The Fugitives by Robert Michael Ballantyne (hardest books to read TXT) 📖

knew the difficulties of the proposed route, and the thinly populated character of the country, looked with considerable apprehension on the prospects of the journey. Some there were, no doubt, who regarded these prospects with a lively hope that the Queen might never more return to her capital!

Of course such a multitude travelled very slowly, as may well be believed when it is said that they had about 1500 palanquins in the host, for there was not a wheeled vehicle in Madagascar at that time. The soldiers were formed in five divisions; one carrying the tents, one the cooking apparatus and spears, and one the guns and sleeping-mats. The other two had always to be in readiness for any service required about the Queen. The camp was divided into four parts; the Queen being in the middle, in a blue tent, surrounded, wherever she halted for the night, by high palisades, and near to this was pitched a tent containing the idols of the royal family. The tent of the Prime Minister, with the Malagasy flag, was pitched to the north of that of the Queen. East, west, and south, were occupied by other high officers of State, and among the latter was the tent of our friends, Mark, Hockins, and Ebony.

"Now," said the first of these, as he sat in the door of the tent one evening after supper, watching the rich glow of sunshine that flooded a wide stretch of beautiful country in front of him, "this would be perfect felicity if only we had freedom to move about at our own pleasure and hunt up the treasures in botany, entomology, etcetera, that are scattered around us."

"True, Massa," returned Ebony, "it would be perfik f'licity if we could forgit de poor Christ'ns in chains an' pris'ns."

"Right, Ebony, right. I am selfishly thinking only of myself at the present moment. But let us hope we may manage to do these poor Christians good before we leave the land."

"I don't think, myself, that we'll get much fun out o' this trip," remarked Hockins. "You see the Queen's too fond o' your physickin' and of my tootootlin' to part with us even for a day at a time. If we was like Ebony, now, we might go where we liked an' no one ud care."

"Ob course not," replied the negro, promptly, "peepil's nebber anxious about whar wise men goes to; it's on'y child'in an' stoopid folk dey's got to tink about. But why not ax de Queen, massa, for leabe ob absence to go a-huntin'?"

"Because she'd be sure to refuse," said Mark. "No, I see no way out of this difficulty. We are too useful to be spared!"

But Mark was wrong. That very night he was sent for by the Prime Minister, and as he passed the Secretary's tent he called him out to act as interpreter. On reaching the tent on the north side they found Rainiharo doubled up on his mat and groaning in agony.

"What's wrong?" demanded the doctor.

"Everything!" replied the patient.

"Describe your feelings," said the doctor.

"I've--I've got a red-hot stone," groaned Rainiharo, "somewhere in my inwards! Thorny shrubs are revolving in my stomach! Young crocodiles are masticating my--oh!"

At this point his power of description failed; but that matters little, for, never having met with the disease before, we can neither describe it nor give it a name. The young doctor did not know it, but he knew exactly what to do, and did it. We cannot report what he did, but we can state the result, which was great relief in a few minutes and a perfect cure before morning! Most men are grateful under such circumstances--even the cruel Rainiharo was so.

"What can I do for you?" he asked, affectionately, next day.

A sudden inspiration seized the doctor, "Beg the Queen," he said, "to let me and my two friends wander round the host all day, and every day, for a short time, and I will return to report myself each night."

"For what purpose?" asked the Premier, in some surprise.

"To pluck plants and catch butterflies."

"Is the young doctor anxious to renew his childhood?"

"Something of the sort, no doubt. But there is medicine in the plants, and--and--interest, if nothing else, in the butterflies."

"Medicine in the plants" was a sufficient explanation to the Premier. What he said to the Queen we know not, but he quickly returned with the required permission, and Mark went to his couch that night in a state of what Ebony styled "perfik f'licity."

Behold our trio, then, once more alone in the great forests of Madagascar--at least almost alone, for the Secretary was with them, for the double purpose of gaining instruction and seeing that the strangers did not lose themselves. As they were able to move about twice as fast as the host, they could wander around, here, there, and everywhere, or rest at pleasure without fear of being left behind.


CHAPTER TWENTY SEVEN.


IN WHICH A HAPPY CHANGE FOR THE BETTER IS DISASTROUSLY INTERRUPTED.

One very sultry forenoon Mark and his party--while out botanising, entomologising, philosophising, etcetera, not far from but out of sight of the great procession--came to the brow of a hill and sat down to rest.

