Journeys Through Bookland Volume Vi Part 8

And when its yellow l.u.s.tre smiled O'er mountains yet untrod, Each mother held aloft her child To bless the bow of G.o.d.

The earth to thee her incense yields, The lark thy welcome sings, When, glittering in the freshen'd fields, The snowy mushroom springs.

How glorious is thy girdle, cast O'er mountain, tower, and town, Or mirror'd in the ocean vast A thousand fathoms down!

As fresh in yon horizon dark, As young thy beauties seem, As when the eagle from the ark First sported in thy beam.

For, faithful to its sacred page, Heaven still rebuilds thy span; Nor lets the type grow pale with age That first spoke peace to man.

FOOTNOTES:

[91-1] There was an old, old belief that a pot of G.o.d was hidden at the end of the rainbow, and that whoever found his way to the spot might claim the gold. This superst.i.tion has existed in almost all lands, and references to it are constantly to be found in literature.

[91-2] According to the account given in _Genesis IX_, G.o.d said to Noah after the flood:

"And I will establish my covenant with you; neither shall all flesh be cut off any more by the waters of a flood; neither shall there any more be a flood to destroy the earth.

"This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you, and every living creature that is with you for perpetual generations:

"I do set my bow in the cloud, and it shall be for a token of a covenant between me and the earth.

"And it shall come to pa.s.s, when I bring a cloud over the earth, that the bow shall be seen in the cloud:

"And I will remember my covenant, which is between me and you, and every living creature of all flesh; and the waters shall no more become a flood to destroy all flesh."

THE LION AND THE MISSIONARY

_By_ DAVID LIVINGSTONE

NOTE.--Few men have endured more hards.h.i.+ps, dangers and excitement that did David Livingstone, missionary and African traveler, from whose writings this account of an adventure with a lion is taken.

He penetrated to parts of Africa where no white man had ever been before, he suffered repeated attacks of African fever, he exposed himself to constant danger from wild beasts and wilder men; and he did none of this in his own interests. He was no merchant seeking for gold and diamonds, he was no discoverer seeking for fame; his only aim was to open up the continent of Africa so that civilization and Christianity might enter.

In 1840 Livingstone was sent as medical missionary to South Africa.

Here he joined Robert Moffat, in Bechua.n.a.land, where he worked for nine years. Learning from the natives that there was a large lake to the northward, he set out on his first exploring trip, and at length discovered Lake Ngami. Later, he undertook other journeys of exploration, on one of which he reached the Atlantic coast and then returned, crossing the entire continent. His greatest achievement was the exploration of the lake region of South Africa. So cut off was he, in the African jungles, from all the outer world that no communication was received from him for three years, and fears as to his safety were relieved only when Stanley, sent out by the _New York Herald_ to search for Livingstone, reported that he had seen and a.s.sisted him.

In May, 1873, Livingstone died, at a village near Lake Bangweolo.

His body was taken to England and laid in Westminster Abbey, but his heart was buried at the foot of the tree under whose branches he died.

Returning toward Kuruman, I selected the beautiful valley of Mabotsa (lat.i.tude 25 14' south, longitude 26 30') as the site of a missionary station, and thither I removed in 1843. Here an occurrence took place concerning which I have frequently been questioned in England, and which, but for the importunities of friends, I meant to have kept in store to tell my children when in my dotage. The Bakatla of the village Mabotsa were much troubled by lions, which leaped into the cattle pens by night and destroyed their cows. They even attacked the herds in open day. This was so unusual an occurrence that the people believed that they were bewitched,--"given," as they said, "into the power of the lions by a neighboring tribe." They went once to attack the animals, but, being rather a cowardly people compared to Bechuanas in general on such occasions, they returned without killing any.

It is well known that if one of a troop of lions is killed, the others take the hint and leave that part of the country. So, the next time the herds were attacked, I went with the people, in order to encourage them to rid themselves of the annoyance by destroying one of the marauders.

We found the lions on a small hill about a quarter of a mile in length, and covered with trees. A circle of men was formed round it, and they gradually closed up, ascending pretty near to each other. Being down below on the plain with a native schoolmaster, named Mebalwe, a most excellent man, I saw one of the lions sitting on a piece of rock within the now closed circle of men. Mebalwe fired at him before I could, and the ball struck the rock on which the animal was sitting. He bit at the spot struck, as a dog does at a stick or stone thrown at him; then leaping away, broke through the opening circle and escaped unhurt. The men were afraid to attack him, perhaps on account of their belief in witchcraft. When the circle was reformed, we saw two other lions in it; but we were afraid to fire lest we should strike the men, and they allowed the beasts to burst through also.

If the Bakatla had acted according to the custom of the country, they would have speared the lions in their attempt to get out. Seeing we could not get them to kill one of the lions, we bent our footsteps toward the village; in going round the end of the hill, however, I saw one of the beasts sitting on a piece of rock as before, but this time he had a little bush in front. Being about thirty yards off, I took a good aim at his body through the bush, and fired both barrels into it. The men then called out, "He is shot, he is shot!" Others cried, "He has been shot by another man too; let us go to him!" I did not see any one else shoot at him, but I saw the lion's tail erected in anger behind the bush, and turning to the people, said, "Stop a little, till I load again." When in the act of ramming down the bullets, I heard a shout.

Starting, and looking half round, I saw the lion just in the act of springing upon me.

