“I lub fishing,” he said one day to Nigel when in a confidential mood; “I can’t tell you how much I lub it.  Seems to me dat der’s nuffin’ like it for proggin’ a man!”

When Nigel demanded an explanation of what proggin’ meant, Moses said he wasn’t quite sure.  He could “understand t’ings easy enough though he couldn’t allers ’splain ’em.”  On the whole he thought that prog had a compound meaning—­it was a combination of poke and pull “wid a flavour ob ticklin’ about it,” and was rather pleasant.

“You see,” he continued, “when a leetle fish plays wid your hook, it progs your intellec’ an’ tickles up your fancy a leetle.  When he grabs you, dat progs your hopes a good deal.  When a big fish do de same, dat progs you deeper.  An’ when a real walloper almost pulls you into de ribber, dat progs your heart up into your t’roat, where it stick till you land him.”

With surroundings and capacities such as we have attempted to describe, it is no wonder that Moses sat down on the river-bank and enjoyed himself, in company with a little Malay boy, who lent him his bamboo rod and volunteered to show him the pools.

But there were no particular pools in that river It was a succession of pools, and fish swarmed in all of them.  There were at least fifteen different species which nothing short of an ichthyologist could enumerate correctly.  The line used by Moses was a single fibre of bark almost as strong as gut; the hook was a white tinned weapon like a small anchor, supplied by traders, and meant originally for service in the deep sea.  The bait was nothing in particular, but as the fish were not particular that was of no consequence.  The reader will not be surprised, then, when we state that in an hour or so Moses had had his heart progged considerably and had filled a large bag with superb fish, with which he returned, perspiring, beaming, and triumphant to breakfast.

After breakfast the whole party went forth for what Verkimier styled “zee business of zee day,” armed with guns, spears, botanical boxes, bags, wallets, and butterfly nets.

In the immediate neighbourhood of the village large clearings in the forest were planted as coffee gardens, each separated from the other for the purpose of isolation, for it seems that coffee, like the potato, is subject to disease.  Being covered with scarlet flowers these gardens had a fine effect on the landscape when seen from the heights behind the village.  Passing through the coffee grounds the party was soon in the tangled thickets of underwood through which many narrow paths had been cut.

We do not intend to drag our readers through bog and brake during the whole of this day’s expedition; suffice it to say that the collection of specimens made, of all kinds, far surpassed the professor’s most sanguine expectations, and, as for the others, those who could more or less intelligently sympathise did so, while those who could not were content with the reflected joy of the man of science.