of dinner, and arriving half
an hour too soon, were shown into a long room that opened on to
the verandah. You were working there, being I believe a private
secretary at the time, copying some despatch; I think you said
that which gave an account of the Annexation. The room was lit
by a paraffin lamp behind you, for it was quite dark and the
window was open, or at any rate unshuttered. The gentleman who
showed us in, seeing that you were very busy, took us to the far
end of the room, where we stood talking in the shadow. Just then
a door opened opposite to that which led to the verandah, and
through it came His Excellency the Administrator, Sir Theophilus
Shepstone, a stout man of medium height with a very clever,
thoughtful face, as I have always thought, one of the greatest of
African statesmen. He did not see us, but he caught sight of you
and said testily--

"Are you mad?" To which you answered with a laugh--

"I hope not more than usual, Sir, but why?"

"Have I not told you always to let down the blinds after dark?
Yet there you sit with your head against the light, about the
best target for a bullet that could be imagined."

"I don't think the Boers would trouble to shoot me, Sir. If you
had been here I would have drawn the blinds and shut the shutters
too," you answered, laughing again.

"Go to dress or you will be late for dinner," he said still
rather sternly, and you went. But when you had gone and after we
had been announced to him, he smiled and added something which I
will not repeat to you even now. I think it was about what you
did on the Annexation day of which the story had come to him.

I mention this incident because whenever I think of Shepstone,
whom I had known off and on for years in the way that a hunter
knows a prominent Government official, it always recurs to my
mind, embodying as it does his caution and appreciation of danger
derived from long experience of the country, and the sternness he
sometimes affected which could never conceal his love towards his
friends. Oh! there was greatness in this man, although they did
call him an "African Talleyrand." If it had not been so would
every native from the Cape to the Zambesi have known and revered
his name, as perhaps that of no other white man has been revered?
But I must get on with my tale and leave historical discussions
to others more fitted to deal with them.

We had a very pleasant dinner that night, although I was so
a