Off to the Wilds | Page 7

had his arm over the white-legged cob's neck and had given it a hug, the horse looking at him with its great soft eyes, and uttering a low snort.
"Up with you then, my boys, and have a canter."
"Without a saddle, father?" said Dick, nervously.
Jack was already up.
"Have it saddled if you like, my boy," said Mr Rogers, kindly.
But Dick flushed, gave a spring from the ground, and was on the little cob's back.
They were both skilled riders, but Dick's illness made him timorous at times. He, however, fought hard to master his weakness; and when Jack cried, "Come on, Dick; let's race to the big tree and back," he stuck his knees into the cob's plump sides and away they went, with the wind rushing by their ears, and the cobs keeping neck and neck, rounding the big tree about a mile away on the plain, and then making the dusty earth rise in clouds as they tore back, and were checked with a touch of the bridle by the home field.
"Why, Dick, my boy, I would not wish to see a better seat on a horse," cried Mr Rogers, patting the cobs in turn. "Jack, you set up your back like a jockey. Sit more upright, my boy."
"All right, father; I'll try," said Jack, throwing himself right forward so as to hug his cob's neck. "But I say, father, isn't he lovely? I felt all the time as if I was a bit of him, or we were all one."
"You looked like it, my boy," said Mr Rogers, smiling in his son's animated face. "I wish Dick had your confidence, and you a little more of his style."
"All right, father, we'll try and exchange a bit a-piece," laughed Jack. "But I can't half believe it, father, that these are to be our own horses."
"You may believe it, then," said his father. "And now get them to the stable."
"Oh, I say, Dick, what beauties!" cried Jack. "What shall you call yours?"
"I don't know yet," replied his brother. "He's very fast. `Swift' wouldn't be a bad name; and we might call yours `Sure.'"
"Hum! I don't think much of those names. Hold up!" he continued, examining the hoofs of his brother's nag. "I say, Dick, what fine thick shoes he has got."
"That's a good suggestion," said Dick, laughing, and looking brighter than he had seemed for weeks. "Let's call him `Shoes,' and his brother with the white legs `Stockings.'"
"Shoes and Stockings!" cried Jack; "but those are such stupid names. I don't know though but what they'll do."
The question was not discussed, for the lads busied themselves in bedding down their own horses; and for the rest of that, day the stable seemed to be the most important part of the house.
CHAPTER THREE.
PREPARATIONS FOR THE JOURNEY.
"What is it ye're doing?" said Dinny, a day or two before that proposed for the start.
Coffee and Chicory looked up from their task, grinned, and then went on sharpening the points of a couple of assegais upon a heavy block of stone, which they had evidently brought from a distance. Their faces glistened with perspiration; their knees were covered with dust; and they were in a wonderful state of excitement. Resuming their work on the instant, they tried to bring the weapons to a keen point.
"Kill lion," said Coffee, laconically; and he worked away as if the lion were round the corner waiting to be killed.
"Then ye may just as well lave off, ye dirty little naygars; for it's my belafe that you're not going at all."
Dinny went off into the house leaving the two boys apparently paralysed. They dropped the assegais, stared at each other, and then lay down and howled in the misery of their disappointment.
But this did not last many seconds; for Coffee sprang up and kicked Chicory, who also rose to his feet, and in obedience to a word from his brother they took their assegais and hid them in a tree which formed their armoury--for out of its branches Chicory took the two kiris or clubs; and then the boys ran round to the front, and stood making signs.
The brothers had such a keen love of anything in the way of sport that, expecting something new, they ran out and willingly followed the two young blacks out into the grassy plain about a mile from the house, when after posting their young masters behind a bush, Coffee and Chicory whispered to them to watch, and then began to advance cautiously through the grass, kiri in hand, their eyes glistening as they keenly peered from side to side.
"What are they going to do?" said Dick.
"I don't know. Show us something. I wish we had brought our guns. Look out!"
There was a whirring of wings, and the two Zulu boys struck attitudes that would