*Chapter XVI.*
*GATHERING GOLD.*
Instantly they all set to work with a feverish intensity which almostsurprised themselves. Poeskop was hunting about on the big spit of sandand shingle, quartering the surface very much as a pointer quarters itsground in search of game. In less than five minutes he had found whathe expected, and, holding up between his right finger and thumb aflattish object, which shone perceptibly in the strong sunlight,exclaimed,--
"_Here so, baas! Here is de gelt!_"
One and all of the trio searching near him forsook their task and rushedup to him. Mr. Blakeney took the piece of metal from the Bushman'soutstretched hand. It was a flattish nugget, pale yellow in colour,smooth and rounded as to its edges, manifestly much water-worn, andmeasuring about three inches in length by one in breadth. He examinedit very closely, weighed it in his open palm, and said quietly,--
"Yes, that's gold, right enough. Where that came from there ought to belots more. Guy, I congratulate you. We have accomplished our object,and I think the search is likely to be a very profitable one." Then,glancing at Poeskop's delighted expression, he added in Dutch, "Welldone, Poeskop; you were quite right. The gold is here. We must now setto work and find all we can. I suppose there's plenty of it?"
"_Banje_ [plenty]!" replied the Bushman, his odd yellow face expandedinto the widest grin of which it was capable. "_Banje!_"
"Well, now," said Mr. Blakeney, "what we have to do is to explore thisplace carefully and systematically. To-day, and for the next week, we'llgo over the surface and work our way upstream towards the ravine at thehead of the kloof. When we've gone over the surface, we'll set to workwith pick and shovel, and wash the gravel and soil. We shall have toknock up some kind of cradle, but I know how to do that. I was on theLydenburg alluvial fields, in the Eastern Transvaal, in 1875, and saw agood deal of rough mining. I knew at once that this was a real goldnugget. We'll have a test at the wagon to-night, but I haven't theleast doubt in the world that this nugget, which weighs about fourounces, is the genuine metal. That, at L3, 15s. per ounce, meansL15--not by any means a bad result for about five minutes' work."
"Splendid, pater!" put in Tom enthusiastically. "Why, I feel like amillionaire already." As he spoke, he was turning over some gravel withthe tip of his boot. "Hullo!" he said, suddenly stooping and picking upsomething small and bright. "Here's another!"
And so in truth it was. Tom's nugget was smaller than that found byPoeskop, and was rounder in shape. But a nugget it was, of pure gold,free from any trace of quartz, and weighing about an ounce and a half;and the party were proportionately delighted. They now set to work,and, arming themselves with sticks, cut from the neighbouring bush, forthe purpose of turning over the gravel, hunted with minute care over thebig spit and in the clear shallows of the stream flowing by. By twelveo'clock, when they knocked off for half an hour's rest, and ate somelunch under the grateful shade of an adjacent acacia tree, they had allbeen more or less lucky. Poeskop had gathered up nine nice nuggets ofvarying size. Next to him Guy had been most successful, having pickedup seven; while Mr. Blakeney and Tom followed with five each.
"I'm going to keep my best nugget and give it to mother, to make abrooch or a bracelet of," said Tom, as he dived into his pockets andexamined his spoil.
"All right, Tom," added Guy; "I'll do the same by Ella. There's a finenugget, which ought to make her a real good necklet."
"And I'll provide for Marjory," said Mr. Blakeney, laughing at the lads'eagerness. "But where does Arthur come in?"
"Oh, I'll look after Arthur," said Tom. "I feel such a bloatedcapitalist that I can provide for anybody. There," he went on,selecting a good nugget, "is Arthur's _dot_ or dowry, or whatever youlike to call it."
