ll aware, that as long as they were willing to accompany
us, they would share with us whatever we had left; or that, if resolutely
bent upon leaving us, no restriction, save that of friendly advice, would
be imposed to prevent their doing so; but at the same time they were
aware that we would not have consented to divide our little stock of food
for the purpose of enabling any one portion of the party to separate from
the other, but rather that we would forcibly resist any attempts to
effect such a division, either openly or by stealth. They knew that they
never could succeed in their plans openly, and that to do so by stealth
effectually and safely, it would first be necessary to secure all the
fire-arms, that they might incur no risk from our being alarmed before
their purpose was completed. No opportunity had occurred to bring their
intentions into operation until the evening in question, when the scrubby
nature of the country, the wildness of the night, the overseer's sound
sleeping, and my own protracted absence, at a distance with the horses,
had all conspired to favour them. I have no doubt, that they first
extinguished the fires, and then possessing themselves of the fire-arms,
proceeded to plunder the baggage and select such things as they required.
In doing this they must have come across the ammunition, and loaded the
guns preparatory to their departure, but this might have been without any
premeditated intention of making use of them in the way they did. At this
unhappy juncture it would seem that the overseer must have awoke, and
advanced towards them to see what was the matter, or to put a stop to
their proceedings, when they fired on him, to save themselves from being
caught in their act of plunder. That either of the two should have
contemplated the committal of a wilful, barbarous, cold-blooded murder, I
cannot bring myself to believe--no object was to be attained by it; and
the fact of the overseer having been pierced through the breast, and many
yards in advance of where he had been sleeping, in a direction towards
the sleeping-place of the natives, clearly indicated that it was not
until he had arisen from his sleep, and had been closely pressing upon
them, that they had fired the fatal shot. Such appeared to me to be the
most plausible and rational explanation of this melancholy affair--I
would willingly believe it to be the true one.

Wylie and I moved on in the evening, with the horses for two miles