us start."

At a sign from Sru, Nalilc and the boy Toka, followed by the dogs, went
off towards the head of the canyon, so as to drive down to the old man
and myself any pigs which might be feeding above, whilst we slipped
quietly down the side of the spur to the bank of the rivulet. Sru
carried my gun (which I had loaded with ball) as well as his spear. I
had my Snider.

We had not long to wait, for presently we heard the dogs give cry, and
the silence of the forest was broken by the demoniac yells of Nalik and
the "devil," who had started a party of two boars and half a dozen
sows with their half-grown progeny, which were lying down around the
buttressed sides of a great tika-tree. They (the pigs) came down the
side of the rivulet with a tremendous rush, right on top of us in fact.
I fired at the leader--a great yellow, razorbacked boar with enormous
tusks--missed him, but hit a young sow who was running on his port side.
Sru, with truer aim, fired both barrels of his gun in quick succession,
and the second boar dropped with a bullet through both shoulders, and a
dear little black and yellow striped four-months'-old porker went under
to the other barrel with a broken spine. Then in another three or four
minutes we were kicking and "belting" about half of the dogs, who,
maddened by the smell of blood from the wounded animals, sprang upon
them and tried to tear them to pieces; the rest of the pack (Heaven save
the term!) had followed the flying swine down the canyon; they turned up
at the camp some three or four hours later with bloodied jaws and gorged
to distension.

The boar which Sru had shot was lean enough in all conscience, but
the young sow and the four-months'-old porker were as round-bodied as
barrels, and as fat as only pigs can be fat. After disembowelling them,
we hoisted the carcasses up under the branch of a tree out of the reach
of the dogs, and sent Toka back to the camp to tell the women to come
and carry them away.

Then, as we had still another hour or two of daylight, and I longed to
see the deep, deep pool at the head of the river, even if it were but
for a few moments, the old chief Nalik and I started off.

It lay before us with many, many bars of golden sunlight striking down
through the trees and trying to penetrate its calm, placid bosom with
their warm, loving rays. Far below the sound of the waterfall sung to
the dying day, and, as we listened, there came to us the dulled, distant
murm