efore coming
to water."

"Val!" cried my companion suddenly.

"What's the matter?"

"That's what some of our chaps have been doing."

"What! going down to the water?"

"No; exploring to find gold. Look here; they've been doing exactly what
I said. Here's a rein tied round this stone with the end going right
down, and--"

_Crash_!

"Ah! Val!"

There was the sound of a couple of strokes, one falling upon the lamp,
which seemed to leap down into the shaft at our feet, the other stroke
falling on Denham's head; and as I sprang to his assistance I was
conscious of receiving a tremendous thrust which sent me headlong
downward, as if I were making a dive from the stone I tried to cross.
The next minute my head came in contact with stones, strange
scintillations of light flashed before my eyes, there was a roar as of
thunder in my ears, and then all was blank.

CHAPTER THIRTY FIVE.

IN DOLEFUL DUMPS.

Mine was a strange awakening to what appeared like a confused dream.
There was a terrible pain in my head, and a sensation as of something
warm and wet trickling down the side of my face, accompanied by a
peculiar smarting which made me involuntarily raise my hand and quickly
draw it away again, for I had only increased the pain. Then I lay quite
still, trying to puzzle out what was the matter.

At first I could only realise the fact that the darkness was intense.
After a time the idea occurred that I must have been out with my troop
attacking the Boers, and that a bullet had struck me diagonally on the
forehead and glanced off after making the cut, which kept bleeding; but
I was so stunned that a kind of veil seemed to be raised between the
present and the past.

"I shall think all about it soon," I mused. "It's of no use to worry
after a fall."

Then I wondered about Sandho, and how the poor beast had fared, a pang
of mental agony shooting through me as I listened.

I could not hear a sound.

"He's killed," was my next thought; "for if he had been alive he would
have stopped directly I fell from his back, and waited for me to
remount."

I began to feel about with my hands; but instead of touching soft earth
or bush I felt rough stones, wet and slimy as if coated with fine moss,
and it had lately been raining. A faint musical drip, as of falling
water, strengthened this notion; but I did not try to follow it out, for
my head throbbed severely. So I lay still trying to rest, and gazing
upward e