How Piet the Bugler was Cured.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 1526, 9 April 1886, Page 3

How Piet the Bugler was Cured.

•wli the eariy part of the present abobt ten years after the of! Good Hope had become subject to English rule, the seantilyMBpl eolooy had suffered considerably trough wan with the satires of Wytisifc, a chain of strong military was ewcted on the frontier, in* to keep the Kaffirs in check as fiiah as possible, as well as to serve as places of refuge in times of war for fp fanfliea and cattle of the otherwise unprotected farmers. in fnafee Ms a lane force of Butlllh soldiery wu maintained, as fill It in each one a company, or at timea only a few of the regiment, composed principally of Hottentots, and flrited "The Cape Corp*" At first this corps consisted only of inlfcntry, and the Hotjentots themselves were little better than their slave j brethren; but subsequently, when these frontier posts were built, and it wti consequently found that these coloured soldiers were more useful in timveying dispatches, and recovering stolen cattle from the Kaffirs, when iiounted, the regiment was by degrees changed into the "Cape Mounted Elflea." They then attained a better position, and for many years did ItfaMHe service under their British The little incident I am about to relate, refers to the time when one of these large military posts was in its infancy. The poet Pringle has, I believe toM the story, but I heard it- from a Gtifaa Hottentot woman, who used to come, isto Fort Beaufort sometimes from the Kat Hirer Settlement She boasted that been in the Cape Cups herself, and had many a time not only carried meteages from one place to soother, but had even managed b6ce,wheh a certain garrison ran short ofammunition, to get in with an aproifull of eartriages. Charlie, our big boy, liked the old wanan, and always came to bega long Itick of M Boer tobaeco" for her; and tHik after regaling her under the tfiandahL at the back of the house with.coffee and other comestibles, would make her tell him all sorts of wonderful stories about lions and tigers,

The old woman was very garrulous, aril generally prefixed her stories with: Ton see, Muter Charlrs, I was io the Cape Corpa myself; I waa brought DP in it, for my father waa a Cape Corpa man, and 10 wu my uncle, and aftwtahhi my huiband and my boya; BoS I waa going to tell yon about my uqMi Day. "He waa alwaya so clever about innate; he oould whistle pretty tunr« through a wheat stalk, and th*n li»* made fiatea ont of the reeds that grew in t&e nter: but one dar he got into troubTe, for he cut off the end of my ar.de'a bamboo whip-atick, and though be made a rery fine flufe* and lots of people aaid it waaas good aa one of the band instruments, still he epoilt the whip and got a whipping for it. * But lie kept his flute, and when the officers heard him play they told th# bend-master (I think it was) to make a bugler of bim. "How proud he wu! He s.xro learnt all the bugle-calls and notes, and played beautifollr. He always WOlt his bugle in bis beit, and kept it aa bright aa gold, and he might have been aa happy as the commandant himself, for be had only to do just ths thing be liked beat; but he got spoilt, and too fond of drink. M First one would giro him a glaw of Cape brandy then another, and ec on. •* Oh, Maater Cbarlie, when you'n ' a grown up gentleman, don't yot sever give people glaasea of drink t< nay them like for things they do if yoi ha rent no money to giro them ; it ii better to give them nothing at all thai what mine them body and soul M At last Piet waa getting to hi quite a drunkard. He kept sober til kfter parade-time, and managed th<

bugle iD right every morning, bat afta that he was taking ' soopys/ or whet the Eogliah soldiers call ' a drop of drink,' all day long. "One day —it was just as hot as it ia to day—Piet had been out with a petty to get firewood for the meat kitchen; they had to chop down some of the mimoaaa and the wild olire-trees, cut up the wood* and load )t up on to thewaggona. That took them a good fiH of the morning, then the oxen wore pat into the yoke again and they tracked homei "When they were aboat half way, aboip one arid: ••Where's Piet the Bugler?' M • Oh,' replied another, 'the lazy little Hottentot 1 He woald not help with the wood, and I expect he's fast asleep on the w&jgon«trap; be can carl Limaelfap anywhere.' '* Piet waa asleep, it wu true, but not anrMme with the waggons. He hid been fcanng little sips of brandy pit of a tin canteen that was slung acvoaa In shoulder* for the parpoee of hoMiogarater, and 1 suppose that aud tife heat together made him feel so drowfr that ne thought he might as well tie down ander a bash and sleep till the noed party wwe ready to go tack t**e fort

