Chatterbox, 1905 Part 104

He did so; but the men promptly vowed that they had not stolen the duck.

They did not appear at all surprised, however, when the accusation was made; and Ping w.a.n.g concluded that they were not speaking the truth.

'As you have stolen the duck,' Ping w.a.n.g continued, sternly, 'you must return to me the money which I gave for it.'

'Would my honourable brother rob his slave?' the boat-owner asked, in alarm.

'Yes. If you cannot give me the duck, I must have back the price I paid for it. If you cannot give me the money, I will keep the rifle which the foreigner is holding.'

This decision alarmed the boat-owner. 'Honourable brother,' he said, after a few moments' silence, 'I will search for the duck: perhaps it has rolled off the dish.'

He searched in what appeared to Ping w.a.n.g to be very unlikely places, and found the missing dainty in a basket on top of the pile of cargo.

'The rifle shall be given you,' said Ping w.a.n.g, and then turned to speak to Charlie and Fred. 'We had better breakfast on sh.o.r.e,' he said; 'let us land at once.'

Ping w.a.n.g handed over the Lee-Metford to the boat-owner, and the three travellers stepped ash.o.r.e, thoroughly glad to get out of the boat.

(_Continued on page 317._)

ENCOUNTERS WITH LIONS.

The accounts which travellers and hunters sometimes give us of their encounters with wild animals are often very interesting, not only because they are exciting, but also because they show us the habits of the various animals, and the effects which are produced upon the human brain by these sudden and unusual attacks.

Mr. Moffat, the missionary, describes the very strange behaviour of a lion which caught a native asleep. The man was returning home from a visit alone, when, tired with his walk, he sat down to refresh himself by the side of a pool, and fell asleep. He awoke with the heat of the sun, and found a lion crouching scarcely more than a yard from his feet.

He sat still for a few minutes, and tried to think what he ought to do.

His gun was lying a little distance away beyond his reach, and he moved his hand towards it several times. But whenever he did so, the lion raised his head and uttered a loud roar. So long as the man remained quite still, the lion did not molest him. The day and the night pa.s.sed, and neither the man nor the lion moved from the spot. At noon on the following day the lion went down to the pool for a drink, watching the poor man all the while, and then returned to its former position.

Another night pa.s.sed, and again on the following day the lion went for a drink. On this occasion it was alarmed by some noise, and made off to the bush. The poor native crawled to his gun, and then crept down to the pool to drink. His toes were so scorched by the heat of the rock that he could not walk. Fortunately, he was discovered by a person pa.s.sing, and was rescued. He lost the use of his toes, however, and he was a cripple for the rest of his life.

Livingstone once nearly lost his life in an encounter with a lion in South Africa. He had gone out to shoot one of a troop of lions, in order to frighten the rest away from the village. After the natives who were with him had allowed several to escape, Livingstone shot at one about thirty yards off, and wounded it. He was quietly re-loading his gun, when he heard a shout from one of his attendants, and, looking up, he saw the lion springing upon him. It caught him by the shoulder, and shook him as a dog shakes a rat. The shaking seemed to deprive him of his sense of feeling, and he felt neither pain nor alarm, though he knew quite well what was happening. The lion growled all the while, and placed his heavy foot upon the doctor's head. At this moment one of the natives had courage enough to fire, and, though the shot failed, the lion's attention was drawn to the native, and it rushed upon him and bit him in the thigh. Another native tried to spear it, and he in his turn was attacked, and bitten in the shoulder. But this time the lion was exhausted by its wounds, and fell down dead.

Not long ago a Government ranger in the Transvaal had a fierce struggle with a lion, which was reported in _The Field_. He was riding homewards alone, having left his companions behind, when he heard his dog bark at something near the path, and saw a lion crouching near him on the right side, ready to spring. He turned his horse quickly and the lion missed his spring, but the ranger was thrown from his horse. No sooner did he touch the ground than another lion pounced upon him from the opposite side, while the first ran after the runaway horse. The second lion seized him by the right shoulder, and dragged him quickly along the path, his back and legs trailing along the ground. The animal growled and purred like a cat with a mouse, but in very much louder tones. The poor ranger was greatly distressed, both in body and in mind, and it was not until the lion had dragged him about two hundred yards that he remembered that he had a sheath-knife at his belt. As the lion stopped at the foot of a large tree, he drew his sheath-knife with his left hand, and stabbed the animal twice in the right side. The lion jumped back, and in a few moments he turned and walked away, growling and moaning as he went. Meanwhile, the ranger climbed a tree, and tied himself to a branch, lest he should lose consciousness and fall off.

