The Austin weekly statesman. (Austin, Tex.) 1883-1898, 1889-03-21
IN THE BANANA BELT.
Bill Nye's Surprising Adventures in Com
pany with MIR. Riley Haggard.

|
Bill Nye's Surprising Adventures in Com.
pany with Mr.. Riley Haggard.
Many southern people come to st. Paul and
| Minneapolis, it is said, in order to escape the
| rigors Of their own winter. The banana belt
extending from Duluth TO Winnipeg reminds
one of tropical Africa. Last week Mr.. Riley
Haggard and started out for little quiet
elephant shooting in the country. Bidding
farewell to the concierge at the hotel, we
packed our heavy express rifles and smooth
bore elephant guns, penetrated as far as
the sleeping car could convey us, and, bid
| ding farewell to our faithful Wan Wenga,
who caressed us both with a whisk broom to
the value of twenty scudi, we hired an ele-
| plant apiece and began TO permeate the jun
| gle, preceded by our trusty bird dog
AT the kraal or livery stable where we en-
gagged our elephants we were told that game
was very plenty about thirty miles across the
dinglelow, and that in a small forest Of jung
sang trees and hoola bushes quite covey Of
quagga and elephants had been scared up by
Boer who had penetrated the jungle accom-
panied by his brake or dog.
The first night we camped beneath the shade
Of a Vienna bread fruit tree on the borders Of
the Karroo, and preventing the escape Of our
trusty elephants by attaching their trunks,
we began TO prepare our evening meal l
read the directions from book Of African
travel and my very faithful comrade, Mr..
Riley Haggard, did the cooking.
First refreshing ourselves with a long
draught from gourd of spoopju from
Peoria, marked 1912, so called because it is
placed on the market eighteen hours and
forty-two minutes after it is made our faith
full gun bearer, Wang Ylang, began to carve
the bultong, Meiboss, and jerked muskrat for
the evening meal. Making a bright fire of
karroo bushes and fresh train figs, a wad of
mealies was soon simmering over the Goals,
while the odor of Cincinnati bultong per-
vaded the tropical forest.
Ylang Wang, our faithful valet, who has
made his name household word because Of
his search after Schwatka and One Night
Stanley, said that according to the books on
African exploration it was now time to bed
down the elephants. After doing this he re-
turned and proceeded with the cuisine.
We had hardly swallowed our supper, and
Mr.. Riley Haggard was about to climb
date palm to secure few luscious lecture
dates, when our ears were saluted by most
unearthly and ear piercing roar from the
heart of the Jungle At this moment our
faithful Wang Wang came in with eyes
sticking out like sore thumb to announce
that our bird dog had flushed large Abys-
sinian Hon.
Hurriedly putting little Mayonnaist
dressing on our faithful Wang Wang, we
sent him out to parley with the lion while we
put on our telegraph climbers, and filling our
pockets with bultong we assembled u Duluth
palm tree.
We had not long to wait! The wang-wanga
bushes parted and n low, heavy set perform
ing lion crept softly into the open Karroo,
preceded at u distance of about three-quarters
of an inch by our faithful Ylang Wang. AS
tho poor fellow jumped low Kirdish bush,
| heard q crunching sound such as l never
hope to hear again, and turned away my
head rather than see our trusty gun bearer
in the act of backing into lion.
As soon as l could regain my courage by
small nip Of spoopju, | looked back at the
sicbening spectacle. All was still save the
distant song Of the red breasted blim-blam in
the Koojoo bushes.
Suddenly remembering how l had once
seen lion tanner make a lion quail de-
seconded from the tree and, taking q small
riding whip with me, l said, "HiI" and
whipping him across the forelegs, in the
mean time frequently making the remark
"Hil" drove him away from there. Out of
the lraal, down the sloot or dry water
course and across the Karroo lands he sped
and 50 on back to Winnipeg, where he joined
his congress of rare wild beasts, as / after
wards learned
Hastily saddling our elephants and sinching
them tightly, so that the howdah could not
slip around under the stomach of the noble
beast, we mounted by means of a freight car
standing near by and returned across TIE
transvaal, whatever that is, and hiring a
diligence, we packed our remaining supply
of bultong, elephant tusks, spoopju, pemmi-
can, elephant blubber, sacred cow meat, dried
yak, krooliejam, Milwaukee Heidsieck and
a glossary Of hard words from Rider Hag-
gard, and took the cars at Stanley Pool, re-
solving to penetrate still furt,'er into the
tropical depths of the northwest. Nye
in New York World