followed Mrs. van Warmelo into the garden: and when it became
evident that the enemy was bombarding the Pretoria Forts, the two
young men immediately saddled their horses and rode out in the
direction in which they thought it most likely that some resistance
would be offered, after having advised their mother and sister to flee
to some place of refuge in the centre of the town.

There was no doubt that Harmony was directly in the line of fire, and
as the great shells went shrieking and hurtling through the air, the
very earth seemed to shake with the force of each explosion.

Mrs. van Warmelo hastily packed a few valuables into a hand-bag, and
fled into town with her daughter, leaving their dinner standing almost
untouched on the table. On their way to town, they found many
terrified women and children huddled under bridges for safety.

The bombardment continued all the afternoon, and ceased only when
darkness fell.

That night, when the van Warmelos returned to their deserted home,
they found the house still standing and no trace of the bombardment
except pieces of shell lying in the garden.

They were much surprised a few hours later, by the return of their two
warriors, weary and desperate after a hopeless attempt to keep back
the English with a handful of burghers, and the news they brought was
to the effect that Pretoria was to be surrendered to the enemy the
next morning. Once more they expressed their determination to escape
to the Boer lines, wherever they might be.

Only a few hours' rest for them that night and then they rode away at
dawn, in the Middelburg direction, on that dark and dreadful June 5th.

It was Fritz's twenty-second birthday on that cruel mid-winter's morn,
and when Hansie saw him again he was a man of twenty-six, with the
experiences and suffering of a lifetime resting on his shoulders.

The fate of the two young men remained a mystery to their dear ones
for many months of agonising suspense, and they pass out of these
pages for a time while we turn our attention to the relation of events
within the capital.

CHAPTER II

HOW THE MINES WERE SAVED

Before we begin relating the events with which this book is actually
concerned, and which took place, as we have said in the previous
chapter, exclusively in and around the capital, I must ask my reader
to turn his attention for a few moments to that great mining centre,
Johannesburg, "The Golden City" of South Africa.

If it