Their appearance had become somewhat curious and brigand-like by that time, for their original garments having been worn-out were partially replaced by means of the scissors and needle of John Hockins--at least in the trousers department. That worthy seaman having, during his travels, torn his original trousers to shreds from the knee downwards, had procured some stout canvas in the capital and made for himself another pair. He was, like most sailors, expert at tailoring, and the result was so good that Mark and Ebony became envious. The seaman was obliging. He set to work and made a pair of nether garments for both. Mark wore his pair stuffed into the legs of a pair of Wellington boots procured from a trader. Ebony preferred to cut his off short, just below the knee, thus exposing to view those black boots supplied to negroes by Nature, which have the advantage of never wearing out. Hockins himself stuck to his navy shirt, but the others found striped cotton shirts sufficient. A native straw hat on Mark's head and a silk scarf round his waist, with a cavalry pistol in it, enhanced the brigand-like aspect of his costume.

This pistol was their only fire-arm, the gun having been broken beyond repair, but each carried a spear in one hand, a gauze butterfly-net in the other, and a basket, in lieu of a specimen-box, on his shoulder. Even the Secretary, entering into the spirit of the thing; carried a net and pursued the butterflies with the ardour of a boy.

"Oh! massa," exclaimed Ebony, wiping the perspiration from his forehead with a bunch of grass, "I _do_ lub science!"

"Indeed, why so?" asked Mark, sitting down on a bank opposite his friend.

"Why, don't you see, massa, it's not comfortabil for a man what's got any feelin's to go troo de land huntin' an' killin' cattle an' oder brutes for _noting_. You can't eat more nor one hox--p'r'aps not dat. So w'en you've kill 'im an' eaten so much as you can, dar's no more fun, for what fun is dere in slaughterin' hoxes for _noting_? Den, if you goes arter bees an' butterflies on'y for fun, w'y you git shamed ob yourself. On'y a chile do dat. But science, dat put 'im all right! Away you goes arter de bees and butterflies an' tings like mad--ober de hills an' far away--troo de woods, across de ribbers--sometimes into 'em!--crashin' an' smashin' like de bull in de china-shop, wid de proud feelin' bustin' your buzzum dat you're advancin' de noble cause ob science--dat's what you call 'im, `noble?'--yes. Well, den you come home done up, so pleasant like, an' sot down an' fix de critters up wid pins an' gum an' sitch-like, and arter dat you show 'em to your larned friends an' call 'em awrful hard names, (sometimes dey seem like _bad_ names!) an'--oh! I _do_ lub science! It's wot I once heard a captin ob a ribber steamer in de States call a safety-balve wot lets off a deal o' 'uman energy. He was a-sottin on his own safety-balve at de time, so he ought to have know'd suffin about it."

"I say, Ebony," asked Hockins, "where did you pick up so much larnin' about science--eh?"

"I pick 'im in Texas--was 'sistant to a German nat'ralist dar for two year. Stuck to 'im like a limpit till he a-most busted hisself by tumblin' into a swamp, smashin' his spectacles, an' ketchin' fever, w'en he found hisself obleeged to go home to recroot--he called it--though what dat was I nebber rightly understood, unless it was drinkin' brandy an' water; for I noticed that w'en he said he needed to recroot, he allers had a good stiff pull at de brandy bottle."

Ebony's discourse was here cut short by the sudden appearance of an enormous butterfly, which the excitable negro dashed after at a breakneck pace in the interests of science. The last glimpse they had of him, as he disappeared among the trees, was in a somewhat peculiar attitude, with his head down and his feet in the air!

"That's a sign he has missed him," remarked Hockins, beginning to fill his pipe--the tobacco, not the musical, one! "I've always observed that when Ebony becomes desperate, and knows he can't git hold of the thing he's arter, he makes a reckless plunge, with a horrible yell, goes right down by the head, and disappears like a harpooned whale."

"True, but have you not also observed," said Mark, "that like the whale he's sure to come to the surface again--sooner or later--and generally with the object of pursuit in possession?"

"I b'lieve you're right, doctor," said the seaman, emitting a prolonged puff of smoke.

"Does he always go mad like that?" asked the Secretary, who was much amused.

"Usually," replied Mark, "but he is generally madder than that. He's in comparatively low spirits to-day. Perhaps it is the heat that affects him. Whew! how hot it is! I think I shall take a bath in the first pool we come to."

"That would only make you hotter, sir," said Hockins. "I've often tried it. At first, no doubt, when you gits into the water it cools you, but arter you come out you git hotter than before. A _hot_ bath is the thing to cool you comfortably."

"But we can't get a hot bath here," returned Mark.

"You are wrong," said the Secretary, "we have many natural hot springs in our land. There is one not far from here."

"How far?" asked Mark with some interest.

"About two rice-cookings off."

To dispel the reader's perplexity, we may explain at once that in Madagascar they measure distances by the time occupied in cooking a pot of rice. As that operation occupies about half-an-hour, the Secretary meant that the hot spring was distant about two half-hours--that is, between three and four miles off.

"Let's go an' git into it at once," suggested Hockins.

"Better wait for Ebony," said Mark. Then--to the Secretary--"Yours is a very interesting and wonderful country!"

"It is, and I wonder not that