Lunch over, and Mr. Blakeney's pipe finished, they went to work again.From half-past twelve till three o'clock they steadily pursued theirinvestigations. At two o'clock the greatest and most amazing discoveryof the day was made by Guy. While turning over some gravel, just at theedge of the stream, he came upon what he took to be a submerged, roundedstone, of which there were plenty scattered about the bed and edges ofthe rivulet. In trying to push this out of its cradle of sand andgravel he found it unexpectedly heavy. At last he shifted it from thesoil in which it lay, and lifted it out. Its weight astonished him.Suddenly a thought flashed across his mind. He whipped hishunting-knife from the sheath, and scraped away a coating of what lookedlike rusty soil which covered it. Then, cutting into the stone, astreak of bright yellow showed instantly. The lump was solid gold. Hisshouts brought the rest of the party running up to him.
"Here's something like a nugget!" said the lad, with flushed face."Look, uncle, it's gold right enough; and it weighs, I should think, atleast ten pounds. It's certainly the weight of a light pair ofdumb-bells!"
Mr. Blakeney stooped and picked up the stone, and carefully examined it.Then, taking out his knife, he cut into it as Guy had done. Again thereshowed a streak of bright yellow.
"Yes, that's gold right enough," he said, in answer to Guy's intenselook; "and it must weigh well over ten pounds. I see there's just athin skin, apparently of quartz, on one side. Deduct, say, a couple ofpounds for that and quartz further inside, and you have something likeeight or nine pounds of virgin gold. A magnificent find, indeed! Icongratulate you, Guy, with all my heart."
Leaving the big nugget, they worked till three, and then knocked off forthe day. The occupation was so exciting, so entrancing a one, that itwas difficult to tear themselves away. But, as Mr. Blakeney pointedout, they had the climb out of the kloof before them, and an hour's walkto camp, and they would scarcely reach the wagon much before sunset.
The valley, as they walked down it on their way to the ladder, lookedmarvellously fair. Flights of wild duck, geese, widgeon, and teal flewup and down stream. A big troop of guinea-fowl, at least fifty or sixtystrong, was making its way to some favourite roosting-place; the sharp,metallic cry of the various members of the flock, calling to oneanother, sounded curiously resonant in this rock-engirdled kloof. Manybirds of lovely plumage flitted hither and thither; occasionally a smallsteinbuck, duyker, or bushbuck would dart away in front of them. Theflowers and flowering shrubs starring the green of the kloof andclimbing the cliffsides added not a little to the beauty of the scene.
"What a lovely spot, uncle!" said Guy, as they marched steadily forward."I feel almost as if I should like to throw up gold-digging, and settlefor life in such a paradise."
"I'm afraid, Guy," replied his uncle, "you would soon grow tired of theplace. It's very beautiful, certainly; but it's mighty lonely. And youwould have a rare business to keep yourself supplied with even the barenecessaries of life. Think of the long trek from Mossamedes--six weeks'travel before your tea and coffee, and sugar and other small luxuries,can reach you. Take my word for it. No one has enjoyed the life of thehunter and explorer more than I have done. I knocked about, as youknow, for years in South Africa before I settled down. After a time,even the most inveterate wanderer begins to sigh for rest and some ofthe comforts of civilization. I speak of what I know. I dislike townlife; and the huddling together of huge populations, with an immensedeal of misery for two-thirds of the poorer folk, is to me absolutelyhateful. I believe the system, for which machinery is largelyanswerable, is absolutely wrong, and will lead to untold misfortunes tothe so-called civilized nations in the future, if persisted in. But onthe other hand, fascinating as is the life of the wilderness for atime--say a year or two at a spell--you would become weary of it if youhad to settle down in such a place as this, fair though it is, for therest of your existence. The fact is, mankind is to a great extentgregarious, and you would want some kind of company as an occasionalrelief from the monotony of too much solitude."
"Besides," broke in Tom, who had been listening quietly to his father'sideas, "I should say this kloof, jolly as it looks, would be prettyfeverish--wouldn't it,
pater?--especially after the rains."
