come up with them. The Zulu
hunters had suggested that they should follow the Unvunyana down towards
the sea where game was more plentiful, but this neither Hadden, nor the
captain, Nahoon, had been anxious to do, for reasons which each of them
kept secret to himself. Hadden's object was to work gradually down to
the Buffalo River across which he hoped to effect a retreat into Natal.
That of Nahoon was to linger in the neighbourhood of the kraal of
Umgona, which was situated not very far from their present camping
place, in the vague hope that he might find an opportunity of speaking
with or at least of seeing Nanea, the girl to whom he was affianced, who
within a few weeks must be taken from him, and given over to the king.

A more eerie-looking spot than that where they were encamped Hadden
had never seen. Behind them lay a tract of land--half-swamp and
half-bush--in which the buffalo were supposed to be hiding. Beyond, in
lonely grandeur, rose the mountain of Isandhlwana, while in front was an
amphitheatre of the most gloomy forest, ringed round in the distance by
sheer-sided hills. Into this forest there ran a river which drained the
swamp, placidly enough upon the level. But it was not always level, for
within three hundred yards of them it dashed suddenly over a precipice,
of no great height but very steep, falling into a boiling rock-bound
pool that the light of the sun never seemed to reach.

"What is the name of that forest, Nahoon?" asked Hadden.

"It is named _Emagudu_, The Home of the Dead," the Zulu replied
absently, for he was looking towards the kraal of Nanea, which was
situated at an hour's walk away over the ridge to the right.

"The Home of the Dead! Why?"

"Because the dead live there, those whom we name the _Esemkofu_, the
Speechless Ones, and with them other Spirits, the _Amahlosi_, from whom
the breath of life has passed away, and who yet live on."

"Indeed," said Hadden, "and have you ever seen these ghosts?"

"Am I mad that I should go to look for them, White Man? Only the dead
enter that forest, and it is on the borders of it that our people make
offerings to the dead."

Followed by Nahoon, Hadden walked to the edge of the cliff and looked
over it. To the left lay the deep and dreadful-looking pool, while close
to the bank of it, placed upon a narrow strip of turf between the cliff
and the commencement of the forest, was a hut.

"Who lives there?" asked Hadden.

"The great _Isanusi_