Part 11 (1/2)

'What on earth are you going to do, Good?' asked Sir Henry

'Do--why dress, of course! You don't expect s, do you?' and he pointed to his soiled and worn gars, very tidy, and with every tear neatly s with breathless interest

His first step was to get Alphonse, as thoroughly competent in such matters, to trim his hair and beard in the most approved fashi+on

I think that if he had had some hot water and a cake of soap at hand he would have shaved off the latter; but he had not This done, he suggested that we should lower the sail of the canoe and all take a bath, which we did, greatly to the horror and astonishment of Alphonse, who lifted his hands and ejaculated that these English were indeed a wonderful people Uh-bred Zulus, scrupulously cleanly in his person, did not see the fun of swi with ot back into the canoe much refreshed by the cold water, and sat to dry in the sun, whilst Good undid his tin box, and produced first a beautiful clean white shi+rt, just as it had left a London steaarments wrapped first in brown, then in white, and finally in silver paper We watched this undoing with the tenderest interest and much speculation One by one Good removed the dull husks that hid their splendours, carefully folding and replacing each piece of paper as he did so; and there at last lay, in all the olden epaulettes, lace, and buttons, a Commander of the Royal Navy's full-dress uniform--dress sword, cocked hat, shi+ny patent leather boots and all We literally gasped

'_What!_' we said, '_what!_ Are you going to put those things on?'

'Certainly,' he answered composedly; 'you see so much depends upon a first impression, especially,' he added, 'as I observe that there are ladies about One at least of us ought to be decently dressed'

We said no more; ere simply dumbfounded, especially e considered the artful way in which Good had concealed the contents of that box for all these estion did we make--namely, that he should wear his mail shi+rt next his skin He replied that he feared it would spoil the set of his coat, now carefully spread in the sun to take the creases out, but finally consented to this precautionarypart of the affair, however, was to see old Uht at Good's transforlory, even down to the medals on his breast, and contemplated himself in the still waters of the lake, after the fashi+on of the young gentleman in ancient history, whose name I cannot remember, but who fell in love with his own shadow, the old Zulu could no longer restrain his feelings

'Oh, Bougwan!' he said 'Oh, Bougwan! I always thought thee an ugly littletime; and now thou art like a blue jay when he spreads his tail out Surely, Bougwan, it hurts my eyes to look at thee'

Good did not much like this allusion to his fat, which, to tell the truth, was not very well deserved, for hard exercise had brought him down three inches; but on the whole he was pleased at Uhted

'Ah! but Monsieur has the beautiful air--the air of the warrior It is the ladies ill say so e coet ashore Monsieur is corand--'

Here we stopped Alphonse

As we gazed upon the beauties thus revealed by Good, a spirit of eet ourselves up as well as we could The most, however, that ere able to do was to array ourselves in our spare suits of shooting clothes, of which we each had several, all the fine clothes in the world could never nificant; but Sir Henry looked what he is, a aiters, and boots

Alphonse also got hi an extra turn to his enoreneral way given to the vain adorning of his body, took some oil out of the lantern and a bit of tow, and polished up his head-ring with it till it shone like Good's patent leather boots Then he put on the iven hi cleaned up Inkosi-kaas a little, stood forth coain as soon as we had finished bathing, we had been progressing steadily for the land, or, rather, for the reat river Presently--in all about an hour and a half after the little boat had left us-- ee nu up to ten or twelve tons burden One of these was propelled by twenty-four oars, and lass we soon made out that the row-boat was an official vessel, her crew being all dressed in a sort of uniform, whilst on the half-deck forward stood an oldwhite beard, and a sword strapped to his side, as evidently the commander of the craft The other boats were apparently occupied by people brought out by curiosity, and were rowing or sailing towards us as quickly as they could

'Now for it,' said I 'What is the betting? Are they going to be friendly or to put an end to us?'

nobody could answer this question, and, not liking the warlike appearance of the old gentleman and his sword, we felt a little anxious