"Yes, Tom; I think it would. This country is a good deal nearer theequator than British Bechuanaland, which I take to be the healthiestpart of South Africa; and where you get the combination of moisture andheat you are bound to have fever. That reminds me, we shall have tolook after our health on the homeward trek. The rains haven't fairlyset in yet, but they will soon, and I shall have to put you fellows on acourse of quinine. I don't want to take you home mere pallid spectres,like men who have been suffering from Zambesi fever."
They reached the rope-ladder at length, and then began the upward climb.As Mr. Blakeney had warned them, the ascent was a very different matterfrom the journey down. For the first fifty feet or so, as the ladderswung and swayed in empty air, it was by no means pleasant progression;and by the time they had reached the top, all were out of breath andexhausted.
"My word, pater!" gasped Tom, as he threw himself on the ground and laypanting. "Shall we have to do this often? It's a beast of a climb, andour gold will be jolly hardly won if we're to have much of this sort ofthing."
Mr. Blakeney sat up. Evidently he was thinking hard.
"Well," he said, "it is a terribly tough, as well as a very nasty,climb. I for one don't want to attempt it very often. It's worse thanI bargained for. I think we'll have to camp in the kloof till we'vefinished our gold search."
Poeskop, who had stayed behind to make the ends of the ladder fast totwo stout bushes which grew near the foot, and so prevent the unpleasantoscillation of the last fifty odd feet, now made his appearance. Thesight of his queer little sharp-chinned face (now streaming from thetoil of the climb), as it appeared over the edge of the cliff, sent Guyand Tom, and indeed Mr. Blakeney himself, into fits of laughter, towhich the good-humoured Bushman freely responded.
"What ho! Poeskop!" cried Tom; adding in Dutch, "How do you like theclimb?"
"Hard work, Baas Tom," responded Poeskop cheerily, as he squatted on hishams to rest, and wiped the sweat from his face with his usualhandkerchief, a jackal's tail. "But I've seen harder jobs even thanthis. If you had lived the life of a wild Bushman, as I did till I wasa grown man, you'd soon understand that a day like this is mere child'splay. Nowadays I know that I get two good meals every single day of mylife, rain or shine. When I was a lad the great puzzle of my life wasto find or catch food at all. When your skorf comes to you as easily asit does to me now, a day's work is just nothing at all. Why, baas, as alad of ten or twelve, I've travelled three days at a stretch, fiftymiles a day, without food or water, and thought nothing much about it."
"Yes," said Tom reflectively; "I quite see your point. A hard day's workto a well-fed, healthy man, who gets his breakfast and dinner 'regular,'is a mere healthy exercise canter. Still, Poeskop, it was a toughclimb, eh?"
"Ja, baas," responded the Bushman, grinning; "but think of what you havein your pockets."
Tom looked down at his breeches pockets, bulging with nuggets, androared with laughter.
"Quite so, Poeskop," he said; "it's worth it all."
They now started with Seleti and September, who had spent a quiet andperfectly uneventful day at the cliff top, and made their way rapidlydown to the wagon. There, after their supper, they turned to theirtreasure, which meanwhile reposed in a Kaffir blanket, and Mr. Blakeney,having got out his scales, began to estimate the value of the day'sfind. Altogether, not counting Guy's big nugget, which they christened"Poeskop's Pride," they had gathered forty-nine nuggets, giving a totalweight of ninety-eight ounces. This amount of gold, at the value of L3,15s. per ounce, would figure out therefore at a total of L367. Thesenuggets, varying in size and weight from a pea to more than five ounces,had scarcely any indication of quartz or other extraneous substanceabout them, and were manifestly nearly all pure and solid metal.Deducting L17 for wastage, Mr. Blakeney estimated their value at notless than L350.
