d licked away
the slope; so the existing bank was two feet above the stream. Little
recked the demon drivers or the parched cattle; in they plunged
promiscuously, with a flop like thunder, followed by an awful splashing.
The wagon stuck fast in the mud, the horses tied themselves in a knot,
and rolled about in the stream, and the oxen drank imperturbably.

"Oh, the salt! the salt!" screamed Phoebe, and the rocks re-echoed her
lamentations.

The wagon was inextricable, the cattle done up, the savages lazy, so
they stayed for several hours. Christopher botanized, but not alone.
Phoebe drew Ucatella apart, and explained to her that when a man is a
little wrong in the head, it makes a child of him: "So," said she, "you
must think he is your child, and never let him out of your sight."

"All right," said the sable Juno, who spoke English ridiculously well,
and rapped out idioms; especially "Come on," and "All right."

About dusk, what the drivers had foreseen, though they had not the sense
to explain it, took place; the kloof dwindled to a mere gutter, and the
wagon stuck high and dry. Phoebe waved her handkerchief to Ucatella.
Ucatella, who had dogged Christopher about four hours without a word,
now took his hand, and said, "My child, missy wants us; come on;" and so
led him unresistingly.

The drivers, flogging like devils, cursing like troopers, and yelling
like hyenas gone mad, tried to get the wagon off; but it was fast as a
rock. Then Dick and the Hottentot put their shoulders to one wheel, and
tried to prise it up, while the Kafir ENCOURAGED the cattle with his
thong. Observing this, Christopher went in, with his sable custodian at
his heels, and heaved at the other embedded wheel. The wagon was lifted
directly, so that the cattle tugged it out, and they got clear. On
examination, the salt had just escaped.

Says Ucatella to Phoebe, a little ostentatiously, "My child is strong
and useful; make little missy a good slave."

"A slave! Heaven forbid!" said Phoebe. "He'll be a father to us all,
once he gets his head back; and I do think it is coming--but very slow."

The next three days offered the ordinary incidents of African travel,
but nothing that operated much on Christopher's mind, which is the
true point of this narrative; and as there are many admirable books of
African travel, it is the more proper I should confine myself to what
may be called the relevant incidents of the journey.

On the sixth day fro