Harriet Ward (continued 7)

Hans brought in, on some sticks, some slices of broiled gnoo, and there was a rusty tin dish, filled with rice and carbonatje; the savoury steam was grateful to the senses of even the melancholy Gray, and some coarse but sweet bread and a calabash of Cape brandy being added to the refection, the adventurers did full justice to their hostess’s hospitable display.

The bald rocks of Asphogels’ Kop, a peak distinguished from the other heights of the Stormberg by this name, were shining like snow in the rays of the newly-risen silver moon, when Lynx and Frolic put their impish faces into the cave, and announced that Vander Roey and his escort were in sight of the Donder Berg, for a fire was blazing on the hill.

The old Boer crossed his hands on his breast, closed his eyes, and his lips moved, as Gray supposed, in prayer. The deserter sat down beside the aged Du Plessis; Madame Vander Roey, accompanied by Lyle, left the cave. On emerging from it, into the clear moonlit air, the latter saw that the whole bivouac was astir; there were some forty men and eight or nine women, several children, and a motley assembly of Hottentots, half-castes, and bushmen. These gathered together in a group near Madame Vander Roey, and the beads of approaching men and horses soon appeared above the long waving grass of the little plain, on which the encampment was spread in somewhat disorderly fashion.

The equestrian party came up leisurely, after the manner of those who bring no cheerful or decided tidings. The atmosphere was clear and light as that of day.

Madame Vander Roey said, in a low voice, to Lyle, “There is no good news!”

And so it proved. Vander Roey had not even bees admitted to an interview with Sir John Manvers; indeed, there was little time for treating with any one; for, as we have shown, the brand and the spear were abroad, and the colonists were looking with anxious eyes for the “sea-wagons from across the broad waters,” and their freights of “red men.”

The captain of the bivouac, Lodewyk, a boater, with a race almost covered with hair, arms bared to the elbow, but garnished, Kafir fashion, with bangles of brass, and a ring of ivory, a large straw hat on his head, and equipped with leather trowsers, girded with a belt containing immense pistols, and carrying besides an elephant gun, stepped forwards as Vander Roey swung himself from his jaded horse, and said, in a loud, distinct voice, in the Dutch language,

“Vander Roey, is it peace or war with our white brothers?”

“War,” replied the Boer leader, abruptly, and strode on without greeting his wife, who followed him to the cave.

“War!” shouted Lodewyk—“War!” echoed Lyle; and Lodewyk, recognising the trader, whom he had had dealings with of late, turned to Lyle, and offered his hand.

Lyle grasped it.

“Let us smoke a pipe of tobacco together,” said Lodewyk, and the two men strolled off towards the habitation of the latter; it was a domicile, half hut, half tent, formed of withered boughs and skins, and screened from the east by a scarp of rock, on which many a grotesque and unnatural-looking creature was depicted in yellow ochre and different-coloured chalks.

Circumstances conspired to induce Lyle to develop his plans and purposes sooner than he had first intended; there was something in the bearing of Lodewyk that chimed in with his own feverish desire to be up and doing; and, on the other hand, Lodewyk had been attracted by the hearty, dare-devil style in which the Englishman had flung up his hat, in the moonlight, and shouted “War! war! to the knife!”

They talked fair into the night, as they reclined on a bank facing the habitation of the Vander Roeys. Gray had joined them, and lay fast asleep, his head pillowed by a stone.

The people in the bivouac, through which the cry of “War!” had rung till the voices that uttered it were hoarse, were all busied in preparing for the march at early day across the mountains, the chief having resolved to move to the plains, where the majority of the Boers and their families were awaiting his decision to trek or return.

The women were as busy as the men, collecting the few draught-oxen they possessed, and yoking them to the wagons with their own hands, that there might be no delay; and stalking in silence from group to group, and wagon to wagon, but chiefly intent on superintending the packing of all the gunpowder that remained, on the backs of the beasts of burden, might be seen Vander Roey, with his broad-flapped hat and dark ostrich plume, towering in height above his fellows, and issuing his orders, in a tone of lofty command.

Within the cave, Madame Vander Roey was making preparations for the journey, her father watching her movements with a sad, bewildered dr.

“Peace or war!” muttered the old man. “How many years have I been wandering without rest for the sole of my foot, without a roof to shelter these grey hairs? My son Vander Roey, let it be peace till I die. Whither would you take me? The mountains will sunder me from my dead—my buried wife—my three brave sons, all lying in one grave, killed within a month. I can see from these plains the blue peaks of the hills beneath which they lie. Let me, too, rest here, within sight of those blue hills!

“There has been strife too long, always strife. Let there be peace till I die!—peace! peace!”

And so the old man muttered on, his daughter proceeding with her preparations, and now and then remonstrating with him kindly, and begging him to rest as long as he could on the couch she had spread for him, and so arranged that it could be lifted like a litter. In this, with a light wagon-tilt, the aged patriarch was to be borne over the mountains on the morrow.

Ere the night had passed, three men rode into the camp; these were Brennard and two young Boers of Vander Roey’s party. The former had resolved to join the rebels, and due greetings passed between him and Lyle. Poor Gray, shuddered at the web gathering round him, but there was no escape. He was resolved, however, to keep to the one resolution he had formed during his miserable sojourn among strangers—he would not fight against his sovereign’s troops, come what might.

He could recollect many a loyal saying of his father’s; as a child, he had been taught to “fear God and honour the King.” In spite of the sway his passions had obtained over him, he remembered the lesson; and now, in spite of difficulties and danger, he determined to keep his fealty to his liege. Alas! many a soldier who forgets God abides by his allegiance to man!

Brennard confirmed all that Lyle had been striving to impress on Lodewyk. He swore that Holland had protested against the conduct of the English Government towards the unfortunate white Africans; that help would be sent to Natal, near which the Boers might establish a government of their own, backed by the mother-country; that France was favourably disposed towards the descendants of her sons. They might hear through the papers that France was perfectly peaceful; but it was not so—the people of France would dance over a mine till it sprung and destroyed them—they were deaf to all warnings; the rising Powers had already begun to think of the colonial possessions of England, and their unsatisfactory state. As for the colony, now was the time to make ready for war. The troops, although they fended the Kafirs would be easily beaten, would be thoroughly harassed—“used up”—before reinforcements could arrive. Every one knew that Sir John Manvers, the present commander of the forces, was an irresolute, sullen, haughty man, anxious for the arrival of the new Governor, who was reported to be Sir Adrian Fairfax. Every one knew, too, what Sir Adrian was; he had said that he compassionated the Boers, but was bound to carry out the orders of Government, and must shoot them as rebels if they attempted to show fight. What had they—these poor, unhappy white Africans—gained by passive endurance of ill? In England, men were already standing up for a fresh Charter on their own ground—but what did the Boers want? Only space to feed their cattle, permission to exercise their own laws, without interfering with the English—and this was not to be granted. Would they submit like dogs? At any rate, was it not worth while to try for freedom?

Vander Roey followed up this tirade by informing those who had not accompanied him to the British settlements, that he had been turned from Sir John Manvers’s door like a dog. “He sent me word,” said he, “that he had not time to listen to me. His messenger was a youth with careless mien. I opened my lips to speak, but he heeded me not. I could hear voices, and see lights through the doorways, and the young man passed away, leaving me to be shown out of the house by a servant. I walked by the front of the mansion; the man who ‘had not time to see me’ was receiving guests in a large lighted room. The windows were open, and I stood in the garden, grinding my teeth with rage. I strode out of the light into the darkness; my horse stood patiently at the great gates of that fine house. He hung his head; he was worn with hard riding—he had a sorry look—the sentry, standing under the lamp, was laughing at his miserable plight. I mounted him, dashed through the town, and never drew rein till I reached a river, the waters whereof bubbled and foamed, and I was forced to stop to give the good beast rest. We lay down side by side to sleep, and when I awoke, poor ‘Starry Night’ was dead!

“I had to carry my saddle many a mile before I came up with my people; they asked me few questions, but saw that hope was lost—so now for war.”

“War! war!”—it was not shouted now, but passed from lip to lip, as the chief occupants of the bivouac continued their preparations for the early journey. Only the children and a few of the elder people were asleep in the open ground, for the tents and other wretched contrivances for covering were struck, and all the poor property of these unhappy wanderers packed for the march.

“War! war!” was the dogged watchword of sullen men without. Du Plessis sat up on his couch of skins. “Peace! peace! let there be peace!” he murmured. His daughter laid him gently down on his rude pillow, a saddle, and, before taking an hour’s rest herself, stepped out beyond the cave to see how the people sped in loading, under Vander Roey’s superintendence, the patient beasts of burden.

Lo! a brilliant lunar rainbow spanned, with its broad, illuminated arch, the little plain over which the houseless people were scattered. “See,” said Madame Vander Roey to her husband,—“see the sign of peace God sends us. Ah! I begin to feel myself but a woman; must you lift your hand against our white brethren?”

“We are aliens,” replied Vander Roey, sullenly. “We have no white brethren but those who will echo our cry of war.”

Madame Vander Roey re-entered the cavern, and, casting herself on a pile of dried leaves, was soon asleep.

Oh! the contrast of that shining arch, which God had set in the heavens, and the restless, feverish scene below; horses neighing, bad men swearing, children wakening from their uneasy asleep, and screaming in vague terror, women foremost in urging men to up-saddle and trek. Lodewyk, Brennard, and Lyle, strong in nerve and limb, forswore sleep till they should pass the mountain ridge which shut out the western plains from their sight. Gray lay betwixt sleeping and waking, and as he watched the hues of the rainbow blend one within the other till they faded into mist and veiled the beauty of the moon, an old fancy revived within him—a child’s fancy—“that the rainbow takes its shape and hues from the gathered tears of Heaven,” and is set in the clouds by angel heralds, as a token between God and man of a covenant of peace.

