s closed the view. The day had been
cool, and a slight breeze just blew out the folds of the heavy
Portuguese flag, waving from the stern of the larger boat. Its cushions
had been removed and placed inside the tent, and the guitar lay
neglected on the ground, its fair owner listening to the soldier's tale
of the Matabele hunt and the rhinoceros, as she twisted indolently the
stalk of a splendid water-lily, gathered before landing. Between Dom
Francisco and the missionary was the chess-board, but both were
listening too attentively to pay much attention to the game; while the
boatmen and attendants were seated in small knots round the tent
discussing the remainder of the dinner, emptying half-empty bottles, or
laughing, talking, and tale-telling in opposition to the parrots'
screaming among the branches.

"But," said Isabel, as Hughes concluded the story, "your rhinoceros,
dangerous as it was, is nothing to the animal of the same species, which
we heard of at Tete, and which many affirmed they had seen."

"What is it?" eagerly asked Wyzinski, forgetting the game in his desire
for information. "I once met a woman of the Makao tribe, who spoke of a
strange species. Strange enough she was herself, with her upper lip
pierced and ornamented by an ivory ring, a bark covering serving for
petticoat, that and a necklace of bark for all clothing."

Reclining back on her cushions, the black mantilla drawn over her neck
and bust, one tiny slippered foot just peeping from out of the folds of
the light dress, Dona Isabel carried the pure white petals of the
water-lily to her face, her large black eyes peeping over the flower
contrasting strangely with its whiteness, but seeming herself too
indolent to reply.

Puffing a long spiral stream of smoke from his mouth, the Portuguese
noble answered for her.

"It is said, and implicitly believed by the natives, many of whom assert
that they have seen it, that far away to the northward there exists a
rhinoceros, carrying one single sharp pointed horn right in the centre
of the forehead."

"The unicorn of old," interrupted Wyzinski.

"The unicorn of our fathers' tales," replied Dom Francisco, gravely
bowing. "The animal is of immense strength and savage ferocity, say the
natives. It is useless for man to contend with him, and any one who
meets it may count on death."

"At all events he may take refuge in a tree, and wait until the animal
goes away."

"It is said this rhinocer