‘My--ahh--my a--a a,’ yawned a--large gaunt silver-backed jackal out of the long grass by the side of a little stone _kopje_. Anon he raised his head and licked his gums in a slow and appreciative manner, as if a pleasant thought had occurred to him. The night was drawing in over the sandy plain, Namaqua partridges were flitting to the half-dried waterhole, the spring-bok were drawing together, and forming serried squadrons against the possible attack of such as Silverback of the stealthy foot and hungry fang; and from the Englishman’s camp hard by came the smothered grunt and squeal of the mules beginning with rapture their evening feed out of the leather trough slung to the waggon pole. The stones of the _kopje_ moved, and an aged one-eyed hyæna slunk out into the grey-green growth that surrounded his home. He sidled deprecatingly till within speaking distance of the jackal, and said in a whisper, the huskiness of which was born of much midnight prowling and many an unholy meal: ‘Is there meat in the wind, friend, that thou lickest so thy good red gums and white teeth? If perchance it be so, I pray thee remember thy old comrade, the widower and one-eyed.’ ‘Meat,’ snarled the jackal, ‘ay, ay, but meat is for those who can see;’ and casting a sneering glance at the bleared face of his visitor, he resumed his careful watch on the camp. ‘Peradventure it is mule, O crafty one?’ said the old reprobate, leering covetously towards the newly-lighted fire that threw the encampment into sharp relief against the fast gathering darkness. ‘Bah!’ said Silverback, ‘mule! mule is good enough for prowling one-eyed vagabonds, but not for me. I would sooner chase a young buck through the long night than eat a plaguey salt beast like mule.’ ‘Ow--ah,’ sighed the hyæna, ‘your Swiftness may indeed speak so, having legs of steel and jaws like cast-iron traps; but to one who has fasted these many days, being old and forsaken, mule and meer-cat ’tis all the same, it goes into the stomach--what more can I expect, who am old, and nigh to my end?’ and he rolled his eye imploringly at Silverback. ‘Well, well,’ said the latter somewhat mollified, ‘I say nothing; for two nights have I watched and hunted, and what I have seen, I have seen.’ With this enigmatical remark he sat up, and regarded his aged companion with a critical glance. ‘Truly he _is_ old,’ he said to himself; ‘he cannot count greatly on a division, and having a certain experience of graves, perchance he may be of service, the hoary old sinner. Watch with me if you will,’ he snarled aloud. So bidden, the one-eye joined the two eyes, and with them glared on steadily and patiently through the dark at the white man’s camp. * * * * * ‘When you’ve finished supper, Dan, saddle me Hopper’s horse; I’m going to have a try in the dark at that last lot of buck we saw this afternoon.’