The clouds which, like sheeted ghosts, hung about the sides of the Stormberg mountains, melted into drizzling showers, and met the party commanded by Vander Roey, in its journey up the steep and stony pathways.

First rode Vander Roey, his flapped hat and sweeping feather drawn down to his eyebrows. A little apart from him, watching his leader’s countenance with keen and anxious glance, strode the wild hunter on foot, staff in hand, a handkerchief bound round his head, and this surmounted by a coarse, weather-beaten straw hat. Close behind were Brennard, Lyle, and Lodewyk. The former was a sworn ally of Vander Roey—he, too, had been a deserter. Lyle, introduced as his friend, had found a ready welcome, but as yet had had no opportunity of close discussion with Vander Roey; and poor Gray was mounted on a somewhat tired steed; but this signified little, as the acclivity was impracticable for a hurried journey; and, besides this, the feeble and infirm of the party could only proceed at a certain pace. Very few wagons accompanied the procession, and these halted often, that the smoking oxen might take fresh breath for the desperate task before them. Now a wagon was lifted almost edgeways on a huge block of stone, now it came down with a crash that threatened dislocation to every joint of the creaking mass; sometimes the poor animals, in utter despair at the sight of the almost perpendicular track, dashed at it at headlong speed, halted suddenly, and were almost dragged back by the weight of the huge vehicle in the rear; or, if they did succeed in gaining a ridge, overlooking a hollow in the mountain-side, would plunge recklessly on, and come down en masse, jumbled together in a confused heap.

But, apparently absorbed in thought, sullen, angry, smarting under a keen sense of wrong and disappointment, the leader expressed no impatience at the delays occasioned by the feebleness or incapacity of the most useless followers of the cavalcade. He made no reply when told that a halt must be called, for the sake of some sickly family, wasted with fever, from lying long in the open bivouac, or some patriarch of the tribe, head of three or four generations, who could not walk, was not strong enough to sit his horse, or whose rheumatic limbs needed a respite from the jolting of the wagon. Moodily silent, he sat upon his powerful horse, which he had kept fresh for the work before him, and apart from his fellow-men, save that Lodewyk and Brennard occasionally conferred with him. At last Lyle made his way slightly in advance, and, turning his horse’s head to the westward, surveyed the panorama lying before him. They were on a ridge of table-rock near the summit of the lowest mountain, over which their path lay, and here it was intended they should outspan for an hour or two, and make a meal of some of the poor sheep, which with great difficulty had been driven up the steep by the bushboys, Lynx and Frolic.

Lyle’s powerful frame, bronzed but handsome face, the very air with which he carried his rifle, his attitude on horseback,—in fact, his whole bearing, as he smiled cordially on Vander Roey, attracted the latter at once to his colleague. The two riders brought their horses together, neck and neck, and watched the party winding up the steep.

In rear of all was old Du Plessis on a litter. The mists had cleared away, the rays of the sun illuminated the hills above them with a glory, the clouds were tinged with flame. Nature breathed gently on the rocky soil, and as the aged Boer sat up in his primitive palanquin, the tilt partially drawn back, the balmy breeze lifted his white hair, and seemed to refresh him. His daughter rode close by, reining in, with no small skill, a horse of the same shape and power as her husband’s, but with some attempt at smartness about his harness; the saddle was a man’s, but she had learned to ride in the civilised districts, and with the left stirrup shortened, and the right one brought over to the near side, she contrived to sit with comfort and considerable grace; but the head-gear was unsightly,—a gingham bonnet, shaped like a wagon-tilt, almost concealed her face, yet from the depths of this miniature tunnel flashed out the dark and brilliant eyes; but when these turned upon her father, their radiance softened to a tender light.

As Vander Roey and Lyle sat conversing in short pithy sentences on the subject of oppression, the former believing Lyle’s indignation to be as patriotic and disinterested as his own, the latter somewhat discomposed at finding Vander Roey as shrewd, resolute, and intelligent as himself, and withal comparatively honest of purpose, though blind in judgment, they both watched the last division, consisting of the chief Boer’s wife, the litter, its bearers, and some of the younger people of the clan.

All at once, Madame Vander Roey dropped her reins, clasped her hands, sprung from her horse, and cast herself on her knees beside the couch of her father, then looking upward, beckoned her husband to her; her bonnet railing off, disclosed an anguished countenance. Vander Roey dismounted, and leading his horse, descended the few hundred yards, that lay between him and his wife. Lyle followed, and the little crowd, halting on the hill-side, looked down upon the litter and the attendant group.

Du Plessis had raised himself with a strength unusual to him; an unnatural light filled his eyes; his voice, though not loud, was firm and clear. The air was so still, that the gentle breeze wafted his words to those above. Those who could, drew as near as they could do with due respect to his immediate relatives.

“My children,” said the old man, “draw near. Let me bless you before I die. I thank my God that he gives me light at the last. I shall die within sight of those dark purple hills, whose feet are washed by those pleasant streams beside which I dwelt through many a long, long year. There my forefathers came, pitched their tents, and tarried for four generations. There they sowed, there they reaped, there they were despoiled, but abided patiently for help that never came. My children, I would fain have you still wait for help; the race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong; God will take his own time to make the crooked pathways straight, and the rough places plain; think well before you lift your hand against your white brethren.”

Old memories seemed to flit in shadows before the eye of the dying “white African settler;” it looked into the past. A sudden flush crimsoned the ashy cheek, and the eyes shone with tears.

Folding his trembling and withered hands together, he gave himself up to thoughts of bygone days; the cheek paled again, but the tears of weakness rolled slowly down, and bedewed the old rough jacket. He was back again at the foot of those hills, purpling in the glory of the morning sun, but green and fresh in his memory even now. He mentioned father, mother, brothers, sisters, wife, all gone; all lying beneath the sod near a ruined chapel. Of all his people, his daughter was the last one; his sons’ bones had bleached unburied in the waste.

Sometimes swiftly, sometimes slowly, he spoke of the days when the white men of Africa were all united: “But now,” said he, “our white brethren—where are they? Some tell us they are sorry. We were friends once. We ate bread together, we smoked our pipes together at sunset. We had no thought of strife—strife—strife. Peace, peace”—the wings of the angel of death swooped down, and overshadowed his recollection. A gleam of light irradiated his face for a few minutes, he raised himself higher on his couch, the wind parted the snowy hair on his majestic brow, his gaze was fixed westward, his arms were stretched towards the mountain ridges of his first home, his daughter clasped his hands in hers, he bowed his white head upon her breast, she uttered a loud cry, Vander Roey stooped to support the patriarch, but he was dead to human sympathy. The sable wings of Azrael had overshadowed him, and his soul passed away, while his outward vision was fixed longingly and lovingly upon those mountain ridges which he was never more to tread in youth or age, in sorrow or in joy.

They buried him decently upon the lone hill-side.

Few of the married families were without their Bibles; and he, who stood next in age to Du Plessis, said a prayer over the open grave. While they were occupied in closing it with safe blocks of stone, a mother gathered a little flock around her, and read them a chapter suited to the occasion. Madame Vander Roey sat beside her, weeping bitterly; the men stood apart in groups. Some had been impressed with the old man’s last words, “Peace, peace.”

But as in all disorganised communities the strong and evil spirit of man’s nature prevails over the good, there were not wanting women, as well as men, to step forward and urge even the incident of old Du Plessis’ death as an incentive to carry out the purpose of wrath and of revenge. He, the aged, the virtuous, the banished patriarch!—who had driven him into the wilderness to die, but his white brother, another Cain? Were they to submit to the will of these jealous, bad white brethren, who permitted the savage Kafir the exercise of his diabolical laws, his heathen rites, and denied the poor Dutch colonist the use of his own moral laws? Who had first robbed them of their slaves, and then pretended to make them compensation for depriving them of what was theirs by purchase? Had not Du Plessis himself urged the obligation of making a sacrifice, because it was disgraceful to white men to trade in human flesh? What reward had he gained? His cattle had been swept away, his sons shot down by the Kafirs, his home devastated; he had met with no pity or redress, and he had died sorrow-stricken amid the mountains of the storm.

And to add to these grievances, men had belied them, and were still belying them, in England. The traders, now with them, had brought them the evil sayings of wicked or ignorant Englishmen, who proclaimed to the world that the Boer was cruel and rapacious, never satisfied with the land he had pillaged from the Hottentots, but committing unequalled cruelties against them, entering their countries with commandoes, despoiling them of their cattle, devastating their villages; but men were among them now who knew how false these allegations were; that the commandoes, wherein many a life was lost, were undertaken to recover their own goods stolen from them by the thieving Hottentots, the bushmen, and Kafirs, who had no villages, except hamlets of huts built by the hands of women, their beasts of burden; a noble race were these to be indulged and pitied by enlightened men of the greatest nation in the world...

“Peace. Yes, they would have peace; but the waters of many a river must be turned into blood first ere this would be. On, on! to the land of promise, the land flowing with milk and honey, where they should have their own rules, and the judge and the criminal speak one language face to face!”

So spoke Lodewyk, the hunter, standing between, and at all times appealing by gesture to Brennard and Lyle. Alas! the sentiments he uttered had been strengthened by the agency of these two desperate men.

