56 HOME LIFE ON AN OSTRICH FARM. 



sequences will ensue. To the inexperienced eye the 

 prickly pear looks innocent enough ; with its smooth, 

 shiny skin, suggestive only of a juicy interior, and 

 telling no tale of lurking mischief — yet each of those 

 soft-looking little tufts, with which at regular intervals 

 it is dotted, is a quiver filled with terrible, tiny, hair- 

 like thorns, or rather stings ; and woe betide the fingers 

 of the unwary " new chum," who, with no kind friend 

 at hand to warn him, plucks the treacherous fruit. 

 He will carry a lively memento of it for many days. 



My first sad experience of prickly pears was gained, 

 not in South, but in North Africa. Landing with a 

 friend in Alcjiers some time agro, our first walk led us 

 to the fruit market, where, before a tempting pile of 

 figues de Barbarie, we stopped to quench the thirst of 

 our thirty-six hours' passage. The fruit was handed 

 to us, politely peeled by the Arab dealer ; and thus, as 

 we made our first acquaintance with its delightful 

 coolness, no suspicion of its evil qualities entered our 

 minds. And when, a few days later, adding the excite- 

 ment of a little trespassing to the more legitimate 

 pleasures of a country ramble, we came upon a well- 

 laden group of prickly pear bushes, we could not resist 

 the temptation to help ourselves to some of the fruit — 

 and woeful was the result. Concentrated essence of 

 stinging-nettle seemed all at once to be assailing hands, 

 lips, and tongue ; and our skin, wherever it had come 

 in contact with the ill-natured fruit, was covered with 

 a thick crop of minute, bristly iiairs, apparently grow- 

 ing from it, and venomous and irritating to the last 