Then came Guy's monster nugget to be dealt with. It weighed exactlytwelve pounds ten ounces. At a liberal estimate the thin coating ofquartz running down one side, and other impurities with which it wascoated, could not possibly exceed two pounds. This would leave a weightof gold of nine pounds ten ounces, or, reduced to ounces, one hundredand eighteen ounces. At L3, 15s. per ounce, then, "Poeskop's Pride" wasworth L442 at the least. Adding this sum to the L350, the value of thesmaller nuggets, a total of L792 would represent the value of the day'swork.
"Not by any means a bad day's work, even for four hard-working men likeourselves," said Mr. Blakeney, with a smile, as he looked round at hisaudience--the two lads and Poeskop.
"I should think not, indeed," added Guy.
Mr. Blakeney now went to the wagon, and produced a bottle of champagnewhich, with five others, he had brought for such high occasions as thepresent; and as medicine, if occasion needed. Opening the bottle--itwas Giesler 'eighty-nine, a first-rate brand--he poured out a tot allround in the _kommetjes_, or little earthenware basins, used by theBoers and most up-country trekkers for coffee. Then they pledged oneanother, and drank to the complete success of the expedition. Poeskop,as pioneer of the grand discovery, was served out with a drink of thesame excellent liquor. He had never tasted or even seen champagnebefore, and the effervescing wine, getting into his broad nostrils, sethim off in so violent a fit of sneezing that he upset the remainder ofhis tot.
"My baas," he said presently, after he had somewhat recovered, "I don'tthink I like this medicine. It is not so good as 'pain-killer' [a drugbeloved of all African natives], and I would much rather have a _soupje_of Cango brandwein."
The Bushman's struggles with his champagne, and his plaintive speechafter the mishap, were received with much laughter.
"All right, Poeskop," said Mr. Blakeney, "you shall have the Cango."
Going to the locker of the wagon, he brought out a bottle of the goodCape brandy of that name, and, pouring out a dram, handed it to theBushman. Poeskop, smacking his broad lips over this liquor, was at oncesatisfied, and expressed himself as more than well pleased at theexchange. The rest of the men were, in honour of the evening, also eachserved out with a tot of the same spirit. At ten o'clock a merryevening beneath the stars came to an end, and all sought their restingplaces.
Next morning Mr. Blakeney announced his intention of trying to get thewagon up to the cliff, near where they had let down the rope-ladder. Itwould be a hard and difficult trek, and some trees and bush would haveto be cut down. But he had carefully surveyed the ascent by which theyreached the place, and he thought it could be accomplished. His chiefreason for getting the wagon up was, that he disliked very greatly theidea of maintaining two separate camps at some distance apart from eachother. He knew that it was by no means improbable that KarlEngelbrecht, and any allies he might get together, would make anotherattack on them. A strong camp might be formed near the ladder. Therewas a fountain in the hill close by; and it would be much moreconvenient to load the wagon there than to have to carry every ounce ofgold they won each day down to their present camping ground.
All parties, including Poeskop and the other native servants, heartilyapproved of the scheme; and the whole of that day, therefore, was spentin clearing a road up the long and steep mountain ascent, over the nek,and on to the plateau overlooking the Gold Kloof. Next day theyinspanned the oxen, now much refreshed and recruited by their rest andgood feeding, and ascended the long mountain slope. It was, as Mr.Blakeney had anticipated, a tough trek, but it was accomplished. Theypassed the nek, gained the plateau, and made a permanent camp within ahundred yards of the cliff edge overlooking the Gold Kloof. Theposition was an excellent one against attack. Their rear rested againstthe base of a mountain peak above them; they had a secure water supply;and any assault delivered against them must be made across the openplateau. There was plenty of good grazing for the cattle and horsesamong the long grass which here covered the plateau. Occasionally theoxen were taken down to the valley, where they had first outspanned, forchange of diet. At night they were kraaled in a strong
thorn scherm,which effectually protected them against the raids of leopards, lions,or other Carnivora.