Gray sat moodily apart from all, resigned doggedly to the fate that awaited him, but resolute in his intent to die, rather than fight against “his own.”

Day was dying in glory on the hills Du Plessis loved, ere all the rites of sepulture were concluded, and as the moon came up calm, serene, and radiant, the sky cloudless, the elements at peace, the band of pilgrims halted on the mountain ridge, and, turning their faces towards the homes of their forefathers, sang their beautiful paraphrase of the 137th Psalm, “By the waters of Babylon we sat down and wept;” and as the last low notes floated dirge-like over the patriarch’s new-made grave, they descended the eastward side of the mountains, and held their silent course during the night, halting at daylight, when many an eager, carious gaze was turned to scenes hitherto unexplored by these wanderers. As the mists lifted, a strong gleam of sunlight shot down upon a spot in the centre of a wide-spreading, treeless plain. Some men of the party advanced and fired a volley from their roers. A thick wreath of smoke intercepted the glory of the sun’s rays, and the signal was responded to. As the eye became accustomed to the glare, a large bivouac, dotted with tents, wagons, oxen, sheep, horses, and men, became distinctly visible. Soon a little body of horsemen were seen skimming the plains, and ere long the salute of their uplifted hats was answered by a similar movement on the part of Vander Roey’s determined band.

Chapter Eighteen.

The Settlement Besieged.

How sped they at Annerley, when the war-cry rang loud and clear in the silence of that night in Kafirland?

Daveney and Ormsby were pacing the stoep in silence; Frankfort sat within the entrance-chamber, his head buried in his hands.

That unearthly cry was a relief to his paralysed heart: he started up, his host and Ormsby lifted the latch of the door as he put his hand upon it to go forth. Mrs Daveney and Marion stood by the bedside of the unfortunate Eleanor, who, pale and motionless as marble, lay insensible to the yells of the savages on the hills, or the voices of the poor settlers under the windows.

Mr Daveney was too good a soldier to be absolutely surprised; but so stealthy had been the Kafirs in their movements, that not even a distant scout had been seen for many days.

They were near at hand now, however: the mountains far and near shone with the fiery telegraphs of the warrior tribes. The master of the house summoned his people to arms, and bade the women and children come from the wagons to the interior of the building. It has been shown that the settlement was backed by hills, intersected with gullies or kloofs; one of these, by which Zoonah had approached, was wide and dense: it will also be remembered that redoubts had been thrown up; but the space enclosed was so vast that there were barely sufficient hands to defend all points in rear. The front was well protected by a fortification of wagons, drawn up in line with great precision; from these wagons the settlers were able to check the enemy in his advance; and a small six-pounder, brought in former days from an abandoned fort, filled the gap between the steps and the avenue.

In rear of the house, within the trellised passage, was a little corps de reserve of young men and matrons, the latter being in charge of spare ammunition, and provided each with a brace of pistols, which they had earned the use of by experience. It was of course certain that the Kafirs would make their first attack on the cattle, and as the herdsmen at sunset were driving in the animals from their pastures, the enemy poured down the hills in hundreds; by this cunning manoeuvre they at once cut off the communication between the settlement and the cattle herds; indeed the latter, of whom some were Kafirs, mostly deserted, the Hottentots flying off to conceal themselves where they could—they were not worth following while plunder was to be got; so the poor cows and oxen and bleating sheep were driven off by the detachment of the enemy told off for the purpose, and the others advanced, their dark faces reddened with ochre, their crane plumes waving, and their assegais and muskets ready poised for the onslaught.

Mr Daveney had adopted the wise precaution of dividing his flocks and herds, only sending half to pasture at a time; for, with so large a population to feed, and at such a distance from any emporium of provisions, it was necessary to husband the stock with peculiar care. Thus the kraals in rear of the vineyard were tolerably well filled at present, and the chief object now would be to keep the enemy at bay, lest he should carry the redoubt, and rush in upon the cattle.

But few shots had been exchanged between the herdsmen and the Kafirs; but, as the marauders carried off the plunder in triumph, a chief appeared, clad in leopard skin, and riding a noble white charger. Advancing at a smart canter, he was cheered by the cry of “Izapa,”—“Come on”—from the hill-sides, and, followed by those who had assisted in capturing the cattle, he passed the left of the buildings, turned sharp with his face towards the kraals, and bade his people advance; they did so, made a dash at the redoubt, were suffered to set foot on the top, and were received with a rattling volley of musketry, which tumbled them within the defences sooner than they had bargained for. A shout of laughter rose from the Annerley garrison, a yell of defiance burst from the savages.

Then the chief on the white charger drew back, rallied his forces, paused for the reinforcements which rushed down the hills in all directions, lighting their brands at the fires as they passed, and having formed them in a phalanx, of which he was the centre, the mass pressed forward, shouting their wild war-cry, and brandishing aloft their weapons of steel and flame. The blaze on the mountain slope gave all this a demoniacal aspect; the horrible screams, the excited, rampant gestures of the Kafirs, the dropping fire of musketry from Annerley, and the occasional hearty English cheer answering the war-cry, all combined to make as terrific a scene as the most imaginative eye or ear could conceive.

As yet the enemy reserved his fire.

Two women stood suddenly face to face in the entrance-room of the house.

“My sister, my little sister!” shrieked the girl.

“My child, my child!” gasped out the elder.

“I left her beside you sleeping in the wagon,” said the girl.

“I woke frightened,” said the pale mother, “and thought you had taken her—you did, you did—where is she?”

“I laid her beside you,” again answered the girl.

The elder one burst through the group that crowded the room, and put her hand to the door-latch. Ormsby stood sentry there. “No one can pass,” said he; “the house is closed while the enemy advances.” The woman raised her hands imploringly, her lips moved, and she had just power to articulate the words, “My child!” Ormsby’s heart had been softened by gentle companionship—he opened the door, the pale woman rushed upon the stoep, flew down the steps—soon they heard her laughing hysterically; “Let me in, let me in,” she cried. Ormsby opened the door again, and she entered, bearing her infant in her arms. Something followed her overhead; a sharp whizz made all draw back; the door was slammed to, but not before a bullet had buried itself in the wall beyond—the little child pointing to the splintering bricks, with a merry laugh.

Then the occupants of Annerley knew that the enemy encircled the settlement; the shots soon began to answer each other swift and sharp.

That part of the building which was commanded by the hill in the rear was defended by a wall of earth some twelve feet high; fortunately, the hill sloped abruptly and was lower than the rest, so that there was no great range for assegais, and the enemy’s shots were fired at random—they told, however, among the cattle, and the chief on the white horse, watching his opportunity, made a dash at a side gate, and succeeded in forcing an entrance to the kraals between the vineyard and the redoubt. The confusion that followed is indescribable; the settlers fearing to fire on the besiegers, lest they should kill the cattle; the beasts lowing, the sheep bleating, horses flying about wild and terrified, and the Kafirs yelling, whistling, shouting, and goading the frantic animals forward with their weapons, till they fairly succeeded in clearing the stock-yard, the spectators on the ridges above dancing about between the fires, and mocking at the poor settlers, four of whom had fallen, severely, if not mortally, wounded.

May was flitting about, perfectly reckless of the flying bullets, and when the Kafirs cheered their comrades, he would wait for a pause, and then set up a laugh of derision, crying out, “Shoot higher, shoot higher;” while, in fact, the balls were whizzing many feet above the heads of those at whom they were aimed. Now May would crouch behind the redoubt, single out his man, get him in a certain position, where the fires glaring on brim lit him up as a mark, and then, with an original remark, a grin, and a gibber, would bring him down, draw a long breath, cut a caper, and anon, lying at frill length, would load his musket in the dark, and go to work again, con amore.

The enemy in front meanwhile were busy in trying to dislodge the poor farm-people, who had tied their span (team) oxen to their wagons, and drew closer every moment to the building. Frankfort stood on the stoep directing the defence, and striving, by keeping the Kafirs at bay, to prevent bloodshed as far as possible; but the chief on the white horse, having seen the cattle from the kraals safely whistled off, resolved, in the true spirit of rapacity, to have more, and, with a phalanx of his warriors, advanced at a rapid pace up the avenue.

Then Frankfort, standing on the upper step of the stoep, said, in a clear, calm, but most decided tone—

“Man the gun.”

And four men, who had been trained to the deadly exercise, took their stations.

The firing from the wagons ceased; in the rear all was comparatively still, for the enemy was resting on his arms, and the settlers were carrying in their wounded. The Kafirs, unprepared for the reception it was deemed necessary to greet them with, came up, quivering their assegais, and shouting their war-cry. In their imagination, the settlers were paralysed—they were within seven hundred yards of the wagons.

“Fire!” said Frankfort.

The word rose strong and clear above the savage chorus.

A dazzling flash!—a wreath of smoke—a roar—a sharp sound of a ball cleaving the air, and the dark mass of human beings burst asunder like a splintered oak.

The shrieks of startled men rose to the sky, that, lurid as the vaults of the infernal regions, burned fiercely overhead, and the compassionate-hearted Frankfort shuddered at the shout of exultation uttered by the settlers as they saw the havoc the discharge of the gun had effected, and the dispersion of the enemy in front.

It may be imagined that Daveney’s mind had been so disturbed by the renewal of anxiety about his daughter, as to render him scarcely fit to meet the emergencies of the hour; hence the surprise of the cattle-kraals, an advantage the Kafirs fortunately cared not to improve, since they quitted their ground as soon as they had collected the stock. The aperture was immediately closed and manned with steady hands, and, as the besieged were beginning to suffer from the enemy on the hills, and the water irrigating the vineyard was discovered to be cut off, the magistrate deemed it advisable to draw the rear guard within the house; the front was not likely to be attacked again, the gun occasionally making play along the avenue.

