d
and an advance-guard of four men, with four flankers, marched out and
down the road leading to the open country. Two of these wore each a
large tin disc painted with luminous paint fastened to his back. When
these discs were only just visible from the gate a couple more
disc-adorned men started forth, and before their discs faded into the
darkness the remainder of the party "formed fours" and marched after
them, all save a section of fours which followed a couple of hundred
yards in the rear, as a rear-guard. In silence the small force advanced
for an hour, passed some cross-roads, and then Colonel Ross-Ellison,
who had joined the advance-guard, signalled a halt and moved away by
himself to the right of the road.

In the shadow of the trees, the moon having risen, Captain Bruce ordered
his men to lie down, announcing in a whisper that he would have the life
of anyone who made a sound or struck a match. This was known to be but
half in jest, for the Captain was a good disciplinarian and a man of his
word.

Save for the occasional distant bark of the village-dogs, the night was
very still. Sitting staring out into the moon-lit hazy dusk in the
direction in which his chief had disappeared, Captain John Bruce
wondered if he were really one of a band of armed men who hoped shortly
to pour some two and a half thousand bullets into other men, really a
soldier fighting and working and starving that the Flag might fly,
really a primitive fighting-man with much blood upon his hands and an
earnest desire for more--or whether he were not a respectable Professor
who would shortly wake, beneath mosquito-curtains, from a very dreadful
dream. How thin a veneer was this thing called Civilization, and how
unchanged was human nature after centuries and centuries of----

Colonel Ross-Ellison appeared.

"Bring twenty-five men and follow me. Hurry up," he said quietly, and, a
minute later, led the way from the high-road across country. Five
minutes marching brought the party, advancing in file, to the mouth of a
nullah which ran parallel with the road. Along this, Colonel
Ross-Ellison led them, and, when he gave the signal to halt, it was seen
that they were behind a high sloping bank within fifty yards of the
high-road.

"Now," said the Colonel to Captain John Bruce, "I'm going to leave you
here. Let your men lie below the top of the bank and if any man looks
over, till your command 'Up and fire,' kick his face in. You will peep
th