host, who had listened to my long relation with an
impassive face, then remarked

"Yes; you have got the yarn pretty right. My name is Tyrer."

I shall never forget Currey's look of astonishment.

Veld fires were occasionally things to be reckoned with in the Low
Country. Looking from the cliff-crest of the mountain range over the
immense plains, one was apt to think that these were covered with
dense, continuous forest. But a closer acquaintance corrected this
impression. There was little jungle, but there were many large trees
and these usually stood somewhat far apart. When among them it was, as
a rule, possible to get a clear view over a radius of about two hundred
yards. Now and then one reached an area in which the trees were very
high indeed, with clean boles running to a height of thirty to forty
feet. But the ground was covered with long, coarse grass, which was
tinted a soft green in summer, but in winter was yellow and dry. At all
seasons the haulms were so hard that the toes of one's boots wore out
with distressing quickness. It was in winter that the grass fire became
a real danger.

Great tracts perhaps hundreds of square miles in extent might be swept
by a conflagration. If, during the course of one of these, the wind
happened to be blowing towards you from the direction of the fire, the
danger was apt to become real and imminent. There was only one
alternative; you had either at once to find some spot comparatively
clear of grass and there wait until the flame-storm had swept past, or
else to set the grass alight where you were and then take refuge on the
burnt area.

Occasionally the trees caught alight and afforded striking spectacles
at night. I think that when this happened the tree was very old, and a
considerable portion of the trunk, from the ground upwards, was
decayed. I remember once noticing an extremely large tree which had
caught alight from a grass fire that had swept past. I returned along
the same track more than six weeks afterwards. The grass was springing
up luxuriantly, it had reached a height of several inches. But the tree
was still burning. I camped near it; the tall, massive trunk, glowing
on the windward side like a column of ignited charcoal and sending out
a great tress of flame to leeward, was a sight never to be forgotten.

The unfortunate balala "the people who are dead" those miserable
fugitives from savage justice, or, more often, remnants of clans
scattered in war,