What for master and the missus
come to this bad country?
That's one bad kind will eat the missus
in the night! Perhaps he come and eat Mahomet!" This
after-thought was too much for him, and Bacheet immediately
comforted him by telling the most horrible tales of death and
destruction that had been wrought by lions, until the nerves of
Mahomet were completely unhinged.
This was a signal for story-telling, when suddenly the aggageers
changed the conversation by a few tales of the Base natives,
which so thoroughly eclipsed the dangers of wild beasts, that in
a short time the entire party would almost have welcomed a lion,
provided would he only have agreed to protect them from the Base.
In this very spot where we were then camped, a party of Arab
hunters had, two years previous, been surprised at night and
killed by the Base, who still boasted of the swords that they
possessed as spoils from that occasion. The Base knew this spot
as the favourite resting-place of the Hamran hunting-parties, and
they might be not far distant now, as we were in the heart of
their country. This intelligence was a regular damper to the
spirits of some of the party. Mahomet quietly retired and sat
down by Barrake, the ex-slave woman, having expressed a
resolution to keep awake every hour that he should be compelled
to remain in that horrible country. The lions roared louder and
louder, but no one appeared to notice such small thunder; all
thoughts were fixed upon the Base, so thoroughly had the
aggageers succeeded in frightening not only Mahomet, but also our
Tokrooris.
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