Among the defences, Daveney had erected a small block-house, or square tower of stone; this was well provisioned, and contained the principal stores of ammunition. This building was now under the command of Mr Trail, who, with some of the younger hands, kept the enemy in check from attacking the trellis-work uniting the vineyard with the house. Bitterly, indeed, did the good man deplore the necessity for action; but there was no alternative, and he calmly directed the movements of his subordinates in keeping off the Kafirs, who drew near with lighted brands. The house, built of stone and roofed with zinc, would have withstood an attack by fire; but the destruction of property and inconvenience attending the ignition of the outworks would have been very serious.

To this block-house Mr Daveney determined to remove his still insensible daughter as soon as a lull in the siege permitted it; and the chief attraction being withdrawn, it was likely the enemy would retire for a time; indeed he would probably have done so before; but the destruction, at a single blow, of so many of the band, elicited a thirst for revenge, which the abler warriors declared their intention of satisfying, swearing, by the bones of the great chief Gwanga, that they would “eat up” the white man’s kraal, and trample the inmates to dust!

Banishing for the time his own domestic anxieties, Daveney went from man to man of his little garrison, and, returning with them from the redoubt to the house, concentrated his rearward force, and, drawing up a body of men in line, poured forth a heavy volley of musketry just as the enemy, having rushed down the hills, had succeeded again in reaching the top of the parapet. This daunted the Kafirs considerably, and they drew off in skirmishing order, dragging their dead and wounded with them; and thus encumbered, the rage of the fight moderated, and the settlers had time to wipe the smoke and blood from their faces, take breath, and refresh themselves with some water, which Mrs Trail, aided by Fitje, served out to them as carefully as if it had been wine; for she believed, like others, that this was but the beginning of a long season of tumult and bloodshed.

Mr Daveney ascended the staircase leading to his daughter’s apartment; he carried no light, for day was approaching. A shadow flitted by, noiseless and swift, and he heard the latch of a side door, which had been unbarred, lifted quickly, and the door cautiously closed. He thought little of it; but, on mustering the attendants, it was discovered that little Sana, Eleanor’s especial protégée, was missing. She was Zoonah’s sister, and, having been present at the scene which followed the examination of the assegai, had, in the confusion, possessed herself of the weapon, and, gliding along a vegetable garden flanking one end of the house, soon escaped to a kloof in the hills; and, ascertaining Zoonah’s route from some of the scouts, followed his footsteps for two days, when she came up with him on the banks of a river, whence they could perceive, on a distant elevation, an encampment of British troops. She related the issue of Zoonah’s manoeuvre, and he departed, and told Lyle, as will be shown, how his mission had prospered.

Poor Eleanor!

“She lay upon her pillow, pale,” her cheek ashy white, and cold as clay. The expression of utter hopelessness is seldom blended with that of terror, for the grave of Hope is generally that of Fear also. But this poor young creature seemed to have been singled out by Fortune as a worthy victim for her angry caprices in every phase. Yes, utterly despairing, she lay moaning softly, like a child that can scarce comprehend its pain; but the large eye, usually so soft and downcast, now shone with a wild lustre, and glanced rapidly and uneasily around. Even her father’s tread alarmed her—her lips quivered with affright, and she gazed long at him before she could quite believe it was he.

Marion was sobbing, as though her overcharged heart would burst. Mr Daveney took Eleanor’s cold hand within his agitated palm. She tried to smile in his face; it was the saddest smile you can imagine. Mrs Daveney, overwhelmed with anxiety on her husband’s account, had, on Eleanor’s recovering from her death-like trance, descended to the trellised passage, and there watched the progress of the siege, till, on the wounded being brought in, she had shared with Mrs Trail and Fitje their duties towards them; poor Fitje running out at times to call May, that she might employ him within—May sometimes answering her summons, but oftener disobeying.

There were no cases requiring surgical skill—alas! those whose wounds had disabled their limbs lay dead within the redoubt, speared by the assegai of the relentless savage. Three had fallen, never to rise again, and within the house rose the wailing sounds of “lamentation and mourning and woe!” They reached the upper apartments. Eleanor’s senses were awakened at the cry of sorrow from the women.

She spoke for the first time.

“The world seems filled with grief,” said she, and then looked vacantly from her father’s face to Marion’s, and back again, with an air of sad inquiry.

Mr Daveney took his stricken daughter in his arms; Marion followed. Mrs Daveney waited for them at the foot of the stairs. Loud cries of anguish burst upon them. Children were sitting on the floor, weeping for lost fathers or brothers. A woman had fainted, and her baby tried in vain to rouse her.

May drew a little cordon round the father and daughters, as they hurried to the block-house, for shots were still interchanging between the besieged and the besiegers, and Mrs Daveney, vacating her office in favour of the matrons who had borne their part in the strife, followed with Mrs Trail and Fitje, the latter carrying her sleeping infant in her arms.

The grey light of morning was streaming through the loops of the little tower. The enemy was evidently on the retreat, and firing as he retired; and Mr Daveney, having seen Eleanor again laid upon a couch, and gradually awakening to the consciousness of her mother’s presence, returned to the dwelling to restore order, as far as he could, among the mourners, the wounded, and the untiring, fighting members of the community.

Ormsby’s first inquiry was for Eleanor—next for Marion; Ormsby was becoming accustomed to think of others before himself. Frankfort, for the first time since the beginning of the siege, cast himself on the sofa, and, after several minutes’ deliberation, inquired of Mr Daveney whether he thought it likely that the troops had taken the field.

“I have not the slightest doubt of it,” replied the magistrate; “the demonstrations we have witnessed to-night are the result of information from the tribes to the westward that the army is on the march; it will not be long now before the expresses reach us,—that is, if the savages do not cut them off. Sir John Manvers is new to this country; I hope he will be guided by good advisers, and send strong escorts with his dispatches.”

“The escorts will of course return to the camps,” observed Frankfort inquiringly, “or will they proceed further?”

“I shall take advantage of the first arrival,” answered his host, “to communicate with some of the farms in the district; but,” he added, anticipating Frankfort’s intentions, “they will return hither with all possible speed after delivering their dispatches.”

“Then,” said Frankfort, rising, and clasping his host’s hand warmly in his own, “it will be time for me to go; if my regiment is not in the field, I doubt not Sir John Manvers will permit me to accompany his force as a volunteer; or I may be useful to him in heading a band of burghers—”

All he could say in addition was, “I fear I shall ever remember Annerley too well. You will, I hope, sometimes think of me as linked to you by being a sharer of the calamity that haunts your house.”

Only the commonplace remarks of life passed afterwards between these two good men.

Mr Daveney admitted that this was clearly his duty as a soldier.

Three weary days dragged their slow length along ere the expresses arrived. The Kafirs had occupied the immediate frontier in such multitudes, that no small force could move; but now, having plundered the settlements, and disposed of their prey to their hearts’ content, they had dispersed, and spread themselves along the bushy banks of the great Fish River, waiting their opportunities of crossing into the colony, which, had they known their own strength, they might have devastated from the Fish River to the sea.

The dead were decently laid out beneath the mulberry-tree, the bell swinging heavily in the oppressive air of a sultry autumn day. Here the mourners gathered round to take a last look of the uncoffined corpses of the brave. The household, with few exceptions, assembled to listen to the prayer and exhortation pronounced by the good missionary, for the pressure of circumstances would not admit of their lingering over the grave, which was to contain all three. Then the comrades of the poor, sacrificed settlers, with muskets reversed, formed in funeral order round the bearers, and Mr Daveney having taken his place as chief mourner, the sorrowful procession wended its way to the ground which had been purchased for a chapel; and there, in sad and hurried fashion, the deep, deep grave was filled.

It was well, indeed, that the master of Annerley had provisioned his little fortress, the inmates of which amounted to forty persons, the greater proportion women and children. The defenders of the wagon barricades had saved their span-oxen, but it would have been imprudent to kill these unless driven to the necessity, as, without oxen, how were they to travel, if obliged to desert the settlement?

Daveney himself contemplated removing his family as soon as circumstances would permit; for, although the buildings were safe, a sad scene of devastation presented itself when day dawned upon it, after the terrors of the night attack—broken palisades, scattered thorn-bushes, the earth torn and bloody with the fearful struggles of men and beasts, the vineyard laid waste and trampled, assegais half buried in heaps of rubbish, and sheep that had been stabbed, and left to die, running hither and thither, mutilated, and bleating piteously. The pretty trellis-work was battered to pieces, and the walls defaced with bullet-holes.

The enemy had taken his departure towards the colony, but this was only suspected, till the fourth day, when the expresses from Sir John Manvers’s camp brought news of his whereabouts.

Then the younger men of the garrison sallied forth to the known fastnesses for cattle, and brought back a few foot-sore beasts, which had strayed from the rest; and the good host held a consultation with Mr Trail, on the re-organisation of the little band under a stout old settler, no longer able to ride, but quite capable of defending a post.

Marion looked from the loops of the block-house, and saw the departure of her lover and Frankfort with an aching heart. It was known beyond doubt that the Kafirs were mustering in the mountains; it was fully believed that there must be an action; and even this, with such an enemy, in such a country, could not be decisive.

