With a white scared face our guest slowly lowered 

 his mug, screened his eyes with the other hand, and 

 after fighting down the mouthful of bread, got up and 

 walked off without a word. 



We tried to smother our laughter, but some one's 

 choking made him look back and he saw the whole 

 lot of us in various stages of convulsions. He made 

 one rude remark, and went on ; but every one he met 

 that day made some allusion to beans, and he took the 

 Durban steamer next morning. 



The insect life was prodigious in its numbers and 

 variety ; and the birds, the beasts, and the reptiles were 

 all interesting. There is a goodness-knows-what-will- 

 turn-up-next atmosphere about the Bushveld which 

 is, I fancy, unique. The story of the curate, armed 

 with a butterfly net, coming face to face with a black- 

 maned lion may or may not be true in fact ; but it 

 is true enough as an illustration ; and it is no more 

 absurd or unlikely than the meeting at five yards of 

 a lioness and a fever-stricken lad carrying a white 

 green-lined umbrella which is true ! The boy stood 

 and looked : the lioness did the same. " She seemed 

 to think I was not worth eating, so she walked off," he 

 used to say and he was Trooper 242 of the Imperial 

 Light Horse who went back under fire for wounded 

 comrades and was killed as he brought the last one 



out. 



I had an old cross-bred 

 Hottentot-Bushman boy 

 once one could not tell 



342 