Just then Good spied a school of hippopotaested that it would not be a bad plan to i soh, struck us as a good idea, and accordingly we at once got out our eight-bore rifles, for which we still had a few cartridges left, and prepared for action There were four of the anirown We got up to the theain a few yards farther on; indeed, their excessive ta boats were about five hundred yards away, Sir Henry opened the ball by firing at the three parts grown young one The heavy bullet struck it fair between the eyes, and, crashi+ng through the skull, killed it, and it sank, leaving a long train of blood behind it At the same moment I fired at the cow, and Good at the old bull My shot took effect, but not fatally, and doent the hippopotaain presently blowing and grunting furiously, dyeing all the water round her crimson, when I killed her with the left barrel Good, who is an execrable shot, ether, the bullet lancing up, after I had fired my second shot, I perceived that the people we had fallen anorant of the nature of firearms, for the consternation caused by our shots and their effect upon the aniious

Soan to cry out in fear; others turned and entlereatly puzzled and alar row-boat

We had, however, but little time for observation, for just then the old bull, rendered furious by the wound he had received, rose fair within forty yards of us, glaring savagely We all fired, and hit him in various places, and down he went, badly wounded Curiosity now began to overcome the fear of the onlookers, and so the man and woman e had first seen a couple of hours or so before, who drew up alain within ten yards of their base, and instantly with a roar of fury made at it open-ive the boat way, but without success In another second I saw the huge red jaws and glea an enor it Doent the boat, leaving its occupants struggling in the water

Nextthe open- in the water Liftingjaere about to close on her, I fired over her head right down the hippopota round and round, snorting, and blowing red streah his nostrils Before he could recover himself, however, I let him have the other barrel in the side of the throat, and that finished hiain, but instantly sank Our next effort was directed towards saving the girl, theswum off towards another boat; and in this ere fortunately successful, pulling her into the canoe (amidst the shouts of the spectators) considerably exhausted and frightened, but otherwise unhurt

Meanwhile the boats had gathered together at a distance, and we could see that the occupants, ere evidentlytheht result unfavourably to ourselves, we instantly took our paddles and advanced towards the off his cocked hat politely in every direction, his aent smile Most of the craft retreated as we advanced, but a few held their ground, while the big row-boat caside, and I could see that our appearance--and especially Good's and U commander with astonishment, not unmixed with awe He was dressed after the same fashi+on as the man we first met, except that his shi+rt was not made of brown cloth, but of pure white linen hemmed with purple The kilt, however, was identical, and so were the thick rings of gold around the arm and beneath the left knee The roore only a kilt, their bodies being naked to the waist Good took off his hat to the old gentleman with an extra flourish, and inquired after his health in the purest English, to which he replied by laying the first two fingers of his right hand horizontally across his lips and holding them there for a moment, which we took as his method of salutation Then he also addressed souished our first interviehich ere forced to indicate we did not understand by shaking our heads and shrugging our shoulders This last Alphonse, being to the manner born, did to perfection, and in so polite a way that nobody could take any offence Then we caht I ht as well call attention to the fact, and did so first by openingentleorously, and pointed towards the harbour; and at the same time one of the men on his boat threw us a line and motioned to us to make it fast, which we did The row-boat then took us in tow, and ith great rapidity towards the mouth of the river, accompanied by all the other boats In about twenty minutes more we reached the entrance to the harbour, which was croith boats full of people who had come out to see us We observed that all the occupants were h some were fairer than others Indeed, we noticed certain ladies whose skin was of awhiteness; and the darkest shade of colour which as about that of a rather swarthy Spaniard Presently the wide river gave a sweep, and when it did so an exclaht burst froht our first view of the place that we afterwards knew as Milosis, or the Frowning City (from mi, which means city, and losis, a frown)