She consoled herself by contrasting her own lot with that of her unfortunate sister. Frankfort had not trusted himself to a last interview with Eleanor; Ormsby’s adieu had been as tender to her as to her sister. Buoyant of spirit as he was, he yet could not help admitting that the aspect of affairs was very grave.

Marion watched the two young men and their heavily-armed escort as they traversed the plain through a slanting shower of rain, so determined, that the space between the sky and earth looked as if it was ruled slantwise with thick leaden lines. She could not see them long for the storm, and she was descending from her look-out to her sister’s bedside, when she heard May, who was on the top of the block-house, exclaim, “More riders—more news!”

A dozen men galloped from the eastward at speed. They brought the welcome intelligence that Sir Adrian Fairfax had arrived at the mouth of the Buffalo River with reinforcements from Cape Town, and that the burghers from the upper districts had rallied round Sir John Manvers.

“Hurrah!” cried May, “we’ve got the Kafirs in a calabash;” and May was right—the warriors were in the mountains between the forces of the two generals; but the cattle, the great source of contention, was far eastward, under the charge of a chief professedly friendly to England.

Mr Daveney hastened to send Sir Adrian a dispatch announcing his suspicions of Lyle’s confederacy with the rebel Boers, but suggested that the idea should not be mooted for the present.

The roar of cannon and the sharp rattle of musketry proclaimed to the settlers at Annerley, on the 18th of March, that the colonial forces to the westward were engaged with the Kafir warriors.

It thundered on till night; then the fiery telegraphs were lit again upon the mountain ridges—silence fell—heaven and earth grew dark again. Morning came, the sun struggled with flying mists, and again the echoes from shot and shell and musket reverberated from kloof to kloof, and filled the hearts of the listeners with terror and dismay.

The little bushman kept watch upon the top of the block-house from dawn till sunset, and Marion shared his vigil for hours. They were strongly contrasted, were those two beings, both fashioned by God’s wise hand. The girl young, blooming, sunny-haired, and graceful; the bushman stunted, ugly, and uncouth; nevertheless, they had many thoughts and feelings in common.

Another day was passing, and still the battle raged; but in the afternoon there was a lull. The very elements were still, and a soft rain descended gently.

Still May and Marion kept watch together.

“Express!” shouted May.

Marion’s lips were closed rigidly, her teeth chattered within; she knew not how she reached the lower apartment: her father had left it; the door stood open; the riders galloped in by the trampled vineyard paths.

“They are beaten, of course?” said Mr Daveney to the captain of the riders.

“Beaten, but not conquered,” replied the latter gravely; “and we have lost—”

Marion, statue-like, appeared at her father’s side.

“A hundred men and five officers,” continued the burgher captain.

“We had friends in the action,” said Mr Daveney, trying to be firm. “Can you tell us if they are safe?”

“Their names, sir?”

“Frankfort and Ormsby.”

“I have the list of officers killed and wounded,” said the man; and first he looked in his hat, next he fumbled in his capacious pockets, then he turned his haversack round,—it was not there; examined his pouch—“No; he was afraid he had lost it.” How little could he understand the agonised suspense of Marion.

He took off his wide-flapped hat again.

“See under the feather,” said May.

The bushman’s quick eye had detected a paper stuck in the string encircling the hat; it was the list. May snatched it from him, and handed it to Mr Daveney.

Neither Ormsby’s nor Frankfort’s name was there.

Marion burst into tears of gratitude and excitement.

The burgher spoke truth when he said the enemy was beaten, but not conquered. May said there were holes in the calabash, and so it was; the warrior bands were broken, but they infested the colony in all directions, walking in and out of it as it pleased them, by manifold kloofs and passes untrod by settlers.

It was Sir John Manvers’s division which had been engaged. Sir Adrian was still to the eastward, preparing to march beyond the Orange River; the messages of defiance addressed to Sir John Manvers were referred to him.

The master of Annerley, in utter dread of Lyle’s reappearance at no distant period, determined on retiring, as soon as possible, to the lower and more civilised districts of the Cape Colony; and Mrs Daveney, eagerly according with his plan, prepared at once for the journey, which was to be undertaken as opportunities offered of travelling with escorts.

Meanwhile comforting letters were received from Ormsby. Frankfort had joined Sir Adrian’s force. Eleanor tried to rouse herself to exertion, and the day arrived when the family was to quit Annerley for ever.

May, to his infinite joy, was, with Fitje and his child, to accompany the Daveneys.

“Be not heart-sore, missis,” said he to Eleanor; “when the night gets darkest, day is nearest;” and taking the long whip from Griqua Adam, he gave the signal for departure by a loud sharp crack, that echoed like twenty whips up the kloof.

The colonists, men, women, and children, with Mr and Mrs Trail, stood at the gate of the avenue. Some begged to say “Good-bye” to the young “missis,” and the curtains of the wagon were drawn aside for a minute; but those who caught sight of Eleanor turned away frightened and sorrowful at her ghastly looks, and begged the rest not to trouble her.

Her mother was beside her. Eleanor’s head was pillowed on her sympathising bosom. Truly did that mother deplore her own blind, obstinate folly in trusting her unfortunate daughter’s happiness to that which, had she chosen to look deeply into it, she would have seen was but a chance of well-doing after all.

Oh! how many are there who will work for themselves, instead of waiting for Providence’s gracious helping hand.

Mr Daveney and Marion were on horseback.

The people pressed forward to say “Farewell.” Father and daughter had a hand for each, and one blue-eyed, fair-haired child would be lifted up to be kissed.

“Ah!” said an Englishwoman, “bless Miss Marion! she has no pride.”

“Troth, an ye’r wrong,” interposed an Irish one. “Sure it’s herself that has the real pride—the pride of the lady, that knows she does not demean herself by showing the good-will to all God’s creatures.”

The little procession moved slowly and silently across the grassy plain. The people at Annerley watched it till the glittering bayonets of the escort were lost in the haze; and when “the master” was fairly out of sight, Markland, the old settler, put the house in order, and assumed the command.

Daveney had planned his line of march intending to avoid Sir John Manvers’s camp; but, on the third day’s journey, the sound of harmonious voices swelling in chorus struck on the surprised ears of the party. A deep glen lay just below; the cavalcade halted; they could see nothing, for the cliffs overhung the gorge. The sounds drew near—’twas an old Scotch air, very martial and stirring, especially in that deep solitude. In front was an opening, an outlet from the glen. Mr Daveney and Marion rode forward, and looked down.

Soldiers singing on a march! Reader, did you ever hear it? Ah, it is worth a world of fine, well-taught, scientific melodies! You should have seen them in this mountain-pass. They were Highlanders, not kilted, but they wore the “tartan trews.”

Beating time with steady tread to the noble chorus, they passed below the cliff from which Daveney and his daughter Marion watched them. Truly this had a singular effect in that ravine, so like a Scottish glen, with mountains looming far and near, and—oh! rare in Southern Africa—a waterfall tumbling and foaming over hoary rocks.

Softly it rose and fell upon the air, again burst forth in full harmony as the glen widened, and died away in the shade where the pathway narrowed between tall hills.

All was still once more, save the murmur of the waterfall. The Daveneys took their station for the night. The escort formed its cordon round the little bivouac, and May directed the lighting of the fires and preparations for the usual sunset meal.

Midnight—Daveney held that watch himself.

“Who goes there?”

“Friends,” answered a voice—it was Ormsby’s. He was in command of a company of soldiers. Sir John Manvers was extending his force. The Daveneys found themselves unexpectedly within the lines of the British troops.

Chapter Nineteen.

The Battle.

I have said that the salute of the horsemen who advanced to meet Vander Roey’s band was answered by a corresponding movement from the latter. Each party moved along its path in stern silence. They met at the foot of the lull, and then palm met palm, as though sealing a sullen but determined compact.

Vander Roey’s countenance proclaimed evil tidings. No one liked to ask him questions; besides, the very advance of the pilgrims over the hills was a signal that hope was lost. Lodewyk was the spokesman, while Vander Roey and his wife rode forward with Vanbloem, a son of the settler introduced in the early chapters of this work. He was young, active, brave, and clever. Each of these two men had much to tell the other.

Lodewyk strode on declaiming—Vander Roey told again how he had been turned from Sir John Manvers’s door with scorn.

The colonists had sympathised with him at the insult, but what could they do? All hope of redress of grievances was over, and no better time could be chosen for trekking. The troops were marching towards Kafirland. Sir John was as bewildered as a bird in a mist. Here were men—pointing to Lyle and Brennard—who could tell them that the eyes of England, and France, and Holland were upon them. Lyle was a patriot, had suffered in the cause of patriotism; he had been cast upon the shores of Africa for a great purpose. They already knew the services that Brennard had rendered them; well, Lyle had been an able colleague—his plans had proved his ability; through his means arms and ammunition had been safely conveyed through various branches of the colony; every Boer was armed, every honest man was roused to a just sense of his forlorn and degraded position; but the time had come—if they were permitted to go in peace, well and good; if not—

“Ah! if not,” said Lodewyk’s brother, “we will dress ourselves in thunder, and mark a boundary-line for ourselves with blood.”

They reached the bivouac: it was more wretched than the last. The plains were saturated with water from the heavy rains which had prevailed on the eastern flats. There were but few tents or wagon-tilts, and these were ragged and damp, serving as poor coverings to the sickly, shivering wretches beneath.

