s, to fetch stores for home use or to dispose of game or
stock. So beautiful it all seemed; now it was so wretched for me to
leave it all, and to be forced to go and fight against my brothers, so
to speak, in a cause that I felt I must hate. As I rode on, thinking
thus, I could see that there was no such oppression and tyranny as the
Irish captain spoke of; nothing but a bitter and contemptible
race-hatred, fostered by idle and discontented men.

"But I shan't have to fight," I said to myself. "They talk about
freedom, and drag me away as a slave; but I too mean to be free."

From that moment the gloomy lookout ahead seemed to pass away, the veldt
seeming glorious in the afternoon sunshine; and, cantering through the
invigorating air, I could have enjoyed my ride but for the constrained
position in which I sat, and the dull pain in my arms and shoulders. I
tried to forget this, and listened to the captain's words, for he grew
more and more loquacious. I gathered that he reckoned upon picking up
other two young fellows of my own stamp at the farm twenty miles from
ours; and I noted that, no matter what he said, his words were listened
to in gloomy silence or received with grunting monosyllables, while the
Boers talked among themselves only about home and farming work or the
sale of stock. More than once, too, I heard one of the men near me
wonder how the housewife would be getting on with the beasts and sheep.
The words were spoken in Boer Dutch; but in the course of years I had
become pretty well acquainted with the expressions of ordinary life.
Thus it seemed as if the men were anything but contented followers of
their noisy, vapouring leader.

At last the farm was reached, and we halted for refreshment, spending
about half-an-hour to water and feed the horses, during which time I was
carefully guarded. There was no opposition here. The two recruits to
the commando, as they termed it, had been duly served with notice, and
within the time named they were ready with their horses, and armed; but
when we made our start I could see with what surly unwillingness they
took their places in the rank, and noticed too that they were nearly as
strictly watched as I was. In fact, I saw them exchange glances after
receiving a bullying order from Moriarty, and felt that it would not
have taken much to cause a display of temper on the part of the
recruits.

That, however, by the way: my thoughts were too much taken up with