It will be attacked
presently, like others. If he has not yet gone when you get up there,
tell him not to go until Umkopo comes. I cannot be everywhere. Where I
am, they dare not touch the men of my race.'

'Have you now discovered for certain that you are English?' I asked.

'Since we met I have learned many things,' he said. Then, before I knew
that he meant to leave us, he was in the river and half-way across.

Before long he disappeared in the jungle, which grew almost to the
water's edge on the far side of the river.

We lost no further time, but found a shallow place, crossed the river,
and trekked onward towards Gadsby's as quickly as possible. We reached
the farm before dusk.

Here we found that the Gadsbys had had warning of the danger, and had
conveyed the news to farms to right and left of their own. Within the
house were assembled Gadsby and his family, his partner, two young
bachelors, Morrison by name, from an adjacent property, twelve miles
away, and a second family of children, with their parents, from a farm
still further away from Bulawayo. They had thrown themselves into
Gadsby's large house for mutual protection.

I was received with joy. My rifles and ammunition would be of the
greatest service, for Gadsby and his brave companions fully intended to
defend the house, and even had hopes of doing so successfully, until
relief should arrive from Bulawayo, which, they were sanguine, would
come in good time.

This being the case, an extra man, well armed and a pretty fair shot
(spare my blushes) was a distinct acquisition.

I found every man in the place busily engaged, some in cutting down and
removing everything within two hundred yards of the house which could
serve the Matabeles for cover. Others were busy boarding up the windows,
and some Kaffirs were saturating the lower portion of the house with a
hose, in order that any attempt to set fire to it might be frustrated.

(_Concluded on page 226._)

A BUTTERFLY'S WING.

O brother, do tell me,' a little ant said,
'What was it went flying just over my head?
'Twas caught in the sunbeam that pierces the yew;
Its colours were crimson, black, orange and blue.
It looked like a flag that the fairies might fly
If leading an army from here to the sky.
And out of the shadow it came from the lane
To flit through the light into shadow again.
O brother! dear brother! what could it have been?
Such colours, such beauty, I s