Lyle’s first salutation from a sallow man, who sat making a coffin for his wife and baby, was, “Welcome to the place of graves.” He passed on; some squalid children in rags were stirring up a pool of stagnant water to find frogs; an agueish woman with parched lips remonstrated with them for troubling the waters; she wished to slake her thirst. Two women were grinding corn between stones, others looked greedily on. There was neither milk nor bread. Some wretched sheep, lately brought in by a foraging party, awaited their doom—they had been earned at great cost; three men lay dying of their wounds; in truth, it was a sorry sight.

Poor Gray was more disheartened than ever. The Boers had begun to look upon him with a suspicious eye; it was evident he was not a volunteer. He felt that he was despised, and his heart died within him. He sat down upon an old pack-saddle; he looked so weary, so dejected, that young Vanbloem’s wife took pity on him. She was an Englishwoman. She spoke kindly to him in his own language. The deserter could have wept, but for very shame.

“Come hither,” said she, “you poor young Englishman; has your country done you any wrong, that you should turn rebel? You look miserable enough in mind and body, but I can give you something for your heart to rest upon,—see here.”

She raised a canvass screen, and showed him Amayeka fast asleep. Amayeka had found a kind heart, and trusted it.

Gray’s face shone with sudden light.

Anne Vanbloem dropped the screen: “There,” said she; “it is good for you to know she is safe; be satisfied with that for the present.”

Poor Amayeka! Vanbloem was the man who had rescued her from the torture, and his wife “had compassion on her.”

Gray would have given much to have poured out his heart to the young Dutchman; but Vander Roey’s disastrous mission and its results had fanned the flame of rebellion to such a height, that no one could expect to meet with a hearing who was not resolved on freedom, or on fighting for it; besides, Gray knew that his confession might draw on him the imputation of cowardice, and then—alas for resolution!—here was Amayeka, the only being on earth who truly loved him.

Doda was as philosophical on discovering that his daughter was in safe hands as he would have been had he heard that she had died by torture. In the latter case, he would have excused his apparent want of feeling by alleging that grief was useless—a Kafir has as little idea of gratuitous sorrow as gratuitous labour.

Brennard expected that Zoonah would bring them news from the colony, and it was resolved in council that, on the arrival of the scouts from different points, if the intelligence of each agreed with the other, the bivouac should be entirely broken up.

Vander Roey had brought some supplies with him, and parties were formed to obtain provisions from the hunting-grounds. In these expeditions Gray redeemed his character for skill and courage, albeit he was no longer strong and lithe of limb as he had been.

He saw little of Amayeka. Anne Vanbloem had her own plans about her, and changed the subject whenever Gray alluded to her. He saw, however, that the young Boeress meant kindly, and was obliged to content himself with that idea.

Anne and Gray were left together one afternoon; he had been assisting her in carrying goods from her tent to the wagons, which were to move towards the Modder River on the morrow with various stores and a strong escort of the Boers, Vander Roey’s object being to advance gradually beyond the colony, and to give battle, if driven to such an alternative, in a position of which he knew the advantages. Thus the elder men, women, children, goods, and arms, were sent off from time to time by small divisions. The Kafir scouts, and five or six more traders from the British settlements, were anxiously expected; and, although the Boers did not contemplate success on the side of the savages in the present strife in Kafirland, they knew that the warfare would be such as to harass the troops, and keep them employed for a considerable time. In the mean time he despatched his message of defiance to Sir John Manvers.

“It is very clear, young man,” remarked Anne Vanbloem, “that your heart is not in this business.”

“I am a miserable creature,” replied the poor young deserter; “my heart is, indeed, quite opposed to the treachery I am called upon to join in.”

“And mine also,” said Anne; “I do not see my way; but, by God’s help, Vanbloem shall have no part in this war.”

It may be believed that Lyle improved every hour of his new acquaintance with Vander Roey. He ascertained from the chief that the great body of the Dutch had formed a settlement near a river, which, it was necessary to cross ere the English could satisfy themselves of the existence of the great Salt Lake. The Boers and aborigines had explored this part long ago (Note 1); but men of science professed themselves unbelievers on this point. Lyle showed his colleagues the advantage of such a position, and stirred up the rest of the unfortunate wanderers into the belief that it would be as unavailing as cowardly to yield without a struggle. Rumours had reached Lyle and Brennard of the prospect of Sir Adrian Fairfax’s return to South Africa, but they determined on keeping this to themselves.

The scouts came in, Zoonah among them; Lyle took the latter aside, and learned from him how he had hovered about the neighbourhood of Annerley, holding daily parleys with his little sister—the traitress!—how she had brought him back the assegai, and related the issue of its discovery.

“Ha! ha!” thought Lyle, laughing bitterly; “they know now that I am not at the bottom of the sea, as they hoped.”

The reports of the scouts encouraged some and daunted others.

On the one hand, Sir John Manvers was harassed by the Kafirs—on the other, Sir Adrian’s sudden appearance in the heart of the country struck terror into the minds of the less resolute.

The season of dewy mornings and bitter nights was fast approaching, sickness was increasing in the camp; Lyle, Brennard—all the English traitors, in fact—urged Vander Roey to retire to the north-eastward without delay. With his usual policy, the former had contrived to send forward a member from almost every family, and thus all had an interest in falling into a position where they might make a stand against the British forces.

The chill dawn of an April morning saw the bivouac again broken up, and by noon the plain was vacant.

Vanbloem rode in the rear with a heavy heart—he was beginning hourly to repent; Gray was beside him. Each knew what was passing in the other’s mind, but neither spoke.

It was midnight; the wanderers had halted at the foot of a bill on the site of an old mission station—part of the house still remained. The rain fell in torrents, a few stunted bushes were all that afforded shelter to the poor pilgrims of the desert.

Gray heard his name called.

It was Vanbloem—he came for help; he had removed his wife into the dilapidated building—Amayeka was with her; ere long he hoped to behold his first-born; but he was in dismay at the sudden pain and peril of Anne, who, hurried by the journey, and terrified at the prospect of her husband leaving her, had been brought sooner into her trouble than she expected.

Gray assisted Vanbloem in removing certain comforts from his wagon to the deserted mission-garden; Amayeka came out under the dripping trees, and received them from her master’s hand, for the poor girl was now in the capacity of a domestic.

God was gracious. Vanbloem held a living girl in his arms ere the night had passed; but it was impossible for his wife to be removed, and he would not leave her desolate.

How Lyle cursed the woman!

“Oh!” thought Gray, “that I might stay with them, and wait my doom from the hands of my countrymen.”

He liked Vanbloem; he had told him his history, and now proposed remaining with him, and stating to Vander Roey his resolution not to turn traitor.

“And,” said Vanbloem, “what reply do you expect?”

“Perhaps,” said Gray, very quietly, “he may order me to be shot on the spot.”

Vanbloem looked at the young deserter. “You are no coward,” thought he. “You are wrong,” he continued, speaking aloud; “he would not shoot you, but they would brand you with a coward’s name. I pity you from my soul. May God have compassion on you, and help you! I see the finger of Providence in what has just occurred to myself. I will remain in the desert with my wife and Amayeka.”

Gray led the young Dutchman to a retired spot, and poured forth his whole soul to him.

“I leave Amayeka,” said he, “to you and your kind English wife; tell her never to forget poor Gray, the deserter.”

Vander Roey felt that Vanbloem would never join his band again. They parted friends, however, the latter resolving, if opportunity required it, to act as intercessor between the Government and his countrymen.

Sir Adrian was indeed utterly confounded at hearing that Lyle was alive, at liberty, and at work in such a field. His career from the time he had left the Cape had been, as I have shown, short and mischievous. He had been foremost as a Chartist leader, had organised bodies of men in Wales and Cornwall; but had, at a fortunate moment for his country and the people he had misled, been seized by the Government, tried, found guilty, and transported, ere the wretched men under him had recovered their breath, after their frantic but useless demonstrations.

Well, there was enough work before Sir Adrian for the cleverest and most active of governors. In front were thousands of savages at war with troops and colonists; to the north-eastward, with a space between of 400 miles, through a difficult country, was a sullen, determined enemy, well prepared with arms and ammunition, bent alike on revenge and the establishment of privileges “dearer to these Boers than life.”

Mr Daveney soon found that it would be madness to attempt proceeding with his family to the more civilised districts. He therefore contented himself by forming a little encampment of his own, some fifteen miles from Sir John Manvers’s. Major Frankfort, having received an offer of active employment from Sir Adrian, had joined the division on the banks of the Buffalo River. Ormsby was in command of a detachment of his own corps, under Sir John.

Here we must leave our friends for a short time. The good master of Annerley set to work upon the erection of a temporary dwelling, round which was drawn a cordon militaire. His advice and assistance would have been of the utmost advantage to Sir John Manvers, but circumstances, which shall hereafter be explained, prevented their holding any but necessary communications with each other, and no alternative was left the General but to harass his savage antagonists till they were compelled to sue for peace.

Meanwhile many Boers in the lower districts, hearing that Vander Roey was on his way to join those who had already trekked beyond the boundary, deserted their farms and bivouacs, and on coming up with him learned that he had resolved on halting in a position where he might give battle to the British forces, or pause in security till the helpless part of the community had reached a more habitable tract of country.

It was to Gray a melancholy thing to hear so many English voices among those who came, day by day, into the rebel camp. Most of these were deserters like himself; but, unlike him, alas! they entered with zest into the prospect of battle with their fellow-subjects.

It was June, but not like that balmy month in England. All day long a blinding shower of snow had been falling; it was bitterly cold, and a cruel north-east wind drove the storm before the Dutch videttes of Vander Roey’s camp, who, posted on a stony ridge, kept the look-out for a reconnoitring party, long expected.

