oves of thorny acacia,
now fragrant with the strong scent of the rich sweet blossoms, but with
the same ill success. It was now late in the afternoon; we passed round
the end of the vlei, skirted the reed-bed, and then came upon more rocky
formation. It was here that I first convinced myself of the
gold-bearing richness of the valley. In a crevice of rock, time-worn by
long ages of water-wear and decay, I picked up three smallish nuggets.
I am afraid this success rather threw us off the search for Tobias
Steenkamp, of which we had already begun to despair. Several times
during the day we had raised our voices and hallooed loudly, in faint
hopes of an answer. The cliffs eagerly returned us echo after echo, but
there was nought else. For the rest of the short afternoon time we
scrambled about the rocks, peering into crannies and basins. We had
fair success, and by evening had between us gathered some fourteen
ounces of gold, all in nuggets.

It was now sundown; already the pelicans had arrived, and were sailing
about the sky in marvellous intricacies; the light was going fast, and
we must prepare to camp for the night. We had told our men at the
wagons not to expect us till next day; they would be therefore under no
anxiety. We picked a place not far from the water, where the view was
open, and danger from the approach of night _ferae_ minimised. We chose
a smooth sandy spot under a wall of rock. In front we made two good
fires, and then, having eaten a scant supper, we sat smoking and talking
beneath the warm starlight. It was about nine o'clock; we were both
becoming drowsy, when Du Plessis suddenly sat bolt upright and listened
breathlessly. "Did you hear that?" he whispered in a low, intense
voice. "No," I said, sinking my voice too, for the man's strange
demeanour rather awed me.

"I heard a man groan--or a _spook_," he said.

Now, I am not a believer in spooks at any time; yet it was a wild, eerie
place, and the senses of these Boer hunters are so preternaturally
quickened by long acquaintance with savage life, that I knew Koenraad
must have heard something.

I listened intently, and again we both heard a faint groan, as of a man
in pain.

"Allemaghte!" whispered Du Plessis, "what, in the name of the Heer God,
can it be?" A moment later he clutched me by the arm, and pointing with
his right hand, whispered fiercely: "Look! look!"

The moon was now up and shining brightly, and the valley had pas