This matter having been arranged satisfactorily, the gold-seekers turnedtheir attention entirely to the work of denuding the kloof of as much ofits treasure as they could find and make their own within a given time.For three days they descended the ladder at early morning, climbing upto their camp each night with loads of gold. But the labour entailed inthis process seemed so great and so unnecessary, that Mr. Blakeneyfinally made up his mind to take down food and necessaries for a week,and camp in the kloof near the gold they sought. They found that thisplan obviated much labour and saved much time. Jan Kokerboom was leftin command of the main camp, with the strictest commands to keep themost vigilant watch and ward. Seleti, Mangwalaan, and September wereeach sent out during the week to take a glance round the country, toinspect the pass, and to ascertain whether any foes were approaching thekloof. Once in three days Poeskop was sent up the ladder to receive JanKokerboom's report.
For six days on end the four diggers, now living in the Gold Kloof,stuck resolutely to their task. Each day they worked steadily up thestream, unearthing nuggets, plying pick and shovel, and washing soil ina rough cradle which Mr. Blakeney constructed. Their success waswonderful. Poeskop had spoken truly when he had affirmed that the kloofwas full of gold. During the first six days' work, after the day of theopening search, they gathered never less than four hundred ounces; ontwo of these, thanks to some large nuggets, their finds totalled closeon six hundred and a little over eight hundred ounces respectively.Each night they camped under the shelter of some bush, close to theladder. They slept in their blankets, with a good fire at their feet;and the weather remaining fine and open, with little dew, they wereperfectly comfortable. They had with them a kettle in which to boiltheir coffee, a three-legged Kaffir pot, which served them for bakingand stewing, and a saucepan. They had brought down a supply of meal andsome baking powder, from which Tom or Guy each day made and bakedsufficient bread for their wants. The kloof, a magnificent natural gamepreserve, provided them with as much game, furred or feathered, as theycared to shoot; and their stew-pot each night furnished them with asavoury meal of the flesh of buck or guinea-fowl, or wild pigeon orpartridge. Sometimes they shot a couple or two of fat wild duck, mostly_geelbek_ (yellow-bill), the best of all South African wildfowl, which,baked in the three-legged pot, with embers above and below, and bastedwith a little fat occasionally, afforded them a delicious banquet.
These were delightful days, which are likely to remain for ever markedin letters of red in the memories of the two young adventurers and ofMr. Blakeney. The toil was hard, but healthy; the kloof was wonderfullybeautiful; the weather was magnificent; the gipsy-like existence wasfascinating; the daily excitement and anticipation of seeking andunearthing great quantities of the most valuable mineral in the worldkept them one and all at concert pitch.
The following Sunday, having climbed up their ladder on the Saturdaynight, they enjoyed as a day of rest in the main camp. After their workof the preceding six days, they were all glad enough to spend the dayquietly about the wagon--resting, reading, writing up their diaries, andlistening to the reports of Jan Kokerboom and his subordinates. Nothinghad happened to disturb the quiet tenor of life in camp during theabsence of the gold-seekers. Nothing had been seen or heard ofEngelbrecht or his followers, although a vigilant watch had beenmaintained, and the neighbouring country occasionally patrolled. JanKokerboom had shot a leopard one night, close to the camp fire, as itclawed down the venison of a koodoo which had been recently slain. Thebrute, stretching itself up to the low branch of a tree on which thevenison hung, within fifteen feet of the camp fire, had been observed byJan. Snatching up his rifle he shot it in the throat, breaking itsspine, and instantly ending its predatory career.
For three weeks the gold-diggers steadily pursued their search.Thoroughly exploring the river-side, they were occasionally delayed forseveral days together by the finding of some unexpectedly rich depositin the banks of the stream, or some smooth spit of sand, left bareduring the absence of the rains. The heap of gold which they wereaccumulating each day near the foot of the ladder was steadily assuminglarge proportions. In another week or two, Mr. Blakeney, who hadcarefully weighed their finds every evening, calculated that they wouldliterally have made their pile, and be ready to trek for the coast andhome.