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Updated: June 14, 2025
Frenzied at the thought of what her fate might be if she had fallen alive into the hands of the savages, I dashed up the front steps to the stoep, clubbing my rifle and striking out right and left at the gorged aasvogels congregated there, which seemed disposed to resent my intrusion.
Dropping my glance I saw that the whole mob of aasvogels were rushing in upon Hans, helping themselves forward by flapping their great wings, and that about three feet in front of them was their king. Next instant Hans vanished, and from the centre of that fluffy, stinking mass there arose a frightful yell.
Also, the powder has been sifted and set to dry in the sun with the caps, and the bullets have been trued to the barrel, so that there may be no accidents when it comes to the shooting. If you miss the aasvogels, baas, it will not be the fault of Intombi or of the powder and the bullets; it will be your own fault." "That's comforting," I answered.
Both parties arrived in the depression at about the same time, but remained separated by a little space. In this space lay the corpses of the murdered men and the two dead aasvogels, with Hans and myself standing opposite to them.
I hope very much that it will serve to cover our remains from the aasvogels, after we have met our deaths in some such fashion as that brute promised us," and he pointed to the dead man. Benita looked at her father in question. "Mr. Meyer means, my dear, that you have done a foolish thing in begging the lives of those Matabele.
Crowds of aasvogels, gathered around the carcass of a mule, rose on the subaltern's approach, uttering discordant cries as they flew away from their interrupted meal. It was unfortunate but unavoidable, and had Wilmshurst been within a couple of miles of a hostile post the aerial commotion would have "given him away."
For when about six miles out from Port Elizabeth, I met a Boer who was trekking in from Uitenhage, and who informed me that, about a mile back, he had been obliged to abandon one of his oxen in a dying condition; and, sure enough, a quarter of an hour later we saw the poor beast lying by the side of the road, with the aasvogels, or vultures, already gathered about it.
He said that this kind of rehearsal was ill-omened; that coming events have a way of casting their shadow before, and he did not wish to furnish the event. He said that the Zulus declared that the sacred aasvogels of Hloma Amabutu were as savage as lions, and that when once they saw a man down they would tear him to pieces, dead or living.
And when I had finished, Mafuta sat for several minutes ruminating deeply. At length, however, he looked up, and, shaking his head, said: "White man, I have never seen the place you describe, otherwise I am sure that I should recognise it. The kopje with its rocks and its aasvogels would alone suffice for its identification.
When this particular royalty had arrived, the other aasvogels, of which perhaps there were now fifty or sixty gathered round Hans, began to show signs of interested animation. They looked at the king bird, they looked at Hans, stretching out their naked red necks and winking their brilliant eyes.
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