ked to undertake the task of escorting
Mr. Celliers to the Boer lines. After some hesitation he consented.
The risk was great, but the promise of L20 reward when the war was
over acted like a charm, and the two set forth before break of day on
their perilous adventure.

Here and there the tiny light of an outpost on the open field warned
them to make a wide _detour_. The crackling of the short burnt
stubbles of grass under their feet caused them to hold their breath
and listen with loudly beating hearts for the dreaded "Halt! Who goes
there?"

When the light of day began to break over earth and sky, the Kaffir,
in evident anxiety, warned the _Baas_ to hide in a large dense tree
while he, the Kaffir, went on ahead to reconnoitre. He departed--not
to return again, base coward that he was, and the unfortunate man in
the tree waited for hours until it dawned on him that he had been
deserted at the most critical moment. He stepped from his
hiding-place, quickly deciding to walk nonchalantly forward, the open
veld leaving no possible means of pursuing his way under cover.

He passes many isolated homesteads, some ruined and deserted, others
inhabited by aged people, delicate women, and little children only.
One and all they shrink from him when he relates his story. They do
not trust him--he may be in the employment of the British, a trap set
for the unwary; their homes are closed to him. He pursues his way
wearily. What is that approaching him in the distance? With straining
eyes he is able to distinguish a group of horsemen coming towards him,
and with lightning-like rapidity he turns from his course and jumps
into the washed-out bed of a small rivulet flowing by. A group of
startled Kaffir children gaze at him in astonishment. The riders come
in clear view--not horsemen, but a number of Kaffir women with
earthenware pots on their heads. These they fill with water, and
mounting their horses depart the way they came.

With renewed hope and thankfulness at his heart our traveller resumes
his course in the lengthening shadows of the short winter afternoon.
At last he reaches a German mission station.

No refuge for him here! For the inhabitants are "neutral," but he is
informed that a few days before 20,000 British troops had passed that
way in a northward direction, in hot pursuit of the Boer commandos
fleeing to the Waterberg district. The benevolent old missionary
directs him to a small farm in the neighbourhood where