Night drew on; rain and sleet veiled the prospect; the videttes descended the ridge, and joined their comrades round the great bonfire, which was no easy matter to keep up, from the scarcity of wood.

Wrapped in their heavy coats, with hats flapped over their brows, their arms at hand, the red light of their pipes irradiating their bearded and swarthy faces, the rebels listened to the alternate tirades of Lyle and Brennard.

It was these two connoisseurs in human nature who had taken care that there should be plenty of tobacco among the stores of the bivouac. The Boers they knew would make the better listeners for this solace.

It was a scene fit for a painter of the wild and picturesque. Rising abruptly in front was the stony ridge, the outline dimly marked against the murky sky; two or three ragged tents and as many wagons were drawn close to the fire, which, from time to time, emitting its fitful light, shone on none but angry or anxious faces.

Vander Roey paced restlessly up and down between his wife’s wagon and the fire. Madame Vander Roey was the only woman in the bivouac. She sat with the curtains of the wagon drawn aside, listening for the approach of expected horsemen. The wind had died away, and the sleet continued to fall noiselessly. The silence of nature was alone disturbed by Lyle’s voice declaiming, and by an occasional challenge from sentinels. The two little bushboys, Lynx and Frolic, wrapped in skins and coiled up under the wagon, peered with their sharp eyes into the mist.

“Here they come,” said Lynx. Frolic laid his ear to the earth, satisfied himself that horses’ feet were beating the ground at a distance, and announced the fact to his mistress, who called Vander Roey.

He was already by her side.

“Who comes there?”

“Who goes there?” shouted sentinel number one; it was repeated by number two, and in an instant the rebels were on their feet.

“Who comes there?”

“Friends!” and about a dozen horsemen galloped in hot haste down the stony acclivity.

The foremost threw himself from his horse: it was Hermanus the stutterer; the light from the fire shone upon his face; in his endeavour to speak, he made hideous grimaces. Lynx and Frolic laughed. Lyle kicked the one aside, and struck Lynx such a blow with his rifle, that the boy was stunned for a few minutes, but recovered to gibber and curse—he had learned to swear in English.

The riders brought word that Sir Adrian was on his way to attack the rebels, if they were unwilling to listen to terms. The Kafirs were coaxed into quietude for a while, that Sir John Manvers might follow the Governor, if necessary, with a corps de réserve; it was clear that all other political questions were to be laid aside, that a heavy blow might be struck against the Boers.

Vander Roey had never anticipated the sudden appearance of Sir Adrian and his troops in the heart of the country, nevertheless there seemed nothing for it now but to fight or surrender, and the cunning English traitors implicated in the rebellion, men who had nothing to lose, persuaded him, through Lyle and Brennard, that to yield at once would be to draw on themselves greater odium, and as heavy a penalty as though they resisted the law to the death.

“Let it,” said Lyle, addressing Vander Roey, in the presence of his wife, “be only a feint of resistance, if you will, but do not, after all your proclamations and messages to that insolent General, throw down your arms as soon as you face the troops; they will laugh, at you, despise you, and you will deserve to be beaten like a dog.”

Vander Roey could not help reminding Lyle, that it was he who had dictated his very last “message” to Sir John Manvers, to the effect that, “as Sir John, had not written to Vander Roey, the latter should answer him as he chose, and that his determination now was to fight, to conquer, or to die.”

Lyle laughed scornfully, raising his voice, and thus gathering a crowd round him, while Madame Vander Roey, undaunted, but anxious, watched her husband’s countenance by the light of the wagon lantern.

“It is well for you to talk thus,” said Hermanus the stutterer, who, once set going, could talk glibly; “you may run away in the scuffle, and you know you cannot escape justice if we yield—you are speaking in favour of your own interests. I say it is folly to fight now,—make a truce.”

“Never,” shouted Vander Roey, suddenly kindling with anger, as he remembered his contemptuous, dismissal from Sir John Manvers’s residence. “Fight or fly,—which shall it be, my friends? Speak, for before daylight we must be up and doing.”

He raised his lofty figure to its utmost height and looked round, his wife leaned anxiously over his shoulder; the lantern, swinging to and fro, showed the expression on the face of each; hers was anxious, yet fearless; his brows were knit, his eyes flashed, and he added, “Let the majority decide; remember my watchword is still ‘War—war to the knife!’”

The English traitors sent up their hats in the air, and cheered the leader, and all the young Boers did the same. Our convict had taken care that not a youth should leave the force; within a circle of two miles behind the strong ridge there were four hundred good men and true, between the ages of twenty-five and thirty; the whole force amounted to eight hundred, and few of the oldest had reached the age of fifty.

Lyle turned to congratulate Madame Vander Roey on her husband’s decision; the curtains of her wagon were closed—he lifted a corner, her head, covered with her scarlet handkerchief, was almost buried in the cushions of her bed; by the light of the lantern he could see her whole frame was shaking with emotion, and stifled groans issued from her lips.

He dropped the screen with a sneer; “She will come to her senses by-and-by,” muttered he; and he was right. At dawn, in spite of a wind which cut like razors, she was busied with Hermanus and others at the stores hidden in the rocks.

Lyle and Brennard took charge of the “Cape Smoke,” and served out to every man his sopie. The spirits of the bivouac were never suffered to flag.

The horsemen had been sent on with all speed to the larger encampment of Boers, Vander Roey’s party being in front, to defend and keep possession of the strong ridge, along which, at intervals, the few guns the rebels possessed had been ranged. To the guns were attached the number of men necessary to work them. Gray had yielded passively enough to Lyle’s orders on the subject, but that very apathy made the latter more suspicious of his victim. Unnoticed by the deserter, he watched him narrowly, and, all-daring and subtle as he was, felt baffled in his conjectures as to the probable issue of Gray’s forced enlistment in the rebels’ cause.

The position taken up by Vander Roey was the strongest in the whole country, being a succession of hills covered with large loose stones. In his front rose the ridge, surmounted by a natural rampart, rendered more complete by the art of deserters from the corps of Sappers and Miners. In the rear was a stream, lined with rushes and long reeds, fordable to those well acquainted with its depths, but offering no easy passage to British infantry. The line of fire extended a full mile.

At dawn of day, the videttes reported the appearance of a mounted reconnoitring party from the enemy’s force, and within half an hour every man was at his post; Gray taking his place at the gun he was to serve.

Lift aside the curtain of that wagon, reader, and see within, a woman kneeling and praying in an agony. Ah! how many there are, who dare unseen dangers, who even meet the reality of peril with flashing eye, a fevered cheek, and brow unblenched, but who, in the dread pause between plan and action, quail at the loud beating of their own hearts!

For months, Madame Vander Roey had looked forward to some such moment as this—she was accustomed to scenes of danger, she had been present at those strifes in cattle-lifting which are the common occurrences of a South African settler’s life; but this sudden call to arms against men, whom her father had been wont to term his “white brethren,” rang on her ear like a knell, and a presentiment of evil overpowered her for the moment.

Still she was persuaded that her husband was right, and she knelt down and implored help and mercy from Him who is “the Father of the oppressed.”

Reassured after her devotions, she assumed the costume she had lately worn in camp, and leaving the wagon, untied her horse from the wheel, saddled and bridled it herself, and mounting it without assistance, rode along the foot of the hill, inspecting the defences with a steady eye and considerable judgment.

Her dress was simple enough, a long stuff petticoat serving her for a habit, her face being shaded by a large straw hat, with the ostrich feather depending from it. It was typical of the times, was that drooping plume, soiled and saturated as it was with the cold mist of that sad morning. Her horse, handsome, fleet, and with that easy action so peculiar to the mountain steeds of Africa, looked somewhat the worse for scanty rations; and her face, once so radiant with health and joy, wore a look of intense anxiety, as, on hearing a murmur among the Boers, she glanced in the direction indicated by their gestures, and saw her husband heading the large force which he had gone forth to meet, and descending the low ridge on the other side of the stream. It was traversed in silence, and, hurrying forward somewhat irregularly, they spread out in extended order.

In twenty minutes each had his station assigned him. Madame Vander Roey dismounted, and took hers beside her husband, to the right of the granite rampart. Gray stood as steady as the rock that screened him. Brennard assumed the command of the left wing. Lyle occupied the centre of the line, where there was a slight bend, and thus he was enabled to watch both flanks, and keep a close eye on Gray, to whom, as he fell into his place, he addressed a few words.

“Gray,” said Lyle, “do you intend to do your duty?”

“By God’s help, I will,” was the reply of the young deserter, in a tone of confidence quite unexpected by the Mephistophiles of the wilderness.

The latter looked at him, sneered, but was satisfied; and then, with his head bent below the ridge, scrambled over stone and scrub, reached his post, and there knelt down, his rifle ready for work, and his eye fixed on the line of march by which the troops were expected.

But rain and sleet still occasionally veiled the prospect in vapour. The report of the videttes was questioned in its accuracy by some, and each man strove to pierce the mist, and give the first warning of the enemy’s advance.

A death-like silence reigned throughout that expectant company.

At length the clouds slowly and almost imperceptibly lifted, and here and there some new feature in the scene developed itself—a solitary bush, the carcass of an ox, or a grave covered with stones—and, finally, two mounted men, soldiers of the Cape cavalry, moving leisurely forward, and, as May would have said, evidently spenning.

“By heavens!” exclaimed Lyle, “they see us, and have turned to report. Confound that fellow Gray, he has run out the gun too far, and these Totties (Hottentots; particularly those of the Cape corps) have distinguished its black muzzle among the grey rocks.”

