over me and washed the blood that had
dried on my face, and then carefully bound up my wounded temple. I began to
see things more plainly--a blue sky above me; a group of rough, hardy men,
all armed with rifles, around me. I saw that I was a prisoner, and when I
tried to move I soon knew I was damaged.

The same good-looking young fellow with the curly beard bent over me again.
"Feel any better now, old fellow?" I stared hard at the speaker, for he
spoke like an Englishman, and a well-educated one, too. "Yes, I'm better.
I'm a prisoner, ain't I?" "Yes." "Are you an Englishman?" I asked. He
laughed. "Not I," he said, "I'm a Boer born and bred, and I am the man who
bowled you over. What on earth made you do such a fool's trick as to try
and ride from our rifles at that distance?" "Didn't think I was welcome in
these parts." "Don't make a jest of it, man," the Boer said gravely;
"rather thank God you are a living man this moment. It was His hand that
saved you; nothing else could have done so." He spoke reverently; there was
no cant in the sentiment he uttered--his face was too open, too manly, too
fearless for hypocrisy. "How long is it since I was knocked over?" "About
three hours." "Is my comrade dead?" "Quite dead," the Boer replied; "death
came instantly to him. He was shot through the brain." "Poor beggar!" I
muttered, "and he'll have to rot on the open veldt, I suppose?"

The Boer leader's face flushed angrily. "Do you take us for savages?" he
said. "Rest easy. Your friend will get decent burial. What was his rank?"
"War correspondent." "And your own?" "War correspondent also. My papers are
in my pocket somewhere." "Sir," said the Boer leader, "you dress exactly
like two British officers; you ride out with a fighting party, you try to
ride off at a gallop under the very muzzles of our rifles when we tell you
to surrender. You can blame no one but yourselves for this day's work." "I
blame no man; I played the game, and am paying the penalty." Then they told
me how poor Lambie's horse had swerved between myself and them after Lambie
had fallen, then they saw me fall forward in the saddle, and they knew I
was hit. A few strides later one of them had sent a bullet through my
horse's head, and he had rolled on top of me. Yet, with it all, I had
escaped with a graze over the right temple and a badly knocked-up shoulder.
Truly, as the Boer said, the hand of God must have shielded me.

For a day and a half I lay at that la