beating down with terrific violence, the scrub
offering scant shelter from its scorching rays. Already the
previously-dew-sodden ground was baked stone-hard, the radiating heat
imparting an appearance of motion to every object within sight.

Literally stewing, the subaltern threw himself flat on the ground under
the slight shadow of a dried thorn bush, and waited, at intervals
sweeping the bare outlines of the kopje with his prismatic glasses.

Thirty long drawn-out minutes passed. According to plan the enveloping
movement ought to have been completed an hour ago, but not a sign was
given that "B" Company had arrived at their position--a sun-baked donga
at a distance of fifteen hundred yards behind the kopje.

Up crept Bela Moshi, his ebony features distended in a most cheerful
looking grin.

"Hun him lib for sit down, sah!" he reported. "Five Bosh-bosh (his
rendering of the word Boche) an' heap Askari--say so many."

He opened and closed his fingers of both hands four times, meaning that
the hostile post consisted of five Germans and forty native troops.

"They saw you?" asked the subaltern.

"Dem no look," replied the sergeant. "Too much busy make eat."

"How far away?"

"One tousand yards, sah," declared Bela Moshi.

Writing his report on a leaf of his pocketbook Wilmshurst gave the
paper to Tari Barl with instructions to deliver it to the company
commander.

Quickly the major's reply was received. The hostile post was to be
surrounded, but no action taken until the order was given for the
concentrated rush upon the Huns holding the kopje.

As rapidly as due caution allowed the enveloping of the outpost was
completed. From his new position, less than four hundred yards from
the spot where the unsuspecting Huns were bivouacking, Wilmshurst could
keep them under close observation.

Three of the Germans were middle-aged men, bearded, swarthy, and
dressed in coffee-coloured cotton uniform, sun helmets and gum boots.
The other two were quite young men, whose attention, despite the heat,
was mainly directed towards the Askaris. Evidently some of the stores
had gone adrift, for the young Huns were browbeating a number of
natives, punctuating their forcible remarks by liberal applications of
their schamboks, while their elders looked on in stolid but unqualified
approval.

"Dem make for one-time good shot, sah!" whispered Bela Moshi, calmly
setting the backsight of his rifle. "Blow Bosh-bosh him hea