268 A Breath from the Veldt 



was glad the lion was killed, as he had suffered much from him, for the brute 

 had lately taken to attacking women when he could not get game or native 

 goats, and had already killed six from his village alone. As we sat at breakfast 

 the whole village turned out to see the bea:st, and great was the rejoicing over 

 his downfall. Both bullets had taken him nicely behind the shoulder. 



After this N'Dale and his people became more civil to us, and after a short 

 delay he agreed to let me have six porters to assist me over the mountains. 

 Then, as Van Staden was a little better, we made all haste to start. Prince 

 packing up while I skinned the lion. A curious fact about this lion was that 

 on some recent occasion he had caught and eaten a porcupine. He had 

 evidently, however, had had some trouble with his meal, as in the ball of his 

 right paw were deeply embedded several of the quills of his victim, and there 

 being no man of the Androcles stamp knocking about Mashonaland, he must 

 have suffered considerably, as the stabs had penetrated at least 3 inches into his 

 flesh. Prince begged for the fat round the heart, which he kept in a condensed 

 milk tin on my waggon for two months afterwards ; and very evil smelling it 

 was. At last, to my relief, he sold it to some Zulus for a considerable sum, as 

 the tribe have great faith in its powers as an unguent and an incentive to deeds 

 of bravery. 



And now — in our attempt to get over the mountains — we began to find out 

 what the civility of N'Dale and his people meant. After a long and painful 

 march we managed with great difficulty to reach the summit, and descending 

 we entered an excessively rough and beautiful defile of massed boulders and 

 great trees, through which it was impossible to pass. It was, in fact, a blind 

 alley, for there was no exit on the other side ; and I am quite sure now that 

 the natives led us into it, knowing that we should be stranded and probably 

 have to abandon our waggon, which they could then come and loot at their 

 leisure. After a time, finding it impossible either to proceed or to back out, 

 I went on a couple of miles ahead, to have a look at the country. Then, seeing 

 only too clearly what a hole we were in, I returned to Van Staden, whose only 

 effort at comfort was a quiet remark that we should have no more trouble 

 with the porters, as they had all bolted. These porters had carried most of 

 the loads which were originally on the little waggon, and now we were in a 

 fix as to how we could get the waggon back, even without the loads. After 

 some discussion I determined to go back to N'Dale by the way we had. come ; 

 and though it took us two most wearisome days to accomplish, we eventually 

 got the poor donkeys up to the summit again, and then loaded up once more 



