if it is full," Hansie commanded. "Here is
another; and when you have finished, make a big fire in the kitchen,
because we must have a nice dinner to-day for the baas."

"All right, little missie," was the respectful answer.

"Gentleman Jim" was settled, and the same performance was gone through
casually with Flippie and Paulus; but the three Italian gardeners and
the eight or ten Kaffirs employed by them were left to think what they
pleased, and they went about their work without taking the slightest
notice of Captain Naude.

"The people in your hospital have nice ruddy complexions," Mrs. van
Warmelo said laughingly, when Hansie told her what the Captain was
passing for; but the ruse answered, and, for the time at least, all
suspicions were lulled to rest.

When they joined the Captain in the garden later on they invited him
to help them to gather strawberries for the people who were coming to
see him again that afternoon. They were just engaged in the pleasant
task, chatting gaily and feeling, oh, so safe, when Mrs. van Warmelo
started violently.

The sergeant-major was standing on the other side of the fence,
watching them intently.

Captain Naude bent low over the strawberry plants and whispered:
"Don't move. Go on picking quietly. He will soon go away."

He did, apparently satisfied with the appearance of the stranger, but
the ladies had been seized with a sudden nervousness and implored the
Captain to come into the house.

Mrs. van Warmelo pointed out to him a group of dense loquat trees,
with dark-green, glossy foliage, a suitable place of refuge should he
be compelled to flee from the house at night.

He was not a man of many words, but, once started, there was no
difficulty in getting all the information they wanted out of him, and
he answered their leading questions in a simple, straightforward way,
his every word bearing the unmistakable stamp of truth.

I have avoided going into the details of the actual war as much as
possible.

It has not been my intention to weary my reader with dry facts
concerning battlefields, nor to give the war reports and war rumours,
so often unreliable, with which Hansie's diary is filled, but the
events connected with Captain Naude's first visit to Harmony I wish to
give in the smallest detail. Great historical truths stand out in bold
relief against a background of minute details and the realistic
description of the common life. This background Hansie's diary affor