e they come--confound those dogs!--call them
off, Phil; if they fly at any of those chaps and hurt them, there will
be trouble at once! Here, Pincher, Juno, Pat, Kafoula, 'Mfan, come in,
you silly duffers! Come in, I say! D'you hear me? Come in and lie
down! And you too, Leo; how dare you, sir!"

Dick and Grosvenor rushed out, and with the aid of sjamboks soon quelled
the disturbance and brought their motley pack into subjection, the
animals having made a general dash at the intruders, when the latter
arrived within some fifty yards of the wagon, while Leo, the lion cub,
excited by the disturbance, had broken the rein which usually confined
him to the wagon at nighttime, and had participated in the general
onslaught.

At the charge of the snapping, snarling dogs the approaching body of
soldiery had promptly levelled their spears, and the interference of
Dick and Grosvenor had only just been in the nick of time to save the
animals' lives. The little episode left the troops and their commander
absolutely expressionless, save that the latter seemed just a trifle
astonished when he saw Dick coolly seize the snarling lion cub by his
incipient mane and rate him roundly for his insubordinate behaviour,
before he ordered the brute to retire with the dogs to the wagon. The
next moment, in obedience to a sign from the officer, six couples
detached themselves from the main body of the soldiery; and in a trice
the two young Englishmen and their four dark-skinned followers, Mafuta,
Ramoo Samee, Jantje, and 'Nkuku--the latter absolutely shivering with
fear--found themselves prisoners, with their arms tightly bound behind
them with stout raw-hide thongs.

"Ah," ejaculated Dick, "this is just what I feared might happen! Still,
it is perhaps better than being killed outright, and--"

"Hush!" interrupted Grosvenor, sharply. "Listen to that fellow giving
orders to his men: I'll be shot if he isn't speaking Hebrew--or
something that sounds uncommonly like it!"

"Hebrew?" echoed Dick. "Nonsense! Surely you don't mean it?"

"Indeed I do, then," retorted Grosvenor; "never was more serious in my
life. Listen! Yes, I feel sure I was not mistaken; it is a sort of
Hebrew patois that he is speaking, Hebrew, mixed up, it is true, with a
number of words that I can make nothing of. Still, I can understand
enough of what he is saying to make out that he is giving his fellows
orders to drive in our oxen and yoke them to the wagon.