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Updated: June 16, 2025
"It all seems like a dream," I answered him, "and I cannot tell. But I must have been several months in the crater perhaps a year. Since then I cannot have wandered long." "Well, then," he questioned, "what month and year was it that you went to Walfisch Bay, and found Inyati?" "In 1860," I said; "I landed there in November, 1860. What is it now?"
Poor Inyati! the bravest, cheeriest comrade black or white that I have ever had; little did I dream when he spoke thus that he would never live to see the morrow! That evening, as we sat smoking by the fire, we noticed that the two horses were extremely nervous, pricking their ears and snorting as they cropped the dry grasses a few yards away from us.
I noticed, too, that Inyati seemed none too pleased at finding this gorgeous garden, and climbed dune after dune to peer in all directions as the sun rose on the morning we found it. "We must cross it quickly, or go round," he said, as I stood beside him on the top of a high dune. "It is a poison flower, and makes one sleep and to sleep among it is to die. But I see no way round!"
"Leopards," suggested Inyati, "there are many spoors here, but no lions." But scarcely had he spoken when the booming roar of a lion came from the direction of the pool; to be immediately answered by another, and another; until it was evident that the pan had been invaded by a numerous troop of them. We both started to our feet with the same thought in our minds.
The last drop of water had long since gone, and I was now consumed with thirst, and sick with misgiving as to what might be found at the pan Inyati had seen. Now we could see it, and, as yesterday, the flocks of partridges were all flying in that direction. How I envied them their wings, and how I grudged them the precious water they would be drinking!
"It seems that we are in a paradise of game. I vote we stop here a day or two, and have a go at them," said Sir Henry, presently. I was rather surprised, for hitherto Sir Henry had always been for pushing forward as fast as possible, more especially since we ascertained at Inyati that about two years ago an Englishman of the name of Neville had sold his wagon there, and gone on up country.
Inyati nodded his head sagely as he sucked at his cherished pipe. "Aye! Aye!" he said softly. "Said I not that the stones were magic? Sad, even as a sick cow, was my master, till I showed him the stone, and now he is even again as a young bull!"
He was a fine upstanding chap who held himself absolutely aloof from the Griquas and Hottentots that formed the bulk of my paid followers, and to whose oblique eyes, and pepper-corn wool, his expressive orbs and shock of crinkled hair formed an agreeable contrast. As for the Bushmen, Inyati treated them, and looked upon them, absolutely as dogs.
And, master, we must struggle on, and find out; for they cannot fast another day, and trek another night, without either food or drink." The rising sun rapidly dispersed the little clouds that Inyati had pointed out, but we kept on in their direction, though the sand was now burning hot and the poor animals were suffering frightfully.
"They are of my folk," said Inyati gravely, as he stooped to examine them, "mayhap they too have fled from the priests? . . And they have crossed the desert the way we would go and are dead of thirst!"
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