being enacted in
her sight.

"It was quiet--quiet as death, and lonely as the grave.

"'Mashune,' I said at last, 'where is Hans? my heart is heavy for him.'

"'Nay, my father, I know not; mayhap he is weary, and sleeps, or mayhap
he has lost his way.'

"'Mashune, art thou a boy to talk folly to me?' I answered. 'Tell me,
in all the years thou hast hunted by my side, didst thou ever know a
Hottentot to lose his path or to sleep upon the way to camp?'

"'Nay, Macumazahn' (that, ladies, is my native name, and means the man
who 'gets up by night,' or who 'is always awake'), 'I know not where he
is.'

"But though we talked thus, we neither of us liked to hint at what was
in both our minds, namely, that misfortunate had overtaken the poor
Hottentot.

"'Mashune,' I said at last, 'go down to the water and bring me of those
green herbs that grow there. I am hungered, and must eat something.'

"'Nay, my father; surely the ghosts are there; they come out of the
water at night, and sit upon the banks to dry themselves. An Isanusi[*]
told it me.'

[*] _Isanusi_, witch-finder.

"Mashune was, I think, one of the bravest men I ever knew in the
daytime, but he had a more than civilized dread of the supernatural.

"'Must I go myself, thou fool?' I said, sternly.

"'Nay, Macumazahn, if thy heart yearns for strange things like a sick
woman, I go, even if the ghosts devour me.'

"And accordingly he went, and soon returned with a large bundle of
watercresses, of which I ate greedily.

"'Art thou not hungry?' I asked the great Zulu presently, as he sat
eyeing me eating.

"'Never was I hungrier, my father.'

"'Then eat,' and I pointed to the watercresses.

"'Nay, Macumazahn, I cannot eat those herbs.'

"'If thou dost not eat thou wilt starve: eat, Mashune.'

"He stared at the watercresses doubtfully for a while, and at last
seized a handful and crammed them into his mouth, crying out as he did
so, 'Oh, why was I born that I should live to feed on green weeds like
an ox? Surely if my mother could have known it she would have killed me
when I was born!' and so he went on lamenting between each fistful of
watercresses till all were finished, when he declared that he was full
indeed of stuff, but it lay very cold on his stomach, 'like snow upon
a mountain.' At any other time I should have laughed, for it must be
admitted he had a ludicrous way of putting things. Zulus do not like
green food.

"Just after Mashune h