the foremost rank
of the Udhloko. An ominous and threatening growl greeted these words,
and spears quivered.

"Whelps of the dog, say rather," exclaimed a deep voice. "Drop your
weapons and advance."

They laughed, those two. Standing before one thousand men, who had come
forth expressly to slaughter them and theirs--they laughed.

"We cubs of the Lion shed not our claws," replied the one who had
spoken, a tall, straight young fellow who, panting slightly after his
run, stood with his head thrown back contemplating the king's troops as
though he were the king himself. "Our claws may be cut, though they
tear badly first. But we do not shed them."

Again that ejaculation of anger went up, this time mingled with
contempt. A rapid movement had been executed. The two young men were
surrounded--stood now in the very centre of the _impi_. Still utterly
fearless, they looked around and laughed defiantly.

"As the child makes a plaything of the sleeping serpent, so now are you
walking over your graves, you two children," said Sobuza,
contemptuously. "Who are you?"

"Greeting, _induna_ of the king's _impi_," returned the speaker, after a
steady stare at the chief. "We are sent by our father, the Lion of the
Igazipuza, to warn you to return. There is _muti_ [medicine, or
philtre] spread on the mountain-side leading to his kraal, which is
death to twenty times the number you have here."

"Have done with such childishness," returned Sobuza, sternly. "Is your
father, the Lion of the Igazipuza, as you name him"--with a
sneer--"prepared to come down here and proceed to Undini to lay his neck
beneath the paw of the Lion of the Zulu whose wrath he has incurred?"

The two emissaries fairly laughed.

"Not he," was the reply. "This is the word of Ingonyama: `There is a
white man named Jandosi here. When the king's hunting-dogs first behold
the home of the Igazipuza, they shall view many things. They shall see
the white man, Jandosi, writhing upon the point of The Tooth--he and all
his following. The English will then make war in their anger upon the
people of Zulu, and will set up a white king. They shall find their
game, but the game of the king's hunting-dogs will be not jackals, but
lions. Now--let them come!'"

The utter audacity of this speech seemed to take away everybody's
breath. They stared at the foolhardy speaker as men who dream. He,
before they had recovered, catching sight of Gerard among the gr