiful! I may never hope to see
such another, except perchance in happy dreams."
We were very sorry to part from him; indeed, Good was so moved that he
gave him as a souvenir--what do you think?--an /eye-glass/; afterwards
we discovered that it was a spare one. Infadoos was delighted,
foreseeing that the possession of such an article would increase his
prestige enormously, and after several vain attempts he actually
succeeded in screwing it into his own eye. Anything more incongruous
than the old warrior looked with an eye-glass I never saw. Eye-glasses
do not go well with leopard-skin cloaks and black ostrich plumes.
Then, after seeing that our guides were well laden with water and
provisions, and having received a thundering farewell salute from the
Buffaloes, we wrung Infadoos by the hand, and began our downward
climb. A very arduous business it proved to be, but somehow that
evening we found ourselves at the bottom without accident.
"Do you know," said Sir Henry that night, as we sat by our fire and
gazed up at the beetling cliffs above us, "I think that there are
worse places than Kukuanaland in the world, and that I have known
unhappier times than the last month or two, though I have never spent
such queer ones. Eh! you fellows?"
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