hardly time to construct a hurried enclosure and collect sufficient
firewood ere darkness fell, and to this slender protection alone had he
been forced to trust for the safety of himself and his horse. Hardly
till his dying day will he forget those terrible eyes flaming red in the
light of his scanty fire, as a pair of prowling lions roared around his
frail breastwork the long night through. These are but some of the
dangers, some of the privations which have fallen to his lot. Yet as he
looks back upon them all it is regretfully. He cannot feel unqualified
satisfaction that the trip is drawing to a close.

For it is drawing to a close. With all its perils and hardships it has
been a very fairly successful one, as the sheep and cattle which they
are driving before them serve to show. So also do such other articles
of barter as can be carried in the waggons, which latter, however, are
travelling light; for nearly all the stock-in-trade has been disposed
of.

Rumours have from time to time reached them in Swaziland and beyond,
with regard to the state of Zulu affairs, and the latest of such reports
has moved Dawes to decide to avoid the Zulu country, and re-enter Natal
by way of the Transvaal. So to-morrow the southward course will be
changed to a westward one, and the trek will be pursued along the north
bank of the Pongolo.

During the months our friends had spent up-country, diplomatic relations
between the Zulus and the British had become strained to a dangerous
tension. Both parties were eyeing each other and preparing for war.

Seated on the waggon as aforesaid, our two friends are talking over the
situation.

"We had better give them a wide berth, Ridgeley, until we get all this
plunder safe home," Dawes was saying. "Even now we are nearer the
Pongolo than I like, and in the north of Zululand there's a pretty
thorough-paced blackguard or two, in the shape of an outlying chief who
wouldn't think twice of relieving us of all our travelling stock, under
colour of the unsettled times--Umbelini, for instance, and that other
chap they're beginning to talk about, Ingonyama; though I don't
altogether believe that cock-and-bull story about the blood-drinking
tribe--the Igazipuza. It's too much like a Swazi lie. Still, I shall
be glad when we are safe home again."

Gerard made no answer beyond a half-absent affirmative. His thoughts
were far away. In point of fact, although he looked back regretfully
upo