at our feet.

"You have got a magnificent pair of horns," I said, contemplating
the fallen giant.

"Yes," answered Anscombe, with a twinkle of his humorous eyes,
"and if it hadn't been for you I think that I should have got
them in more senses than one."

As the words passed his lips some missile, from its peculiar
sound I judged it was the leg off an iron pot, hurtled past my
head, fired evidently from a smoothbore gun with a large charge
of bad powder. Then I remembered the war-horn and all that it
meant.

"Off you go," I said, "we are ambushed by Kaffirs."

We were indeed, for as we tailed down that kloof, from the top of
both cliffs above us came a continuous but luckily ill-directed
fire. Lead-coated stones, pot legs and bullets whirred and
whistled all round us, yet until the last, just when we were
reaching the tree to which we had tied our horses, quite
harmlessly. Then suddenly I saw Anscombe begin to limp. Still
he managed to run on and mount, though I observed that he did not
put his right foot into the stirrup.

"What's the matter?" I asked as we galloped off.

"Shot through the instep, I think," he answered with a laugh,
"but it doesn't hurt a bit."

"I expect it will later," I replied. "Meanwhile, thank God it
wasn't at the top of the kloof. They won't catch us on the
horses, which they never thought of killing first."

"They are going to try though. Look behind you."

I looked and saw twenty or thirty men emerging from the mouth of
the kloof in pursuit.

"No time to stop to get those horns," he said with a sigh.

"No," I answered, "unless you are particularly anxious to say
good-bye to the world pinned over a broken ant-heap in the sun,
or something pleasant of the sort."

Then we rode on in silence, I thinking what a fool I had been
first to allow myself to be overruled by Anscombe and cross the
river, and secondly not to have taken warning from that war-horn.
We could not go very fast because of the difficult and swampy
nature of the ground; also the great heat of the day told on the
horses. Thus it came about that when we reached the ford we were
not more than ten minutes ahead of our active pursuers, good
runners every one of them, and accustomed to the country. I
suppose that they had orders to kill or capture us at any cost,
for instead of giving up the chase, as I hoped they would, they
stuck to us in surprising fashion.

We splashed through the river, and luckily on