We condemn you to be shot as a traitor and a murderer, and may He have
mercy on your soul."

At these dreadful words Marie fell to the ground fainting and a pause
ensued while she was carried off to the Prinsloos' house, whither the
vrouw followed to attend her. Then the commandant went on:

"Still, although we have thus passed judgment on you; because you are
an Englishman against whom it might be said that we had prejudices,
and because you have had no opportunity of preparing a defence, and
no witnesses to the facts, since all those whom you say you could have
called are dead, we think it right that this unanimous sentence of ours
should be confirmed by a general court of the emigrant Boers. Therefore
to-morrow morning you will be taken with us to the Bushman's River camp,
where the case will be settled, and, if necessary, execution done in
accordance with the verdict of the generals and veld-cornets of that
camp. Meanwhile you will be kept in custody in your own house. Now have
you anything to say against this sentence?"

"Yes, this," I answered, "that although you do not know it, it is an
unjust sentence, built up on the lies of one who has always been my
enemy, and of a man whose brain is rotten. I never betrayed the Boers.
If anyone betrayed them it was Hernan Pereira himself, who, as I proved
to the General Retief, had been praying Dingaan to kill me, and whom
Retief threatened to put upon his trial for this very crime, for which
reason and no other Pereira fled from the kraal, taking his tool Henri
Marais with him. You have asked God to judge me. Well, I ask God to
judge him and Henri Marais also, and I know He will in one way or
another. As for me, I am ready to die, as I have been for months while
serving the cause of you Boers. Shoot me now if you will, and make an
end. But I tell you that if I escape your hands I will not suffer this
treatment to go unpunished. I will lay my case before the rulers of my
people, and if necessary before my Queen, yes, if I have to travel to
London to do it, and you Boers shall learn that you cannot condemn an
innocent Englishman upon false testimony and not pay the price. I
tell you that price shall be great if I live, and if I die it shall be
greater still."

Now these words, very foolish words, I admit, which being young and
inexperienced I spoke in my British pride, I could see made a great
impression upon my judges. They believed, to be fair to them, that they
had p