I was upon a little height; he caught my shoulder as he sprang, and we both came to the ground below together. Growling horribly close to my ear, he shook me as a terrier dog does a rat. The shock produced a stupor similar to that which seems to be felt by a mouse after the first shake of the cat. It caused a sort of dreaminess, in which there was no sense of pain nor feeling of terror, though I was quite conscious of all that was happening. It was like what patients partially under the influence of chloroform describe, who see all the operation, but feel not the knife. This singular condition was not the result of any mental process. The shake annihilated fear, and allowed no sense of horror in looking round at the beast. This peculiar state is probably produced in all animals killed by the carnivora; and if so, is a merciful provision by our benevolent Creator for lessening the pain of death. Turning round to relieve myself of the weight, as he had one paw on the back of my head, I saw his eyes directed to Mebalwe, who was trying to shoot him at a distance of ten or fifteen yards. His gun, a flint one, missed fire in both barrels; the lion immediately left me, and, attacking Mebalwe, bit his thigh. Another man, whose life I had saved before, after he had been tossed by a buffalo, attempted to spear the lion while he was biting Mebalwe. He left Mebalwe and caught this man by the shoulder, but at that moment the bullets he had received took effect, and he fell down dead. The whole was the work of a few moments, and must have been his paroxysms of dying rage. In order to take out the charm from him, the Bakatla on the following day made a huge bonfire over the carca.s.s, which was declared to be that of the largest lion they had ever seen. Besides crunching the bone into splinters, he left eleven teeth wounds on the upper part of my arm.

A wound from this animal's tooth resembles a gunshot wound; it is generally followed by a great deal of sloughing and discharge, and pains are felt in the part, periodically ever afterward. I had on a tartan jacket on the occasion, and I believe that it wiped off all the virus from the teeth that pierced the flesh, for my two companions in this affray have both suffered from the peculiar pains, while I have escaped with only the inconvenience of a false joint in my limb. The man whose shoulder was wounded, showed me his wound actually burst forth afresh on the same month of the following year. This curious point certainly deserves the attention of inquirers.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

THE MOSS ROSE

TRANSLATED FROM KRUMMACHER

The angel of the flowers, one day, Beneath a rose-tree sleeping lay,-- That spirit to whose charge 'tis given To bathe young buds in dews of heaven.

Awaking from his light repose, The angel whispered to the rose: "O fondest object of my care, Still fairest found, where all are fair; For the sweet shade thou giv'st to me Ask what thou wilt, 'tis granted thee."

"Then," said the rose, with deepened glow, "On me another grace bestow."

The spirit paused, in silent thought,-- What grace was there that flower had not?

'Twas but a moment,--o'er the rose A veil of moss the angel throws, And, robed in nature's simplest weed, Could there a flower that rose exceed?

FOUR DUCKS ON A POND

_By_ WILLIAM ALLINGHAM

Four ducks on a pond, A gra.s.s bank beyond, A blue sky of spring, White clouds on the wing; What a little thing To remember for years, To remember with tears.

RAB AND HIS FRIENDS

_By_ JOHN BROWN, M. D.

Four and thirty years ago, Bob Ainslie and I were coming up Infirmary street from the high school, our heads together, and our arms intertwisted, as only lovers and boys know how or why.

When we got to the top of the street, and turned north, we espied a crowd at the Tron-church. "A dog fight!" shouted Bob, and was off; and so was I, both of us all but praying that it might not be over before we got up! And is not this boy nature! and human nature too? and don't we all wish a house on fire not to be out before we see it? Dogs like fighting; old Isaac says they "delight" in it, and for the best of all reasons; and boys are not cruel because they like to see the fight. They see three of the great cardinal virtues of dog or man--courage, endurance, and skill--in intense action. This is very different from a love of making dogs fight, and enjoying, and aggravating, and making gain by their pluck. A boy--be he ever so fond himself of fighting, if he be a good boy, hates and despises all this, but he would have run off with Bob and me fast enough; it is a natural, and a not wicked, interest that all boys and men have in witnessing intense energy in action.

Does any curious and finely-ignorant woman wish to know how Bob's eye at a glance announced a dog fight to his brain? He did not, he could not see the dogs fighting; it was a flash of an inference, a rapid induction. The crowd round a couple of dogs fighting, is a crowd masculine mainly, with an occasional active, compa.s.sionate woman, fluttering wildly round the outside, and using her tongue and her hands freely upon the men, as so many "brutes"; it is a crowd annular, compact and mobile; a crowd centripetal, having its eyes and its heads all bent downward and inward, to one common focus.

Well, Bob and I are up, and find it is not over; a small thoroughbred, white bull-terrier, is busy throttling a large shepherd's dog, unaccustomed to war, but not to be trifled with. They are hard at it; the scientific little fellow doing his work in great style, his pastoral enemy fighting wildly, but with the sharpest of teeth and a great courage. Science and breeding, however, soon had their own; the Game Chicken, as the premature Bob called him, working his way up, took his final grip of poor Yarrow's throat--and he lay gasping and done for. His master, a brown, handsome, big young shepherd from Tweedsmuir, would have liked to have knocked down any man, would "drink up Esil, or eat a crocodile," for that part, if he had a chance; it was no use kicking the little dog; that would only make him hold the closer. Many were the means shouted out in mouthfuls, of the best possible ways of ending it.

"Water!" but there was none near, and many cried for it who might have got it from the well at Blackfriars Wynd.