"Hal Hottentots sleep vfry soundly *aU uses, tad especially when they htvwlto drink in them \ besides which oofodykx»wj«twtto ftet w* to

(give him a kick and wake him up; ao I be slept on, never even hearfag all the noise that mas made when the cattle ««n being pat to the waggona. " By-and-by attracted by the scent of the meat that the men had been broiling on some stones made red hot in the fire, a great lion came that way to see what he eonld pick np in the way of a late dinner. "He did not find enough to satisfy him, but soon he began to sniff again. Surely he could amell something very good near by ? He walked ronnd and round again without making any noise, and at last he came upon Piet; he was tying flat on his stomach with his arms under his head.

u They say that if a white man and a black are lying side by side, a lion will always take the black man in preference to the white. So, of course, this lion thought he bad found a rich treat when he came upon Piet. He walked all round him, and smelt him, and satisfied himself that he was alive, for a lion never takes dead game; and then he thought he would take this delcious morsel off to his lioness and her two young cubs at home. " So, to balance him as well as he could, he took him up about the middle which happened to be by the waistband of his trousers, and walked off, holding his head up in the same way as a cat does when she is carrying a mouse that is rather larger than usual; but do what he would, Piet's feet at the one end and hie arms at the other, would keep on knocking and touching the ground, and very soon this woke Piet up. "At first Piet thought he was dreaming, then that one of the men was carrying him off to the waggons, and he called out to him not to pinch his back so awfully. Of course he very quickly found out bis mistake, for he saw the great paws of the lion, and the thought of the fate that was in store for him should he not escape from this monarch of the forest sobered poor litttle Piet the Bagler more effectually than anything had done for many a long day. " What should he do ? He would have liked to kick and shriek, but he knew if he did the lion would only take a firmer grip of hi 3 fieeh, whereas at he was borne along principally by his clothes. His hands were at liberty; he must do something, whatever happened. He felt for bis knife, which he usually carred in his belt. It was gone! Alas! he remembered that he had left it where he had been eat ing his mutton chops. No, he had no knife, but his bugle was still in his belt He might summon help; he knew that it would be contrary to orders to sound the bugle-call at a wrong time, but the officers would forgive him, and some of his comrades might hear him and coin* with their guos before too late. •* Toot, toot, toot, titu toot! went the bugle'* very shrillest tones.

" The effect wm iustantauous; the lion stood stock still!

"Toot, toot, toot, titu toot, toot, iooi! ae shrill and londer than the last.

M lt was enough. The lion had evidently n u ver heard such unearthly sounds in his life. For once he wa< terrified. Tie dropped his prcr aud bounded off to the woods.

"Piet jumped up, nnd ran in a contrary direction as fast as his could carry him, never stopping till he w&e *afe inside the fort, where his comrades were almost incredulous about his storv notwithstanding that the marks of the teeth of the lion were visible in bis flesh. " But Piet'f adventure was discussed at the officers mes?, that evening, aud the next day a party set out to investigate for themaelveeand ascertain the truth of the tale " There was fouud Piet's knife and a tobacco bag, just where he had evidentlv lain down to sleep, and all round about wre the traces of lion's footsteps—or the ' spoor,' as it is called in South Africa. '•Also could be traced where Piet's feet and hands bad alternately been dragged alon? the ground.

" But after all, the best and most convincing proof of the truth of the story was that from that day forward no amount of persuasion could ever induce Piet the Bugler to ta9te a drop ofbran.lv.

" 1 No.' paid Pict; ' The good Lord delivered me out of the liou's mo'ith, and the devil himaelf shan't tern [it me to taste Cape smoke again !' "The whittt brandy that is distilled by the Boer® from the juice of the «jrap» wascalle Iby the soldiers' Cape S.noke.' on account of the smoky flavour it possessed." I bave not been able to tell the story in the old woman's words a* she spoke in the Hottentot-Dutch, which has been in gefleral use among the people of that race since the time that they were conquered by the early Dutch settlers of the Cape, and mad< to substitute the language of their masters for their own, which being full of " clicks," was found to be perfectly unpronounceable to European tongues