3 o 4 ADVENTURES OF AN ELEPHANT HUNTER ch. 
with her, if discovered, would assuredly have meant 
imprisonment for my boy, he came to the conclusion 
that there was only one solution to the problem—he 
must redeem Amina from slavery and marry her. 
The question resolved itself into a question of 
money, generally a scarce commodity with Seremani, 
who was one of those rollicking, good-natured 
fellows, gifted with a happy knack of always looking 
at the laughing side of things, and who, like most 
good fellows, spent his money as quickly as he got 
it. He pondered long over the delicate subject, and, 
as love overcometh all things, it disclosed to him a 
way out of his difficulty. One day he came, wfith 
the dejected mien that only a man caught in the toils 
of love can assume, and laid the whole matter 
before me, confessing that he had spent fifty rupees 
in a week on his light o’ love and had not a sou left, 
much less the price of Amina’s ransom, and asking 
me if I would redeem her for him. I gave him the 
money he required, and, as soon as he possibly could, 
he bought Amina’s freedom and married her. 
Fortunately, it is not given to mortals to see what is 
in store for them—in this little picture of life, behind 
the figure of Cupid, there loomed the dread shadow 
of Atropos. 
Leaving the coast, we arrived, after a seven days’ 
journey, at Seremani’s old home, in the vicinity of 
which we decided to form our main camp. Thence, 
