The Project Gutenberg EBook of Hair-Breadth Escapes, by H.C. Adams

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Title: Hair-Breadth Escapes
The Adventures of Three Boys in South Africa

Author: H.C. Adams

Release Date: July 31, 2010 [EBook #33304]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ASCII

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HAIR-BREADTH ESCAPES ***

Produced by Nick Hodson of London, England

Hair-Breadth Escapes, by Rev H.C. Adams.

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HAIR-BREADTH ESCAPES, BY REV H.C. ADAMS.

DEDICATION.

To the Rev G.G. Ross, D.C.L., Principal of St Andrew's College,
Grahamstown, Cape Colony.

My dear Ross,

I dedicate this Tale to you for two reasons: first, because it is, in
some sort, a souvenir of a very interesting visit to South Africa,
rendered pleasant by the kind hospitality shown us by so many in
Grahamstown, and by no one more than yourself. Secondly and chiefly,
because it gives me the opportunity of expressing publicly to you my
sympathy in the noble work you are carrying on, under the gravest
difficulties--difficulties which (I am persuaded) many would help to
lighten, who possess the means of doing so, were they but acquainted
with them.

H.C. Adams.

Dry Sandford, _August 1876_.

CHAPTER ONE.

THE HOOGHLY--OLD JENNINGS--SHORT-HANDED--THE THREE BOYS--FRANK--NICK--
ERNEST--DR LAVIE--TENERIFFE.

It was the afternoon of a day late in the November of the year 1805.
His Majesty's ship _Hooghly_, carrying Government despatches and stores,
as well as a few civil and military officers of the East India Company's
service, was running easily before the trade wind, which it had caught
within two days' sail of Madeira--and was nearing the region of the
tropics. The weather, which had been cold and stormy, when the
passengers left England some weeks before, had been gradually growing
bright and genial; until for the last three or four days all
recollections of fog and chill had vanished from their minds. The sky
was one vast dome of the richest blue, unbroken by a single cloud, only
growing somewhat paler of hue as i