ead, which had been bent, lifted and his face turned upwards to the
stars. The influence of an African night was on him. None that has not
felt it can understand it so cold, so sweet, so full of sleep, so
stirring with an underlife. Many have known the breath of the pampas
beyond the Amazon; the soft pungency of the wattle blown across the
salt-bush plains of Australia; the friendly exhilaration of the prairie
or the chaparral; the living, loving loneliness of the desert; but
yonder on the veld is a life of the night which possesses all the
others have, and something of its own besides; something which gets
into the bones and makes for forgetfulness of the world. It lifts a man
away from the fret of life, and sets his feet on the heights where lies
repose.

The peace of the stars crept softly into Rudyard's heart as he galloped
gently on to overtake his men. His pulses beat slowly once again, his
mind regained its poise. He regretted the oath he uttered, as he left
Jasmine; he asked himself if, after all, everything was over and done.

How good the night suddenly seemed! No, it was not all over--unless,
unless, indeed, in this fight coming on with the daybreak, Fate should
settle it all by doing with him as it had done with so many thousands
of others in this war. But even then, would it be all over? He was a
primitive man, and he raised his face once more to the heavens. He was
no longer the ample millionaire, sitting among the flesh-pots; he was a
lean, simple soldier eating his biscuit as though it were the product
of the chef of the Cafe Voisin; he was the fighter sleeping in a
blanket in the open; he was a patriot after his kind; he was the friend
of his race and the lover of one woman.

Now he drew rein. His regiment was just ahead. Daybreak was not far
off, and they were near the enemy's position. In a little while, if
they were not surprised, they would complete a movement, take a hill,
turn the flank of the foe, and, if designed supports came up, have the
Boers at a deadly disadvantage. Not far off to the left of him and his
mounted infantry there were coming on for this purpose two batteries of
artillery and three thousand infantry--Leary's brigade, which had not
been in the action the day before at Wortmann's Drift.

But all depended on what he was able to do, what he and his hard-bitten
South Africans could accomplish. Well, he had no doubt. War was part
chance, part common sense, part the pluck and luck