led
by their fierce and active chief, and close upon their heels, in a
compact serried mass, followed the ready "People of the Stick," behind
whom Leigh and his gallant little band re-formed and charged the slavers
home.

By this time the rifles were almost silent, only Grenville's piece
occasionally speaking its mind, for he seemed to have eyes for every
combat of a friend, and when the great Zulu had led his men clean
through the heart of the slavers, and had charged madly back again along
a ghastly lane of dead and dying men, the foe drew off a little, and
sought to load his guns.

This would never do, and with a wild earth-shaking shout, Amaxosa again
charged the craven crowd; with him came the staunch war-dogs of the
Zulu, who loved the slaughter as they loved their daring chief, and
scarce a rod behind came Barad "the Hailstorm," his faithful people
following into the very jaws of death the gallant "Chieftain of the
Stick," and ever side by side with the mighty Zulu, there fought Alf
Leigh, scarcely less fierce than his sable friend, and even more
determined; and before the "giant three" the foe fell in every
direction, like corn beneath the sickle.

Suddenly, however, Leigh broke out of the line, and, with a wild cry of
triumph, fiercely engaged Zero himself, hand to hand, and axe to axe.
The slaver-chief was a powerful and an active man, but he was no match
for the colossal Englishman, to whom fury, revenge, and long-nursed
bitter hate, had given a tenfold strength, and in ten seconds Zero lay
wounded and stunned upon the ground.

Then there arose a mighty uproar, the slavers charged madly in upon the
foe, and bore them back a dozen rods, fighting the while like fiends,
and thus succeeded in carrying their wounded chieftain off the field,
then surging in around the little band which was now fighting in square,
the desperate slavers made a tremendous effort to annihilate their
plucky and determined foes. Clubs are poor weapons to keep the face of
a square, and the formation was quickly broken, and, fighting like
lions, our friends were driven backward to the hill, every one of them
fairly drenched with blood, and almost all wounded, whilst their number
now totalled something under a hundred men.

All about lay the slain, singly and in knots and heaps; dead men
everywhere, and everywhere rivers of blood, and the horrid stench of
slaughter.

After a few moments' rest, the slavers charged in with a wild sh