It needed no oaths to confirm the truth of his statement—the reconnoitrers had faced to the rear so suddenly, that there seemed but little doubt as to the cause of the movement, and a few minutes decided it.

As the sun came up, the veil of mist was rent in twain, and fully disclosed to view a small body of English troops, under the command of Sir Adrian Fairfax. Lyle unslung his spy-glass, took a deliberate view of the encampment, and, closing the telescope in haste, exclaimed, “Every tent is struck—the advance-guard is on the march.”

The word passed to the right and left.

Vander Roey, white as death, but steady as ever, glanced his eye, now along the line, now forward, now in the rear. His spies had evidently been mistaken as to the strength of the force; and now reason whispered him that his chance of success was small, but he had much dependence on his position. It was perfect in every way, whereas the British forces were on open, stony ground; they were new to the locality, and well worn with a march of thirty miles, which they must have made within twelve hours.

But, as the troops advanced, it appeared that a manoeuvre of Lyle’s had answered his purpose for the present. To the extreme right, where a road cut the ridge in two, he had placed several men, who were only to affect concealment. It was to this point that the attention of the advance-guard was evidently directed, for, instead of making a forward movement, they took an oblique path, intent on attacking the detached party to their left, who were fully prepared to retreat within a narrow gorge, capable of containing some twenty men, and defended by a gun placed at the opening.

Poor Gray was guiltless of running out his piece of ordnance, as Lyle imagined—the error lay with a less practised hand, but the circumstance turned the fortune of the hour; for the Boers, misled by the diagonal march of the soldiers, were somewhat off their guard, and, in imagined security, watched the forces of the Government.

It was curious and painful to Gray to hear the cool way in which the deserters of the party made their observations on the scene before them.

“Ha!” said one, who knelt beside him, gazing intently through a fissure in the rock, “they have got up a company of the old Ninety —th; that rascal Zoonah said they were to remain in garrison.”—An oath or two filled the space—“they know this part of the country.”—“Matthews and Wilton, and you, Jem Blaine, you belonged to it.”—“How they march!” said Jem Blaine; “they are as fresh as when I saw them at drill at Graham’s Town;”—and the last oath was uttered heartily, and in thorough good humour, as a strange touch of pride in his old corps brought the red colour to his hard brown cheek. “By —, there’s my old captain, Frankfort. Well done, grenadiers; well done, old fellows—step out. Look sharp, Frankfort. Oh! I see he is a staff man. God bless you, old fellow; if you had not been on leave when I had my last lark, I should have been marching with you now. You would have recommended me to mercy;” and then Jem Blaine sat down, turned his back upon the fissure, and would look no more.

Standing up, leaning on his long roer, his hat at his feet, and great drops of perspiration on his broad forehead, Vander Roey followed the troops with his eye. The mist had not yet quite cleared off, but he could distinguish the rear of the division. He saw that the force was small, but well chosen, but he said nothing.

“They have no artillery,” said a young Boer.

Vander Roey made no reply, but watched his wife, who was looking through a telescope beyond the division.

In another moment Madame Vander Roey exclaimed, “They have artillery; I see a gun advancing.”

She handed the telescope to her husband.

First came the division, consisting of infantry and a small body of Cape cavalry. The Boers had gained heart at sight of this little force, and Vander Roey took it as a sign of the Governor’s contempt of his enemy; still he could scarcely believe that the great Sir Adrian Fairfax would head a mere handful of men; and, therefore, he did not exult prematurely. “Were this the only force,” said he to his wife, “we should powder them to dust in an hour.”

But it was not the only force. The mists hanging to the westward still screened the barren landscape far in rear of the troops, but ere the latter had moved half a mile across the broken plain, there emerged, as from the clouds, four “coal-black steeds,” of great power. These drew a deadly weapon, and, following them, were two slender pieces of ordnance, the nature of which was incomprehensible to the unfortunate Dutch, who soon, however, learned what a rocket could do from their English opponents. Added to these was a strong body of infantry, and a troop of cavalry, protecting the artillery.

Vander Roey’s courage and presence of mind did not forsake him. He saw at once the advantage to be gained by the false move the enemy was making. His plan was to attack him on the broken ground, up which the infantry must move in skirmishing order, in the endeavour to dislodge the Boers on the left.

It seemed clear that the General had no idea of the strength of the rebel forces, and, believing that infantry would rout them out, was bent on bringing the wretched men to terms without using the artillery or charging with his cavalry.

But while nearly a mile distant from the stony ramparts, that looked so still and lifeless, Sir Adrian called a halt. Lyle watched him narrowly; the General conversed for a few minutes with Frankfort, who next rode into the ranks, and brought with him some old sergeants of the corps. It was evident that a council of war was held; it lasted but a few minutes, yet time was thus given for the artillery to advance. Still it was considerably in rear of the front division, and Lyle was slightly baffled in his conjectures.

Brennard would have had Vander Roey open out his guns upon the infantry as they drew near the rebels’ right flank, but at this instant Vander Roey hesitated, and the opportunity was lost. Had the rebel chief followed this advice, he might have conquered, and retired far to the north-east; but his heart failed him at the thought of dealing death from a masked battery on the soldiers.

Probably he would have felt differently had Sir John Manvers headed the enemy, and Lyle, in that case, would have urged a death-blow without hesitation.

Steadily, although the ground was more broken at every step, the British infantry pursued their march; slowly after them moved the cavalry and guns.

“See,” exclaimed Madame Vander Roey, who no longer needed a telescope, “they march still, but there is some stir among them. The tall man on the skimmel (sorrel) horse is flying backwards and forwards from the ranks to the General, from the General to the ranks, and now he gallops to the rear with orders; the artillery halt again, and the skimmel rider dashes back in spite of stones and stunted bush.”

The troops suddenly halted, their bayonets glittered in the morning sun as they changed their position, and they paused for an instant within gun-range of both ridges.

This was the moment Vander Roey had anticipated; piles of loose stones still lay between the two divisions of the British forces; the ground was scarcely practicable for cavalry or artillery. At this juncture the rebel chief turned to the rugged valley in the rear, and lifting his hat from his feet, waved it three times. Five hundred rebels started up from among the reeds and rushes of the river, from behind the great stones, and from the natural caverns at the base of the hills. In rear of the left battery sprung up a hundred others. The summit of each ridge was carefully manned with the deserters, some from the artillery, some from the line, all armed with roers; and mingled with these were many traders and wandering thieves.

Sir Adrian’s consultation with the old soldiers of the Ninety —th had caused him first to pause, and next to alter his movement. These experienced fellows had detected first the muzzle of Gray’s six-pounder, next a Boer’s hat, which, albeit nearly the colour of the stone near which the head leaned, was easily discerned by accustomed eyes. These two indications were quite sufficient to point out the real position of the rebels, and Sir Adrian changed his route accordingly.

“Sit there till I come for you,” said Vander Roey to his wife, taking her by the arm, and placing her in a hollow some feet below the rampart, with a gun above her; he leaned over her, placed his hand on her shoulder, looked sorrowfully into her face, and uttering in a tender tone the words “Poor wife, poor wife!” dashed down the hill, sprung on his horse at the foot of the ridge, and galloped to the front of the rebel band.

Some of the Boers, like Vander Roey, were mounted, but many were on foot. The latter were speedily and silently formed into parties commanded by the horsemen. Each division was still screened by the ridge, and Vander Roey’s plan was to rush out upon the enemy when he should have begun to mount the acclivity. The larger division of the British troops remained halted, and it was plain that Sir Adrian had no idea of the strength of the rebel forces.

But the General learned his mistake soon enough. Scarcely had the infantry advanced many paces up the steep and rugged hills, ere, with a shout of defiance, the rebel Dutch dashed out from their ambush. The road between the ridges was narrow. Horse and foot made a simultaneous charge, and pouring the fire from their long roers right and left with unerring aim, laid many a gallant fellow low.

Staggered at the unexpected appearance of five hundred men in a body, uncertain too of the numbers concealed behind the formidable rampart above, the infantry drew back. Sir Adrian galloped forward, a bullet took the peak from his forage-cap, he met the retiring infantry: he saw the madness of attempting to charge on such ground, and gave orders to retreat beyond gun-range till the artillery should come up, and be put in position.

Lyle laughed aloud.

The Boers, having expended their fire, retired before the infantry had time to return it with any kind of precision; five of the Dutch, however, lay stretched in their blood, and many came back wounded.

The scene now, with the exception of the dead and wounded scattered about, presented the same appearance as at first—the British troops forming for the advance, the ridges silent, and apparently unpeopled.

Madame Vander Roey, implicitly obedient to her husband’s orders, sat where he had placed her, and with eyes of stone watched the sharp angle at the base of the ridge. The Boers came back in masses. She saw not Vander Roey; he was the very last, and then he turned and fired a parting shot at one gallant soldier who had lingered in rear of his company, and who paid the penalty of his imprudence—the roer’s bullet laid him dead among the rocks.

Having thus crippled the infantry, a great point was gained, for foot soldiers were the only people who could work in such a position; and as for the artillery, the ground was equally against that, or cavalry, following up what it might begin. So thought the Dutch; “but,” thought Lyle and Gray and some twenty others, “they have never seen rocket practice!”

“How d—d passive that fellow Gray looks,” said Lyle to Brennard, as the latter, during the awful pause, held a parley with his colleague.

“I never could make him out,” replied Brennard, indifferently. “I think the fellow is half a fool.”