There he was found by his companions, and conveyed to the nearest hospital. The body of the lion was afterwards discovered not far away.

Its heart had been pierced by the blade of the sheath-knife. The lion was an old male, and its empty stomach showed that it had been rendered unusually fierce by hunger.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The second lion seized him."]

[Ill.u.s.tration: "'It is good! very good!'"]

PHILIP WOOD AND SIR CHRISTOPHER WREN.

'Be off, I tell you! We want no loiterers here!' said a workman, roughly pus.h.i.+ng away a country lad who was gazing with deep interest at the busy crowd of people engaged in the rebuilding of St. Paul's Cathedral.

This famous church, destroyed by the Great Fire in 1666, was now--some three years later--being restored under the direction of Sir Christopher Wren.

'I am not loitering, sir,' answered the lad humbly. 'I have come up from Suffolk to seek work. I can carve, and I can----'

'Be off, I tell you!' harshly interrupted the foreman; 'we want no hedge-carpenters here! Here comes the master. Be off, or he will make short work of you!'

The master, no less a person than the great Sir Christopher himself, now came up, and catching sight of the lad, said sternly:

'Who is that youth? Has he business here? If not, bid him begone, for lookers-on hinder the work.'

'Just what I was telling him, your honour,' said the foreman, scowling at the boy. 'He has come to look for work, he says, but I told him we wanted no country b.u.mpkins here.'

Sir Christopher cast a searching glance at the boy. 'What sort of work can you do?' he asked.

The boy, Philip Wood, by name, was much fl.u.s.tered at being addressed by the great architect himself, and hardly knowing what he said, he stammered out, 'I am very fond of carving, sir.'

'Carving--umph! What was the last thing you carved?' asked Sir Christopher.

'The last thing was a trough, but----' and Philip was about to describe the group of roses and columbines he had made for the Squire's chimney-piece, but was interrupted by a scornful laugh from the foreman.

'A trough! and he to seek work on St. Paul's! Let him return to his swine.'

Sir Christopher joined in the laugh. Then, seeing the crestfallen look of the boy, he said, half-scornfully, 'Troughs! Well, then, you have seen pigs. Suppose your carve me a sow and her little ones; that will be in your line. Bring it me here this day week.'

He walked away, and the workmen burst into loud laughter as they hustled Philip out of the yard.

He, poor fellow, was utterly cast down at this mocking suggestion of Sir Christopher's, and hurrying back to his attic he flung himself on his bed and burst into tears.

Some hours later, his landlady, a motherly old soul, who pitied the friendless lad, toiled up the attic stairs with a basin of broth for him, knowing that he had had no food that day.

'Highty-tighty!' she said, going up to Philip and putting a kind hand on his shoulder. 'What's amiss? What's wrong to-day may prove right on the morrow, so never fret, lad.'

Philip could not resist her sympathy, and she soon got from him the story of his reception by Sir Christopher, and how the great architect had scornfully told him to go and carve 'a sow and her little ones.'

'It was all my own fault,' continued the boy. 'I was so confused, I never told him of the bedstead I had carved for the Hall, nor of the mantel-shelf, but I blurted out about the trough, and then he bade me "carve a sow,"' and Philip turned red at the remembrance.

'He said that, did he?' said the woman eagerly. 'Then do it, and show your skill. Sir Christopher bade you come again, and he will not refuse to see you. Set to work on the sow, and mind she is a good one.'

Encouraged by these words, Philip got up, drank the broth, and, feeling cheered by the food, took his last crown-piece, bought a good block of wood, and returned to his attic.

He worked at his wood block from morning to night for the next week, hoping--aye, and praying earnestly--that he might turn out something that the master would not despise.

It was finished at last, and p.r.o.nounced by the landlady to be 'as like a sow as one pea is like another.' So, hoping much and fearing more, Philip took his group, carefully wrapped in an ap.r.o.n lent him for the purpose, and made his way to the Cathedral yard.

'Hallo! here comes our young hedge-carpenter,' exclaimed the foreman, as Philip pa.s.sed the gate. 'What's he got so carefully wrapped up? Another trough, I take it. Let's have a look at the treasure,' and as he spoke he reached towards the bundle.

But Philip would not part with it. 'No,' he said firmly. 'Sir Christopher set me the task, and he shall be the first to see it.'

Before long Sir Christopher appeared, and, seeing the boy standing humbly waiting by the gate, he called to him, and, taking the bundle from Philip's hands, slowly unwound the wrapping. There, to the very life, was a fat old sow, with nine little piglings grouped about her in every possible att.i.tude.