At a distance of some five hundred yards froranite, two hundred feet or so in height, which had no doubt once formed the bank itself--the intermediate space of land now utilized as docks and roadways having been gained by draining, and deepening and e the strea of the saranite that formed the cliff, built on three sides of a square, the fourth side being open, save for a kind of battle place we afterwards discovered was the palace of the queen, or rather of the queens At the back of the palace the town sloped gently upwards to a flashi+ng building of white olden dome which we had already observed The city ith the exception of this one building, entirely built of red granite, and laid out in regular blocks with splendid roadways between So far as we could see also the houses were all one-storied and detached, with gardens round theave soranite At the back of the palace a road of extraordinary width stretched away up the hill for a distance of a mile and a half or so, and appeared to ter that crowned the hill But right in front of us was the wonder and glory of Milosis--the great staircase of the palace, the nificence of which took our breath away Let the reader iine, if he can, a splendid stairway, sixty-five feet frohts, each of one hundred and twenty-five steps of eight inches in height by three feet broad, connected by a flat resting-place sixty feet in length, and running froe of the precipice down to meet a ay or canal cut to its foot from the river This ranite arch, of which the resting-place between the two flights for open space lay upon it Fro arch, or rather so arch in shape, such as none of us had seen in any other country, and of which the beauty and wonder surpassed all that we had ever iined Three hundred feet from point to point, and no less than five hundred and fifty round the curve, that half-arc soared touching the bridge it supported for a space of fifty feet only, one end resting on and built into the parent archway, and the other eranite of the side of the precipice

This staircase with its supports was, indeed, a work of which any living nitude and its surpassing beauty Four times, as we afterwards learnt, did the work, which was commenced in remote antiquity, fail, and was then abandoned for three centuries when half-finished, till at last there rose a youthful engineer named Rademas, who said that he would complete it successfully, and staked his life upon it If he failed he was to be hurled from the precipice he had undertaken to scale; if he succeeded, he was to be rewarded by the hand of the king's daughter Five years was given to him to complete the work, and an unlimited supply of labour andfailure to be inevitable, he determined to coht, however, a beautiful woman came to him in a dream and touched his forehead, and of a sudden he saw a vision of the coh thearch that had hitherto baffled his genius were to be overcome Then he awoke and once more commenced the work, but on a different plan, and behold! he achieved it, and on the last day of the five years he led the princess his bride up the stair and into the palace And in due course he becaht of his wife, and founded the present Zu-Vendi dynasty, which is to this day called the 'House of the Stairway', thus proving once -stones to grandeur And to commemorate his triu, and of the fair woreat hall of the palace, and there it stands to this day

Such was the great stair of Milosis, and such the city beyond No wonder they nahty works in solid granite did seem to fron upon our littleness in their sombre splendour This was so even in the sunshi+ne, but when the storathered on her i-place, or so of a poet's brain, than what she is--a enerations out of the red silence of the mountain side

CHAPTER XII THE SISTER QUEENS

The big rowing-boat glided on up the cutting that ran almost to the foot of the vast stairway, and then halted at a flight of steps leading to the landing-place Here the old gentleman dise no alternative, and being nearly starved, we did without hesitation--taking our rifles with us, however As each of us landed, our guide again laid his fingers on his lips and bowed deeply, at the saaze on us The last to leave the canoe was the girl we had picked out of the water, for who Before she went away she kissedsaved her from the fury of the hippopotaot over any fear she ht have had of us, and was by no means anxious to return in such a hurry to her lawful owners At any rate, she was going to kiss Good's hand as well asman interfered and led her off As soon as ere on shore, a nu boat took possession of our few goods and chattels, and started with the to us by s were perfectly safe This done, he turned to the right and led the way to a small house, which was, as I afterwards discovered, an inn Entering into a good-sized room,that a wooden table was already furnished with food, presuuide th of the table We did not require a second invitation, but at once fell to ravenously on the viands before us, which were served on wooden platters, and consisted of cold goat's-flesh, wrapped up in soetables rese lettuces, brown bread, and red wine poured froood, having soundy Twenty minutes after we sat down at that hospitable board we rose froh we needed two things, food and rest, and the food of itself was a great blessing to us Two girls of the sa cast of face as the first e had seen waited on us while we ate, and very nicely they did it They were also dressed in the sa to the knee, and with the toga-like garht arm and breast I afterwards found out that this was the national dress, and regulated by an iron custoh of course subject to variations Thus, if the petticoat was pure white, it signified that the wearer was une, that she was al wife; if with a black stripe, that she was aIn the saa, or 'kaf', as they call it, was of different shades of colour, fro to the rank of the wearer, and embroidered at the end in various ways This also applies to the 'shi+rts' or tunics worn by the men, which varied in material and colour; but the kilts were always the sa, however, every nia, and that was the thick band of gold round the right ar beneath the knee People of high rank also wore a torque of gold round the neck, and I observed that our guide had one on