92 THE MONKEYFOLK OF SOUTH AFRICA 



me to eat as much as I pleased. At night, I slept at his 

 feet and kept them warm. 



We baboonfolk sleep very lightly, and the slightest 

 noise wakes us, especially if it be a strange sound. One 

 night a leopard stole silently under the wagon where my 

 master and I lay. I seemed to sense danger, for I awoke 

 and carefully raised my head. There, a few feet away was 

 a long, dark body, in the head of which two phosphorescent- 

 looking eyes gleamed. I knew it was a leopard. He was 

 just about to seize my master by the throat, when with a 

 spring I was on my feet, and with all the power of my 

 lungs I barked several times in rapid succession. Instantly 

 swerving, the leopard bounded away in the darkness as our 

 two big mastiffs rushed up to the rescue. 



HUNTING FOR WATER 



My master taught me to find water for him. The way 

 he took to make me understand what he wanted me to do 

 seemed cruel at first, and I felt very miserable to think that 

 the master I loved so dearly could be so hard-hearted. I 

 reflected, and turned the matter over in my mind as I 

 lay one night watching the bright stars, which we are 

 told are all great blazing suns as big and bigger than the 

 sun which gives us heat and warmth. Then I saw the 

 matter in quite a different light. It was clear to me that 

 unless water had been found that the whole lot of us, that 

 is, my master, myself, the Kafirs, the dogs, and the oxen, 

 would have all died in a madness of thirst. 



The method my master employed was this. He refused 

 to give me water for a whole day, and at the same time fed 

 me on very salty food. I was nearly mad with thirst, but 

 I wasn't angry with my master. I only thought there had 

 been some mistake, for he kept as far away as possible. In 

 fact he was away searching about in the bush-veld near by, 



