at about fire?" I said.

"Oh, there's plenty of stuff of one kind and another to get a fire
together. They break up a box to start it, and then keep it going with
bones and veldt fuel. Look; they're coming in with a lot now."

"I say," I cried, as a sudden thought struck me. "Here, Sergeant!"

"What do you say?" cried Denham.

I said it to the Sergeant, proposing that he should make a roasting fire
under the chimney of the old furnace; and as I spoke his face expanded
into a genial smile.

"Splendid!" he said, and hurried away to shout to Joeboy; and in a very
short time the smoke was rolling out of the top of the furnace chimney
for probably the first time since the ancient race of miners ceased to
smelt their gold-ore in the place marked on the maps of over a century
ago as the Land of Ophir, but which has lain forgotten since, till our
travellers rediscovered it within the last score of years.

CHAPTER TWENTY FOUR.

A VERY WILD SCHEME.

"Well," said Denham some two hours later, "it isn't bad when a fellow's
hungry."

"No," I agreed, speaking a little dubiously; "but it would have been
much better if we had not known what we were eating." I did not hear
any other opinions; for the men were ravenously hungry when the cooking
was over, and we had all so many other things to think about.

It had been a very busy morning. Wounds had to be dressed, the
uninjured had the task of strengthening the force upon the walls, and
another party led the horses out a quarter of a mile to graze. This
they were allowed to do in peace, the Boers paying no heed to the
proceedings. Then the lookouts, who were furnished with the officers'
glasses, gave warning that strong parties were quietly on the move about
a mile away--evidently making a circuit for the purpose of disarming our
suspicions--with the intention of swooping round and cutting off the
grazing horses. But, as Denham said, they had not all the cunning on
their side, for we had taken our precautions. A red flag was hung out,
and in answer to the signal the horses were headed in for the gateway at
once.

That was sufficient. The Boers, instead of riding along across our
position, suddenly swooped round, and came on, five hundred strong, at
full gallop, getting so near that they would have cut off some of our
valuable horses had not fire been opened upon them from the walls, quite
in accordance with the Boers' own tactics; our men lying down and taking