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Here they stayed a while till, overmatched and outworn, they were pushed from its rocks across the narrow stretch of broken ground into the shelter of the great stone scherm or wall that ran from side to side of the further neck of the valley, whereon thousands of women and such men as could be spared had been working incessantly during the past night and day.
I now found that the scherm, constructed of small branches of formidable thorns each thorn being nearly three inches long, and sharp-pointed as a needle was about waist high, a yard in thickness, and some ten yards in diameter, completely hemming in the great python, who was now wideawake and rapidly circling the interior of his prison, in an atrociously bad temper, vainly seeking some spot through which he might force his way and escape.
Another two hundred yards and the path took a turn which led to the entrance of the first scherm, the same that the Zulus had captured by forcing the passage of the river. The gateway was open now, and Ralph entered. At first he could see no one, but presently he heard a voice saying: "Will you not tell, for death is very near you? Drink, witch, tell and drink."
A touch on the bridle brought Prince to a halt, and I then produced my telescope and brought it to bear upon the busy party, when I perceived, to my amazement, that the gang of monkeys who were rushing to and fro between the clump of bush and the boulder were engaged in collecting and dragging to the rock a great number of branches of thorns, which they were passing up to their comrades upon the surface of the rock; and that these, in their turn, as it seemed to me, were constructing a scherm, or hedge of thorns, working in such feverish haste that their lives might have been depending upon its speedy completion.
The python, doubtless, had its lair somewhere in the immediate vicinity of the boulder, the flat top of which was probably its favourite basking place; the troop of monkeys, perhaps gambolling about on the face of the adjacent cliff, had chanced to see the huge snake lying asleep upon the rock, and, instantly seizing the opportunity to take their enemy at a disadvantage, had, with diabolical ingenuity, hastened to enclose the creature in a circular fence of thorns, from which it now seemed that it would find it impossible to escape for I saw it make several attempts, at various points around the circumference of the scherm, and upon each occasion, when it essayed to crawl over the thorns, it shrank back, baffled by the innumerable sharp points which everywhere met it.
But what, I asked myself, could happen up there; why had those monkeys taken the trouble to construct that fine scherm; and why, in the name of fortune, were they exerting themselves to create such a terrific row?
The creature glared at me murderously every time it came opposite me in its frantic circling of the scherm, and once made a determined effort to reach me, but the thorns were too much for it; and finally, when I was at length convinced that it could not possibly escape, I levelled my rifle and sent a bullet crashing through its enormous head, instantly thereafter beating a hasty retreat from the top of the rock, in order to avoid the terrific threshing of its convolutions, which now, in its death agonies, sent the thorns flying in all directions.
On landing in the evening, Good would at once set to work, with the help of the Askari, to build a little 'scherm', or small enclosure, fenced with thorn bushes, and to light a fire. I, with Sir Henry and Umslopogaas, would go out to shoot something for the pot. Generally this was an easy task, for all sorts of game abounded on the banks of the Tana.
If they were hungry they might probably attack the horses! It was still light, but no time was to be lost; so hastily cutting down a number of the stunted thorn bushes with which the pan abounded, we proceeded to build a "scherm" in which to pass the night.
Having set some of the "boys" to cut off the best of the giraffe's meat, we went to work to build a "scherm" near one of the pools and about a hundred yards to its right. This is done by cutting a quantity of thorn bushes and piling them in the shape of a circular hedge.
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