"Oh, it's only a scratch, Curtis," said the brave lad, as the palanquin came up, and his comrades placed him in it. "I tell you there's no such thing as only a scratch here. If you will go with him to his quarters, Hughes, I'll send Chapman." The Ensign's bungalow was close by; Chapman, the assistant-surgeon of the regiment, was soon awoke, the wound found to be a severe but not dangerous one, the tiger, having struck forward like a huge cat, with its powerful fore-arm just catching the youngster's leg, scoring deeply into the flesh, and tearing off the light shoe. The wounds were bandaged, and Ensign Harris's name placed on the sick list. "Good-night, Hughes, and a pleasant journey to you," said Curtis, as the two shook hands at the entrance of the compound. The air was fresh and cool, the "Southern Cross" was just dipping towards the distant horizon, the long mournful howl of a far-away hyena came across the plain, and on the white dusty road stood the dark-looking palanquin, with its group of dusky bearers, as, wringing his brother officer's hand, Captain Hughes stepped into it, and with a sing-song chaunt the palkywallers shouldered their burden, and moved away on the first stage, which was to lead to the broad plains and well-stocked prairies of that Shikaree's heaven, the hunting-fields of South Africa. Volume 1, Chapter II. THE "HALCYON" BRIG. "Sail ho!" shouted the look-out in the foretop of the merchant brig, the "Halcyon," one fine afternoon, some three months after, the events related in the preceding chapter. The sun was just setting in the western horizon, tinging the trembling waves with a golden hue. The brig was making good weather of it, and she looked a likely craft to do so. Her long, low, black hull supported a pyramid of white canvas, every sail drawing to a nicety, as, with a fresh breeze right over the quarter, she held her course to the northward and westward, bound for the coast of Africa. Three men only were pacing her quarter-deck. The one, a middle-sized, stout built man, his face tanned to the colour of mahogany, was evidently the master of the brig. The second, much younger, was his first mate; while leaning over the bulwarks, lazily looking into the sea, a solitary passenger, who had been taken on board when the brig lay in Madras roads, completed the trio. Forward, on the forecastle, was a group of sailors, thrown here and there under the weather bulwarks, some asleep, some telling tales of former adventures in the land now a hundred miles away on the brig's larboard bow, and which they hoped to sight in the morning.